Many think the romance genre has grown a bit stale over time, even with the idea of forbidden love. Hotarubi no Mori e is definitely quite a refreshing look at the genre right now. It is about a girl who falls in a sort forbidden love situation with a pseudo-spirit who she cannot touch and what happens. Visually and musically it is good but really the story and the relationship between the main characters is the main focus and stand out part of the movie. Anyway again it presents conflicting emotions about how we should feel.
Movie Poster
First I suppose I should give a bit of a plot summary. So a young girl, Hotaru, meets an older teenage boy wearing a mask, Gin, when she is lost in a forest during her summer vacation at her uncle's house.
The boy is in fact a spirit dwelling in the forest and mustn't be touched by a human, for it would result in him disappearing for all eternity. They spend the summer days with each other playing and relaxing, as well as showing curiousity about each other. When the girl must return home, she promises to visit him again next summer. The spirit waits for her she keeps her promise. This continues for the next few years, during which time she grows up and her age slowly gets closer to the age of the boy (who because he is a spirit doesn't age or ages very slowly). As these summers go on they grow closer together to the point where they think about each other constantly throughout the remaining seasons. And then, one summer, Gin invites Hotaru to a spirit festival as a date. As they are leaving and they grow closer still, Gin catches a child from tripping and thus touches a human. Then, in the few seconds that it takes Gin to vanish, Hotaru is able to finally embrace the one she loves. Then he is gone, leaving only his mask, and she is left to return home and to a normal life.
Gin disappearing after touching the boy. http://www.deviantart.com/art/firefly-319894218
So on the face of it this would seem like a very sad film. The two main characters share a very real and very close bond. Furthermore it is not a bond based on the physical aspects of love, it is a truly platonic bond between two souls that love each other more and more over time. To lose such a love surely makes a sad film. Yet there is more than this because the want thing they both want, to touch each other, to feel that the other truly exists, they cannot possibly do. This is made clear throughout the film with Horatu trying to hug Gin and then quizzically yet cautiously taking off his mask. However as this realisation of their predicament sets in (after numerous reminders from Gin and other spirits) Hotaru makes Gin promise her, in tears, (after she has fallen from a tree) not to touch her. Their closeness is emphasised by how throughout most of the film they are the only ones around each other in the forest. Physically, they are so close to each other yet are restricted. The only time they do touch is for a brief second. When Gin is gones Hotaru says how her chest hurts afterwards, mourning her lover. It is a very bittersweet moment. On one hand she did get to embrace Gin after years of thinking about him but on the other she can never do the same again. More than that she cannot talk to him again. Also Hotaru was sort of forced into hugging Gin as he would disappear anyway, it was not really her choice to do so. Lastly, I suppose there could never really be a happy ending without some Deus Ex Machima (that would have broken the story for me) due to the way the aging issue was working and their inability to touch. Because of this I suppose ultimately it is a tragic love tale.
However, I never truly got the impression that this film was intended to make the audience feel sad about the end result of the film. It felt like an appropriate conclusion to their love. The hug, which was them living in the moment, resolved everything. Also there is much humour made, for example during their date. The happiness they share is focussed on, not the sadness that they cannot touch. In fact much hunour is centred on the fact they cannot touch as Hotaru often forgets. Comedy is not hugely present in tragedies. Furthermore, at the end of the film, neither Gin nor Hotaru were really sad in what was happening. The spirits who were Gin's friends and family thanked Horatu for doing what she had done, giving Gin what he had wanted. The characters were not sad and I had the feeling neither should the audience. They love was never truly going to be able to happen, even if Hotaru moved to her uncle's town and found a job there. She would always be living a sort of double life. Both Gin and Hotaru knew it would never work so the hug was a fitting and climatic end to their Benjamin Button-like relationship.
Everyone was at peace with what happened almost immediately. http://rells.deviantart.com/art/Hotarubi-No-Mori-He-288519708
Ultimately, I see it in the light that Hotaru gave Gin what he wanted and everyone was happy. In the end she took him out of what was essentially a cursed existence. He was a human that could not truly love, but she gave him true love. Also we do not get a sense of the sadness that might befall Hotaru, we get the feeling she is at peace with what happened. But again it is up to personal interpretation. So what did you feel?
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