Cute and simple, but it used clichéd short-cuts to tell the story and was ultimately not that memorable. I didn't feel like I wasted my time on this, and it did bring a gentle smile to my face, but I won't watch it again. You might enjoy it if you're in the mood for something gentle, innocent, straightforward, sometimes cute, and with a focus on parental figures and finding purpose.

The acting was decent but the actors weren't given that much to work with. Most characters are pretty 1-dimensional. We learn more about Yamato by what other people say about him in exposition than anything else. That's telling and not showing a story, so it's hard to feel emotionally engaged with it. The main character, Mitsuomi, fairs a bit better because the story follows him, but his character arc is, sadly, very predictable with nothing new.

The pacing is languid, which suits the characterization of the countryside vs the city, but the end wraps up so quickly that there's a noticeable imbalance in the arc of the story, character, and relationship progression. The soft cinematography with naturescapes as cut scenes suits the mood, but I can easily see why some people find this movie too slow.

The lead actors are able to convey a basic, growing friendship with unexpected curiosity for more, but the screenplay gives them very little beyond that. The character interactions are written simply so there's not much depth to their self-discovery and not much sense of romance.

Using instrumental British Isle folk songs (like The Water Is Wide) for the background music was an interesting choice. It goes with the countryside theme, but it felt odd to me. Probably because my mind could'nt disassociate what I recognized from the culture it came from to let it blend fully with this Japanese story.