NYICFF’s '5 Centimeters per Second' is kid-safe, mother-approved porn

Makoto Shinkai’s, [5 Centimeters per Second], which screened this weekend during the [New York International Children’s Film Festival](http://www.gkids.com/), is a chain of short stories following the three loves of Takaki Tono.  There’s 13-year-old Akari, who braves a hopeless train ride in a blizzard just to see him one last time, high school classmate, Kanae whose connection to him is so strong, it slowly chips away at her emotional stability and Risa, a nebbish office worker who, three years after their break-up, still sends him text messages declaring her unshakable devotion. 

Instead of harnessing this power and using it to talk vulnerable young women out of their panties, Takaki becomes increasingly introspective. He is a distant, solitary figure whose head is either hanging down in sorrow or pointed skyward for long periods of oblivious star-gazing. It’s essentially a film about unrequited love and the endless possibilities of youth, but considering it’s subtitled and done almost entirely in inner monologues, it’s a rather amusing choice for a children’s film festival.  About 40 minutes in, when it became obvious that there would be no juvenile hi jinks, one kid turned to his mother to ask “Is this Mulan?”

I regularly surveyed the theater to see how the rest of the audience, half children with their parents and half 14-year-old girls, was holding up.  The kiddies stared up at the screen from their mother’s laps, surprisingly alert, if not a little bored, while the girls eagerly clenched their fists in anticipation as the story quietly unfolded. Apparently, Takaki had worked his magic on them as well.  A pair of young boys began sitting Indian-style on the floor to my right, chins on their fists pointed intently at the screen, but they soon began to wilt.  It didn’t take long before they were completely horizontal, huddled together like tired puppies.  When the credits began to roll and the house lights came up, one of them stood, sighing to the other impatiently: “Finally!”

I’m not a huge fan of anime (or movies about young love, for that matter), but there was something about 5 Centimeters that I really enjoyed.  Perhaps it was because, for a movie with no sexual content, it is rife with sensual imagery: majestic sunrises, train cars rocketing down their tracks, cherry blossoms falling from the sky.  Even the wind is in on the action, tousling hair and clothing into post-coital disarray.  

Was this my dirty mind in action or was Shinkai intentionally portraying sexual activity in a contextual, kid-friendly way?  I eventually got my answer during a particularly heavy emotional climax, when a rocket—one that minutes earlier Takaki and Kanae stood staring up at in drop jawed amazement—suddenly shoots into the air.  For that one moment, it’s the only thing Takaki can focus on as he forgets about the needs of Kanae, who is in the middle of complete emotional collapse.  Watching it plunge deeper into the atmosphere, it leaves behind a trail of smoke that resembles a thick rope of ejaculate.  I can safely say that it’s the most powerful moment in the film, and his interactions with Kanae—as out of control as she may be—make her chapter of the story the most memorable.  So, basically, crazy sex is the best sex.  I guess it’s a moral you can never learn too early.