Presented in competition at the Annecy festival, Tunnel to Summer, the Exit of Goodbyes is a breast melancholic and sensitive. It is the story of two Kaoru and Anzu high school students who form an unlikely team to explore a mysterious tunnel where time differs from the real world. A touching anime that might well get you out of handkerchiefs by the correctness of its writing and style. In addition to our review, find our exchange with Tomohisa Taguchi at the end of the article!
A solar anime
In a small country town that lurks the sea, Kaoru leads a high school life all the more ordinary until the day he inadvertently discovers the tunnel of Urashima, supposed to fulfill the wishes but not at any price... Every second in the tunnel is equivalent to hours in the real world. Tunnel to Summer adopts a metaphorical approach by proposing an emotional closed session between Kaoru and Hanashiro, a new solo high school student. Their chronophageal exploration leads irreparably to separate them from the real world.
Tomohisa Taguchi here chose to focus on the psychological construction of this duo which everything opposes at first glance. If one finds archetypes of animes narrate high school life, it is very largely secondary and the film opts more for a more subtle approach, where all the other characters are relegated to the background. The intrigue is based on crossed destinies that can sometimes recall Your Name by Makoto Shinkai.
The animation is an exemplary fluidity with a realistic style that leaves the emotions of the characters beautiful. Often contemplative in these plans where the sign is always about details, Tomohisa Taguchi leaves the part beautiful to situational poetry. With its realistic style, however, the surrounding world knows how to erase with elegance with long focal points where the landscapes fade away to better reveal beings.
Memorial trip
By choosing an action that takes place before the era of social networks and smartphones, the general tone recalls this time when relationships were not suspended from an Instagram wire or from a Tinder algorithm. Gradually, the tunnel exploration reinforces the link between Kaoru and Hanashiro. The fact that we have tightened the lens around these two high school students manages to make us completely switch to this universe where nostalgia is never far from the desire of another world. Trust is earned, and the mysterious Hanashiro is parsimony, which maintains the charm of the unknown.
If time seems to be suspended, it is not only because of the film's purpose but because it revives distant memories of a time less frightful than the one we are experiencing today. During an anonymous meeting or an ephemeral exchange on a routine path, with a simple look at the bus stop, the world was deaf to the daily hustle and bustle. Sending an SMS had another resonance, due to technical limitations and, by nature, the sign of a privileged relationship, where each word counts. With the frenzy proper to that of a century cadenced at all speed, one flow erases another, drowned in one mass informs which is called Communication. Would we have lost the meaning of the present?
In addition to this chase-cross between the lives of these two high school students, the director pins a Japanese society obsessed with work and social success, even sacrificing the slightest piece of freedom. If these themes are at the crossroads of the majority of animes, Tunnel to Summer never falls into the caricature and proves on this point closer to the drama than the nevertheless friendly The solitary castle in the mirror (also criticism in our columns). Tomohisa Taguchi's anime suspends her spectator to her ruthless epilogue, without ever falling into the pitfall of haze. An anime far from being blue flower and which could not be recommended for its release in France on 5 June 2024.
Interview with Tomohisa Taguchi
Tunnel to Summer, The Exit of Goodbyes is the adaptation of the seinen eponymous whose story is itself taken from light novel Natsu he no Tunnel, Sayonara no Deguchi written by Mei Hachimoku and illustrated by Kukka, published by Shôgakukan in 2019. It was Tomohisa Taguchi with whom we spoke at Annecy who is director and screenwriter of the film awarded the Grimault Prize, the second best prize of the Annecy festival. We already owe him two movies on the game-video license Persona. He also signed anime Digimon Adventure and the last season of Bleach.
Trailer of The Tunnel to Summer, The Exit of Goodbyes
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