Before I start this review, I have to admit that my boyfriend and I have already watched this movie previously, but my sister 
A Silent Voice // Koe No Katachi
A Silent Voice is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Yoshitoki Ōima and became a Japanese animated film produced by Kyoto Animation, releasing on September 17, 2016. The movie is directed by Naoko Yamada and written by Reiko Yoshida.
A Silent Voice is a story about forgiveness, not just forgiving others, but forgiving yourself for the mistakes you have made in the past. Over the course of reading this series, you will cry, you will laugh, and you will hopefully gain a new perspective on some aspects of life. - Source
The movie starts with the main character, Shōya Ishida, counting down the down the days till he commits suicide. The day he decided to kill himself, he was standing on a bridge ready to jump off when he heard fireworks go off. This started a flashback to when he was in 6th grade, he was known as the class clown and had a group of friends. This was the day that he gets a new classmate.
She enters the room and her teacher introduces her as Shouko Nishimiya and asks her to tell the class more about herself. There's a pause in the room as no action is made by her or any of the other classmates. The teacher taps her shoulder and she takes out a notebook that was previously written on. The notebook explains that she is deaf, she cannot hear and she asks the class to communicate through the notebook.
At first, they're curious about her, wanting to know more, but after a while, they find her an easy target for bullying. After a year of bullying and throwing around her hearing aids, Shouko still wants to be friends with Shōya yet he doesn't want anything to do with her.
Shōya ends up paying for this tenfold. His so-called 'friends' had ratted on him for playing with Shouko's hearing aids, damaging or throwing them away. His mother, who wasn't in the best place financially, had to pay for the damages and she came back with a bleeding ear.
Since then Shōya learns to put up walls and to block other people out, this is shown by a big purple X on each of the characters faces. The only face that has never had an X was Shouko and her family. The X is shown throughout the movie as someone who Shoya does not wish to acknowledge or socialize with.
Flashback ending, he decides to go to Shouko's sign language class so he can feel clean of his conscience. He meets her for the first time since 6th grade and she's understandably scared. He tries to make peace with her, showing the same sign she showed him all those years ago asking - Can we be friends?
There's much more in this story but I truly do want you to watch and experience this movie for yourself. You can watch two adorable characters stumble their way across love meeting quite a few bumps on the road. Something that both me and my boyfriend adored was when she tried to confess her feelings but instead, she said 'I lub moo' and he thought she meant the moon. Although the second time we watched it, the words were changed to suki, meaning the moon.
One thing is known, both Shōya and Shouko hate themselves for their past. Shouko hates herself because she feels as though she's only been a burden to those she cares about. Shōya hates himself because he believes he can only bring bad to the world and hates himself even further because of what he did to Shouko.
During the night of a festival, there were fireworks that were burning bright in the sky. Shouko and Shōya had spent time together and talked a bit more, he had accidentally used the sign that meant 'together' but her response to it was that he would only be sad with her. She excused herself saying that she needed to study and departed, her younger sister, Yuzuru, asked him to grab her camera for her.
Making his way to their apartment he notices Shouko standing on the balcony railings. He quickly rushes towards her in hopes of stopping her but he stumbles and falls onto the ground. Looking up he sees that she's no longer there on the balcony. I don't want to spoil it, it's too good for that!
Final Thoughts
This was such a beautiful movie, the art, the characters, the story behind it all was just all very thought out. I haven't read the actual manga, but, as usual, the book is claimed to be better than the movie. I highly recommend this movie, it's a movie that you can go back to and still learn more about. The ending was a bit of a coin toss and you're left with an unsatisfying finale depending on your point of view, but the story in itself was breathtaking. I've barely scratched the surface of this movie and I truly hope I can encourage others to watch it also so they can form their own opinion on the movie.
Rating: 9.7/10
For those of you who may have already watched the movie, I found a great AMV on YouTube based on Koe no Katachi. The music in the background is called I'll be Good by Jaymes Young.
Sources:
A Silent Voice - Manga
A Silent Voice - Movie
Notebook
Can We Be Friends?
Purple X's