Only Yesterday

Gr 9 Up—Though animated, Isao Takahata's often gentle and playful 1991 film, recently released with English dubbing, is not a children's feature. (It was named one of the top 100 animated films of all time in a Time Out New York poll.) Taeko (voiced by Daisy Ridley) is a 27-year-old woman who has spent the last couple of vacations working on a farm a long train ride away from Tokyo. This year, her thoughts consistently travel back to her time in fifth grade in the 1960s, where there is abundant humor arising from school elections, crushes on classmates, and the awkwardness of having (or not having) a period. The scenes from young Taeko's viewpoint are delicately drawn, with somewhat muted colors and minute attention to detail. Adult Taeko's interwoven scenes have more saturated colors as she harvests safflowers and helps convert their petals to dye. While the younger Taeko struggles with dividing fractions, the adult Taeko meets handsome and earnest Toshio (voiced by Dev Patel), who is eager to share his dream of an organic farm. Certain aspects of family life (an awkwardly translated conversation, smoking at the dinner table, a father's slap) seem out of place by current child-rearing standards. Nevertheless, viewers will root for the young and older Taeko to find a happy ending, and the skillful animation is astounding in its finely rendered color, line, and detail.