A Few Moments of Cheers Anime Film Review – Review

When it comes down to it, A Few Moments of Cheers is a film about the artist’s struggle. The film is focused on three artists: Kanata (a 3DCG artist), Yu (a singer), and Daisuke (a painter). Kanata is at the beginning of his career. He’s happy and hopeful. He’s mostly making videos for self-satisfaction—just for the love of his art. Meanwhile, Yu and Daisuke are in a much different place in their artistic journeys.

Yu is almost entirely unrecognized for her art. She has tried for years to get her big break. She’s uploaded a hundred self-written/self-produced songs but has never once gone viral. She’s facing the reality of the post-internet entertainment world. With things like YouTube, anyone can be discovered. However, while this means she has a chance, she’s also the smallest fish in an infinitely large pond. No matter how good or passionate she is, there is every possibility that she will never emerge from obscurity.

Meanwhile, Daisuke is a kid who achieved moderate success early on. Even in high school, he is viewed as a rare talent. However, he suffers from people only seeing his talent, not the enormous amount of hard work he’s put in. Worse yet, he’s realized that he might not have what it takes to make it big—that no matter how hard he works, he might never be able to make it to that next level.

Yu and Daisuke are facing what may be the end of their art. This film is about their pain and suffering and the looming decision they face: is it time to finally give up on their art—something that has been such a personal part of themselves for so long?

Mixed within this drama is an interesting little look at the difference between making art for yourself versus for others. By the very definition of what he wants to make—i.e., music videos—Kanata’s art requires collaboration. However, he doesn’t quite understand what this means. While he listens to the songs repeatedly and works hard to create visuals to fit, he is more concerned with his interpretation than the original artist’s intent. Kanata can’t remove himself from how he views the world (with hope for the future) to see how someone like Yu sees her music career. Much of the film’s conflict revolves around Kanata’s struggle to see beyond himself and grow as an artist.

As the movie’s plot is focused on making music videos, it goes without saying that music is a vital part of the film. After all, if Yu’s songs aren’t good enough to move the viewer emotionally, how can we believe that they affect Kanata on such a core level that they lead to him shifting his entire worldview? Luckily, the music in the film is on point—especially “Mimei,” the song that draws Kanata and Yu together. The acoustic version, in particular, puts Yu’s astounding singing voice on display perfectly—and shows her crippling emotional pain through sound alone.

Unfortunately, the visuals do little to keep up with the quality of the music. The entire film is done in a 3D, cell-shaded style. Frankly, it looks like a mid-2010s, fan-made Hatsune Miku video. On the one hand, I see what the creators were going for with this choice on a thematic level—this film is about an amateur 3D artist making videos in exactly this kind of art style, after all. However, on the other hand, it looks cheap and plain bad for most of the runtime. Details on both characters and backgrounds are lacking, and the over-reliance on two-tone shading throughout only makes things worse. Outside of the climatic music video sequence, it’s not fun to watch visually.

All in all, A Few Moments of Cheers is one of those unfortunate cases where the animation tanks the whole film. The story and its exploration of what it means to be a struggling artist are well-realized. The actual direction is well done (there are more than a few awesome shots throughout), and the music has at least one earworm that you’ll be listening to on repeat. But none of that changes the fact that the film is an eyesore. If you can get through the trailer unbothered, by all means, watch this film. However, I won’t blame anyone for tapping out.