Mononoke the Movie: The Phantom in the Rain (2024)

More than fifteen years since the Mononoke series (2007) and following a highly successful Kickstarter campaign, director Kenji Nakamura returns with not one, not two, but three feature-length anime about a nameless travelling ‘Medicine Seller’ in the Edo period, who always appears just when a supernatural, vengeful mononoke, feeding off human grudges, needs to be exorcised.

In an even more exuberant style, with every room lavishly decorated with everything from traditional ukio-e woodblock prints to modern abstractions and, once the fighting starts, an extraordinary excess of shapes, movement and expression – all drawn against the fibrous background of traditional Japanese washi paper. The Mononoke trilogy undoubtedly belongs on the list of ‘most overstimulating animated features ever’.

It’s surrealist, bordering on psychedelic, and some reviewers remarked that at home, you’d probably be reaching for the pause button to examine all this visual overload. Well, yes – but what could be better than letting go of this need for control and undergoing these fantastical explosions of images and sounds together in the cinema?

Meanwhile, in this first episode, you will also witness the tender blossoming of a hidden love between the young women Asa (serious, methodical) and Kame (playful, chaotic) within the Ōoku (harem) of Edo Castle, amidst all the court intrigue. A story about what happens when you sacrifice too much of yourself for the collective – and how the grudge will want its revenge.

Melkweg often hosts different types of programmes at the same time, such as concerts, club nights and films. Please note that there may occasionally be some noise pollution from other programmes during the screening.