LIKE:
The friendships developed due to the love of music.
The message: never give up, believe in yourself and you can achieve anything.
Music score was nice and the repetition was limited for their competition song.
Location shots, lighting, cinematography.

DISLIKE:
Directing: Many overly long pauses or lack of anything happening/being said. Whether delayed reaction or change of scene or someone thinking, all of it was very delayed causing pacing issues. At the end the face of the ML, his expression looked like he was about to take a big poop or die of a heart attack. It didn’t match the moment.

Writing: The coming together at the end, was ridiculous in a few ways, especially the dancing and celebrating being so comedic. That just didn’t fit the atmosphere that was created. Almost like they were ridiculing the efforts of those involved. (Trying not to give a spoiler). The writer tried to create romance with a few characters, but it was just thrown in, especially with those at the end. Had there been more backstory then that could’ve been done, but wasn’t really needed. Very cliche/usual trope with predictable ending.

Production: Shaking camera, which tried to show POV, but it didn’t work or fit.


OVERALL: It was nearly as good as expected, like a bad version of Aogeba Toutoshi. This movie’s teacher had very little impact, even though they tried to make him more human towards the end. Time management became an issue, as noted in my dislikes and that took away from what could’ve developed the story and characters. It was cute, average and not something I will watch again. If this is your first viewing of music/school/youth genre, then I recommend it. If not, I wouldn’t bother watching.