Grave of the Fireflies (1988)
Toho Company | Release Date: July 26, 1989 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
94
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 16 Critic Reviews
Positive:
16
Mixed:
0
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
An emotional experience so powerful that it forces a rethinking of animation. Read full review
100
The GuardianSteve Rose
This animated Japanese masterpiece is a war story as wrenching as any live-action movie. Read full review
100
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
While a child might be affected by the film, it takes the weight of a certain number of years to fully absorb what director Isao Takahata has put up on the screen. Read full review
100
TV Guide MagazineRobert Pardi
Based on Akiyuki Nosaka's semi-autobiographical novel, Takahata's alternately sweeping and intimate animated feature is a moving depiction of the fates of cast-off children who become casualties of war. Read full review
100
Time OutStaff (Not Credited)
Grave of the Fireflies is not a film to be taken lightly. It is not even a film to be enjoyed. It is a film which demands – and deserves – total concentration and emotional surrender. The reward is an experience unlike any other: exhausting, tragic and utterly bleak, but also somehow monumental. Read full review
100
Entertainment WeeklyMichael Saulter
The film is so deeply sorrowful that it’s sometimes hard to watch, yet so filled with painterly beauty that you cannot look away. Read full review
100
The New York TimesGlenn Kenny
The movie remains one of the most startling and moving animated films ever. It is also, with the likes of “The 400 Blows,” “Kes,” and “Vagabond,” one of the finest films about being young in an indifferent world. Read full review
91
The A.V. ClubTasha Robinson
Fireflies makes its doomed subjects seem utterly human, with the wealth of personal details and believable characterizations common to Studio Ghibli's peerless animated films. Read full review
91
IndieWireStaff (Not Credited)
Fireflies is, at times, unbearably sad, a eulogy for a bleeding nation but also a hugely imaginative tale that reminds us of art’s power to lift us from the ramparts of our own devastation. Read full review
90
Orlando SentinelStaff (Not Credited)
It's a grim and depressing but powerful story, beautifully told through stunning animation. [25 Oct 2002, p.37]
90
IGNPeer Schneider
From its powerful opening line to the very end, Grave of the Fireflies is an important film that will prove to even the most stubborn naysayer that animated films can move you just like the "real stuff". Read full review
88
Slant MagazineChris Cabin
Isao Takahata makes survival the thematic core of the story, but he never degrades his characters or fetishizes their suffering. Read full review
88
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
Rivals the films of Hayao Miyazaki in elevating anime to the level of fine art. Read full review
80
The Observer (UK)Philip French
It's an accomplished, affecting, relentless work. Read full review
80
EmpireDan Jolin
A devastating heart-stab of a movie, this certainly isn't a family film. It is, however, a beautifully constructed, animated drama. Read full review
75
Miami HeraldJuan Barquin
Isao Takahata, Studio Ghibli's second best-known filmmaker and co-founder, adapts Akiyuki Nosaka's short story of the same name to great effect, using animation to create a film that emphasizes the horrors of war better than most live-action films. [21 Jun 2016]
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