Saikano (live action movie)

Genre: Drama, Sci Fi
Score: Good (anime version: Excellent)
Rating: 15 for warfare, mature issues and some nudity
Length: film

Shuji has just started going out with Chise, which makes his life complicated enough. One day he and his friends are shopping in Sapporo when it’s bombed by a foreign aggressor, signalling the start of a major war. Something small and fast destroys the enemy planes, and slams into the ground near him – which is when Shuji finds that Chise has a great deal to do with this war.

As so often happens when a complicated story is shoe-horned into a film, a great deal gets missed out here, but they’ve done a pretty good job. The actors are right for the parts, the effects are fairly convincing considering.