Heartbreaking Anime With 100% Rotten Tomatoes Score Is The Most Tragic Movie Ever

I didn’t grow up on Studio Ghibli films, but many of my friends did. In high school, I took it upon myself to see what I missed out on and slowly began working my way through the catalog. I fell more and more in love with Ghibli with each film I watched, and soon, Grave of the Fireflies loomed closer and closer on my watch list.

I distinctly remember the first time I watched it, which is also the only time I have watched it. I was 16 years old, and my best friend and I had just been through another tumultuous experience with a boy or girl we liked. We were looking to watch something cathartic. I Googled “saddest movies ever made Reddit,” and at the top of the list was Grave of the Fireflies, something I had already planned on watching.

My best friend was also a massive Ghibli fan who coincidentally had not seen it either, so we made some popcorn, got cozy on the couch, and popped it on. 1 hour and 29 minutes later, we were in each other’s arms, sobbing to the point of hyperventilation. 

Directed by Isao Takahata, Grave of the Fireflies debuted in 1988 and was based on author Nosaka Akiyuki’s semi-autobiographical fiction novel of the same name. In 1945, author Akiyuki was only fourteen years old when the United States began its air raid on Kobe, Japan.

Taking place over March, May, and June 1945, the bombings claimed the lives of over 7,500 civilians. Two months later, in August, two atomic bombs would be detonated by the United States over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Over 200,000 civilians were killed, not counting the generations since who have been affected by radiation poisoning.

Studio Ghibli’s Grave of the Fireflies follows the story of teenage boy Seita, who is tasked with looking after his little sister Setsuko. When an air raid separates the two from their parents, it is up to the sibling duo to beat the odds and stay alive. As food begins to run out, Seita is forced to steal from local farmers as his little sister gets sicker and sicker from malnutrition. Even writing this paragraph now is bringing tears to my eyes.

Grave of the Fireflies is often described as haunting and devastating; there is no happy ending and no saving grace. This feeling of hopelessness is no mistake and is crucial to the audience’s understanding of the main message of the film: the innocence of children is no match for the destruction of war, and often, the value of life is ignored for the chance to “win.” It is important to feel that grief and that sadness; if you don’t, you do not understand the lesson Akiyuki meant to leave behind.

During the war, Akiyuki lost two of his sisters from malnutrition and his father in the Kobe bombings. He wrote Grave of the Fireflies to honor his sisters and to cope with his survivors’ guilt. The novel was also intended to thoroughly document what war was like through the eyes of a child. The book was published in 1967 and earned Akiyuki literary awards, and it wasn’t until Studio Ghibli’s animated adaptation that it rocketed into fame.

Only a few years after its release, Grave of the Fireflies became the most-watched war movie in Japan. To this day, it is broadcast on Japanese national television on August 15, celebrated as the “End of the War Day.”

Studio Ghibli is no stranger to including serious, political, and sometimes darker themes in their works. The aesthetic and whimsical Howl’s Moving Castle is chalked with anti-war rhetoric. However, most of these themes are somewhat below the surface, something you catch onto when you rewatch them with older eyes. Grave of the Fireflies is not given this treatment, and it truly shows instead of tells. 

Yes, Grave of the Fireflies is one of the darkest and most devastating anime movies of all time, but I believe it’s also the most important. Art is intended to make us feel, to make us reach into the uncomfortable, and to understand some part of ourselves and our world. I truly regard this film as high-art as well as an important perspective into a history that Western society tends to water down. 

REVIEW SCORE

If you need a cathartic cry like my friend and I did all those years ago, Grave of the Fireflies will certainly do the job. However when watching it please remember that the film is not supposed to exist as just some sad story, for many it is reality and the film reminds us to not forget that. For those interested in watching it was recently available to stream on Vudu.

For some reason, it is one of the hardest Studio Ghibli movies to find digitally so I really recommend just buying the DVD on Amazon. Please be warned that the film contains some pretty graphic scenes. If that could be a concern, look up a thorough content warning list to decide if it is an appropriate watch for you.