The movie “A Silent Voice” has worn various awards and received large amounts of fame over the 4 years it’s been released. The movie follows the story of a deaf girl called Shouko who joins the same school as Shoya, who starts to bully her because she is different. He goes as far as to throw her hearing aids out the window and even makes her bleed in one instance. So is Is A Silent Voice Worth Watching? Here is our A Silent Voice Review.
The bullying is only encouraged by Ueno, Shoya’s friend and possible admirer. Many viewers get the feel from the trailer that this is a one-way path love story must involve those two characters, you might think it’s about redemption or forgiveness. Well, it’s not, well at least not all of it. Here is our A Silent Voice Review.
Main Narrative – A Silent Voice Review
The main narrative of A Silent Voice follows the story of a deaf girl named Shouko, who is bullied in school because she is seen as different because of her disability.
At the beginning of the story, she uses a notebook to communicate with the other students via them writing questions in the book and Shouko writing her responses.
At first, it’s Ueno who makes fun of Shouko because of her notebook, but later Shoya, Ueno’s friend joins in with the bullying, teasing Shouko by stealing her hearing aids and discarding them.
He also makes fun of the way she talks, as Shouko can’t hear the sound of her voice. The bullying continues until Shouko’s mother is forced to make a formal complaint to the school, in an attempt to cease the bullying.
When Shoya’s mother finds out about his behaviour, she marches over to Shouko’s house with a large sum of money to pay for the hearing aids. Shoya’s mother apologizes on Shoyo’s behalf and promises that Shoya will never treat Shouko like this again.
After Shoya leaves school he joins Highschool where he bumps into Shouko after a long time. It’s revealed that she left the school that she was attending with Shoya because of the way he was treating her.
She runs away from him and begins to cry. This is mainly where the story begins, and the past bullying school scenes were just a vision of the past. The rest of the story is about Shoya trying to make it up to Shouko by learning sign language and slowly warming up to her.
The two face many challenges together, as they are ridiculed by Shoya’s friend, Ueno because of the fact he used to bully her and Shouko’s mum, who does not approve of their new relationship or the two being together. Now on the main characters for our A Silent Voice Review.
Main Characters
Shouko Nishimiya works as the main protagonist alongside Shoya. From a teacher’s POV, it’s obvious that all Shouko wants to do in school is fit in and join her classmates in learning and enjoying school life.
Shouko’s character is a shy and kind one. She doesn’t seem to challenge anyone, and just generally tries to fit in, singing along with them etc. Shouko is a very loving character and acts in a very caring way, making it hard to watch when she is bullied and ridiculed.
Shoya Ishida doesn’t seem to act on his interests and normally follows what everyone else is doing. This happens mostly in the first part of the movie, where Shoya keeps on bullying Shouko.
Shoya doesn’t take responsibility for his actions until his maturity stage. Shoya is loud energetic and clumsy, much the opposite of Shouko. He isn’t very clever, normally conforming to what he is told.
Sub Characters
The sub-characters in A Silent Voice played a very vital role in the progression of the story between Shoya and Shouko, offering emotional support to both characters and acting as a way to vent frustration and built-up anger.
The sub-characters were written very well and this made them very relevant, also sub characters such as Uneo, who were only used a small amount during the first half of the movie are greatly added to and given depth near the end.
I loved this movie and it made each character very significant and memorable, it’s also a brilliant example of character development done correctly in a movie.
Main Narrative Continued
The first half of the movie shows Shouko and Shoya’s past and the reason that he bullied her and interacted with her in the first place. It’s revealed that she just wanted to become his friend and this makes the story all the more emotional.
The first scene after the prologue of Shouko and Shoya in school together sees both Shouko and Shoya run into each other at the new school they are attending.
When Shouko recognizes that it’s Shoya standing in front of her she attempts to run away and hide. Shoya catches up with her and explains (in sign language) to Shouko that the reason he was chasing after her was that she left her notebook. Later Shoya tries again to see Shouko but he is stopped by Yuzuru and told to leave.
This is the first in a string of attempts by Shoya to reach out to Shouko and this is where the rest of the movie leads off to, with a handful of other subplots and twists as well, making it very exciting.
Later in the movie, we see Shoya interact with Yuzuru a bit more as he tries to get closer to Shouko. He explains his situation to Yuzuru and she becomes more sympathetic towards him.
This moment is cut short however when Shouko’s mother discovers them, confronting Shoya by slapping him across the face as he realizes it’s her mother.
It appears that Yaeko’s resentment for Shoya has not yet departed. The story progresses and later we see that Shouko’s mother starts to resent Shoya less and less, as we see Shouko doesn’t seem to have a problem with him anymore.
It’s a very interesting dynamic to consider and it sure helps build tension between the characters. This comes from mainly Shoya’s mother wanting what’s best for her daughter. The reason she acts this way is most likely because she only wants what’s best for Shouko and if Shouko is happy that’s all that matters.
Reasons A Silent Voice Is Worth Watching
So here are some reasons that A Silent Voice is worth watching. These are all of the reasons we could provide for our A Silent Voice Review.
Narrative
First of all let’s start with the obvious reason, the story. The story of A Silent Voice is a very good but touching one. It uses the disability of a deaf girl as its whole narrative structure. The fact that the story starts with the bullying scenes at the start of the movie and then moves on to their time in high school makes the story easy to follow and understand. I loved the overall idea of this movie and that’s why I decided to give it a watch.
Illustration & Animation
The overall appearance of the animation of A Silent Voice is breathtaking, to say the least. I wouldn’t say it’s on the same level as A Garden Of Words for example, but for a movie that’s over 2 hours long it sure does look amazing. It seems as if every character has been drawn and then re-drawn to perfection.
The background of the set pieces is very detailed and beautiful as well. I’d say even if the movie isn’t to your liking the way it looks will not be a problem for you, because it looks simply amazing, a lot of work went into this production and this is very evident from the way it’s portrayed.
Interesting & Memorable Characters
There were a lot of memorable characters in A Silent Voice and they primarily played a role in the first part of the film, playing their role as Shouko’s classmates.
Most of them don’t take part in the bullying and instead watch on and do nothing. They would later make more appearances in the movie, this would be to protest their innocence when asked about Shouko’s previous bullying by the other classmates.
Appropriate Antagonist Character
One of these characters that stuck out to me was Uneo. She would normally be the main instigator of the bullying but would normally act innocent and never actually have to take responsibility as this would normally be covered by Shoya.
The difference with Ueno is that the other students all realize that this sort of behaviour is wrong, Uneo continues to display these patterns even in Highschool where she makes fun of both Shoya and Shouko for being together.
She seems to be angry that everyone around her has moved on from being like this and treating Shouko like this and this makes her feel vulnerable and jealous. This is greatly increased when Shoya is in the hospital.
Dialogue & Body Language
The dialogue is used pretty well in A Silent Voice and this is evident in most scenes, particularly the sign language scenes. The dialogue is also structured in a very informative and careful sort of way that makes it very easy for us to read the character’s body language.
I especially thought this was significant in the bridge scene involving Shoya and Shouko as it captivated how both characters were feeling perfectly and their true intentions. Watch the insert below and you’ll see what I’m talking about.
Symbolism & Hidden Meanings
It wouldn’t be A Silent Voice Review if we did not talk about the symbolism. There is another well-thought-out thing in this movie which is how open people with disability are to start relationships/friendships. This isn’t limited to people with a disability, but the same goes for those who don’t have appealing looks or are not that sociable like Nagatsuka.
Character Depth & Arcs
Throughout the movie, we see various characters have depth given to them as well as see some characters go through a whole arc as well. Some people would argue this is only possible through longer content like series for example but it is completely possible in a movie such as A Silent Voice, in fact, more so because of the length of the movie.
A good example of this would be Uneo, who takes on the role of the antagonist after the first half of the movie is complete. Still shows her resentment for Shouko even much later in the movie.
Her initial hatred for Shouko seems to get bigger and bigger, more so after Shoya has to go to the hospital after saving Shouko’s life. However, by the end of the movie, we see she has changed a lot.
Great Ending (Spoliers)
It would not be a good A Silent Voice Review without talking about the great ending. In my opinion, the ending of A Silent Voice was exactly what it needed to be. It offered a pretty conclusive ending, with most of the problems that arose at the start of the movie being flattered out and solved by the end.
The ending would also see many of the other hardships that came about because of confrontations that were created as a result of Shoya’s actions being concluded and ended. This allowed the series to finish on a generally good note.
Reasons A Silent Voice Isn’t Worth Watching
Here are some reasons that this movie is not worth watching in our A Silent Voice Review.
Strange Ending (Spoilers)
The ending of A Silent Voice offers an interesting ending that supports an appropriate conclusion as well. The ending sees many of the main characters from the start reunite and come together despite the conflicts that they were involved in throughout the movie.
Characters such as Uneo and Sahara also make an appearance, thanking and apologizing to Shoya. I’m not sure if the little confrontation between Uneo and Shouko at the end was supposed to be very malicious but it didn’t fit in with me.
I think it would have been better if the two just made up and became friends, but maybe it was an attempt to show that Uneo still hadn’t changed.
That would seem a bit pointless to me and it wouldn’t accomplish anything that was supposed to conclude her character’s arc.
Character problems
During the second half of the movie when Shoya is in Highschool we see him interacting with several characters who all claim to be his friend, such as Tomohiro for example, whose voice-acting history and overall presence very much annoyed me.
I think that the writers could have done a lot more with his characters and not made him so unlikeable. To me, he just comes off as this needy loser who always hangs around Shoya for no proper reason other than “they’re friends”.
There’s never an explanation of how the two became such good friends or how they became friends in the first place. In my opinion, Tomohiro’s character had a lot of protentional, but only some of this was used evidently.
Incomplete conclusion (spoilers)
I was happy with the ending of A Silent Voice but I felt that they could have done something a little different with Shoya and Shouko’s relationship.
I know this was expanded upon in the film with the two spending time together while doing various other activities, but it felt like the two didn’t get the ending they were supposed to, I was hoping for a much more romanticized ending, but I was still very much satisfied with the original ending.
Length
Being over 2 hours long the story of A Silent Voice is a long one. It also may take a long time to get into, although this may not be the case with some viewers as if you’ve read the movie description you will know what the movie is about. This means it will be easier to sit through the first part of the movie.
Movie pacing
The pacing of A Silent Voice is quite fast and this can make it hard to keep track of everything that’s going. The main reason for this is the fact that it’s been illustrated from the book and each chapter is done in sections of the movie.
This sometimes means the movie can head in a more fast-paced way than how it did before or in the future, this is true of the bullying scenes during the first part of the movie.
The pacing wasn’t a particular problem for me but it was still an apparent element that piqued my interest. Also, I didn’t have many reasons not to watch A Silent Voice.
Conclusion
A Silent Voice offers a touching story with a good ending. There seemed to be an obvious message at the end of this story. This story teaches a valuable lesson about bullying, trauma, forgiveness and most importantly love.
I would have liked more of an insight into why Uneo resented Shouko so much and the reason she acted the way she did even right up to the end of the movie, I think that could have been concluded or explained better.
A Silent Voice illustrates (very well) how a disability can negatively affect one’s self-esteem, which pushes that person even further away from the people around them.
I think the overall objective of this movie was to show the effects of bullying and to present a message, as well as to show the power of redemption and forgiveness.
If this was the aim, A Silent Voice did an excellent job of portraying it. I would honestly give this movie a go if you have the time, it’s definitely worth it and I’m sure you won’t find yourself regretting it.
Rating for this movie:
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