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Grave of the Fireflies (1988)

★★★½ — Grave of the Fireflies (1988)

Grave of the Fireflies was released in Japan in April 1988 on a double bill with My Neighbour Totoro, a pairing that remains one of the more striking programming decisions in animation history (one film a gentle childhood fantasy, the other an unflinching account of wartime loss). Directed by Isao Takahata, the co-founder of Studio Ghibli alongside Hayao Miyazaki, the film is adapted from Akiyuki Nosaka's 1967 semi-autobiographical short story, which the author wrote as a form of personal atonement for the death of his younger sister during the firebombing of Kobe in 1945. Takahata, whose earlier work included the TV series Heidi and Anne of Green Gables, approached the material with a documentary-like restraint that set it apart from anything else Ghibli had produced at that point.

The most depressing Anime I've seen. Grave of the Fireflies serves as a fantastic animation by Studio Ghibli as well as a harrowing depiction of world War 2 from the Japanese perspective. The film does not hold back on delivering gutpunch after gutpunch. As the father of two young children it hits oh so harder to see them going through such tough times. Another banger by Studio Ghibli

Rating: ★★★½ | Year: 1988 | Watched: 2025-04-07

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Where to watch (UK)

Stream: Netflix · Netflix Standard with Ads
Rent: Amazon Video
Buy: Amazon Video
Physical: Amazon UK

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