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I actually really enjoyed this movie that I watched it twice. It's a coming-of-age type story, so I thought it was going to be extremely cliche and boring to the point where I could've guessed the ending halfway into the story.

I have to say that I'm not a big fan of the whole "rotoscope" thing that are getting popular nowadays, but the characters themselves make up for it and the "strange rumors" talked about in the synopsis are not just little teenage rumors; they're rumors about possession and weird, cult-ish activities.

I really liked this movie because Arisugawa Tetsuko (Alice) was a very interesting character. I ... guess some might say that there wasn't enough character development for her, or that the movie often strayed away from the main issue (which I assume is the investigation behind the school rumors). But in all honesty, the story deals with something bigger (such as the aftermath of divorce or the relationship between other people based on fundamental trust). I just thought that the whole mysterious rumor thing was to keep the story running at some pace. The people Alice meets along the way, though they might not be necessarily related to the "investigation" that she does, are related to her issues that she had of her moving and living with her mother in a small town that's seemingly boring.

Alice's struggles weren't really boring, in my opinion. It sounds boring, watching a girl just live her everyday life and facing mundane problems, but I think what's important to look at is not the plot, but the people themselves. The way her mother is, what she works as, and what Alice says to her, I felt, told a story itself. How she interacts with her father and Hana (her shut-in neighbor) told separate stories about each character as well. I think this movie follows a linear plot that's a bit weak, but the relationship that Alice makes between others reinforce it.

Overall, I would suggest watching the movie. It is silly at some points and some parts are a bit unrealistic and the rotoscoping is a bit heavy, but the characters themselves are rather well-rounded and I enjoyed watching the story unfold greatly.

I watched this anime recently; unfortunately I couldn't finish it, so I imagine many people will disregard this review, which is fine.

The reason why I gave "Mouryou no Hako" such a low rating is because of the scattered narration. I don't think a story should be scattered so much to the point where you have no idea what's really happening until the end. That's just not a great way to tell a story, no matter how "well" the ending might be.

I think one anime I could think on top of my head that does this pretty successfully is "Baccano!". But even when watching that ... anime, I could grasp what was happening after a couple episodes, and the ending, I understood the whole story (or stories) fully. The characters were understandable, and even with the story line not being linear, the show was still entertaining to watch. Watching "Baccano!" was like being handed jigsaw puzzles piece by piece so that I could put together each information without a lot of confusion over what the full picture looks like.

This anime just doesn't do that. It has a very, very interesting plot (dismemberment, murders, and cults!), but to make an already complex subject even more hard to understand by adding some sort of spiritual force and talks of "reincarnation" is just too much. I know it's based of a book or something, but the contents of a book and an animated show are completely different. There are some things too difficult to animate, and the book probably translated very poorly into the show. Watching this anime was like being handed a bunch of puzzle pieces mixed in with a bunch of unrelated items at the same time and flashing me what the completed product was supposed to look like at the end.

As for the characters, Yoriko and Kanako were both very strange characters. They were a bit irritating to watch, I didn't enjoy watching their conversations; it was just really absurd, and Yoriko's insistence that she was Kanako's reincarnation was not explained at all in the episodes I watched. Even if it was explained later on, it's just not a great idea to execute her character like that and expect viewers to feel like that's something to be simply accepted. Detective Kiba wasn't really that great either. None of the characters left a good impression on me.

As for the art and sound, I can't say much. I'm not too picky on those sort of things as long as the story stands. The characters look beautiful in certain scenes, and the animation seemed average.

I mean, all-in-all, I don't expect every show to spoon-feed the plot to me, but I do expect them to give me something in every episode that lets me understand some of the characters and the story. I just don't think that was achieved in this anime.

I watched the whole anime, thinking that it was going to get better in some way. Unfortunately, it just kept on spiraling downwards. The animation isn't that great, and I wasn't a big fan on how the characters were drawn either.

I know most people are probably taking into consideration that Harry was just a really, really indecisive, almost annoyingly awkward character. I'm sorry, but if the main character acts like that, it's almost impossible to like the actual show. I don't think I heard Harry say anything substantial the whole entire time, and there are episodes where the longest thing he says is "I ... would like a roast beef sandwich" or something like that. The rest is usually some sort of gasping or name reiteration. There's not a lot of redeemable qualities of the guy with the most screen time, which is one of the reasons why the anime tanks.

The concept of the story is actually very interesting, and the damaging effects that comes with Harry using his psychic powers are intriguing. But after a while, it's just really hard to watch through hours of people staring at one another and trying to keep up with what's happening in the crazy story line, only to have a vague conclusion after enduring everything that went on. I often wonder why I finished the anime.

Story- Story itself is pretty cliche. Those things run down in urban legends.

Art - This is actually one of a handful of horror mangas which I actually felt a bit uneasy. I think it has something to do with the artist's style, which deviates from the regular pointed chin, big eyed characters.

Character -The lady who stalks the main character is scary, and I believe the story itself is scarier that Ibitsu, partially because of how the story is drawn and for one of the characters in the story to actually be able to touch "zashiki onna", which made the lady become this sort ... of touchable being for a chapter or two, instead of the usual "mysterious, unstoppable being/spirit".

Enjoyment - The only thing I have to argue with is that the manga ends pretty abruptly. There's no full explanation for what has happened, which I imagine isn't really such a big deal in a genre such as horror. But still, when a story is being told, it would feel better if some sort of solid conclusion is pulled through.

I still re-read the manga from time to time; I like it because the artwork matches with the story. It's short and very strange, but there are a couple of strings that are left untied in the plot. But it's an interesting manga, overall.