Anime Review: Kimi no Suizou wo Tabetai

I found some time to check out a few anime movies, and one of the top of my list was Kimi no Suizou wo Tabetai (I Want to Eat Your Pancreas). Like most others, I scoffed a bit at the weird title but heard amazing things about the movie, so I decided to put book cover impressions aside and dive into the movie. Was it more than just a weird title?

Let’s Jam!

The Story

Haruki is a boy who believes that he is destined to be alone and likes it that way. He doesn’t care how others perceive him or judge him… just as long as they keep it to themselves to avoid interrupting his life. All of that changes when he goes to the hospital to have some stitches taken out from a surgery that saw his appendix removed. There, he sees a book called Living with Dying. Being the curious bookworm that he is, he begins to read it only to discover it’s a diary.

A girl named Sakura comes strolling up and claims the book is hers. Since Haruki read it, she confides in him that it’s a journal about her final days on Earth because she was diagnosed with pancreatic failure. There is nothing the doctors can do for her and she will, one day die. Haruki doesn’t care one bit and brushes her off rather coldly, walking away since they called his ticket number to come to the counter. Rather than be crushed by his soulless remarks, she decides to annoy him every single day.

Haruki is peeved at this but figures that if he entertains her, she will leave him alone. Instead, Haruki ends up learning a lot about Sakura, himself, and how it begins to change him on the inside.

One thing this movie does is it opens with Sakura already dead. Haruki doesn’t attend her funeral and notes that the last text message he ever sent her was “I Want to Eat Your Pancreas.” He doesn’t even know if she ever read it. The movie takes us back to how they met and the events leading up to Sakura’s eventual death.

The Characters

Haruki Shiga

As noted above, Haruki is cold and uncaring at first. He only cares about his peace and quiet and to live his life undisturbed. All he needs are his books and he doesn’t care about how he’s viewed just as long as nothing disturbs his life; however, there is much more to Haruki than just that. Even though he’s annoyed by Sakura, something inside of him forces his hand to go along with her plans to knock things off of her bucket list with him. Over time, he learns a lot about himself and goes through a heart-wrenching transformation. You’ll understand what I mean by that once you get to the end of the film

Sakura Yamauchi

Despite being terminally ill, Sakura is a high-spirited girl who is borderline unbearable. She comes off as super pushy and annoying at first but the character grows on you over time. She has a keen interest in Haruki and doesn’t seem to want to leave him alone. Also, for some reason, she chose him and only him to talk about her terminal illness. Not even her best friend, Kyoko, knows what’s going on with her. The only other people on the planet who knows she’s going to die are her parents which makes you wonder why she chose Haruki of all people. That is revealed in the film

Before I get onto thoughts on the other characters, I have to make note of this here… how Kimi no Suizou wo Tabetai chooses to handle character development. I read a lot of online reviews that absolutely hated this film because it didn’t clearly explain some of the characters’ actions… but the thing is, it did explain them but it meant that you, the viewer, had to do some detective work to figure it out for yourself. This movie is a very “Show, Don’t Tell” style film in which you have to look deep into the characters, their personalities, and the little nuances… i.e. you need to put yourself in their shoes and think like they do to understand why they did some of the things they did.

For example (and this is probably the most confusing one to some viewers), there is a scene where Sakura invites Haruki over to her house to borrow a book. When they are alone in her room together, Sakura pins Haruki against the wall and teases him with a possible kiss, giving him a pseudo-love confession but then plays it off as a joke. Haruki almost loses control and pins Sakura to her bed and almost has his way with her until Sakura begins to cry. Full of shame, he runs out of the house only to run into Takahiro, Sakura’s ex-boyfriend who is two-faced and controlling. He ends up getting pissed off at Haruki and punches him. Sakura runs out and is worried about Haruki and yells at Takahiro, telling him to, essentially, get lost.

Some were confused why Sakura ran out of the house and acted like Haruki never tried to assault her but here’s where you have to dig into the characters…

Haruki has never known affection. He was a loner for most of his life. He didn’t know the feeling of warmth or companionship. At this point in the movie, his mind is confused. He’s not sure if his principles have been right all along. Without coming out and saying it, you can tell through Haruki’s nuances, his expressions, and his acts, that he’s starting to believe that there is room in his life for someone but, at the same time, his way of life, his past, all of it is holding him back. It’s creating a tug-o-war of emotions in his mind but being the mostly silent type that he is, he bottles it up. When Sakura teased him (more on that in a moment), it sent Haruki’s conflicting emotions into overdrive and his mind became clouded. He lost his ability to think and his inner desire to be loved by someone exploded and caused him to act without thinking. Sakura’s tears brought him back to reality. He didn’t run out of the house to just escape… he couldn’t face the fact that he was about to hurt the one he was falling in love with. He couldn’t stand to see himself become an uncontrollable monster and felt it was best to get out of there before he did something he would regret more than what he had just done.

As for Sakura, she wasn’t teasing Haruki when she pinned him against the wall. She chose Haruki for a reason that’s revealed later on but she was definitely in love with him. This part was obvious. She said she was joking because she knew how Haruki was. He had already said that he didn’t want to be in love nor was he interested in such things. She said it hoping that maybe… just maybe… it would get him to change his mind but when it didn’t, she went with the “just kidding’ excuse to try and cover it up. What she didn’t expect was Haruki to lose control. I believe she cried for two reasons outside of feeling some pain from Haruki’s assault. The first is that she knew that she messed up and could have possibly destroyed everything she had worked on when it came to befriending Haruki. The second is because she knew that she put him in that position. She probably realized right then and there how Haruki felt and when he lashed out she cried because she didn’t mean for that to happen. She blamed herself for sending him into that rage.

This is why she chased after Haruki and acted as if nothing happened. She knew it was her fault. Yes, he did need to apologize for pinning her down but at the same time, her actions caused it all and she felt as if she ruined everything. That’s why she didn’t scold him because despite how that situation turned out, it silently confirmed their feelings for one another… the characters just never verbally conveyed that because you were supposed to figure that out on your own.

Kyoko Takimoto

She’s Sakura’s best friend and… well.. she’s SUPER overprotective of Sakura despite not knowing about her terminal illness but you would think it was common knowledge with her with how severe her attitude is towards Haruki. She even ends up going to his house just to yell at him. She even threatens his life if he dares hurt her. All of this comes from how she saw Takahiro treat her when they were together. She knows how badly she was treated and simply doesn’t want to see it happen again. Because Haruki swore to not tell anyone about Sakura’s illness, it’s heartbreaking to see him take all of that verbal abuse when he could have just ended it by telling her everything. Instead, he stood there and took verbal lashing after verbal lashing from her for no good reason all to honor Sakura’s wish… another unspoken nuance that told you that Haruki truly cared about Sakura.

After all, Haruki didn’t want this. Not being bothered and judged, to have his life not be interrupted, was his top priority and Kyoto was violating that every time they crossed paths. You would think he would just tell her Sakura’s secret to end it and, if he didn’t have feelings for Sakura, he probably would have. The Haruki at the start of the film definitely would have and wouldn’t have cared one bit. The fact he remained completely silent and left her in the dark was a testament to his worldview changing and his growing feelings. This painted Kyoko in a much worse light than intended because now she just came off as a naïve bitch (for the lack of a more appropriate term). It caused you to sit there and shake your head and say “if only she knew” but then you also realize “Wait, he’s keeping the secret… does that mean…?”

It’s a good mechanism because it causes you to build sympathy for Haruki as well, making you hope and pray that they end up together. If he’s willing to take those verbal lashings like that, then he deserves a happy ending before the eventual sad one. On top of that, the fact that he doesn’t even tell Sakura about Kyoko’s threats shows that he doesn’t want to worry Sakura. She has enough to worry about so he bears it all to protect her from further stress.

Kyoko may be that character that only appears when she’s needed (and sometimes when she’s not) but the role she plays, from a “read between the lines” standpoint is extremely crucial and pivotal. Probably the best indirect use of a side character I’ve seen.

Art, Animation, and Sound

Studio VOLN did a pretty good job with this movie. While the visuals aren’t anything way over the top, this is a slice-of-life drama and it has that typical slice-of-life look to it all while seeing that movie budget shine through its animation. The character designs are a bit plain but, again, this is slice-of-life. It’s not a shounen SoL nor is it some sort of hip action series where everyone needs a cool design. What we are given here is just fine and I think everything fits the atmosphere rather well.

Not much to say on this as it’s typical movie-level SoL stuff. From the art,and  the animation, to the soundtrack, it’s pretty typical. Like a TV anime series with a huge budget… but again…. The story is what matters most here… and yes… just like a TV anime series, the fireworks scene is where you can tell they spent the most money!

Overall Thoughts

Man… where do I even begin?

I, for one, thought Kimi no Suizou wo Tabetai was a masterclass in storytelling and the only reason I didn’t give this a perfect 5/5 or 10/10 (for those who use that scale) is that “show don’t tell” does get lost on some people. Without trying to insult a section of the anime community, not everyone understands nuanced storytelling. They need to have it handed to them on a silver platter. They need to have things taken at face value. Little things slip through the cracks and they tend to miss things out of most (not all) of the negative reviews I’ve seen, they all had that one thing in common… they didn’t understand why the characters did some of the things they did and felt the characters were poorly written because of not being able to read between the lines.

So, yes… the style of storytelling in Kimi no Suizou wo Tabetai isn’t for everyone but for those who can appreciate it, it’s going to be a fantastic ride from start to finish. Also, there is a massive plot twist towards the end of the film, and without the foreshadowing, it would have come out of left field but, at the same time, I kind of wished it had because as soon as the foreshadowing hit, you knew it was coming; however, it didn’t matter. When it hit, it hit HARD… and I do mean HARD. Once it happens and the film winds down, just when you think the stake was pounded straight through your heart, the hammer comes down and punches it straight through to let you bleed out profusely. In those final moments of the movie, you learn something that makes the twist hit even harder than it initially did.

If you love reading between the lines and love analyzing characters on a psychological level while taking in their journey… Kimi no Suizou wo Tabetai is a must-watch movie for you. Even if you do take things at face value, this is still a must-watch movie. I’m only sorry that I put it off for this long.