I’m back from a morning screening of The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya.  I promised Yumeka that I’d give a full report tout-suite, so here we go, organized haphazardly with as few introductory frills as possible.  As for spoilers, please proceed at your own risk.

Looks like “The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya” is the official English title, since that’s what we got on the screen in white letters at the very start.  The movie begins from Kyon’s eye view, as he reluctantly gets out of bed in the morning.  This is a motif that will repeat itself several times more before the two and a half hours are up.  From there, we get an exacting adaptation of the novel.  With the exception of a line or two, the script is utterly faithful to the original.  This was a big bonus for me, since my Japanese is quite poor.  I was able to follow along, and I was entertained enough to ignore the gaps in understanding.

The identity of who caused the incident is both mysterious and totally not.  We don’t get to hear Tanabata-Era Nagato say the name, but her lips are animated enough that we can actually lip-read two of the three syllables.  I suspect this is more a matter of following the book’s style than really expecting anyone to be surprised.  By the way, the animation is gorgeous, as expected of KyoAni.  The numerous instances where Kyon finds himself at a FamilyMart hint at where some of the money came from.

There is an updated version of the original Haruhi opening.  The music sounds slightly different, and Aya Hirano sounds a little harder or deeper than she originally was, but it’s pretty much the same song.  The animation is a rainbow pattern of Haruhi silhouettes doing various things in unison, while in a separate window the club members are shown entering one by one and gathering around the heater.  At the end of the “OP,” there’s only one silhouette left, and she slowly disappears into a trapdoor.  Spooky.

Speaking of music, up until the disappearance happens, we get regular music from the TV show.  But immediately afterwards and for the rest of the movie, it’s mostly orchestral arrangements.  A lot of it sounds rousing and adventurous, especially when Kyon starts putting the pieces together.  I liked it as a tone-setter.

Seeing everything in motion before my eyes, I now definitely see the story’s homage to Back to the Future Part II. Kyon hiding from himself and Mikuru, for one, but in the café scene where Alt-Koizumi describes the possibilities of what’s happened, he draws a diagram on a napkin suspiciously similar to Doc Brown’s explanation of the alternate 1985.  That was kind of neat.

Asakura’s last scene was fabulous.  If there was one moment when I was truly on the edge of my seat, that was it.

Yuki… Wow, where to start?  Alt-Yuki’s voice is higher, more fragile and uncertain sounding.  It’s actually kind of freaky, seeing this person who is almost Nagato Yuki in every way including the way she sounds, but ever so slightly off.  Props to Chihara Minori for her voice work.

The moe for Alt-Yuki is incredibly strong.  KyoAni added some details: When she holds Kyon’s sleeve when he’s about to leave her apartment, she not only blushes, but the tops of her ears turn red also.  When Kyon decides to activate the emergency program and returns the Literature Club application to Yuki, the book says that Kyon can’t see her expression.  In the movie, she has a look on her face like she’s about to burst into tears, but then she just barely holds it in.  Ah, that scene really hurt…  But it was very well done, a great embellishment.

Kyon’s realization at the climax, that he’s been having fun and that he wants everything back, is handled with Evangelion-esque abstractions and conversations with avatars.  I wasn’t expecting that.  It was brief and quite deftly handled, though; better to see Kyon actually argue with himself than to simply hear his monologue at such an important time.

Shippers are in for a delight.  I won’t say how, but Kyon demonstrates real attraction to and affection for Haruhi in one of the last scenes.  Yuki also gets a great rooftop scene with Kyon, too, where he may (or may not) have called her by her first name for the first time.  Again, these are KyoAni embellishments that made the whole thing so much better.

The film ends not as I thought it would (perhaps with some version of Hare Hare Yukai): After Kyon says his last line from the book, it’s just plain black and white scrolling credits, set to a song sung by Chihara Minori with no accompaniment.  I couldn’t get the entirety of it, but it sounded like Alt-Yuki, or real Yuki in her heart of hearts, telling us not to forget… something.  It was haunting.

Lastly, I was happy to see at the very end of the credits, in English:

Special Thanks
All fans

That was nice.  And when you watch, remember that there’s something afterwards!

Okay, I think that ought to do it.  This is literally twice the length of a usual blog entry.  I’ll write about my actual experience next time, if there’s interest.

Oh, I also got a booklet with what looks like exclusive art from Noizi Itoh.

To the right, an ad for the upcoming "Solanin" movie. That was a pleasant surprise.

Not sure, though.

God…  This was worth the long journey (I’ll talk about that later if there’s interest), but right now I am so tired.