1988 was an incredibly good year for Studio Ghibli, the famous Japanese animation studio. That year saw the studio release two classic films as a double feature: Hayao Miyazaki’s My Neighbor Totoro and Isao Takahata’s Grave of the Fireflies. It is almost impossible to think of two films more diametrically apart in terms of tone and story. My Neighbor Totoro is one of the most light-hearted, and happy films ever made. Grave of the Fireflies is an emotional gut-punch, able to reduce even the strongest-willed human into a mess of tears, and belonging on that list of emotionally devastating movies you can’t watch more than once. It has also received praise for being one of the greatest anti-war films ever made. So why is the film so emotionally devastating? How did it come to be one of the most powerfully depressing films ever made? That’s what we’re going to talk about today.
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The Story
Distributed by Toho
The film is based on author Akiyuki Nosaka’s 1967 story of the same name, and tragically, the story is a case of real life writing the plot. Nosaka was inspired by his own experiences growing up in Japan at the end of World War II and the devastation he witnessed. Suffering from malnutrition, Nosaka and his infant sister struggled to survive in the war’s waning days. Nosaka survived. His sister, unfortunately, did not. Consumed with grief, Nosaka wrote Grave of the Fireflies as a tribute to her.
The film’s story concerns two children, the 14-year-old boy Seita and his 4-year-old sister, Setsuko, as they struggle to survive in and around the city of Kobe at the end of World War II. Right out of the gate, we learn this will not be a happy story. The first line of the film is Seita saying “September 21, 1945. That was the night I died.” Seita’s spirit looks on his dead corpse in a train station. A janitor finds a candy tin on Seita’s body and tosses it outside, where fireflies light up the night as Seita is re-united with the spirit of Setsuko. The rest of the film is told in flashback, detailing how we got to Seita dying in that train station.
As it turns out, Seita and Setsuko’s father is serving in the Japanese Navy, with nobody knowing if he’s alive or not. They lose their mother during a firebombing. Firebombing was frighteningly effective against the wood and paper houses in Japan and would end up inflicting more casualties than the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined. The two siblings then go live with an unsympathetic aunt, who makes them sell their mother’s possessions, but after she insults them, the two children leave her and try to survive on their own with what little they have. Tragically, Seita is reduced to stealing to survive, and after Japan surrenders, he learns that his father is most likely dead. Setsuko dies of malnutrition, with Seita cremating her. Seita also succumbs to malnutrition soon afterwards. His spirit and Setsuko’s will end the film looking down at the modern, rebuilt Kobe from atop a hill as Michio Mamiya’s hauntingly beautiful musical score plays on.
The Innocence Of The Two Leads
The fact that the film’s two leads are innocent children definitely factors into the film’s emotionally destructive power. Seita tries to shield Setsuko from the horrors of war, such as their mother’s death, but Setsuko finds out anyway. The film is filled with moments of the two siblings playing together, such as when Seita makes a small bubble for Setsuko in a bath or captures a bunch of fireflies for them to release at night. Setsuko innocently asks why the fireflies have to die so quickly, and wants to make a grave for them just like the one for her mother. Hearing this reduces Seita (and likely anyone watching the film) to tears, painfully reminding us that no child should ever have to have the experiences these two do. The two siblings very clearly love each other deeply and Seita puts a lot on his shoulders to care for his sister.
Those small rays of happiness just make the two siblings’ ultimate fate sting that much worse. Setsuko’s death scene is incredibly powerful. Not only is she suffering from malnutrition, but hallucinations as well. She tries to eat a marble, thinking it’s her favorite hard candy. She says she made rice balls for Seita, but the rice balls are really just mud. Witnessing any loved one suffer from that is tough enough, but seeing it happen to a little girl is just powerfully painful. There won’t be a dry eye in sight when Setsuko finally passes away, nor should there be.
The Struggle To Survive
After leaving their aunt, the two siblings turn an air shelter into their makeshift home. The two are on their own, with no support, and limited resources and supplies. Simply put, they’re now refugees in their own country. More is put on Seita’s shoulders than any 14-year-old boy should ever have to go through. He’s now the breadwinner in a country that has been completely decimated by the most destructive war in human history. When their limited supplies do run out, the two suffer. As mentioned earlier, Seita has to steal simply to survive. It’s heartbreaking to watch. Then the film decides to add the extra punch of showing that Seita and Setsuko’s mother had some money in a bank, with Seita withdrawing and buying food, except it’s too late to save the starving Setsuko. It’s one of the many examples of how the film provides a small glimmer of hope that everything will be okay, only to snuff it out when another setback occurs.
Grave of the Fireflies is one of the best looks at the impact on the home front during a war. It’s a tale of survival in some of the worst conditions possible, which makes the tragedy of our two leads not surviving the ordeals the film puts them through even worse, especially when one factors in their ages. It’s not a story one typically sees in an animated film, but there is no doubt whatsoever that the medium does not lessen the impact of the story. True, Grave of the Fireflies is in contention for one of the saddest films ever made, but it’s also one of the greatest ever made. It’s easily a film that everyone, no matter their age or nationality, should see at least once.
