Summer Wars Review: Japanese Cult Classic Nails the Family Drama Despite an Unprecedented Ending

I’m not a person who prides myself on being able to predict the ending of a film. I don’t fully understand the people who think that way, because it's not an act of being fully in the moment. Typically, a film isn’t a puzzle to be solved but a reality to be experienced. The question is more important than the answer. That being said, after a long time of watching and studying, it becomes easy to recognize certain patterns within the context of the story. I can tell naturally where something will progress, or I can at least see the overall synopsis within a good twenty to thirty minutes of run time. I only mention this so that people realize the extent of which I was surprised by the direction of this story. Not even someone who was actively looking would be able to decipher where the hell this plot was heading.

The film starts with an ad probably closer to sci-fi at the time, but now remains a ludicrously timely look at the world we have today. The ad centers “OZ”, a virtual world in which people can live their lives, attend community events, and take care of business transactions. It’s not just a game, although it certainly plays like one. It’s everything, and to the primary hero of the film, it’s especially so to him as well.

I appreciate the allusions this movie was making, as I can tell it was both entirely relevant in its message at the time and still even more relevant to the state of media now. Facebook was released in 2004, World of Warcraft was released in 2004, and Myspace was released in 2003. The aggregate of these companies was not only a statement on the current market, they were a promise of what the internet had in store. Summer Wars developed a natural extension of that promise, in both the potential it had for good and a warning for the destruction that it could bring.

Despite its disturbingly accurate prognostication, it was the scenes dedicated to family ties that I found the most engaging. The story follows Kenji, a typical Eleventh-Grade outsider with a soft heart and an even softer sense of security. His regular life gets turned upside down when a girl he’s interested in (Natsuki) asks him to do her a favor. That favor? Telling her family that they are currently engaged. What ensues from then on is nothing less than an extravagant introduction to her illustrious family, and an exploration into their history. 

Now, it was near the beginning of the film where I noticed how patient the editing was. It stuck with certain characters or moments just a few seconds longer than you would expect, elevating the atmosphere and allowing the story to breathe and relax. There are certain shots such as watching them in a bus or seeing the family eat at the table which were particularly engaging. It was like looking at a photograph, and inserting the image with all your forgotten memories that come with it. Modern cinema doesn’t typically have patience like this. When it does, it adds extra life into it by being atmospheric and original. 

The family itself was stunningly well realized, with each character offering a large array of personality despite their limited screen time. The writers (Hosuda and Okudera, respectively) do a brilliant job of layering their dialogue so that their characters are saying two or three things in one sentence. They keep the literal conversation going, they say it in a way that magnifies their character, and they speak about something that engages the overall theme/message of the film. It’s a delicate process and takes a long time to write, so I have infinite respect for those writers who approach their craft in that manner.

The film had a different level of gravitas though when the matriarch of the family (Sakae) enters the frame. She was powerful, and intimidating, and gentle, and kind of reminded me of my own grandmother. She had a firm sense of morality that became uplifting to see, and with all the chaos around her she acted as a clear backbone to the family. As I’ve aged I’ve become more partial to characters like these, because it's become so much clearer to me how difficult it can be to live up to your moral code in day to day life. It requires intellect, wisdom, bravery, and kindness. She’s an umbrella that sets the tone for the family and makes the conflict in the main character (Kenji) so much more interesting as it develops.

There’s two films inside this one though, two films that are so radically different it’s fairly jarring to travel from one plot to the other. Here’s where the plot gets so timely: In the world of OZ, a mysterious villain sends a testing AI machine to see how quickly it can improve, and what level of power it can attain from the inside. It’s quickly determined by Kenji the level of danger they’re dealing with, as an AI with access to OZ very realistically has access to the entire world ecosystem. This is where the real plot gets set into motion: finding the AI, stopping it before it grows beyond their ability, and resetting the engine before it effectively takes over the world. 

Two very different plotlines, right? This juxtaposition can either make the film or break it for someone. On one hand, there’s an ordinary family drama. On the other, an international conspiracy. Despite two elements so vastly different in stature, the film does a surprisingly good job tying them both together in a way that’s both coherent, and balanced. 

The movie does particularly well at showing what it looks like to be part of a large family, in that it can at times feel like a miniature garrison fighting against the world. There’s a clear hierarchy, a wide range of expression, and a comfort that comes from being a part of the group. In a way, stopping the end times is nothing new for a family like this, and they seem remarkably comfortable with their situation. Is it blown a little out of proportion? Yes, yes it is. But the family would treat it the same way even if it was just a neighborhood scuffle. 

But that comes around to my one issue with the film; maybe it could’ve been just a neighborhood scuffle. The AI work was relevant, and it was timely, but I don’t think it was as interesting as the scenes centered around the family dynamic. Its villain was imposing, but it was used more as a force to continue the plot than it was interested in delving into the realities of artificial intelligence. To be fair, the film didn’t have time for that. But also, if it doesn’t have time for it, maybe it doesn’t need to be there. 

I’m in one of two veins here. The villain, the scale and everything, they’re kind of what makes the film original. They have a level of ambition I can’t help but admire, and I always appreciate a filmmaker going for the big swing. So if anyone were to tell me, ‘I love this part of the film’, I would completely understand. I think it would’ve been funny to take this family’s dramatic tendencies and put them into a smaller story, but that’s not what happened. Not only that, but the way they dealt with the AI monster at the end was unexpected, and hilarious.

I think this is a testament to filmmaker Momoru Osada, whose writing and directing were well executed and entertaining to watch unfold. Even despite my issues with some of the overall storyboards, Osada was comfortable within his world, and he delivered the details in a way that makes a person feel ‘oh well of course that would happen next’. Even if it were crazy. Even if it were silly. Even if it didn’t make sense, it did make sense. He’s got a subtle yet firm grasp on the kind of story he wants to tell, and thanks to his technical prowess in directing it felt like it went off without a hitch. He had the monumental task of combining two entirely different stories into one coherent film, and he virtually pulled it off. That requires a delicate balance in its thematic storytelling, and strong understanding of exactly what kind of world he wanted to make.

So on a technical level, I think the film was incredibly well made. It had a sure hand in its direction, it’s comfortable within its pace, and the cinematography was both refreshing and atmospheric. It had great characters, and it was able to utilize what little time each of them had to create well realized people. Their conflicts were clear and never ignored. They were memorable, which is one of the most difficult and least quantifiable things to achieve when crafting a story. I just had some issues with the other end of the plot. When I think about the film, it’s certainly not the first thing to come to mind. Even when it comes to major plot points, it’s not the action in the game that excites me, but more my anticipation over how the family will react to it. Even with that decision in mind, the execution of it works well and I was never less than wholly invested throughout the movie.

It’s the kind of film that’d make me excited to look up the other work of the filmmaker, and explore exactly what else they have in store. I had a good time watching this one, although it’s hard to ignore my story issues when they take place at the conceptual level. It had relentless ambition though, and I’m hard pressed to call it a mistake when they took such a fun swing.

Grade: ❁❁❁