Summer Wars – A Movie about “Family VS A.I Hacker” on epic scale.

There are no spoilers in this entry.

Eva 2.0 might not be enough to actually push me to write a full review about the movie, and I thought Eva 2.0 is great enough to go for a run on any sort of award that the movie deserves.

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann : Lagann Chapter was a movie I thought surpasses everything I’ve enjoyed in the cinema so far (save for Lord of the Rings series but that’s merely personal, I’m not too much of a movie guy).

But Summer Wars is different. Summer Wars is unexpected – Summer Wars is/was a hit, Summer Wars is a movie where it unexpected thrown at my face with a lot of “seen before” elements yet still come out with a totally satisfying, touching, and enjoyable story to watch. My words might not weigh much, but I can say this : If Pixar has “Up” as their 2009 hit title, then Madhouse definitely has “Summer Wars” to compete with this.

The director of Summer Wars, Mamoru Hosoda (best known as the director of “The Girl that Leapt Through Time”, has a message to the people who watch “Summer Wars” :

“A story about a family that is the descendant of a warrior clan, fights off a world-level crisis that takes place in the world of the Internet (network). No matter how high tech or how modern technology has become, The bond that is “family” is stronger than any existing network. As a work of entertainment, regardless of young or old, male or female, I have taken in mind to make a story that is acceptable and easily taken in by the audiences, an adventure that can be enjoyed even by family, and have always wanted to make a suitable, lively, and refreshing summer movie for the audiences.”

He certainly made it : Summer Wars ranked 7th and grossed almost 127,000,000yen during its opening weekend, and in South Korea, the film debuted in 8th place and earned the equivalent of $369,156 on 118 screens.

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