She’s so waterlogged with the efforts of making others happy that she loses all sense of her physical self, disappearing in a fast edit and leaving only a deflated dressing gown behind. She explains to Hodoka that soon she’ll become pure water, a human sacrifice to the sky, joining the giant rain clouds hanging above Tokyo. They are replaced by iridescent pools of water, like a human-shaped aquarium, as if she is soaking up everyone’s unwanted rain, and simultaneously, their problems. Of course, doing nice things for others feels good, and Hina has good vibes to spare, but the emotional labour that women perform on top of their salaried jobs – tempering their own emotions as well as those of their coworkers – is expected as a character trait purely because of gender.Īs Hina continues to produce more and more sunshine throughout the city, parts of her body begin to disappear. And if women choose to have children, they may have to decide where to place their energy – their careers, or the wellbeing of their children – in a way that their male partners are less often asked to do. Even in the home, household chores between heterosexual partners often fall to women on top of their full-time jobs. It’s well-documented that women are more likely to be caregivers to family members than men. Hina’s job responsibilities feel inherently gendered – offering happiness and comfort (in Hina’s case, literal warmth) to people as part of an interaction is something many women are often expected to do from a young age. She even clears the inclement weather over a stadium for a fireworks display. Hina’s entire career then revolves around the act of bringing joy to others she clears the skies for a flea market, and makes the sun shine for a father’s trip to the park with his daughter. Thrilled to have tracked down a real-life ‘Sunshine Girl’ – someone who, in Japanese folklore, can bring a sunny mood with them wherever they go, a kind of lucky charm in a sense, taken literally in the world of the film – Hodoka suggests they advertise Hina’s services for money, creating income from her power. This is Hina, also a teen, who possesses a rare ability to change the weather – she can create small pockets of sunshine in her immediate vicinity by praying, a skill she’s only recently discovered that she has after saying a quick prayer for a sick relative. While struggling to find a job, stay alive, and feed himself on free McDonald’s soup every night, a girl sneaks him a Big Mac. In Weathering With You (which was so highly anticipated it surpassed Your Name at the Japanese box office in its opening weekend), 16-year-old runaway Hodoka is trying to survive in the seedy Kabukichō neighbourhood of Tokyo, where it’s been unseasonably raining every day for the past two weeks. It proved hugely popular in Japan, becoming the country’s second highest-grossing film of all time, behind Spirited Away. The Japanese animation director is probably best known for his 2016 hit Your Name – a magical body-swapping fantasy with almost hysterical levels of drama, that anyone who has been a 16-year-old in love can relate to. Are this girl’s actions inherently selfless, or has she been conditioned to feel it’s her duty as a woman to take on such a mammoth role? But the story’s real strength lies in its female lead, Hina, who attempts to please everyone around her at the expense of her own sense of self. A sense of hope washes over this early scene of Weathering with You – could she clear the rain slowly drowning the city with this power? Makoto Shinkai’s latest sci-fi teen romance has been seen as an allegory for imminent climate change and the pressure young people face in being tasked with dealing with it. The boy stares on in amazement this strange girl has just cleared the skies for a moment, using nothing but her own energy. The girl clasps her hands together, deep in concentration, and suddenly a patch of sunlight illuminates the grimy rooftop, chasing away the rain clouds. On the rooftop of an abandoned building, in an unseasonably wet modern-day Tokyo, a teenage girl and boy stand at a small, remarkably intact shrine. Steph Watts investigates the specific and sensitive case of Weathering With You. But in anime like in reality, the responsibilities placed on female shoulders are far greater than we realise. The latest teen melodrama from Your Name director Makoto Shinkai reframes women’s labour as warm, sunny – and utterly life-saving.
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