Movie Review: Kara no Kyoukai 4 - Garan no Dou

Finished watching the movie a week ago but only find time to write something now. Continued with the second episode, the story starts with the cry of the ambulance, Shiki is in the car and being sending to the hospital, with blood all over her red Kimono.

Dark room with those lights twinkling like some kind of hell, I think this is probably the best description I can find for how Kokuto felt at that moment.

The story does tell us why and how Shiki got hurt, but we might have a little guess, and in some part of our mind, we’ve already known. Recall those memories of the second episode, Shiki was about to kill Kokuto and the episode stopped here. What has happened? And right now, all we can see is the sadness on Kokuto’s face, I guess he wishes to be the one that gets hurt.

Shiki’s been in the hospital for 2 years, unawakened. In the movie, we can see nurses helping Shiki to keep the her body functional by massaging for her. It seems very hopeless to me when I look into the nurses eyes, and I don’t want people I care to be in that kind of situation.

Kokuto at that time was only a high school boy, with his affection towards Shiki, probably something more than that. But to him right now, Shiki seemed to be a untouchable dream, splited by fate.

But Kokuto never gives up. He went to hospital to visit Shiki every week in the coming 2 years while she keeped sleeping as before. I do not double what the nurses said in the movie that Kokuto is someone who deserve something more than a appraise, and how the nurses kept showing envy on Shiki.

While Shiki was in the hospial, lots of things were changed, another Shiki inside Shiki was gone, forever, and she didn’t even realize that, or resisted to realize that.

Kokuto, to me, is an optimistic guy and I really think that’s the way he’s unique. Two years later, Kokuto has already graduated from high school, and what we’ve already known from the first episode that Kokuto’s now lives along since he had a fight between his parents for the university things (I think this is also because of Shiki’s still in hospital). We can see the expression on Kokuto’s face when the day he attended the graduation ceremony, lonely and solitude. But to Shiki, it’s the same, since she’s now alone.

Nurses in the hospital have already known the boy who comes to the hospital for two years, non-stop. But to Kokuto, I think he’ll keep on visiting Shiki, no matter how long it’s gonna take.

Actually, I’m very interested in Kokuto’s life in the past two years those the story does tell me a lot. What I know, apart from the acquiantance with Toko, the magican who has great influence on Shiki and Kokuto in the coming life, and to me, this is really another version of Shiki Tohno (遠野志貴, the hero in Tsukihime, another master piece of TYPE-MOON) and Aoko Aozaki (蒼崎青子). Apparently, this is how Tsukihime was created.

Interested in how Kokuto met Toko, some information was released in the first episode, but that’s totally not enough. Better to read the novel after finish watching all the episodes.

Some girls in Japan are really fond of Toko’s style, probably because she’s cool, and partly knowledgable.

The story mostly focus on Kokuto and Shiki, at least in the first few episodes (congratulate, Azaka is about to become the main character in the 6th episode), it doesn’t tell me a lot about Toko and she’s quite an interesting character.

I still remember in the first episode when Toko said that how Kokuto found her and has great interests in puppets . Just happened to know that Toko is the sister of Aoko Aozaki, surprise.

The puppet below is quite alike Shiki and that’s why Kokuto was deeply fond of her, probably.

Two years later, and finally, Shiki woke up, with shock and chaos.

With the ability of the so called Mystic Eyes of Death Perception (直死の魔眼, Chokushi no Magan), Shiki is able to see inherent mortality of everything in the form of lines and a single point which is shown by having a rainbow-like color in her pupils.

However, to a person who had slept for two years woke up only to see though lines and rainbow alike stuffs, this is a terrible shock.

Shiki’s always tough on her face, but this time, probably the only time that I can see fears and solitude. To most of the girls, I really don’t have much problems with this. But to Shiki, I think she needs to beat up though she looks cute and beautiful at this moment.

With the ability of her eyes, she touched those flowers and they were “killed”.

Shiki was scared and had no way to control her ability. Whilst every time she looked at people, she saw those lines the dead body of them. And that’s why she tried to make herself blind.

Kokuto was told that Shiki woke up. However, due to her unstable status, he’s not allowed to visit her. Sadness in his eyes.

Nasu Kinoko, the author of the novel didn’t tell us a lot about the story between Kokuto and Toko, as well as how Kokuto got to know about Toko’s ability. But she’s here, on her way to cure Shiki.

Meeting Toko the first time, Shiki quickly found out Toko is not a doctor and Shiki was shock whilst Toko told her that she’s now alone.

Shiki finally noticed that another Shiki inside her was forever gone and all “he” left behind was an empty hole (Garan no Dou, this is how Toko descripe it).

Shiki looks graceful with her long hair, pity that she cut it at the end of this episode ^^

When Shiki recovered from the two-year sleep, she didn’t remember anything, even thing about Kokuto, all she left was an empty heart.

Kokuto didn’t change a lot in two years, wearing his black glasses as before.

I think Shiki was able to see things even with the bandage on her eyes.

No idea who the woman was, probably Shiki’s mother.

This scense seems to be the same with what in the second episode, purple flowers in the rain, but at that time, Shiki was standing beside Kokuto.

Just as Toko said, Shiki had killed too much (probably another Shiki), the only thing Shiki scared at that moment is the death of herself and this is ridiculous so how.

Shiki had no ideas about her ability of the eyes and she was about to make herself blind. Toko, arrived just in time to save her.

Toko thought it was probably the right time to tell Shiki about her ability and how to control it.

The movie showed at the same momentÂ Kokuto was singing a song, one he used to sing when he was with Shiki in the rain.

Though Shiki might don’t how what she was since she had lost her memory, she did remember something about a boy, and his name was never able to recall.

Finally the action scense began. It started with a dead man (looks like mummy) breaking into Shiki’s room and was about to kill her. Though Shiki’s been resting for two years, she did move and jump like a cat.

It’s the first time the movie shows us what Toko is capable of. I think the whole Nasu Kinoko’s novel background setting is almost the same, say, Fate/stay night and Tsukihime, and the magic systems are identical.

And finally, Shiki decided to fight, with her extraordinary ability. At the moment she loosed her bandage, she looked really cool and I started to feel like, wow, Shiki was finally back.

Fighting scense with a mummy. There’re few action scenses in this episode, and there will be plenty of them in the next episode which lasts about two hours.

As I mentioned above, Shiki really looks graceful in her long hair, and now she’s about to cut them with her knife.

Though Shiki looks good with long hair, she’s way spectacular with her short hair ^^.

Get rid of your diry hand.

When Shiki’s back to who she was, there’s blood all over.

Shiki looks really cool, but in her eyes, there’s nothing but cool.

The spirits of the mummy flow into the sky.

However, Shiki overlooked the mummy and the spirits rushed into Shiki’s body.

Shiki was controlled by the spirits and was about to kill herself.

“‘I’ll kill the weak me! I won’t give you Ryougi Shiki!”

My favorite line of this episode.

I don’t know how this works, but it does tell us something about Shiki’s ability to kill without hurting herself.

Shiki finally accepted Toko’s invitation and decided to work for her and at the same time Toko would tell Shiki about her ability and how to control it.