We watched the Japanese ‘killfest’ Battle Royale a couple nights ago. My wife has been reading The Hunger Games series lately, and this movie is supposed to be similar (I haven’t read the books) in story.

I liked the movie but it is way gory. Kind of a ‘live’ anime in many ways, a sort of “lord of the flies” meets “any dystopian 70s flick” meets “Westworld” with over-the-top Japanese-style violence mixed in (how do those little kids know how to kill so efficiently)?

If you like this sort of thing, you’ll like this movie. If you don’t like kids dying within less than 10 minutes of the movie’s start – don’t watch it, your nightmares will begin shortly after you finish.

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I really want to see this. I don’t mind having to watch Initial D all over again (or alternatively, Wangan Midnight) – but we need MORE ‘driving anime’, people! 🙂

Scarecrow told me it’s not out on DVD yet but they will keep an eye out. It’s not on Amazon, either…..doh!

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Watched the anime Vexille (note: major spoilers in the Wikipedia link!) tonight, post-skiing. Vexille, named after one of the main characters, tracks the story of a completely isolated (diplomatically, physically and technologically) Japan; a malevolent plot courtesy of the internationally known Daiwa Corporation (makers of all kinds of advanced androids and robot tech); and the US Navy S.W.O.R.D. commando team sent to infiltrate Japan to figure out what’s going on after breaking up a secret meeting in the Colorado mountains. This show is kind of a mixed bag, however, for the following reasons:

1) The animation, done by the same team that did Appleseed, is good. I still think, however, that Appleseed was considerably more dazzling overall in appearance than this movie. Sometimes the visuals are very stunning, and other times they seem like the animated intro’s to a PS2 game or something (the ones you always skip past by hitting ‘X’ repeatedly so you can get to playing the actual game?). Also, in some ways this movie’s look seems to directly mimic Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within in a number of scenes also.

2) There are parallels in the plot between Vexille and Appleseed too – I won’t reveal them to avoid spoiling it, but on the bright side, this movie doesn’t have the heroine shouting ‘Briareos!’ over and over again like Appleseed does.

3) The Jags (metal-seeking ‘worm whirlwinds’ in the Japanese wastelands) are obviously a Dune sandworm ripoff, plain and simple.

4) The characters (excepting possibly Maria) aren’t really developed well, if at all – they are pretty flat and one-dimensional.

5) Finally, one of the last battles between Vexille and Kisaragi (Daiwa Corp’s resident mad scientist) is pretty unbelievable.

Wikipedia references other reviews that call out Vexille for going over ground already covered by Ghost in the Shell – I agree with that in some ways, but Vexille put a reverse twist on the whole ‘man vs. machine’ debate (central to many of these similar anime) which had potential but became fairly formulaic in the end, not unlike the recently reviewed Sky Crawlers. The quest for better anime goes on!

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Haven’t caught any anime recently, but with the vacation – woo ho! – saw 2008’s The Sky Crawlers this afternoon. This was directed by Mamoru Oshii, the same director as Ghost in the Shell and Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence.

The main characters are ‘Kildren’ – they are permanently young children, used to pilot/fight air battles in planes that look a lot like WWII-era fighters, but at closer range they are an amalgam of various fighters put together – One looks like a P-51 Mustang with Stuka wings, others like a love child from a LIghtning + a British Mosquito, the others are similar amalgams. The battles are apparently a ‘violence outlet’ for an otherwise peaceful society (this theme has been done before, think Rollerball), companies are the employers and stage the battles (which do in fact kill the pilots/etc.). The plot concerns the struggles of the Kildren in and around their lives and ultimate, inevitable fate (likely death in a dogfight).

While this is a beautifully animated movie – i’d put it up there close to Appleseed and others that seamlessly combine CGI (the planes, most of the backdrops and scenery) with animation (the people, some of the dogfighting when people are shown) – the plot is kinda lacking. There are a lot of slow background sequences which again – while very pretty – don’t really add much. Some of it you figure out later is implied and key to the mental state of the main characters – but a lot of it is kinda ‘surplus’ screentime.

It also reminded me of early episodes of Witch Hunter Robin – where the camera plays over the scene, people sit there, atmospheric or trippy music in the background, but some minutes drag by before anything happens. Hm.

If you already watch some/a lot of anime, you may like this movie – if you are looking for a ‘first anime’ to watch – this definitely isn’t it. Either of the Ghost in the Shell movies (or the two TV series) are better, Appleseed, etc. are all better intro’s to anime.

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As seen elsewhere on this blog, i’ve become a fan of anime in the past several years. I think there’s several reasons:

a) I’ve always liked animation, whether movies, TV cartoons, and in many cases, even ads;

b) the diversity of animation just keeps on getting better and more interesting, even if increasingly computer-based. Of course, just as seen in video games over the past 15-20 years, there is no substitute for actual plot, good writing and coherent themes with good character development. The best looking animation(s) can still end up boring and predictive without them (yes, Appleseed Ex Machina – I’m talking to you!);

c) I think in part anime is also interesting because so often the characters are written in a more over-the-top sensibility (certainly every Initial D episode i’ve ever seen qualifies on that score, but many others are right behind) and often have characters act as if they are in ‘life or death’ struggles (which in many cases isn’t true, but they act that way anyway).

d) Anime just has a different take on things. It’s not usually glorified sitcom situations or plots (at least not the anime I watch) and often has crazy inclusions for characters (Poipodor in Mars Daybreak comes to mind) or fantastical futures that all but make no sense (IGPX) but somehow still manage to entertain.

Which brings me to Initial D. This is an anime series about a school kid living in Gunma province in northern Japan, whose father runs a tofu shop and is an ex-street racer. The father, Bunta, subtly encourages this trait in his only son by having him deliver tofu to several accounts in the early morning over a mountain pass. The kid, Takumi Fujiwara, is fairly dense but seems to have a talent for racing and surprises older 20-somethings who race more seriously. In the first several series, we see Takumi’s talents develop until he’s the equal or better of most other racers in the area and beyond. In Stage 4, ‘Project D’ – he’s now become part of a traveling race team led by a former rival, Ryosuke Takahashi, who dreams of conquering japan’s many mountains and street racing teams with his brother Keisuke and Takumi as the two ace racers on the Project D team. They travel around Japan, challenging team after team in tough and varied races.

What’s appealing about this series is as mentioned before – the characters take themselves VERY seriously, which in some cases comes across as laughable but endearing in a way. You’d think the world would end if this kid doesn’t win a given race by the way they act in posturing against each other up to and during each race.

Also cool is simply the thought of blasting down mountain roads in souped up cars at clearly WAY illegal speeds – watching it on animation is about the only way i’d ever do THAT – I don’t like driving SLOW on cliffside roads – ask kerewin about that one when we were driving around on Crete or Santorini last fall!

Also amusing is how no matter where they go, everyone (racer-wise, anyway) knows about them and keeps putting the best racers up against them. Yet no cops ever show up to THROW THEM IN JAIL for such blatant mountain-racing at nearly every mountain pass they encounter? This was amusing in Wangan Midnight too – although in that series they are largely blasting around highways IN THE CITY at ridiculous speeds but also apparently immune to police (or at least, invisible)?

Anyway, Initial D is pretty entertaining – don’t expect detailed character development or much valid social commentary – it’s pretty focused on one thing, blasting down mountain roads in the middle of the night. But it does a good job of handling that story over and over. Hoping there will ultimately be a Stage 5, but time will tell…..

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So finally saw Speed Racer (the 2008 live-action version, not the original 60s anime) tonight. When this movie came out, I was definitely interested in seeing it, but then many reviews were middling to bad, so I didn’t. The Wachowskis are somwhat polarizing filmmakers these days, and have a lot to live up to (and live down) after the Matrix series went from excellent (1st) to good (2nd) to somewhat mediocre (3rd). But V for Vendetta was also excellent (IMHO), so whatevs – most other filmmakers would be completely jealous to have only a *couple* of those movies in their CV, after all.

Anyway, this movie takes in a lot of the original anime’s plot devices (yes, Chim-Chim is here) and I was definitely pleased to see a scene where they go through all the Mach 5’s special devices (but they never used the Ctrl-G ‘Homing Bird’? They used to use that all the time in the anime!). Racer X of course is key to the plot, and he doesn’t disappoint, either. The look of the cars varies from ‘shiny Hot Wheels surrounded by CGI’ to semi-real looking (when the humans are in them or driving them on “normal” streets).

The movie itself owes a LOT to Pixar (Monsters, Inc and The Incredibles most notably for the factory scenes and the Racer family neighboorhood/house/school/etc.). It also definitely takes from at least two PS2 videogames I own – Kinetica (robot battle-racing) and XG3: Extreme-G Racing (hyper-powered motorcycles with weapons) – both games are played on crazy tracks that soar up/down/multiple dimensions/aerial/underwater/you name it. Props must also be given to drift racing/dirt track racing in general (given the way they drive the cars almost horizontally a lot of the time) and the old standby – Initial D, which I’m sure the Wachowskis have watched at least most of. In the big rally race mid-movie, some of those crazy mountain races look a LOT like the way Initial D shows its crazy mountain racing (the latter’s animation being far more primitive, however).

Finally, there is a lot of IGPX here too (a recent anime from 2005) in the look and feel of the racetracks, especially the Fuji race – and the battling between the cars during the race.

As you’d expect, the races themselves are very well done and crazy to watch, and the movie doesn’t try to oversell the characters, either – unlike the mostly cheesy Racer family seen in the anime. I would say the Racers are as appropriate for the story as The Matrix’ characters – without the speechmaking every 15 minutes by Morpheus of course :). What was a bit sad was that actor Emile Hirsch (who plays Speed) was BORN the same year I graduated from high school – DOH! I guess you can’t win them all. The usual anime ‘challenges’ confront Speed and the rest to varying degrees – *almost* insurmountable odds, increasingly maniacal opponents, crisis-whew-bigger-crisis-whew, etc. – But it moves along fairly well and has a bit of fun even with camera asides in a few tiny scenes.

In summary, I was far more entertained by this movie than say, Avatar – even though the latter is of course way more advanced effects-wise. Even having seen some of the SR anime before as a kid (probably 30+ years ago) didn’t really spoil anything. This is a great movie, and i’d definitely see it again on the big screen (Cinerama or midnight movie at The Egyptian, anyone?) I watched it this time at home on my computer……

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So I finally watched Akira recently. This is one of the anime movies that started it all, way back in 1988. It shares many (now) typical anime plot devices (angry head cop going-it-alone against the system, devil-may-care central characters that live (and often die) completely in the moment, a post-apocalpytic Neo-Tokyo that has more than one section of the city living in all but anarchy, subtle yet pervasive technology throughout everything the characters see and experience, etc.) – many of these themes, however, originated in *this* movie, so small wonder these influences persist to this day – Akira is by far among the best anime I’ve seen to date.

Like the first Ghost In The Shell movie, this one doesn’t seem to have any CGI in it – given that TRON and The Last Starfighter weren’t too many years before this movie, the lack of CGI (or, CGI integrated into anime) isn’t very surprising. The scenery and drawings are fairly impressive with a meticulous attention to detail, and the characters are drawn with a wide range of emotion throughout.

There are definite external inspirations within Akira in turn. The super-bikes all the main biker gang characters own are obviously influenced by the TRON light-cycles (and 80s ‘crotch rocket’ street bikes from the real world of the same era). And there has to be a shout-out given to Escape From New York (and similar but far cheesier early 70s post-apocalyptic sci-fi) as influential upon the burned-out city in Neo-Tokyo.

Without revealing very much – essentially one of the main biker-gang members, Tetsuo, is inadvertently exposed to a mutant on the run from a secret army agency. This exposure (of course) begins to create powers in this kid and one can begin to predict what happens next – although it’s still not near as predictable as you might think, and just when you think the movie is ending, another plot twist moves in another direction – nice!

To repeat, definitely one of the best anime I’ve seen yet – others have amazing animation/CGI but largely flat characters (Appleseed); interesting stories that sadly create inherent plot contradictions over time that aren’t resolved (Witch Hunter Robin); or very simplistic (but fairly entertaining) plots in a completely fantastical setting (Mars Daybreak – all hail talking Belugas!). Akira stands way above all of those – if you only ever see one anime – make it this one.

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Generally speaking, I’ve loved animation since well, forever. Over the past several years, besides the rise of Japanese anime in US pop-culture, another worthwhile offshoot of animation has been a variant of (arguably) good ol’ claymation – except with Lego bricks. Saw this Lego Matrix homage today, reminded me of the White Stripes Lego video of several years ago – enjoy!

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Finally popped up on my hold list at the library, and was able to watch the original Ghost in the Shell movie (again – saw it several years ago once before) tonight.

While the first two GITS movies have the same characters but an almost completely different storyline than the two series and much later 3rd movie, it’s interesting now to go back and watch this one again, having seen all the rest. It’s obviously older – there isn’t any CGI in this one, all classic animation (although I guess it has since been remade itself and incorporated some CGI). The characters, excepting Aramaki, all seem somehow ‘younger’ – almost as if you are seeing The Major in her late 20s or something. It’s not impossible to believe that her merger with The Puppetmaster program by the end of this movie made her into the arguably colder, more calculating/mature and ‘older’ Major of the later series? Interesting to think about at any rate. Batou seems younger too, as if he’s all but ready to *tell* The Major he loves her, but as per usual, seems torn up about it? Hard to say. He’s definitely a colder fish in the first TV series, if not the second.

As the story here (and in the second original movie) are again, not part of the rest – seeing them before/after everything else is fine, you aren’t losing out – there are only really five characters here from the later series – The Major, Batou, Togusa, Chief Aramaki, and Ishikawa. Saito gets mentioned but they never show him, and Borma/Paz don’t exist here.

I think of the three movies, I like this one best. Its story can stand alone, even though of course it was easy to build a sequel and later series from it. Of the two series, the first one was better for me (see earlier post on this). Great stuff, definitely top-tier anime, for sure.

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Well, after 2-3 weeks of off-on watching, I finally finished the second Ghost In the Shell anime TV series – S.A.C. 2nd Gig. This series is a continuation from the previous Ghost In The Shell: Stand Alone Complex (see earlier post on that one here).

This second series is more of a political thriller than the first. Both series have a long story-arc that persists until the end, but they don’t seem to ‘explain’ as much in this one by the end – there are still at least a few motivations and actions I didn’t quite understand. There is more straight up ‘battle’ and conflict in this one too – and I liked the fact that they gave the other members of Section 9 (Paz, Boma, Saito and Ishikawa) a lot more to do in this series, than just focusing on the main four characters (Togusa, The Major, Batou and The Chief) as seen in the previous series.

There is a great villain in this one too – Kazundo Gohda, the head of the Cabinet Intelligence Service. Besides being facially disfigured and scarred (like all great over-the-top villains) this guy has plans within plans within plans, something every other main character finds out all too often along the way. While personally I thought The Laughing Man from the previous series was a more interesting foe for a variety of reasons – I had small hopes he’d show up in this one at some point – Gohda is definitely a man with a complex and hidden mission.

The main ‘anti-hero’ in this series Hideo Kuze, who remains at least in part a semi-major enigma. It would have been neat to see another episode of flashback(s) to his wanderings in Eurasia and how he came to his revolutionary stance portrayed in the series. They explore some of this through dialogue, but IMHO not enough. The Tachikomas even get a bit more to do – there are computer simulations of them used for the various episodes centered around computer hacking, besides their usual role as battle-backup for Section 9.

All in all, another great and interesting series – the animation is again excellent, The Major isn’t near as invincible in this one, and even Batou has to face up to a number of his own demons by the end.

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