'Your Name': A romantic, teeny-bopper version of 'Freaky Friday'

Big news in the anime world: The animated Japanese feature “Your Name” has recently overtaken “Spirited Away” as the highest-grossing anime film ever. Whether the new film can ever replace the Studio Ghibli classic in the hearts of that 2001 film's fans remain to be seen.

“Your Name” starts with a familiar premise: two Japanese teens — country girl Mitsuha and Tokyo boy Taki — find themselves repeatedly switching bodies in their dreams, leading to some predictably silly comedy regarding body parts, as well as the expected love story. But what sounds like a romantic riff on “Freaky Friday” soon turns into something stranger, as writer-director Makoto Shinkai introduces an element of time travel and the transmigration of souls that thickens, if not deepens, the plot.

The film's crisp and clean visuals are genuinely lovely, and they sharply render the distinctions between Taki's hectic urban life and Mitsuha's sleepy rural home. But a soundtrack featuring cheesy, power-rock ballads often overwhelms the pretty visuals. And the narrative can get a bit confusing.

At one point, Taki, while he is “possessed” by the spirit of Mitsuha, tries to find her — or is that him? — on the astral plane by drinking kuchikamizake, which is essentially the alcoholic fermented spit of Mitsuha. You may need a shot of that for any of this to make sense.

“Your Name” is still highly watchable, even when this mystical story cloys — or confounds.