it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

American films are a shallow, inane mess. That's why people go see foreign films at art houses. They want to feel good about themselves, and they want to look good to others. Miss Hokusai probably isn't playing in theaters anymore. But if it was, it's a great place to take a date if you want to impress them with your amazing and elitist tastes.I'm not one for typical anime. And of the other anime-ish films that were big in America - Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, etc. - I guess I kind of liked them, but I'm not sure why, other than I'm supposed to like them, and it's good and right to like them. Agree, NPR crowd?Well. Miss Hokusai is a film critic's dream. As soon as I saw it playing at my local college town theatre, I already knew it got 100% from Metacritic and consistent red tomatoes on Rotten Tomatoes. Film critics' tastes are extremely predictable. The more pretentious and experimental a film, the more it merits 5 stars, or 10 stars, or whatever's the highest rating of X publication or website. Why Miss Hokusai gets rave reviews from critics:-It's Japanese anime-ish, and critics and TED lecture fans alike all salivate for those. -It has - gasp! - LBGT in there, and it's not even implied or subdued!!-I don't know what the f--- it's about, but it sure looks good!-Japanese Edo period, about famous artist/painter! Critics love artsiness. -Beautiful Japanese anime-ish characters! Critics appreciate different cultures. -Japan, Japan, oh how they love and adore Japan!-Gorgeous 19th-century Edo cityscape and scenery. Critics adore and appreciate cinematography, history, architecture, and the outdoors - a plus if it's a different culture!-And what is the film about again? I don't care, it seems experimental and cool, so I'll upvote it!Anyway, I'm guilty of thinking like critics, so I was pretty impressed with the film, and I enjoyed it. I'd hate to say this, but it really is way better than typical American films. Art-house elitism!

Despite being an animated film, "Miss Hosukai" is not a film for children nor was it ever intended to be. Instead, it's a very melancholy portrait of the life of the famed Japanese artist Hosukai and his daughter, O-Ei and it's seen through his eyes. But it's not a normal biography, as you only see bits an pieces of one period of Hosukai's life. If you want to learn a lot about the guy, you're better off reading a biography. The story itself is VERY meandering and this lack of direction to the film made it difficult viewing for me. You see how flawed a man Hosukai was and MOST of the information about him and O-Ei is learned at the very end through a very brief prologue. Beautifully animated but otherwise the film left me very cold and left me wanting to know more.

While lacking in plot and character development--generally what most people look for in a film--Miss Hokusai is a lovely and wistful look into life in Edo, which was Tokyo before the Meiji Restoration of 1867. The film centers on the painter Hokusai, whose Great Wave off Kanagawa is probably the most well-known Japanese artwork, and his real-life daughter O-Ei, of whom little factual data remains. They live together in a squalid flat and are completely devoted to producing art, while Hokusai's wife and blind younger daughter live elsewhere. The film unfolds as a series of vignettes featuring well-known works by the artist, some of which the film posits may have been painted by his daughter. There is a visit to a brothel in Yoshiwara to see a geisha who has out-of-body experiences at night, dealing with a haunting caused by one of O-Ei's paintings, a ride on a boat where the great wave is reenacted, and various other scenes. Two subplots round out the film, one involving O-Ei's unrequited love for her father's disciple, and the other the younger daughter's worsening health and eventual death. The short film is capped with O-Ei telling how her life played out after the events and a text crawl at the end relating her own death. With the exception of the younger daughter's death no single plot line in the film is fully played out, which leaves something of a sour taste in the mouth. But the film is nonetheless enjoyable for its visual beauty and the window it grants into life in Edo. The scene where O-Ei follows the alarm to a fire was especially fascinating, the firefighting companies holding their standards, getting doused with water and tearing down the surrounding structure to prevent the fire from spreading. The character designs are somewhat simplistic, maybe even a bit crude, but they're deftly animated and with the exquisite backgrounds the team at Production I.G. have created another masterpiece visually. Worth watching, and if you're intrigued plan a visit to the Edo Tokyo museum in Tokyo for a more in-depth look at life in this fascinating time.

The art, as well as the way the making of art is portrayed in the film is great; however, there is no real story arc or character development to speak of. Perhaps not much is known about the daughter of Hokusai, but even so, historical fiction is fiction for a reason. Though the film is narrated by the daughter, it is not about her at all, which is misleading (title, trailer all suggest the film will be about her). Her character does not develop much, though there is ample room for it to develop. Just when she may go beyond her immature, mean self, beyond her father's shadow, the film ends with a few narrated summary lines conveying what happens in the next 30 years without actually showing it. The film seems to focus on the period in which the blind daughter of the famous painter (the narrator's sister) is young, falls sick, and dies. It is not clear how and why Hokusai is separated from his wife, why his eldest daughter draws and paints with him (though she resents him plenty)... None of the romantic interests develop during the film, yet the summary in the end tells us she married once! It is hard to imagine her marrying, so this would be a great story, but it is not the subject of the film. At one point, we learn that she has a passion for fire, but have no idea how, if at all, this affects her paintings, her art...All in all, the art is great, especially the parts where painting and drawing itself is discussed. But the story is severely lacking and aimless.