Weathering With You is the latest film from Makoto Shinkai, the writer and director who shot to worldwide fame with 2016’s Your Name. Your Name was tremendous; it became the highest-grossing anime film at the time it was released. It was also the perfect distillation of Shinkai’s sensibilities: openly romantic, quietly profound, and every frame gorgeous. It’s tempting to compare Weathering With You to Your Name, since the films have many similarities. That feels unfair, though. Weathering With You is trying for something far more difficult.
The film takes place in a Japan beset by near-endless rain. Under a perpetually gray sky, Weathering With You follows Hodaka, a teenage boy who leaves home for Tokyo with no real plan other than…