★★★★☆
Kohei Kadowaki’s We Are Aliens is a visually stunning animated film that remains grounded and heart-wrenching, while offering an insightful look at friendship, love, and life.
The film tells the story of Tsubasa and Gyotaro, who become best friends in elementary school. Until one day, they have a falling out and become something of rivals, altering the course of their lives well into adulthood.
Kadowaki approaches the script in a way we rarely see: through a double narrative. The story starts over after the first narrative reaches its conclusion, allowing us to experience the same chain of events from Gyotaro’s perspective.
Yet there is a twist. While the timeline remains the same and the events overlap in both place and time, the experience feels almost entirely different.
The narrator changes neither the events nor how they unfold, but rather where the focus lies.
“The dual narrative transforms the same events into an entirely different experience.”
By doing so, Kadowaki showcases something incredibly subtle that often goes unnoticed: the different ways people interpret events and the varying levels of importance those moments hold in their lives.
He captures the essence of childhood friendship, the impact it has on us, and how easily those bonds can be shaken and broken.
The value of something seemingly invaluable is embodied through a simple paper ninja star. It not only forms a life-altering friendship but continues to play a vital role throughout it.
Their friendship ultimately falls apart over what is little more than an accident. While it could have been avoided, it stems from the kind of childish behavior that naturally occurs, forming a feud born from relatively small moments that follows them far beyond their youth.
Kadowaki’s attention to detail during the writing process allows him to revisit these moments throughout other aspects of the film, particularly its art direction, which he also oversaw in addition to directing.
Not only is the animation itself phenomenally executed, particularly in its character work, but so too are the color palette and the construction of the film’s world and individual sequences.
The visual storytelling, in the sense of what live action would consider cinematography, is equally exceptional. The selective use of angles stands out throughout the film.
“Phenomenally executed animation with exceptional visual storytelling.”
One of the strongest examples comes when the two boys stand beneath the towering metal power structure, where Kadowaki frames the moment from their perspective.
Another comes when Tsubasa watches Gyotaro press the eraser end of a pencil into his arm and imagines an alien invasion. The pacing and visual style perfectly capture the tone of the moment.
My favorite sequence, however, involves nothing more than a single grain of rice on the floor. The mother notices it, and what follows becomes an intensely effective moment, culminating in a phenomenal point-of-view shot from the floor, as though the grain of rice itself is looking up at the characters.
Yoshida Yaffle’s score, like the rest of the film, captivates and elevates. Yet it remains largely dormant throughout much of the runtime. Unlike many films that rely on constant background music to generate emotion or complement every scene, Yaffle uses restraint.
The score is sparse, but whenever it emerges, it does so with force and purpose, elevating each scene with precision rather than simply complementing it.
Kohei Kadowaki’s We Are Aliens crafts an animated film that captures youth, adolescence, and life in a way that few live-action films have. Animation allows the story to age its characters and play with time in ways that feel uniquely natural.
“Captures youth, adolescence, and life in a way that few live-action films have.”
It captures the pettiness of childhood arguments and rivalries—moments that may not be universal in their details, yet evoke the childish conflicts we all experienced. It captures our inability to move on and the misunderstandings that so often escalate and remain unresolved, culminating in an ending that not only resonates but stayed with me long after the credits rolled.
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