Mark Reviews Movies: BELLE (2021)

Belle, GKIDS

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Review by Mark Dujsik | January 13, 2022

The story of Belle takes place in the real world and a virtual one. Like its distinct backdrops, writer/director Mamoru Hosoda's screenplay is also split—between the everyday worries, as well as the specific trauma, of a teenage girl and an online mystery that takes the world by storm, as well as some music, a quasi-romance based pretty blatantly on a famous fairy tale, and a debate about the purpose and worth of internet fame and anonymity.

Hosoda packs his movie with so many various and varied ideas, spread across these two very different worlds, that we keep waiting for some connective tissue to give the narrative a firm form. That doesn't happen, which is unfortunate.

There is some to admire in the story's assorted pieces, just as there's a lot to respect about how Hosoda and his team of artists bring these two realms to life. The real world is a mostly bright place, re-created by this team in a style that feels authentic enough, albeit with a hint of romantic stylization that matches the more cartoon-like appearances of the characters.

These segments have the flat but lively look of traditional, hand-drawn animation. Within it, there's a certain feeling of comfort to the style—so familiar but becoming so rare these days that there's an added level of nostalgia to the painterly backgrounds, the sharp lines of the characters' forms, and the specific kind of illusion of movement that comes with the technique.

The virtual world, called "U," is an entirely different story. Entering it is our introduction to this tale. The camera moves with complete, untethered freedom, from an overhead view of a layout that looks like circuit boards, only to reveal structures like towering and hanging skyscrapers—like stalagmites and stalactites in this cave of unlimited possibilities—inside this online realm. With the camera unleashed, we have clearly entered a place of computer animation, where Hosoda can move the camera, the characters, and even the space itself in any direction and on any axis. There's a pageantry here that doesn't exist in the movie's reality, which makes it so tempting, so freeing, and, in some ways, so terrifying for the people who venture there.

Our protagonist does. She's Suzu (voice of Kaho Nakamura), a teenage girl who lives with her widower father (voice of Kōji Yakusho) in the hills outside a city. Her mother died when Suzu was a child, drowning while saving a girl from a river, and since then, Suzu has been quiet, reserved, and unable to sing. When her friend Hiro (voice of Lilas Ikuta) sends her an invite to join U, Suzu does and discovers that she can sing again in the virtual world.

Unexpectedly, her avatar, named "Belle," becomes an overnight sensation in the world of U. Some people love Belle, and others are annoyed with or jealous of her (Poor Suzu focuses on the latter group). Everyone wants to find out who the mystery singer is, but when one of Belle's concerts is violently interrupted by an avatar known only as "the Dragon" (voice of Takeru Satoh), the worldwide search shifts to uncovering the Dragon's identity.

Suzu is especially entranced by the Dragon. As the beautiful Belle, she starts looking for the beast—in U and in the real world.

The rest of the story plays out in two separate modes. In the real world, while hunting for the Dragon with Hiro, Suzu has to contend with her secret romantic feelings for childhood friend Shinobu (voice of Ryō Narita), her fear that popular girl Ruka (voice of Tina Tamashiro) might love have a crush on him (A clever bit has Suzu taking on the gossipy cliques of high school like a strategy video game), and the continued pain of grief. Hosoda approaches these elements with a relaxed, sincere tone (as well as some humor, such as when Suzu has to play mediator to a pair of teens who like each other but are too afraid to say it), but that also means the down-to-earth drama is constantly overshadowed by the grand visions and broader melodrama of the virtual world.

The irony, then, is that, while the realm of U is more obviously striking on a visual level, the story there is far less engaging. Belle does eventually find the Dragon, a recluse—when he isn't causing trouble—in his secret castle, where she sings and they dance in the great hall of the fortress (Hosoda doesn't hide his influence from the most obvious fairy tale connection—or the story's most famous animated adaptation). After, Belle has to keep the Dragon's hideout a secret from Justin (voice of Toshiyuki Morikawa) and his team of self-appointed Justices—a makeshift, unofficial police force in U (Whatever Hosoda wants to say about the nature and consequences of online anonymity is either indefinite or a mixed message).

Most of these numerous characters, concepts, and concerns are established, given some spark, and then ignored or forgotten as the search for the Dragon takes over the plot. The revelation of the beast's identity offers some final sense of theme, although to say that it unifies the disparate elements of the story would be exceedingly generous.

At times, Belle offers glimpses of marvelous imagination. Its story, though, is a mostly ineffective mishmash of tones, modes, and ideas.

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