Your Name


Your Name is a 2016 Japanese animated romantic fantasy film written and directed by Makoto Shinkai, produced by CoMix Wave Films, and distributed by Toho. The first installment of what critics deem Shinkai's "disaster trilogy"—followed by Weathering with You and Suzume —whose three entries each share themes inspired by the frequency of natural disasters in Japan, it depicts the story of high school students Taki Tachibana and Mitsuha Miyamizu, who suddenly begin to swap bodies despite having never met, unleashing chaos onto each other's lives.
The film features the voices of Ryunosuke Kamiki and Mone Kamishiraishi as Taki and Mitsuha respectively, with animation direction by Masashi Ando, character design by, and its orchestral score and soundtrack composed by the rock band Radwimps. A light novel of the same name, also written by Shinkai, was published a month prior to the film's première.
Your Name premièred at the 2016 Anime Expo in Los Angeles on July 3, 2016, and was theatrically released in Japan on August 26, 2016; it was released internationally by several distributors in 2017. The film received widespread critical acclaim, with praise for its story, animation, music, visuals, and emotional weight. Until it was surpassed by Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Mugen Train in 2020, Your Name was the highest-grossing Japanese film of all time, with a worldwide gross of after re-release, breaking numerous box office records and dethroning Spirited Away. It received several accolades, including Best Animated Feature at the 2016 Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards, the 49th Sitges Film Festival, and the 71st Mainichi Film Awards; it was also nominated for the Japan Academy Film Prize for Animation of the Year.
A live-action remake is in development by Paramount Pictures and Bad Robot.

Plot

Mitsuha Miyamizu is a high school student in, a rural town in Gifu, central Japan. Bored of her provincial life, she wishes to be reborn as a boy from Tokyo. Soon, she begins to intermittently switch bodies with Taki Tachibana, a high school student from Tokyo's ward of Shinjuku. On certain days, the two wake up in each other's bodies and must live the entire day as the other, reverting to their own bodies when they sleep. The two set ground rules for sharing their bodies, communicating via writing on paper, their phones, and their skin. Mitsuha sets Taki up on a date with his coworker, Miki Okudera, while Taki helps Mitsuha become more popular at school. While in Mitsuha's body, Taki accompanies her grandmother Hitoha and younger sister Yotsuha to a Shinto shrine in the crater near Itomori, leaving an offering of fermented with Mitsuha's saliva. Hitoha explains that God is sovereign over both time and the connections between humans. Mitsuha informs Taki that Comet 279P/Tiamat is expected to pass nearest to Earth on the day of the autumn festival. The next day, Taki goes on a date with Okudera in his own body; Okudera enjoys the date but says she can tell Taki is preoccupied with someone else, owing to his unusual behavior. Realizing he is falling for Mitsuha, Taki attempts to call her, but cannot reach her. The body-switching stops as inexplicably as it started.
Taki, Okudera, and his classmate Tsukasa Fujii travel to Hida to search for Mitsuha. As Taki does not know the name of her village, he sketches its landscape from memory. A ramen-shop owner in Takayama recognizes the town as Itomori and offers to take the trio there. When they arrive, they find the town completely in ruins, having been almost entirely decimated by fragments from Tiamat. The comet having passed three years earlier, Taki realizes that he and Mitsuha were separated by three years, with her living in 2013 and him in 2016. At Hida City Library, the three discover that Mitsuha, her family members, and friends were among the 500 victims killed by the impact. Taki then begins to lose his memories of Mitsuha. Taki leaves his inn accommodation and rushes to the shrine at Goshintai to imbibe Mitsuha's. Upon doing so, he faints, undergoing a vision chronicling much of her life, and realizes that she once came to Tokyo to find him. Although he was unaware of who she was, she passed her crimson braid to him, which he has worn as a good-luck bracelet ever since. He then awakens in Mitsuha's body on the morning of the festival. Hitoha undergoes an epiphany upon observing "Mitsuha's" uncharacteristic behavior; speaking directly to Taki, she reveals that the body-switching phenomenon has been in their family for centuries. Realizing he has a chance to save Mitsuha and the entire town, Taki convinces Mitsuha's friends, Sayaka and Tessie, to assist in broadcasting an emergency signal to evacuate Itomori before the fragments strike. He then rushes to the shrine, where Mitsuha has just arose in Taki's body. As twilight falls, their timelines intersect, allowing them to finally meet in person. Taki returns Mitsuha's braid, and they attempt to write their names on each other's palms, but twilight ends before Mitsuha can write hers.
Returning to Itomori on foot, Mitsuha observes that the evacuation plan had failed. She then successfully convinces the mayor, her estranged father Toshiki, to order an evacuation drill. Beginning to forget Taki, she discovers that he had written "I love you" on her hand instead of his name. Taki awakens in his own time with no memory of Mitsuha.
Five years later, in 2021, Taki has graduated from university, but struggles to find a job: he is haunted by persistent feelings of longing and emptiness. He has continuously fixated on the impact of Tiamat, from which the residents of Itomori were miraculously saved by a fortuitous evacuation drill, but is unable to determine why. Eventually, on April 8, 2022, he glimpses Mitsuha, who has moved to Tokyo, on a parallel metro train, and they race to find each other. On the steps of, Taki calls out to Mitsuha, and the two simultaneously ask for each other's names, declaiming the film's title.

Characters

; Taki Tachibana
; Mitsuha Miyamizu
; Katsuhiko "Tessie" Teshigawara
; Sayaka Natori
; Tsukasa Fujii
; Shinta Takagi
; Miki Okudera
; Hitoha Miyamizu
; Yotsuha Miyamizu
; Toshiki Miyamizu
; Futaba Miyamizu
; Yukari Yukino

Production

conceived the film's plot following his July 2011 visit to the fishing village of Yuriage in Natori following the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. Reflecting on the devastation, he thought: "this could have been my town." He subsequently conceived an idea for a film in which the positions of the residents of Yuriage would be swapped with the viewers. During his visit, Shinkai produced various sketches, some of which have been displayed in exhibitions.
Shinkai delivered his initial film proposal to Toho on September 14, 2014, with the original title of Yume to Shiriseba, derived from a line in a attributed to Ono no Komachi. Its title was later changed to Kimi no Musubime and Kimi wa Kono Sekai no Hanbun before being finalized as Kimi no Na wa. On December 31, 2014, Shinkai announced that he had been writing the film's storyboard.
Inspiration for the plot was derived from various literary works, including Shūzō Oshimi's Inside Mari, Rumiko Takahashi's Ranma ½, the Heian period tale Torikaebaya Monogatari, and Greg Egan's short story The Safe-Deposit Box. Shinkai also cited influence from Christopher Nolan's Interstellar. Meanwhile, Shinkai and his team scrutinized their earlier work for reference, such as Crossroads, a television advertisement for Z-kai, and 5 Centimeters per Second.
While the town of Itomori, one of the film's settings, is fictional, the film drew inspirations from real-life locations that provided a backdrop for the town. These include the city of Hida and its library.

Music

The score of Your Name was composed by Yojiro Noda, the lead vocalist of the Japanese rock band Radwimps. Shinkai requested him to conceive its incidental music "in a way that the music will the dialogue or monologue of the characters." Aside from various instrumental tracks, Your Name features four songs performed by Radwimps:
  • "Yume Tōrō"
  • "Zenzenzense"
  • "Sparkle"
  • "Nandemonaiya"
These four songs were recorded in both Japanese and English.
The film's soundtrack was well-received by critics and audiences alike and is acknowledged as one of the factors behind the film's commercial success. It was runner-up in the "Best Soundtrack" category at the 2016 Newtype Anime Awards, with Zenzenzense being the runner-up in the "Best Theme Song" category.

Release

Your Name premièred at the 2016 Anime Expo convention in Los Angeles on July 3, 2016, and later was released theatrically in Japan on August 26, 2016. The film was released in 92 countries. In order to qualify for the Academy Awards, the film was released for one week in Los Angeles.
The film was also screened in Southeast Asian countries. Purple Plan streamed an English- and Chinese-subtitled trailer for the film, premièring the film in Singapore on November 3 and in Malaysia on November 8, with daily screenings onwards. In India, PVR Cinemas released Your Name as the opening film of the "Makoto Shinkai Film Festival" on May 19, 2023. M Pictures released the film on November 10 in Thailand, earning in four days. In Indonesia, the film distributor Encore Films and cinema chain CGV Blitz announced that they would screen the film, with the former hosting its première on December 7. screened the film in the Philippines on December 14, where it immediately became the country's highest-grossing animated movie of 2016. In Hong Kong, the film opened on November 11, earning in three days. The film premièred in Taiwan on October 21, and earned in its first week while staying in the first position in the box office earnings ranking. By October 31, 2016, the film earned in Taipei alone. It was released in Chinese theatres by Huaxia Film Distribution on December 2, 2016.
The film was released in Australian cinemas on limited release on November 24, 2016, by Madman Entertainment in both Japanese and English. Madman also released the film in New Zealand on December 1, 2016. The film was screened in France on December 28. The film, distributed by Anime Limited, was also released in the United Kingdom on November 18, 2016. The film, distributed by Funimation, was released in North American theaters on April 7, 2017. In Germany, the film was screened in over 150 cinemas in January 2018, being completely sold out on the first day. It ranked as one of the top ten movies of that weekend. Due to high demand, additional screening days were arranged.