“I stand in the wilderness of knowledge; it stretches as far as the eye can see.”
A Brief, Spoiler-Free Recommendation
529 days after its production was announced on August 7, 2017, I Want to Eat Your Pancreas (Pancreas for short) has finally opened in mainland China. At first, like many others, I was drawn in by a title with a hint of clickbait about it. Only later did I realize that, despite its slightly creepy title, this was ultimately just an ordinary story set in the real world.
The male lead, known simply as “Me,” happens to pick up a diary called Living with Dying at a hospital. This brings him into contact with its owner, Sakura Yamauchi, a popular girl in his class. A cold boy unwilling to socialize and a cheerful, terminally ill girl together write a story of youth, death, and love.
Reading the synopsis, I found that this rather formulaic opening already had me imagining any number of formulaic endings. But it also raised a question: what unexpected delights lay hidden in Pancreas to bring sales of the original novel to 2.6 million copies? And so doubt gave rise to anticipation. Only when I finally watched it did I understand what made Pancreas so skillfully crafted.
Death Is Only a Moment; Love Is Not
Pancreas breaks with the formula of stories of this kind. Take Looking Up at the Half-Moon, which I have read: again, a seriously ill girl; again, a meeting in a hospital; again, high-school students. And while Rika Akiba faces an operation with an extremely low chance of success, Sakura, the heroine of Pancreas, is certain to die from the outset. Yet the story goes in the opposite direction. What awaits Sakura is not a Prince Charming eager to care for and cherish her, but a classmate so cold that, even after learning of her illness, he offers not so much as a stock phrase of comfort.
That is only the first step in breaking the formula. Next, illness-related plotlines are stripped out of the main narrative entirely. Instead, the story turns to Sakura and the boy eating, drinking, and going places together. Through these episodes, two people who barely knew each other gradually come to understand one another and gradually open their hearts.
Romantic love is a ghost. That summer, the two shared a secret, went through a great deal together, and shared a great deal with each other. Yet the author never spells out how much distance remains between their hearts in the end. The boy’s coldness keeps all his feelings in check; any hint of romance in Sakura’s behavior can be softened by joking and curiosity. Perhaps even they themselves have not worked out whether they have seen the ghost called “romantic love.” The only thing they know for certain is that they want to be with each other.
It is this feeling, drifting like mist through the film, that fascinates me—and that shows how deftly the story is handled. It is easy to say they love each other, and easy to say they do not. But to capture the feelings somewhere between the two, and let them develop convincingly and find expression within a film, is no easy task. Here we can see the work put in by both the original author and the animation team.
A High-School Girl Who Embodies Youth
In the recently concluded SSSS.GRIDMAN, many viewers praised TRIGGER for giving Rikka Takarada so much high-school-girl appeal. But no two people are alike. Where Rikka embodies the charms of high-school girlhood, Sakura Yamauchi in Pancreas embodies her own youth.
Full of curiosity about the world and brimming with energy: this popular image of youth may be somewhat stereotyped, but that does not stop it from being something to aim for in creating a character. Nothing about Sakura leaves a stronger impression than the sense of youth she brings to the screen. She is lively and outgoing, stands up for others when they are wronged, and gives her young life a “rose-colored” hue by doing what she enjoys. That is precisely why she draws the boy, who has never had any part in such things, into the story of her youth.
But uncertainty and anxiety are also central themes of youth—all the more so for a terminally ill girl with little time left to live. Although the film says little about her illness, it is precisely those few remarks that quietly betray unease, those barely perceptible shadows crossing her face, that make the audience feel the anxiety beneath her smile more keenly and give her character greater depth.
Sakura’s youth comes through not only in her actions and thoughts: the animation also quietly conveys it through her appearance. If you look closely, you will notice that Sakura wears many different looks besides her usual school uniform and long hair falling over her shoulders. Twin ponytails paired with a dark jacket give her an energetic look. On her trip, carefully tied-up hair and dark clothes, complemented by a necklace and a watch, lend her a slightly more mature air. Then there is the look with her hair loosely tied up, a plain white camisole with two little pink cherries at the chest, and loose short shorts: relaxed enough for home, with a touch of cuteness. These varied looks also show a girl’s desire to look beautiful during her high-school years.
Her movements, words, and clothes together bring this girl, so full of youth, to life. To me, this is also the portrayal of youth that feels most true to life. If you meet a girl like her, why not try taking a couple of steps closer and experiencing her youth at its most beautiful?
In these few words, I can only touch on a little of what makes the film so good. Finally, I hope you will go to the cinema and experience the whole story for yourself, and hear that girl say those words—“I want to eat your pancreas.”
Editor’s Note:
A short review and recommendation, in the hope that more people will watch this animated film and explore the related works.
To my mind, the relationship between these two has certainly gone beyond an ordinary romance.
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“I Want to Eat Your Pancreas”: Behind a Seemingly Frightening Title Lies the Most Sincere Declaration of Love (Donghua Xueshu Pa / 动画学术趴)