#26 - I LOVE Arashi No Yoru Ni - 22/08/2025
Oh my god i need to talk about this.
So this passing Monday on August 18th, I spent my time in a voice call with friends late at night for a movie night. Now, being all over the place nowadays and having a lot on the brain, let alone life, having a movie night nowadays is rare for me so I really banked on this. Especially so, as the movie that was due to be watched was something that for the longest of times, I had been recommended for YEARS: Arashi No Yoru Ni, aka, One Stormy Night. I sat down at around 11 at night with a hot chocolate in hand, spending the next few hours of my night watching.
And oh, my, god, it's changed me.
I mean, how often is it that a movie grips me so much, has me so invested, smitten...and makes me cry? Audibly, mind you, on CALL with friends?
FUCK.
I actually wrote a review of the movie on letterbox, which you can read here, but i'd like to just sort of ramble on my thoughts. I want to hold onto the feeling that this film has instilled within me. Some random little thoughts, since the film has officially become my latest hyperfixation, and something that I don't think will ever be apart from me. It's rare for a film to genuinely make such a deep mark on me.
For starters, this film is just fucking gorgeous, visually - it's an animated film which occasionally combines some small use of CGI (that blends in quite well, mind you), but just the way that things are framed and the way that the palette is so vibrant when need be and grim and dark when need be in other situations is so beautiful and nice. It especially goes well for the character designs, especially the main characters, Mei and Gabu. OH MY GOD I LOVE THEM SO FUCKING MUCH, AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH. LIKE, MAN. Mei's design is just goddamn adorable: small, fluffy, fur that has so much texture to it. Mei's level of expressiveness is genuinely adorable too, and when it's placed within certain situations later within the film, it's such a beautiful and hard hitting, emotionally hitting contrast to Gabu (who's a Wolf and the second main character to Mei being the first) - it also really hits given that you expect that from a glance at stuff like just photos of the character or the poster for the movie, or just from remembering in-grained tropes or being influenced by such things, that you'd assume Mei to be this shy but aloof type. Yet, the movie flips your expectations on it's head and Mei is actually quite a collected yet omnipresent character with this quaint, gentle voicework by voice actor Hiroki Narimiya. Ill speak on the voicework in a second.
Meanwhile, Gabu, I LOVE HIM A LOT TOO. Your expectations or assumptions from past media and seeing wolves in other media prior to this plus photos of the character would make you assume he's this evil, antagonistic type or he's sly, but Gabu is actually a very soft-spoken, goofy character who's instinctual traits are just because of the species he is rather than him really wanting to do anything like that in particular to Mei. His voice actor, Shidou Nakamura II, does this really brilliant job of creating such an aloof character that flips the tropes and expectations of what you assume on their head. Getting into the voicework, the entire voicework for the movie is phenomenal, with Mei and Gabu having such gorgeous chemistry. The way these two characters interact is so beautifully natural, so well-orchestrated, so well done and well scripted that it's genuinely soothing and entertaining to just see the two interact and seeing the pair of them evolve over the course of the film and become close feels so...right. Like, I won't say anything spoiler-centric, obviously, but there imo is no way to view this film in a heterosexual way, the way that Mei and Gabu are combined with the story and the general basis of what happens, given that they're naturally prey and pred to each other yet they deny instincts to be "secret friends" together, it's incredibly queer in such a gorgeous way. Like, the original book that the movie is based off of has Mei as gender-neutral apparently, but the movie went out of it's way to make Mei male, which imo is a VERY CODED choice.
The soundtrack of this film is something that is also so well done, so fitting of the mood and so strong. I'd genuinely like to own a copy of the soundtrack, if such a thing exists. But honestly, the way things are composed fits the deeping emotional stakes that rise and rise as the film goes on, with some really choice decisions making all of the existing elements hit so deeply. I love everything about this film, but the combination of beautifully done animation, excellent voicework and chemistry between Mei and Gabu and how their voice actors handle their roles and how intense and deeply emotional it gets with all of that, how fresh the way they use the predator/prey dynamic in a story setting and the way things are paced, and just how things come full circle in the end, it really deeply hits. Again, not saying spoilers here, but god.
This movie made me cry at it's ending. On a voice call, in a movie night. This is something im a little shy over, mainly because I can be a dumb guy with my stupid sense of pride at times and I get a bit hung up on appearing big and strong, which isnt what I wanna try doing all the time, but, alas, that's a different conversation. But being so overwhelmed with emotion and being so deeply smitten by this film has hit home to me in a way that I havent felt from a piece of media (aside from Deltarune) in a while. Especially a movie - like, recently, I actually watched the matrix films for the very first time in full. I will discuss these at somepoint, as to be honest, I have a lot of thoughts about the matrix films, especially that of the first one and ressurections (which I actually think is better than how most people think of it - a lot of people generally have written it off far too much). The point i'm getting at, is that while I loved the matrix films, they didnt hit these big emotional stakes for me in the way that Arashi No Yoru Ni/One Stormy Night. Even Source Code, which is a film i've loved for ages because I'm a big fan of simulation/unreality stories, it didnt hit big emotional nerves in me like the former did.
I havent sobbed at an animated film in a while.
But it quickly made a place within my heart, and ever since, IVE BEEN OBSESSED. I've dug around the internet for as much information as possible, learned about the fact that this film is quite smitten and popular in a lot of circles, how there's a tie-in manga, how there's a...cursed tv-animated series with an admittedly "alpha and omega"-style to it (not in a good way), and how there was a book in the book series that this film was based off of, that got released not too long ago! But Gabu and Mei...AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA SO CUTE SO CUTE SO FUCKING CUTE I LOVE THEM BOTH DEARLY!!!!! LIKE, I LOVE THEM SO MUCH I FEEL LIKE ID DAMN EXPLODE LMAO
Like, it makes me deeply happy that these two are so fuggin cute together, that people have drawn them all cuddly and snug together, that people see how heavily queercoded this whole thing is; but...in a way, I sort of feel...seen. Like, I don't know how to describe it, but it's such an atypical film in a good way. But as a person within the queer community myself, two male partners, comfortably poly and snug with my two hubbies (love you both <3), it's kind of nice to have a film that, sure, while it doesnt outright say that the pair of them are literally homosexually gay in that way, their bond is beyond that of a normal friendship and what they go through is so deeply coded that I can't help but feel that this seems to be a recurring pattern within Gisaburō Sugii's work. Night on the Galactic Railroad has a few elements that feel particularly coded in the same way, which makes me want to know about the man's thoughts on this kind of outlook on the films he's had involvement within.
As it stands, I'm in love with Arashi No Yoru Ni - there's really not been an animated film, aside from Night on the Galactic Railroad, that's hit me so deeply. Arashi No Yoru Ni hits deeper than the latter, in this particular way that I can't fully ascertain, but a feeling that I feel deeply resonant with. Resonant, that's the word that i'd describe the film as, with me. I'm currently cooking up a cute piece of art involving Mei and Gabu, as i've had the spark of inspiration lit under me. I said this to my partners, I said it to close friends too and even the people I had the movie night with, but it's so rare for me nowadays to have a lit fire in my soul for drawing. It's not that I lack motivation to draw, it's not that I hate drawing either or anything of the sort - I draw because to be honest, I just feel like doing it, but I don't have THE SPARK often as of late. That's mainly due to the fact that I have a lot on my mind about life and the like and i'm trying not to generally just go existential about my life - if I get too in my own brain about things, then i'll probably just be perpetually miserable. So, I just keep going and living life day by the day. And when it comes to drawing, I sort of go automated about it, but it feels so good to feel inspired and to have such a spark when it comes to art. And this isnt the only time I intend to draw the two~
This is kind of added on to the footnote, the little crumb about myself that I put in the section above, but, being an adult is weird at times as it sort of feels like I can be running on automatic; there are aspects of my life that I don't feel like are automatic, that light me up with happiness - my partners, my friends, my good family connections, my passions, they make me full of love and hope and joy. But between those, I'm sort of just trying to get back into this good headspace that I feel I need to be in to handle living after being terminated wrongfully from my now ex-job. But what I'm getting at is that life can sometimes be like I'm sleeping while awake, walking like i'm running, sluggish while im speeding, like I'm just aimlessly continue to do things without actually enjoying life. Again, the joyful happy things like my partners and whatnot, they break through the brain fog and I feel happy. But it's weird, to feel like im running on automatic function. My partners, movies that hit me deeply like Arashi No Yoru Ni/One Stormy Night, they make me awake, in a way. When my brain is full of fog, the happy things cut through the fog like a knife and I feel like i'm really alive. It's nice.
I want more experiences to make me feel like this.
Perhaps the autumn season will make me feel this too. I hope, anyway.