‘The Colors Within’ Marks a Fresh Challenge for Animator Naoko Yamada

Naoko Yamada makes films about experiencing emotion. All of her characters feel everything on the emotional spectrum, basking in the highs and finding beauty in overcoming the lows. Yamada often trades in bittersweetness; her 2016 masterpiece “A Silent Voice” is a study on overcoming self-hatred, and 2018’s “Liz and the Blue Bird” is a story about letting go of the people you hold closest. Her new film, “The Colors Within,” is different, distilling the joy of experiencing art, community and spirituality into hand-drawn animation. 

“The Colors Within” was a fresh challenge for Yamada. “It’s an original story, and I had to create everything from scratch,” she told IndieWire. “It did take more effort, but it was very satisfying. I was moved by the whole process. Before, I wasn’t the type to want to make original films, I wasn’t that type of creator, but I realized how fun it is to work on an original.”

Set in a Catholic girls school, “The Colors Within” follows Totsuko, a girl who sees people’s inner colors, or auras. Yamada looked to subvert the expectations of a character like Totsuko: “She’s a believer, but she’s also just a girl,” Yamada said. “It’s not like she’s going to be a good Catholic girl the whole time, her heart is going to fluctuate, how she acts is going to fluctuate.”

Those fluctuations are enhanced when she meets Kimi and Rui, aspiring musicians with whom she forms a band. The music they make isn’t rebellion against a stifling environment, but instead is another outlet for Totsuko to express her spirituality. Yamada believes she unconsciously aimed to link the transcendence of religion with that of art. “Religion is key to how she senses the world and how she feels in the world,” she said. “It is very interesting how that connects with music, it’s not something that you listen to, but that you experience. Perhaps I was trying to connect those two elements. I think that’s what me from three years ago was saying.”

Animation is an act of collaboration, and for “The Colors Within,” Yamada found herself returning to acclaimed studio Science Saru, with which she worked on the 2021 series “The Heike Story.” “I’ve been working with the same staff [since starting “Heike”] and that has given me comfort in working on this film,” Yamada said. “Their teamwork and the trust we have in one another was so important for the movie. If you compare their show ‘Dan Da Dan’ to ‘The Colors Within,’ the style is completely different. That really showcases how much of a powerful studio they are. All of the staff have this pure passion for the art of creating.”

‘The Colors Within’GKids

Despite “The Colors Within” taking a more muted approach to drama compared to Yamada’s previous projects, themes of isolation, friendship, and infatuation continue to be present in them all. “I try to separate my work from my personal preference,” Yamada said. “But I think the characters that the audience sees represent what’s important to me, what’s inside my heart. It’s something that exists quietly, but what elements do you express outwardly, and what parts do you keep inside, just to yourself? Loneliness, friendship and infatuation. I think those are really important keywords to me.”

Crafting a character that feels real and tangible is a difficult task in the heightened world of animation, but Yamada has a graceful way with it. “The audience has to see them as if they actually exist,” she said. “When they’re watching the film, they need to think, ‘Wait, this is animation, right?’ Because personally, I don’t see them as drawings. I think that I’m a director holding a camera actually filming real people. If I can convey that to the audience, I think that’s what makes a good character.”

Developments in animation technology have made for better integration between traditional styles and CG, a dichotomy that is a hot topic in the west but, according to Yamada, isn’t a thing in Japan. “I’m surprised, coming to the United States, there’s a lot of interest in the war between CG animation and hand-drawn animation and the future of animation,” she said. “I’ve actually never really thought about it, so I’m curious why Americans are really interested in that battle. For me, when you work with CG, any physical movements or the camera lenses become very perfect. It’s too perfect. I think the allure of animation lies in the mistakes that come with it.”

Because of this, Yamada thinks that the world will never stop embracing 2D animation, “Disney used to always do these hand-drawn films,” she said. “In Japan, we were really shocked when we heard they fired a bunch of hand-drawn animators, but I think now they’re returning, and I’m really happy about that. I do think hand-drawn animation is something that we can never let go.”

GKids will release “The Colors Within” in select Los Angeles theaters December 13. The film is set for release across the U.S. on January 13, 2025.