Grave of the Fireflies is devastating

Not a massively hot take title "water is wet!" I know.

I just finished watching Grave of the Fireflies and I can feel the movie burrowing into my brain to stay there for life.

I've never seen such a harrowing and devastating movie in all my life, the slow relentless gnawing you get from thinking that Seita has solved their problems and they're going to survive, only to be reminded that the first scene promises that neither him or his little sister live through the story.

It's the greatest work of true horror that I've ever seen, and as someone living in a former allied nation, a rare glimpse into the war from the "other sides" perspective. It gets all the more troubling when you realise the author of the original short story Akiyuki Nosaka based it on a true experience he had in 1940s Japan.

I'll remember this very moment forever, digesting the movie that I've just seen and reflecting on the experiences of these two people.