Running time: 23 minutes
Number of episodes: 13
Vintage: 2004-04-01 to 2004-06-17
Age rating: Mature (May contain sex, drugs, and extreme graphic violence)
Genres: Drama, Psychological, Romance, Slice of Life
Animation Production: A.C.G.T.
Broadcaster: KIDS STATION, TV Asahi
Music Production: Lantis
Production: Geneon Entertainment (USA) Inc., Geneon Entertainment, Inc., Rondo Robe, TV Asahi
Source: Anime News Network
Koi Kaze takes a journey into the mindset of two people very much in love but torn by the exterior pressures that they must face if their love should ever be the way they wish it to be. Before even trying to lay out the storyline, it’s important to warn you what you’re up against. Koi Kaze tells a gritty tale of two siblings who fall in love without knowing they were siblings when they meet several years after separating. They are then are smitten by the crime of forbidden love and work hard to suppress these feelings they have while trying to live a normal life together. I don’t necessarily condone incest in real life, but after witnessing the way things unfold in Koi Kaze as a fiction story, you can’t help but blind yourself to certain parts of this equation because of how true and meaningful the feelings these two people have towards each other are.
The main characters are Saeki Koushiro and Kohinata Nanoka. Koushiro is a 27 year old man that lives his life as a regular salaryman. He has never once in his life been truly affectionate about something or someone which has lead to his current slump. His girlfriend breaks up with him because she doesn’t feel like Koushiro really has feelings for her. Koushiro isn’t surprised by her actions because he himself doubts what he truly feels about her and lets her go easily.
One day on his way to work, Koushiro notices a cute 15 year old high school girl named Nanoka on the same train with him. The girl suddenly gets off the train once it reached a stop, but in the middle of pushing her way out she drops her I.D. card. Koushiro quickly fumbles through the chaos, picks it up, and gets off the train so that he can give it back. He calls out to her and she turns around to face him. In the midst of their confrontation sakura leaves blow right past them and in the few seconds it lasts they are in a profound sudden rush of emotion. They part ways with a smile once the good deed was done. As fate would have it, they meet again the next day when the same girl is passing by Koushro’s workplace by coincidence just as he’s about to leave. Koushiro received some tickets to an amusement park and he decides to give them to Nanoka. Nanoka happens to need to kill some time while waiting for someone so she decides to go with Koushiro. Thus, they end up taking a quick innocent date at the park. While they spend time at the park they slowly open up to each other and say the things that have been bothering them in their lives to cool off. The quality of the voice acting and the detail in the music helps transmit the emergent sensations that these two people feel and how they connect while being together at the park.
When the day is finally over and they are about to part their separate ways, a much older man yells at them from a distance. This man happens to be their father, Saeki Zensou. He’s happy that they are together and jokes around since he’s convinced they knew they were siblings and that’s how they ended up together. Obviously, Koushiro and Nanoka are really surprised by this and the path down a bumpy road begins from here.
Rather than focus only on the pure emotions these characters feel, the show instead takes a more direct path down the reality of two people in love. It’s not always about how they felt when they first met, or the beautiful things they may say, but the gritty truth that they just can’t be apart. In real life the layers of desire, emotion, and temptation all unfold in humanly ways, thus real life is not beautifully scripted like in a sugar coated fiction love story. In those stories characters say what they mean with certain levels of eloquence and confidence while also doing the right things that trigger the beauty of their profuse love; this doesn’t happen in Koi Kaze for the most part and instead we get to see a more rough yet truer transmission of feelings and emotion. The fact that people make mistakes and let their emotions get the best of them is not an understatement and it is well presented here.
While the show is very powerful and delivers an emotional drive of taboo love, once it ends it’s a little less explicit. I must say the end of Koi Kaze employs a level subtlety that’s very effective but may require re-watching to fully understand it. It won’t change your views on the subject matter at hand, but once you pick up on the details you’ll be able to piece it together and create your own conclusion. I really enjoyed Koi Kaze despite the shortcomings of assimilating a scenario of blood related siblings falling in love. The music and the voice acting helped elevate the delivery of quality on the whole package. If you can swallow the premise and accept the consequences, you will most likely enjoy Koi Kaze.
Opening:
Ending:
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