Scarlet is by far the most disappointing film I saw at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) this year. Though, in retrospect, I shouldn’t have been surprised. I’ve made it no secret that I’m an avid anime fan. However, I’ve also never been shy about expressing my issues with the filmographies of various high-profile directors within the industry, including Scarlet’s director, Mamoru Hosoda.
Hosoda is an interesting director because while he certainly has a distinct voice that is present throughout his filmography, I wouldn’t exactly describe any of his movies as “good.” A recurring issue I’ve had with Hosoda’s films, especially his recent ones, is that, while ambitious, they are ultimately stretched too thin because the director would rather create half-baked observations on multiple ideas and themes at once than narrow down and fully flesh out one or two of them. Despite their flaws, Hosoda’s movies are ones I’ve always respected, even if I don’t end up actually liking them. Scarlet is the first Hosoda movie I actively dislike.
My biggest issue with Scarlet is that it fails on multiple levels because it cannot decide what kind of film it wants to be. The movie attempts to be both a dark epic fantasy (as indicated by its use of blood and violence) and a children’s fairy tale adventure (as indicated by its childish themes about war and conflict). Unfortunately, not only does Scarlet fail at being either type of story, but also these stark differences are so wide that they often clash with each other, resulting in a film so tonally and structurally messy that it’s almost impossible for me to understand what I’m supposed to take away from the overall experience. The movie needs to commit to being either a pure dark fantasy or a Miyazaki-style children’s fairy tale epic (a la Castle in the Sky); it cannot be both, no matter how hard Hosoda tries. Mirai and Belle shared the same issue with Hosoda’s attempt to capture multiple tones at once, but at least it made sense why the story elements those films tried to blend were so messy in their respective narratives.
Additionally, while Mirai and Belle were incoherent and unfocused films, they at least boasted gorgeous visuals and memorable soundtracks, two key elements that are severely lacking in Scarlet. It’s bad enough that the 3D animation in Scarlet somehow looks worse than the one used for Belle four years ago, which, even then, didn’t look that great, but at least aesthetically fit the film’s virtual-world setting. My real frustration stems from how inconsistently Scarlet uses its 2D and 3D animation. Initially, Scarlet’s visual presentation approach is to depict real-world scenes in 2D and fantastical ones in 3D. This would have been a perfectly suitable method had they just fully committed to this. However, the problem is that Hosoda doesn’t even adhere to this principle, as there are a handful of moments in which certain characters in the fantasy world are briefly presented in 2D animation before reverting to 3D.
It’s as if even Hosoda is aware of how unappealing the 3D animation can look at times, and so tries to hide that ugliness by switching back to 2D animation as needed. However, at that point, Hosoda should have just quit while he was ahead and made this entire film in 2D. I genuinely do not understand why this director is obsessed with 3D animation, because most of the scenes that are not in 2D can look absolutely atrocious at times. The worst instances of this are any scenes that involve complex movements and coordination, such as all the action scenes and a dance sequence that plays in the second half. These scenes have such major uncanny valley vibes that it was almost impossible for me to emotionally connect with any of these moments or even appreciate them from a purely visual perspective. I’m not fundamentally opposed to 3D anime in general. Films like Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero demonstrate that good 3D anime is possible, but Hosoda’s execution in his movies falls short in terms of visual realism.
That being said, I could forgive all the bad visuals and animation if Scarlet had some kind of narrative hook that could get me invested the way Hosoda’s earlier movies did. Unfortunately, the movie doesn’t even have that because, at the end of the day, this is the most bog-standard and by-the-numbers fantasy isekai imaginable, as every element of Scarlet’s setting and plot has been done better in some other fantasy and/or isekai anime. What’s worse is that all of those generic story elements are in service of delivering the most surface-level, childish, and naive message about how war is bad. If the ruler were simply a good person who genuinely cared about others, then all violence would cease. This message is absolute nonsense, especially since this is as far as the movie goes, and any attempt to even remotely elaborate on this theme is quickly interrupted by more mindless action. Scarlet is such a bafflingly terrible movie, and the more I think about it, the angrier I become at how much of a waste of potential it is.
Rating: 2/10