Honami YANO's Chromosome Sweetheart (2017)
There are films like Honami YANO's Tokyo School of the Arts graduate film, Chromosome Sweetheart—films that live in complexity, ambiguity and uncertainty.
NOTE: This Monday short was originally posted on August 26, 2019. We are re-uploading some of Peter Hemminger's amazing Monday Shorts until further notice.
Additionally, Honami Yano also made A Bite of Bone, a film that showed at GIRAF17 and won a Jury Award Special Mention!
It's ultimately a personal matter, but I'd argue animation is at its best when it functions as poetry rather than prose. Especially when it comes to topics like love. There are any number of animated shorts that tell love stories as another narrative, using the medium to heighten emotion or stylize the characters. They pull at the heartstrings and can communicate powerful truths, but ultimately what they're telling is still a story.
Then there are films like Honami YANO's Tokyo School of the Arts graduate film, Chromosome Sweetheart—films that live in complexity, ambiguity and uncertainty. I've watched Chromosome Sweetheart dozens of times, and I still can't decide if it's optimistic or cynical about love, let alone piecing together an understanding of how all its vignettes fit together. But that disorienting rush of emotions—brief moments of tenderness, anxiety, heartbreak and elation—feel far more true to the experience of love than a straightforward story. It is complex, exhilarating and a bit gross, and what's more, it feels different every time I see it. It is inconsistent in the best sense of the word, and that's why it's so worth returning to.