A Silent Voice

A Silent Voice – When new female student Nishimiya who is deaf, joins Ishida’s elementary school class he quickly finds himself shifting from most popular boy to social pariah after causally instigating a campaign of bullying against her for no reason other than that her disability makes him uncomfortable. Years later, driven to the brink of suicide by the guilt of his actions, Ishida seeks atonement. Having learned sign language he starts communicating with Nishimiya, but will he get redemption? Or will his attempts drag up more bad blood?

A Silent Voice (2016) – Director: Naoko Yamada

By Source (WP:NFCC#4), Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=50082540

Rating: 12

Running Length: 130 minutes

Starring: Miyu Irino, Saori Hayami, Aoi Yûki

Genre: Drama, Romance

REVIEW: ‘A SILENT VOICE’

Based on the manga of the same name written and drawn by Yoshitoki Ōima, ‘A Silent Voice’ (also translated as ‘The Shape of the Voice’) is a beautifully animated and mature tale touching on teenage issues of suicide, bullying, prejudice, guilt, and redemption (or lack of it). We share the story of Ishida and Nishimiya at elementary school age – where a popular but brash Ishida is a ringleader in picking on the deaf and friendly Nishimiya for reasons that he can’t quite articulate – through to high school age where a guilt racked and suicidal Ishida tries to make good the ills of his past.

With such a heavy set up it is the relatability of the characters that make or break your emotional connection. And ‘A Silent Voice’ missteps heavily by making Nishimiya such a doormat and stoic character. No matter how much abuse she receives she barely reacts, wearing instead the same vacant smile. Whilst on one level this is understandable due to the disconnect from those around them felt by the deaf, and despite a few weak fightbacks (where she mostly apologises throughout), ‘A Silent Voice’ loses some of the emotional connection it so badly needs by, at least so far as Nishimiya is concerned, showing the bullying but not the repercussions of it. It’s odd, given that Nishimiya’s introduction as a new student is the catalyst for the plot, that of all the characters she is also the least defined – existing primarily as a punching bag for other characters.

What ‘A Silent Voice’ does excellently though is explore guilt and anxiety. Ishida, as ringleader of the bullying campaign (for no reason other than discomfort at disability), finds his life utterly destroyed once he is turned on by he so called ‘friends’. Racked with guilt he sinks into himself, unable to look any of his classmates in the eye: something given tangible life by the presence of flickering blue ‘x’ marks drawn over the faces of all around him. This effect lasts through most of the movie, with the camera reflecting Ishida’s point of voice by skirting around instead of making eye contact which really draws the audience into his state of mind. Through staccato flashbacks, dream like ambient soundtracking, and Ishida struggling to make amends and come to terms with his own suicidal ennui, ‘A Silent Voice’ glides over much of its run time in a smeared haze: effectively echoing the feeling of someone suffering with depression.

‘A Silent Voice’ has strong and consistent artistic direction which eschews the typical anime flamboyance for subtle but beautiful twinges of longing. Be it the recurring themes of water or the slowing to breath in the gaps between moments, the sensation of the movie wins out even if some of the tears it tries to jerk fall flat. It may look like a love story on the surface, but in reality it is about fighting each day at a time to make life work, which is a much more mature and realistic message to give.

CONTENT: IS ‘A SILENT VOICE’ SUITABLE FOR CHILDREN?

Note: Ordinarily we would write our content guide as spoiler-free as possible by avoiding naming characters so that a scene can be described without giving away the plot too much. However, due to the nature of bullying and mental health issues raised in ‘A Silent Voice’ we have felt that in order for the context of scenes to be properly described and the cumulative effect to be understood, we will go into more detail where required including naming characters.

The movie opens with a teenage boy, Ishida, wrapping up his affairs so that he can prepare to commit suicide. He quits his job, repays some debts, and then goes to a bridge and tries to psyche himself up to throw himself off. He is about to fall when he is distracted by fireworks. The scene cuts to the intro sequence and an extended flash back.

During the intro sequence several characters dive from a low bridge into a shallow river. One holds up a beaver in triumph. This is part of a montage and done very quickly. After this a new girl, Nishimiya, is introduced to a school class room of elementary school children. When it is clear she that is deaf one character yells out ‘holy crap!’

Ishida throws small stones at Nishimiya to get her attention. She points at him, uses sign language, and says “friends?”. He responds by gathering up some dirt and throwing it at her, shouting, “you creep me out!” before walking away. She stands, stoic but confused. The scene cuts.

One girl, Ueno, takes a dislike to Nishimiya and starts to talk badly about her. She mocks a girl who wants to learn sign language, and after says, ‘”What is it with her fashion sense?” to a group of girls as Nishimiya walks past.

When one student is absent, Ishida writes on a chalkboard after class saying, ‘Congratulations Nishimiya-san, you made Saraha-san disappear!’ The other students chide him for being a jerk but also laugh. Nishimiya enters the class room and Ishida pretends it was written by someone else and erases it.

Ishida rolls up a magazine and yells loudly right behind Nishimiya’s head, making her jump. She isn’t upset by this but it is clear that he is doing it to taunt her. Afterwards, Ueno walks up to Nishimiya and sweeps her hair aside rudely, noticing that she is wearing hearing aides. Nishimiya pulls one out to show Ueno, but Ueno grabs it and throws it across the class room to Ishida, who throws it out of the window. After this sequence there is a montage with jolly sounding music where many clips of bullying by Ishida are shown, including the magazine shouting again, grabbing more of Nishimiya’s hearing aids and throwing them (which has clearly become a favoured game), tripping her up with a broom, and spraying her with water from a hose. She doesn’t react each time, but the montage ends with Ishida pulling both Nishimiya’s hearing aids out simultaneously from behind. Nishimiya yelps and claps her hands to her ears and blood is shown to run down her arms. Another character says, “You took it too far, Ishida”.

Next, Ishida and his friends are walking away from the faculty office (presumably after being scolded). Nishimiya stops them and holds up her notebook with ‘I’m sorry,’ written on it. This notebook has previously been established as Nishimiya’s main method of communication with her class mates. Ishida grabs and shouts at her, calling her a liar. She grabs his hand and attempts again the sign language for ‘friends,’ but he pulls his hand away in disgust and throws her notebook into a fountain. The scene cuts to Ishida himself sitting in the fountain, with his school books floating around him and one on his head whilst his apparent friends walk away. As the scene progresses it becomes apparent that Nishimiya’s mother has made a complaint and that when accused of bullying all of Ishida’s friends confirmed in class that it was him behind it all (despite their own involvement). He protests and blames his friends also, causing them to start picking on him instead. One of the girls fake cries in class to deflect the blame.

Ishida picks up Nishimiya’s notebook from the fountain and reads it as he walks home. It says things like ‘Good luck, moron!’ in it. When he gets home his mother takes him to Nishimiya’s house so that she can apologise on his behalf. She bows in shame to Nishimiya’s mother and gives her money to pay for the broken or thrown hearing aids.

A montage follows showing Ishida being the subject of bullying. His shoes are stolen and binned, he is tripped up with a broom in the hallway, he has footballs thrown at him, he is grabbed into a chokehold from behind from one of his former friends (something that earlier in the film he was shown to have instigated first), sprayed with a hose, and shown flat on the floor and panting with all his books strewn everywhere.

The above sequence ends with Ishida walking into an empty classroom (wearing donation slippers as his shoes have been stolen) to see Nishimiya cleaning his desk. He shouts at her, and she smiles blankly at him, which angers him further. He physically attacks her, pulling and pushing her around by her clothes and demanding to know why she isn’t ‘pissed off’ with him. As he gets more violent she bites his hand and he starts shoving her head and forcing her down. There is nothing sexual about this; it is best described as a very ineffectual but angry fight. He tries to punch her in the face but misses. She yells and kicks at him, causing him to fall onto his back. Nishimiya gets on top of him grabs handfuls of his shirt, pulling him up and down. She cries and yells, “I’m doing the best I can!!” but as she is deaf her speech is a little slurred and Ishida can’t understand her. He shouts, “I can’t understand what you are saying!” The scene then fades to him cleaning abusive graffiti off his own desk which says “Ishida, go away” but he still mutters, “She really pisses me off”.

After this point the extended flashback ends and we return to ‘current events’. Ishida lives with his mother and young niece. When he goes down for breakfast his mother asks why he tried to kill himself. He admits that he was going to and she shouts at him. She forces him to say he will stop trying to kill himself which he does. All this takes place in front of the three-year-old niece who is taken aback but unaffected and the scene is rather chaotic due to a sudden fire and so isn’t particularly emotional.

An older student asks to ‘borrow’ the bike of another student who is much smaller. It is clear that the older student has no intention of returning it. The younger student refuses but gets pushed around and he cries. He shouts out, “someone help me!”

When Nishimiya’s mother first sees Ishida she slaps him around the face due to how he treated Nishimiya when they were younger.

Two male friends realise a female friend works in a ‘kitty cafe’. The work up the courage to visit, believing it to be a ‘maid cafe’, which are cafes particular to japan when people are served by and pay to have conversations with attractive young women usually in some form of cute or suggestive outfit. This is unlikely to be understood by younger viewers who are not familiar with Japanese culture.

When Ueno meets Nishimiya again for the first time she again pulls out her hearing aid as she had done before and says she wants to throw it. However, Ishida chastises her. Nishimiya doesn’t react.

A group of friends go to a fairground to have fun. Ueno grabs Nishimiya and cajoles her into riding on a Ferris Wheel. Unknown to them both the conversation is recorded in a small video camera given to Nishimiya to hold. When watched back it shows Ueno telling Nishimiya that she hates her. She physically attacks her although this is brief. Once off the ride Ueno pretends nothing has happened and Nishimiya is quiet.

An elderly relative previously seen in one scene dies. A character is upset on the way to the funeral and is reassured by another.

One character stands on the ledge of a high-rise building, clearly intending suicide. They slowly fall forwards and plummet as another character races from behind to stop them. They grab their hand and struggle to pull them up. One character falls and the camera shows their point of view with the road below racing up to meet them. At the point of impact the scene cuts to a flashback to a stream but some blood is shown in the water.

Two female characters get into a physical fight. This involves some pushing and shoving with some slaps to the face. One character cries as they attack, and another older character breaks it up, but also gets in some slaps of her own.

One character suffers an anxiety attack and flees a classroom. They lock themselves into a bathroom cubicle and breathe heavily with their head in their hands.

CAN I SEE A CLIP?

VERDICT: IS ‘A SILENT VOICE’ FOR KIDS

The first 20 minutes of the movie are a constant stream of bullying and the vast majority of the content we have highlighted above is within this time frame of the movie. There is little light relief throughout. Due to the adult nature of the themes explored, such as suicide, depression, and prejudice, we would recommend ‘A Silent Voice’ as suitable for ages 12 and above.

• Violence: 2/5 (nothing graphic or gory but some realistic fights – as in lots of pushing and shoving)
• Emotional Distress: 4/5 (Nishimiya rarely gets upset at her being bullied but does twice break down. A family death causes upset. Ishida suffers from suicidal thoughts and depression throughout)
• Fear Factor: 0/5
• Sexual Content: 1/5 (the ‘kitty cafe’ scene will likely go over the head of most children)
• Bad Language: 2/5 (various mild childish insults like ‘turd glasses’ – some mild cursing)
• Dialogue: 5/5 (a constant stream of passive aggressive abuse in the first 20 minutes followed by lots of emotionally charged dialogue)
• Other Notes: Deals with themes of depression, anxiety, panic attacks, suicide, bullying, prejudice, deafness and social isolation, guilt, teenage friendships, redemption, and unrequited love.

Words by Michael Record

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