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Hiro tends to Miyako when she has an accident moments after stealing Hiro's bicycle.
It sometimes amazes me that more anime do not take advantage of the fact that animation is a visual medium. A lot of shows are just there, visually; others look damn good. But then there are the shows that do not stop at looking sharp and beautiful. They have ambition. They understand that books tell stories through words, while anime tells stories through images. Sure, the characters speak, but if the viewer is actually going to watch something unfold in front of his or her eyes, then shouldn't the show take advantage of that? Of course. Ef - a tale of memories is a series that pulls no stops in telling its story with breathtaking, often heartbreaking visual delights.
A tale of memories is an adaptation of a visual novel that follows three main storylines that occasionally intersect. In one, an aimless student named Renji Asou (voiced by Motoki Takagi) meets a girl with a tragic past, Chihiro Shindou (Natsumi Yanase), at an abandoned train station, and he strikes up a relationship with her. Another follows a love triangle among Hiro Horono (Hiro Shimono), Miyako Miyamura (Hiroko Taguchi) and Kei Shindou (Junko Okada), the sister of Chihiro. The final main story involves Kyosuke Tsutsumi (Yuuki Tai), who wants to become a filmmaker, and decides to make a movie with Kei as the subject.
The stories may sound ordinary and cliché at first glance, but the developments, and the way those developments are told, cut straight through to the heart with often surprising sharpness. As a 12 episode series, a tale of memories does not waste much time meandering around -- if it ever seems as if it is, the show is liable to pull the rug out from under the viewer and shake things up with a brilliantly executed twist in one of the stories. Sometimes it can be surprising just how much happens during the course of the series; a tale of memories packs as much into 12 episodes as many series can manage in 26.
One reason for this is that it is clear from the outset that the production studio, SHAFT, has a clear vision for how the series should unfold. The visual quality and depth of visual storytelling is outstanding. A tale of memories pulls no punches in its use of visual metaphor, composition and surrealist imagery to get across the intensity of the emotional turmoil these characters feel. Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the series' visual storytelling is how a tale of memories so often uses simple techniques to perfectly complement and enhance the story. One simple example of this is how a shot will occasionally be held far away from the characters to emphasize the emotional distance between them during the scene. The way scenes are set up are so much more cinematic than the average anime series.
At its best, the voice acting (which is generally excellent), plot and visuals combine to make moments that would be good in an ordinary series magical and devastating here. One such scene comes at the end of episode seven: It takes a simple concept -- a lonely person sending text messages -- and through the combination of powerful acting and a simple visual technique (having the messages appear and slowly overwhelm what happens onscreen), that ending becomes one of the saddest, most painful moments in a tale of memories. (One other thing I should also mention -- that bit involves a character who, up until that ending, I did not care for much, which makes the scene all the more remarkable.)
The only real weakness of the series is that things wrap up maybe a bit too nicely at the end, but the way each of the stories turns out could hardly be called bad, so it is a minor quibble. Ef - a tale of memories is what anime at its best should strive to be -- lean, strong and wonderfully ambitious. It has a good cast of characters, damn good seiyuu, a good plot and storytelling ability that many series could learn from. Apparently the show received mixed reviews when it first aired during the fall 2007 season, but how this happened is beyond my capability to understand. Ef - a tale of memories is a visual, vibrant breath of fresh air that should not be missed by anyone.
As a parting gift, here is ef - a tale of memories' excellent OP, "Euphoric Field" by ELISA. Watch this, and you will get a feel for how the series works, visually. (This is the Japanese version of the song, which was used during the final episode of the show. For eps 2-11, the English version of the song is used.)
