Theme is Bonds

kadiotatsuryu

Naruto Shippūden The Movie: Bonds was a very hyped up movie because of the rogue ninja himself, Sasuke. To be honest, it was an enjoyable film, but not one I can necessarily rave that much about, so this won't be long.

All chaos breaks loose at Naruto's home village, Konoha at the hands of the Sky Ninja. The movie is basically about a mini war between Leaf and Sky. Also, Naruto, Sakura and Hinata are sent on a mission to a village and meat a girl and her sensei. So that's the main plot. The title of the film generally matches the central theme of the film, hence why Sasuke himself makes an appearance, despite having "severed" his bonds" with Naruto, Sakura and Konoha. Just in case, hat's not a spoiler by the way, Sasuke is in the film. He plays the typical role of an anti-hero; not on the good side but having a common purpose with it, on Orochimaru's orders.

At the same time, this girl Amaru works on her bond with her sensei, who encourages her dream to become a good doctor, despite her gender. She admires him a lot, as is further shown after countless battles and trials, though she has a tomboyish punk personality and lashes out at Naruto a lot. But as with I think pretty much all Naruto movies, Naruto makes it his personal mission to try and change someone's attitude. Plus, some weird biology seems to keep going on with Amaru and they've gotta find a way to stop or suppress some strange demon called the Reibi, or Zero-Tails. Another issue to add is how Konoha can deal with the airborne attacks of the Sky Ninja.

Animations are decent in this movie, similar to those used in the previous Shippūden film. Action is okay of the most part. This movie also has one of the longest end battles among Naruto movies, possibly depending on weather you count the end as one big fight or two. Mine is not the latter. You get to see some awesome fighting, mostly taijutsu and what Naruto can do against such a dangerous opponent with his own power and will. He emphasizes on the significance of love and bonds. He's pretty rouged up at the end just in appearance as he keeps fighting. I suppose Amaru is in a way an encouragement to young girls who want to be doctors. Jiraiya is a huge influence on all of Naruto's actions in this movie. And we get to see a nostalgic duo that most Naruto fans have been dying to see fight side by side.

So overall, action was okay I guess but got really awesome at the end, animations were decent, plot was well done but not phenomenal. If you exclude the central themes that is, every Naruto movie has a theme...still unsure about Blood Prison's theme, but I'll figure it out and you'll see when I review it!. Here, it is bonds, which is also a fairly big theme in the canon plot of Naruto. I wish I could give my score in decimals, not sure how to yet, but whatever. I give this film a review of 9/10...more or less!

score /10

kadiotatsuryu 28 April 2014

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw3006229/