Komada: A Whisky Family Review — Scotland Loves Anime 2023
Studio P.A. Works have a formula for their “Working Series”, and Komada: A Whisky Family is their fifth installment — albeit in relatively shortened, movie format. Every previous entry in the loosely-linked series has included a 24-to-26-episode TV anime, starting in 2011 with Hanasaku Iroha (sequel movie in 2013), and continuing in 2014 with the very popular Shirobako (sequel movie in 2020), 2017 with Sakura Quest, and most latterly in 2021 with The Aquatope on White Sand. Generally, each story focuses on female characters and their trials and tribulations in their various workplaces. Amongst the drama, setbacks and heightened emotions, the Working Series is renowned for impressive attention to detail, evidence of deep research and a convincing sense of reality. Komada: A Whisky Family is no different.
Now, for a Scotsman, I guess I’m quite unusual, for I have next to no interest in whisky, or any alcohol at all, for that matter. Scotland Loves Anime compere Jonathan Clements told the audience in Edinburgh that they’d decided to disqualify the movie from competing for the Audience Award because they felt that the predominantly Scottish audience would be heavily biased towards a film about their national drink. Whether this was true or not I’ve no idea, but my lack of personal interest in the Golden Aqua Vitae did not impact my enjoyment of Komada, for it provides an interesting and educational look at an industry about which I’m mostly ignorant. At only ninety minutes duration, it’s one of the shortest of the 2023 festival’s movies, so it doesn’t stay past its welcome. It’s concise, though of course much less expansive than its Working Series predecessors.
Of the whole Working Series, the only other I’ve watched is The Aquatope on White Sand, which I enjoyed. I covered it a few times during the time it ran, and you can read my thoughts as it progressed here, here, here and here. My fellow AniTAY writer and editor Declan Biswas-Hughes wrote an excellent piece on the anime as linked below, while I also covered the show on that season’s AniTAY’s collaborative article. It was a popular show amongst our merry little band of weebs!
As much as I would love to watch Shirobako, there’s currently no way to legally stream it in the UK, and it never received a blu-ray release. Thankfully the good folks at Anime Limited have seen sense and are due to release a Shirobako Collector’s Edition blu-ray set sometime in 2024. I really hope they bring the movie across too, because although it received a couple of showings at Scotland Loves Anime back in 2021, I don’t think it had a wider release. Hanasaku Iroha doesn’t currently stream in the UK, but I own both volumes of MVM’s UK blu-ray release (unfortunately no film sequel for us.) Both Sakura Quest and Aquatope continue to stream on Crunchyroll.
Komada: A Whisky Family follows two characters — first the rookie journalist Kotaro Takahashi who works for a Tokyo newspaper (or magazine? I’m not completely sure.) He’s assigned to cover a series of interviews of prominent whisky producers conducted by a prodigious young whisky expert — the female protagonist Rui Komada. Kotaro is completely ignorant about whisky, and hardly endears himself to begin with by making a multitude of ill-informed mistakes that even someone as alcohol-indifferent as me knew were idiotic. (Calling a whisky distillery a “brewery” isn’t likely to win you many friends, for example.) He really keeps putting his ignorant foot in it so many times, it’s a wonder that Rui or one of her employees doesn’t lose their rag and stab him repeatedly. It’s not that kind of movie, however.
Only in her early twenties, Rui has made a name for herself by taking over the Komada family distillery and rescuing it from closure. During the 2011 Tohoku earthquake their buildings were heavily damaged, and they lost the precious casks used to make their bestselling unique blend “Koma”. After her father died from overwork and her elder brother left to work for a rival distillery, Rui returned home from Art School to run a business she’d never previously shown an interest in. Through sheer effort and determination she grasped the mechanics of the business and with a new blend made from the remaining casks of surviving whisky, she saved her family’s livelihood.
Rui is adored by her employees, who band together to keep the Komada distillery running despite knowing they could easily get better-paid jobs elsewhere. Kotaro’s underappreciation of Rui’s skills and personal sacrifice cause sparks to fly between him and the other distillery workers, especially as he is drafted in to work at the distillery as part of his mandatory research. Thankfully, Kotaro does eventually develop something of a clue, and even becomes instrumental in helping Rui pull her business back from the brink of unexpected disaster. Kotaro even helps to mend the fractures in Rui’s family.
Even with such a short runtime, Komada: A Whisky Family manages to cram a lot of information about the whisky distilling industry — from the distillation, casking and maturation procedures, to the incredible complexities of blending multiple malts. I found the whole thing pretty interesting, although it felt longer than its runtime, and I was glad it finished when it did. I suspect a three-hour-long whisky-drenched epic would have bored me to tears. Despite the huge amount of technical language and the fact that at least fifty percent of the dialogue involved discussing the uniqueness of the fictional “Koma” blend, I still found it easy to follow, and to care for Rui and her family business. I especially liked Rui’s hilarious way of recording notes about various blends (I won’t spoil it here, but it got one of the biggest laughs of the whole festival.)
My son and daughter who attended with me were underwhelmed by the film. Perhaps they were exhausted after a long day, and it was the fourth movie we watched within a very short space of time. However, Komada: A Whisky Family just isn’t in the same league as the other Scotland Loves Anime 2023 movies. That’s not to say it’s not a fine movie. It’s totally fine. But it’s also not significantly more cinematic than most of P.A. Works other admittedly very pretty TV anime. It’s not as spectacular or as emotional as Lonely Castle in the Mirror, nor as relentlessly funny and surreal as The Concierge, nor as inspiring and uplifting as Blue Giant. Perhaps it’s unfair to judge it on these terms, but of all the weekend’s films, it was my least favourite, the least memorable. If I was a whisky fiend, my opinion might be different. I can’t see myself watching it ever again, though. I don’t regret the pleasant ninety minutes I spent watching Komada: A Whisky Family, however it didn’t leave much of an aftertaste.
I’ll be back soon to write about something completely different — Galaxy Express 999 The Movie, which received its UK theatrical premiere at Scotland Loves Anime in 4K restoration, over forty years since its original release. Keep an eye out for it!
Komada: A Whisky Family
Directed by: Masayuki Yoshihara
Screenplay by: Yukito Kizawa and Soue Nakamoto
Music by: Tatsuya Katou
Character design by: Tomomi Takada
Studio: P.A. Works
World Premiere: 11th June 2023, Annecy
JP premiere: 10th November 2023
US premiere: not announced
UK premiere: 4th Nov 2023
Runtime: 91 minutes
Language: Japanese audio with English Subtitles
BBFC rating: 12A
