Children of the Sea
Ruka is a young girl whose parents are separated and whose father works in an aquarium. When two boys, Umi and Sora, who were raised in the sea by dugongs, are brought to the aquarium, Ruka feels drawn to them and begins to realize that she has the same sort of supernatural connection to the ocean that they do. Umi and Sora's special power seems to be connected to strange events that have been occurring more and more frequently, such as the appearance of sea creatures far from their home territory and the disappearance of aquarium animals around the world. However, the exact nature of the boys' power and of the abnormal events is unknown, and Ruka gets drawn into investigating the mystery that surrounds her new friends.
SWITCH.@maketheSWITCH
This film epitomises the risk that filmmakers (both live-action and animated) take with adapting a long-running or ongoing manga - a vast amount of material has to be peeled back to the core essentials to make a film with a feature-length running time.
Sometimes you can shorten the plot of the manga considerably, add in scenes and motifs and end up with a timeless piece of art like Katsuhiro Otomo’s ‘Akira’. Chop out too much or pick the wrong elements to keep, and you can sink even a film as visually rich as ‘Children of the Sea’ beneath waves of turgid storytelling.
- Jake Watt
Read Jake's full article...
https://www.maketheswitch.com.au/article/review-children-of-the-sea-sunk-by-a-soggy-script
Head to https://www.maketheswitch.com.au/sff for more Sydney Film Festival reviews.