Dragonfly
2023 · 14m · USA
Directed by Julia Morizawa
Genres: animation, drama, historical
Tones: contemplative, melancholic, tender
A young Japanese girl is guided by her brother's spirit through flashbacks of her family's life before and during the devastating Tokyo Firebombing of March 1945. A 2D-animated memorial inspired by the director's maternal grandparents.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
Everyone expects a firebombing film to be a sermon; Morizawa makes it a séance instead, letting the dead brother narrate as a formal constraint that actually *complicates* the memorial instinct rather than softening it—which is genuinely weird and worth watching.
The decision to filter Tokyo's destruction through a child's memory and a ghost's testimony places this film in direct conversation with postwar Japanese cinema and animation traditions; the formal restraint of the 2D work itself becomes an act of archival precision.
The framing device of the brother as spectral guide could've been mawkish, but Morizawa uses it to create spatial ruptures between past and present that a voice-over alone couldn't achieve—that single structural choice is what makes the flashback mechanics feel earned rather than expository.
Reviews
An unforgettable triumph. A harrowing yet essential reflection on loss, survival, and the spectral weight of history.
Julia Morizawa's Oscar-qualified 2D animated short… explores a young girl's discovery of her mother's survival during the Tokyo Firebombing.
Festivals
- Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival 2023, Premiere
- Maryland International Film Festival 2023, Best Animation
- Phoenix Film Festival 2023, Best AAPI-Directed Film
- DisOrient Asian American Film Festival 2023, Audience Award for Best Animation
- Arizona International Film Festival 2023, Jury Award for Creative Achievement
- Japan Film Festival Los Angeles 2023, Best Short Film
- Hillsboro Film Festival 2024, Gold Award for Best Short Film