Dreams do come true. I always dreamed of being the mother of a little girl. A nice, warm house, a pretty daughter. Even if my husband was no good... I would accept dire poverty as long as I had my child.
This is the story of Gin (a down-on-his-luck alcoholic), Hana (a cast aside drag queen who speaks the quote above), and Miyuki (a young girl who has run away from home). These three may not seem appropriate to serve as the base of a "Christmas" movie (and the movie certainly doesn't advertise itself as such), but the story offers up extremely honest and touching Christian ideals. The movie tells of the epic Christmas Eve adventure of the three troubled homeless souls and their discovery of an abandoned baby. They name the baby Kiyoko, which means pure child. Along the way they help begin to understand and show others the power of love, compassion, and family.
Unlike yesterday, I wouldn't really recommend this as a Christmas movie for everyone. Still, if you are open-minded, don't mind Japanese with English subtitles, and want to see one of the greatest anime movies of all time, check this out now. On a side note, this was one of only three movies written and directed by Satoshi Kon (a fourth is to be released in 2011). Although working as an animator all of his life, he was only recently discovering his role as writer and director. His other movies, "Millenium Actress" and "Paprika" showed an enormous amount of talent and promise. Satoshi Kon died this year of pancreatic cancer at the age of 46. The collective consciousness of our world today seems to be that everyone is going to live until they are 100 (or longer), but this is a complete lie. No one knows how long they have, so take advantage of every second. Hug your mama, tell your kids you love them, and, like Satoshi Kon, go make some beautiful art.
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