Since watching Ghost in the Shell, I had scoured Tubi for other interesting looking anime on there, it is mostly stuff I didn't care about but one film caught my eye. A Wind Named Amnesia. I never heard of it but the cover looked interesting enough so I added it to my list and I had just recently watched and wow. This film's ending destroyed me. Like usual, spoilers ahead, and sorry if the review sounds fresh from the crock pot, I didn't let it really settle in me like the other films.
The film, like the title suggests, is about a mysterious alien wind that sweeps over the Earth and wipes out all their memories, leaving them primitive and only acting on instinct. Meanwhile, a man named Wataru learns to speak and talk and along the way he meets a girl namd Sophia, who accompanies him on his journey to go across all the cities of America up to New York all the while being hunted by a relenting police robot.
While a relatatively simple and frankly ominous plot, I personally enjoyed it and it is a genuinely unique take on the post apocalyptic genre that isn't one of the billions of nuclear war or zombie stories in the genre.
In the beginning of the film, Protagonist Wataru meets mystery girl Sophia and tells her his sad backstory. When the wind swept over his town, he like the rest of the people ended up like a savage, but he ended up meeting wheelchair bound 13 Year old Johnny, who was apart of a government experiment to expand human memory beyond its normal capabilities. As a result, he was not afflicted by the wind and ended up teaching Wataru many things, how drive, shoot a gun, talk, etc.
From then to the middle of the film, he meets multiple humans, a girl about to be sacrificed to a tribe's God and her father. Along with supercomputer controlled city citizens Lisa and Mr. Simpson (who still have memory), though Wataru ends up not able to teach the savages much if any, he learns stuff himself and ends up even helping the tribe girl's father lead the tribe.
The film has a very bittersweet ending in my opinion, Sophie to no one's surprise, reveals to Wataru she is an alien and makes love to him after he kills the police robot before leaving Earth behind for Wataru to continue his journey of reforming the mindless remains of humanity.
The film took it's toll on me, though rather slow and over the course of the film, I felt sadder knowing that Wataru never actually really helps anyone out and when he did it was really all for nothing. By the time the film was nearing its end and Wataru was enacting his plan to kill the police robot, I was rooting for him to at least be able to do just that. Kill the thing stalking him cross country. And I was actually really happy he did.
When I hit the point where Sophia and Wataru were saying their final goodbyes and mking love, I definitely teared up knowing that a very beautiful and unique film was coming to an end and I had to go think for a short while on what I just watched.
A unique post apocalyptic film with a interesting plot and likable characters that ended up being a sleeper hit, if you're a fan of obscure anime I certainly do recommend it though it is of course not for everyone. In the end it is definitely a 7.5 to an 8/10 film for me. For a film that is 80 minutes long, it took me like usual roughly 2 hours to finish it.
That's all for today and just a friendly reminder.
Just. Be. Ultra!
