Mind Game

Mind Game (マインド・ゲーム, 2004) is a 103-minute Japanese animated film you can watch online on iFILM, and the feature debut of director Masaaki Yuasa. The visual language alone is worth the runtime: hand-drawn animation cuts to photo collage, live footage bleeds into watercolor, and the frame rate lurches between stillness and pure frenzy as the story demands.

Nishi is a young manga artist who can't get anything right. He runs into his childhood crush at her family's small restaurant, and within the hour he is shot dead by a yakuza enforcer — the most undignified exit imaginable. What happens next involves a negotiation with God, a second chance, a high-speed chase, and eventually a whale. The film does not slow down to explain itself.

Yuasa builds something that swings between slapstick, grief, and outright visual hallucination without losing its emotional center. If you've seen his later work on Devilman Crybaby or Lu over the Wall, this is where the instincts were first fully let loose. Stream Mind Game online on iFILM.