Short Peace (2013)

Short Peace (2013)

Directors: Katsuhiro Otomo, Shuhei Morita, Hiroaki Ando, Hajime Katoki

The more I dig into the world of anime films the more I find, sometimes I find treasures, and sometimes I find pieces of coal that need to be refined. You know how that goes, one film leads to another! Case in point, while exploring Japanese animated anthology films like Robot Carnival (1987) and Memories (1995) I learned that Katsuhiro Otomo the creator behind Akira(1988) was involved in directing one of the shorts in yet another animated anthology film called Short Peace (2013), so of course I was salivating at the prospect of seeing this film, the talent involved is composed of masters in animation.  I went into this one knowing next to nothing about it save for Otomo’s involvement, so this one could go either way. It could be a treasure or a piece of coal. So which was it?

Short Peace is composed of four stories that are connected by one theme and one theme alone: Japan. It was kind of tricky for me to grasp what held these four tales together, but the fact that they all take place in Japan and that that they all seem to focus on Mount Fuji when they end kind of led me to this conclusion, also because nothing else joins these stories together, they are quite disparate in nature. Reading up a bit about the film, they focused in Japan during different eras, so one takes place during feudal times, one is in the future, one is in the present, but the one that takes place in the present is actually a video game, because part of the marketing scheme for this anthology was to also release a video game along with the film.

Sadly I didn’t really fall in love with this anthology like I did with Memories (1995), Neo Tokyo (1987) and Robot Carnival (1987). My main problem with it was that the stories are not very engaging. Short stories should get to the point quickly; they should give us a lot of information in a very short time but with a quick jolt to the system. Now when you simplify the story to the point where there’s not enough meat to the short, well, you’re left with a short that you don’t connect with because it’s too simple, it feels like padding, like you are stretching it for running time. On Short Peace the stories are either too simple and end abruptly without proper closure. Short films aren’t meant to leave you hanging, they should start and end and tell their story all within their 20 to 30 minutes of running time; sadly that doesn’t always happen with the short films in Short Peace. To me they were very uneventful in a way.

Now this is not to say that the animation isn’t astounding, quite the contrary, on a visual level the film is solid. It’s the content that needed a bit more beefing up; it needed more weight to it. As it is, with some of the shorts here you’ll feel like you walked into a movie already in progress and by the time they end you’ll feel like you left the theater without seeing the ending. Take for example Katsuhiro Otomo’s ‘Combustible’ a short film about a young man who always wanted to be a fire extinguisher in ancient Japan. Technically speaking the short is impressive because it’s animated in a way that it looks like ancient Japanese scrolls, which is extremely interesting from a  visual angle. It’s a tragic love story that builds up to something, yet ends up never delivering, leaving you without closure. Suddenly, boom, it’s over. What happened to everybody and everything? Combustible had potential, but failed to deliver in my book. And this was the segment directed by Otomo! It was the one I was most looking forward to! And while innovative from a visual stance, story wise it was missing a lot. 

The film isn’t a total loss because there were two stories on it that I enjoyed a lot. The one called ‘Possessions’ was actually nominated for ‘best animated short film’ and it’s about this traveler who is walking around the forest when a storm breaks out and he has to shelter himself in this little hut, which just so happens to be haunted. This one was visually stunning, with a very unique look. They used computer generated images which were made to look like traditional animation. The whole idea behind this short is that old, used things are requesting their validity in this world. Suddenly a bunch of old umbrellas come to life, piles of garbage become steam spewing dragons and a piece of silk cloth becomes possessed by the spirit of a woman. Here’s a simple story that gives us everything we need, a beginning, a middle and an end and we’re left happy because the short says something and it entertains. Also, the colors on this one are beautiful. This short was awesome all around.  

The other one I loved was the one called ‘Gambo’ which is, again, a simple story about this small village that’s being attacked by a giant red demon that starts killing villagers and the soldiers who are trying to stop him. Thankfully, there’s a giant white bear who serves as a protector to this village and so at one point it’s all about Gambo the white bear vs. The Red Demon. I liked the concept of this huge white bear serving as a protector to this small village, he seems like a pure, gentle soul that at the same time won’t hesitate to rip your throat out if need be. This short is awesome looking because it has this sketchy vibe going for it and also because it has this one really gory, gory scene which just went on forever. Gambo proved one thing again, this film is composed of pretty visuals with not a whole lot of meat to them.

The last story in the anthology is the one called ‘A Farewell to Weapons’ and it’s about these Japanese soldiers who go around deactivating old weapons from an ancient bygone war. Their job is to go in, deactivate and collect old war robots. Technically speaking it’s an awesome short, the animation has a unique look and the designs are awesome, especially those suits the soldiers wore? With all their technical gadgetry, they reminded me of the suits in Robert Heinlein’s Starship Troopers. On this short there are a lot of explosions, a lot of lasers and gun shots, but sadly it doesn’t feel like an important story. It just feels like a day in the life of these soldiers. It has a pacifist message which didn’t go unnoticed by this viewer; it’s just that I didn’t care much for anything that was happening in it. It felt like I was seeing a scene from Call of Duty or something, only I wasn’t playing it. Personally, there’s nothing more boring to me then following soldiers around, I don’t know, I expected something more exciting. This one was sort of boring in a way, worst part is they end the movie with this one, so the film ends on this boring short. 

So yeah, I guess you could say I was half way disappointed with this one. I mean, Katsuhiro Otomo equals excellence to me, so I expect nothing but the best in terms of production value, which is what I got here, a good production. But I do think that producers should request excellence in the writing as well the visuals or else we get an anthology that’s half cooked, missing in one department. Stories should have some weight to them, if they don’t simply entertain us, then they should move us and entice us, and not just in a visual level. On the other hand, this is a very Japanese film, perhaps there are certain aspects of their culture I’m not connecting because of that? Yet, if that was the case, why haven’t I had a problem with any other number of Anime films I’ve seen recently? Films tend to play with universal themes that we can all connect with, no matter what part of the world they are from. Sadly, as evidenced by some of the stories on this short film, blandness is also universal. This is not the worst anime anthology I’ve seen, it’s a quality production with beautiful visuals and animation, there’s no denying that. It just needed to be more engaging. So it’s the classic case of style over substance.  

Rating: 3 out of 5     

Heavy Metal 2000 (2000)

Heavy Metal 2000 (2000)

Directors: Michael Coldeway & Michel Lemire

Voice Actors: Julie Strain, Michael Ironside, Billy Idol

It took eight people to write Heavy Metal 2000, the film I will be reviewing today, and you know how that goes, the more writers a film has, the worse the movie is going to be! And this movie had eight writers! Was the resulting script a disaster? Or did these eight writers achieve their goals of making a movie that paid tribute to one of the greatest sci-fi/horror magazines on the planet? So anyhow, this is Heavy Metal 2000 (2000), the sequel to the animated cult classic anthology film Heavy Metal (1981). Now if you know anything about the original film, then you probably know that it’s composed of various stories, all done by different animation houses. This amalgamation of talent yielded an melting pot of short films with some of the worst and some of the best animation you will ever see, so it’s interesting in that sense. Nothing stays the same for very long, just when you think you’ve had enough of a particular short, soon another artistic style and voice takes over. The soundtrack on Heavy Metal is a memorable one, including many awesome rock and roll bands from the 70’s and 80’s. Today I review the sequel, Heavy Metal 2000. The thing to remember while watching this sequel is that it’s vastly different than the first film.

In contrast to the first Heavy Metal (1981), this sequel isn’t an anthology film; Heavy Metal 2000 sticks to only one story, this immediately shatters our expectations of it. Fans of the first film expected this sequel to maintain the anthology format, so they were disappointed to discover that with this sequel, they were going to get just one feature length story. I enjoy the amalgamation of different artistic talents that an anthology brings, but I also appreciate the fact that this sequel was going for something different. In its defense I will say that even though Heavy Metal 2000 isn’t an anthology, it still manages to retain that feel of what Heavy Metal Magazine is all about. If you didn’t already know, both of these movies are inspired by Heavy Metal Magazine, a magazine totally devoted to science fiction, horror and fantasy comics. It is a magazine filled with stories that are exactly like the story we see in Heavy Metal 2000. As a fan of this magazine, I can tell you I’ve read my fare share of issues, most of the stories include half naked heroines fighting muscular evil dudes, sorcerers, magicians, aliens, you name it. Many of the stories include nudity, violence and gore in one form or another. This is why I say that Heavy Metal 2000 captures the feel of the magazine; it has all the elements you’d expect to find on any given issue. Yet even though Heavy Metal 2000 is inspired by Heavy Metal magazine and gets everything right in terms of the spirit of the magazine, Heavy Metal 2000 is actually based on a graphic novel called ‘Melting Pot’, which was written by Kevin Eastman, Simon Bisley and Eric Talbot. Kevin Eastman created the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (along with co-creator Peter Laird) and is the current publisher and editor (and has been for years) of Heavy Metal Magazine, so he truly knows what Heavy Metal is all about. This explains why he is one of the writers of the film. 

Above: Issue #4 of 'Melting Pot', the comic series on which Heavy Metal 2000 is based on 

Below: Lady Death, an example of the Bad Girl comic craze of the 90's 

So let’s keep things in perspective, Heavy Metal 2000 isn’t Shakespeare and it never intends to be. Heavy Metal Magazine has always been about the type of stories that sci-fi/horror fans love to read. Stories filled with the fantastic, the horrifying, the shocking. This magazine has always been a love letter to low brow entertainment, it’s the kind of literature that some will no doubt consider immature, and they’d be right, these stories are often times juvenile in nature, but that’s the nature of the beast. And so, Heavy Metal 2000 basks in its b-movie roots, unashamedly so. Trust me when I say that one liners will be spoken, in fact, you’ll feel that it is the only language these characters speak. In this film you will see females being treated like sex objects and the females loving it. For example, Julie Strain does the voice of the main character in the film, a bad ass lady who goes by the name of ‘Jules’. She’s you’re a-typical bad ass babe. During the 90’s Bad Girls were the rave of the comic book world; suddenly every comic book was about Bad Girls with big boobs and even bigger guns! During those days we had comics like Vampirella, Lady Death and Danger Girl. And though Heavy Metal 2000 was released at the beginning of the new millennium, it still retains that 90’s Bad Girl vibe to it. You’ll notice the emphasis on showing Jules breasts bouncing all the way through the movie, sometimes the camera will focus entirely on her ass, or take its time showing her taking a shower, it’s all very gratuitous, designed to titillate teenage boys. You should see the extras on the Heavy Metal 2000 dvd, where Mrs. Strain talks all about how much she loves being the sexy sci-fi chick and showing some skin. She’s the ultimate tease for young boys (and men in general) kind of like a sci-fi version of Elvira. She knows you like her jugs, and she’s got no problem showing them to you, in fact, she loves the adulation she gets from it. Julie Strain obviously infused the character of Jules with her own persona, so much so that they even share the same name. 

Above, Julie Strain dressed up as Jules, below her animated counterpart

On this film, Jules is out for revenge. You see, this power hungry madman who goes by the name of Tyler is on his way to a distant planet that holds the gates to immortality. Tyler has the key, and he aims to use it in order to acquire immortality. Problem is that whoever holds the key goes insane from lust of power, and so throughout the movie Tyler destroys, rapes and kills anything on his path. Too bad for him that on one of his joy rides he ends up killing Jules family and her people. To make matters worse, Tyler kidnaps Jules sister because he thinks she’s hot. Now Jules is on a race to try and stop Tyler from acquiring immortality, while avenging her people and rescuing her sister!

I’ve always had a couple of problems with this movie. Number one, the animation is not the best. Maybe it’s because its old school, but I’ve seen old school animation films with excellent traditional hand drawn animation, so maybe it’s just the animation on this show isn’t really that good. Then again, it’s American animation, which has never distinguished itself for being excellent. And they do that thing where they mix computer generated images with traditional hand drawn animation and it sucks big time because back in those days computer animation was just getting started, so whatever computer animation the squeezed into any given scene looks amateurish by today’s standards. Then again, maybe I’ve been spoiled rotten by anime films. That being said, once I got accustomed to the films look and the choppy animation, I found myself having fun with it. Same story with Ralph Bakshi films, you just gotta get accustomed to the fact that the animation is a little rough around the edges.

Heavy Metal 2000 has its moments, like when Jules and Tyler meet up on this pleasure planet of sorts, filled with strippers with six breasts and aliens from all sorts of planets, it reminded me a bit of the cantina scene from Star Wars, if the cantina scene from Star Wars had been rated ‘R’. And by the way, speaking of this films rating, they don’t even make live action ‘R’ rated films like this one today! I mean, this is a hard ‘R’ rated film! There’s tons of gratuitous nudity, profanity is common place, and the gore, well, even for a cartoon it’s over the top at times. In that sense, this film is extremely rare, it’s an animated ‘R’ rated film! You don’t see one of those every day. Last time I saw one of those was Richard Linklater’s  A Scanner Darkly (2006), another one that comes to mind is South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut (1999). Every once in a while, an adventurous filmmaker will make one from time to time, but the truth is that the R rated animated film is rare because (with rare exceptions) they are not marketable. For a time there, animated films for adults where trying to find its corner in the market with films like Fritz the Cat (1972), Fire and Ice (1983) and American Pop (1981), but I guess it proved too difficult to get the common American adult to think of animation as anything more than the stuff of Saturday Morning Cartoons or children’s films. So Heavy Metal 2000 is a rare bird, on this one axes slice people in half, brains are blown to smithereens and sex robots can be bought at the corner of the street.

The soundtrack of the first film is one of the most memorable things about it; it included old school rock and roll bands like Blue Oyster Cult, Stevie Nicks, Journey, Cheap Trick, Black Sabbath, Devo and even Sammy Hagar. So of course, the soundtrack for Heavy Metal 2000 had to amass an interesting amount of bands as well. On this sequel we get the likes of Pantera, Monster Magnet, Coal Chamber, Bauhaus, Insane Clown Pose, Queens of the Stone Age, System of a Down and Puya. The problem for me with this soundtrack is that sometimes, the visuals don’t match with the music. Sometimes there’s a real hardcore song going on and it just doesn’t go with the visuals. The same thing happened when Dario Argento started using heavy metal in his horror movies, the heavy metal just didn’t mix with the visuals, thank god he stopped doing it after a while.  This is something very important on any film, the visuals have to go in accordance and sometimes even to the rhythm of the music. Not so here where songs are apparently randomly inserted into a scene without rhyme or reason. It feels like the songs where only inserted into the film in order to sell a soundtrack and not because the song is perfect for the scene. This truly sucks in my book.

The other problem I had with it is the weak direction and the editing. I don’t think I’ve ever seen any movie that uses fade to black so often! This is one of the signs of amateurish filmmaking, fade to black is what you resort to when you’ve got nowhere else to go because you forgot to film a transition or establishing shot. There’s no way to flow from one scene to the next so you fade to black. Well, they do this all the time in Heavy Metal 2000and it just reeks of bad filmmaking. So there’s unevenness in the editing and the music. Strange thing is that even with all these imperfections, I still managed to have fun with Heavy Metal 2000. Its dialog, sense of humor and mentality is so comic bookish that I ended up surrendering to it and having a blast. It’s a film made for adults who want to feel 12 years old again. It’s the kind of film in which when the masses are calling his name, the villain says “Blind adulation makes me so horny! Get me a wench!” At first I hated Heavy Metal 2000 with a passion, but it’s grown on me over the years. It’s rude, raw, loud, imperfect and sexist, but that’s exactly the way it should be, or else it wouldn’t be Heavy Metal. The original Heavy Metal film is superior in the sense that if offers a larger variety of stories and styles, the animation is a million times superior and because the soundtrack is infinitely more melodic and plain cool, but this sequel is definitely worth a watch, if you can get over the imperfections.

Rating: 3 out of 5

Cowboy Bebop: The Movie (2001)

Cowboy Bebop: The Movie (2001)

Director: Shinichiro Watanabe, Hiroyuki Okiura, Tensai Okamura

My exploration of anime films continues and this time I tackle Cowboy Bebop: The Movie, an anime film that always pops up as the ones that “you gotta see” so I decided to finally give it a spin. The trailers for this film called it “Today’s hottest kind of cool” and a “gritty futuristic thrill ride that definitely delivers the goods” so of course my curiosity was sparked. My only concern was that I had never seen the series that the film is based on, so I was sort of going into this movie naked, not knowing anything about what the world of Cowboy Bebop was all about. But then I learned that the film was designed so that newbies like me and fans of the show could enjoy the film alike. I’m sure I’ll enjoy this film a bit more after I’ve seen the entire show, but I like watching anime films perse, so I decided to watch it even though I have not seen the show. Still, just in case you’re interested, this film takes place between episodes 22 and 23 of the show. So, how was my first dip into the world of Cowboy Bebop?

The story for this film is fairly simple, a terrorist named Vincent wants to destroy the world via a virus he wants to set lose upon the world on Halloween Night. The government puts a hefty bounty on the head of the terrorist, so of course, Spike and his crew of bounty hunters decide to go after the guy, so they can cash in all those millions. Problem is that Vincent has gone into hiding, and Halloween night just keeps getting ever so close! How will they stop the terrorist attack from ever happening? As you can see, the story is nothing complex, a weakness of this film in my opinion, I was expecting a bit more. Thankfully, the visuals are top notch as is the animation. 

Now taking in consideration that I knew nothing of the concept behind Cowboy Bebop save for the fact that it was a beloved series, I’d say that I grasped the concept behind the whole thing pretty quickly. The idea is that these are a group of Bounty Hunters who are always looking for new bounties in order to make money, the idea being that they are only in it for the money. They aren’t cops or detectives or anything of the sort, they just do these missions for the money, hence the tag line for the film “They are going to save the world, but not for free!” Spike Spiegel is the leader, he’s you’re a-typical “cool dude” always posing, saying cool things, smoking his cigs. Oh and he’s good at martial arts at well! Then we have Jet Black, the aged tough guy/father figure who owns the spaceship they fly called ‘The Bebop’. Faye Valentine, the sexy chick who used to be a bounty but now forms part of the group, Ed who is a computer whiz and is always getting them all the info they need during their missions and finally, Ein a dog with human intelligence who’s also a genius at chess. 

But of course, me being a Cowboy Bebop rookie, some elements of the story flew right by me, for example, I didn’t exactly grasp the idea that the whole film takes place in Mars because humanity had to flee from earth. Humanity has spread itself throughout different planets because of this. The year wasn’t clear either. In fact, to me the movie simply takes place in a strange amalgamation between New York City, France and the Middle East. So of course, not having seen the show will put you at a small disadvantage, but not enough of a disadvantage that you won’t be able to enjoy the film. The whole film starts like you are walking into the middle of a film already in progress; I actually liked the fact that the film wasn’t spelling things out for the viewers. You have to sort of figure things out on your own and get on the bandwagon and I liked that about this film. From what I hear the show is structured in the same way. So the film doesn’t treet its viewers like idiots, a cool thing. Also, this is an animated film that’s rated ‘R’, so it has profanity, nudity, guns, violence, the works. So cool, an anime film entirely directed towards adults.

So with all these cool things going for it, why did I end up feeling underwhelmed? Not saying that it’s a bad film, it has some great things about it, and actually, I feel that I need to watch it a few more times to truly grasp the thing, but at first glance I felt the film was in need of a bit more action. As it is, the film has some cool action scenes, like for example the one that takes place on a train, which was awesome. There’s also a climactic spaceship chase sequence that I enjoyed, but in my opinion it needed a bit more than that. I think the big draw of the film is more the chemistry between the characters, but for a show with emphasis on gun play and fights, the film might have needed a bit more of that, or maybe editing a bit of the melodrama to make the pacing a little quicker. But I will say that when the action starts, it’s pretty cool. The animation, the angles chosen by the director and animators, I loved all that stuff because that’s what I love seeing in animation, things that aren’t done often in live action films. I was kind of saddened to hear that the show has a lot more space adventure in it, because sadly characters do not go into space on this film. I love sci-fi films that take place in space, so that would have added a whole other level of cool, but alas, that never came to be, a missed opportunity in my book. Still, we do get cool spaceships and I always enjoy those, even if they aren’t flying around in space. Actually, Spike has this whole scene that’s a chase as he drives this cool little spaceship (called The Swordfish II) which was pretty cool stuff, love the design work on this film.

Hollywood has shown interest in making a Cowboy Bebop live action film but its taking a while to lift off.  Shinichiro Watanabe, the creator of Cowboy Bebop assures us that its happening, but that it’s all very secret and hush-hush. At one point Keanu Reeves was going to play the role of Spike, sadly the project has been in development hell for so long that Keanu now feels that he is “too old” to play Spike, so he turned down the project. While it’s true that Keanu at one point would’ve been perfect for it, he actually looks a bit like Spike, I agree, too much time has elapsed and maybe the film would benefit from having a younger actor play the role of Spike. Keanu also stated that the film would cost a fortune to make, so maybe that's holding it back a bit as well, similar to how the live action Akira film is being held back for the same reason. But one thing’s for sure, I would love to see a live action Cowboy Bebop movie. In the meanwhile, you got the show (which I hear is better than the actual film) and this film to quench your thirst for Cowboy Bebops special brand of “Jazzy” action, just remember that its manufactured for fans of the show, newbies might feel just a little bit lost, still there’s fun to be had if you decide to take the plunge.

Rating:  3 out of 5 

     

Redline (2010)

Redline (2010)

Director: Takeshi Koike

One of the short films that impressed me the most from the anime anthology Neo Tokyo (1987) was the one called ‘The Running Man’, a segment about a race featuring a bunch of cool looking futuristic racing cars; it had a feeling of speed, a style and kinetic energy about it that I loved. It was also dark and gritty, sort of like Blade Runner (1982), but within a race track? It was an awesome short, highly recommend checking it out. Redline (2009), the film I’ll be talking about today takes a similar premise (that of the futuristic racing circuit) and stretches it into a full length film. But instead of dark and gritty, Redline is ultra colorful and bright! This abundance of shinny, bright colors brought to mind the Wachowski’s Speed Racer (2008). Redline also features outlandish and crazy cool racing cars that defy logic, gravity and realism. In this way, Redline functions as pure escapism, so outlandish, that it will transport you to a whole other world. Don’t look for logic here; just look for the cool and the stylish! Welcome to the world of Redline.

Redline immediately throws us into the racing world by starting the movie off right smack in the middle of a race called ‘Yellow Line’. This race takes place in a planet called ‘Dorothy’, which by the way is a planet inhabited by humanoid dogs that also race cars! So anyhow, through this blazing, speedy introduction we first meet the characters we’ll be seeing throughout the rest of the film, the racers. The principal characters are a racer called JP; a guy who lives and breathes racing and loves to look cool. He’s all about the leather jacket, the cigs, the hair and the switchblade knife that doubles as a hair comb. Then we have Sonoshee, a girl who is equally passionate about racing, in fact, so much so she has no place left for love in her life. Or does she? So anyhow, both JP and Sonoshee grew up together and have a crush on each other, yet they end up being enemies on this huge race called ‘The Red Line’, which will be taking place in Roboworld, a planet ruled by a Nazi like race of androids. I know that all sounds totally bonkers, but such is the nature of this film and this is what makes it such an interesting watch.

This is an extremely stylish film; it places its emphasis on cool. The main character, JP, dresses like a rocker from the 50’s, with his leather jacket and greasy hair. JP doesn’t just drive a motorcycle; he drives this awesome looking hover bike, which looks like a futuristic Harley. Some of the racing cars look like spaceships; their designs are very diverse. Point is this is more of a visual trip than anything else. Redline  is not a deep or profound film, but boy is it a fun movie to watch. Part of the fun comes from the animation, which utilizes these odd angles and exaggerated designs. I loved how they placed the camera in the strangest of places, it made things more interesting.  In fact, this movie is so interesting visually that you’ll probably want to watch it a couple of times over. If you’re an anime fan, you’ll immediately want to own it and place right next to your copy of Ninja Scroll (1993). Speaking of Ninja Scroll (1993), this movie was produced by Mad House Studios, the same guys who brought us that very same Ninja classic. So you can expect the same level of excellence in the animation.

The crazy angles in Redline reminded me of Afro Samurai (2007), an anime film which featured that same style, which places the camera in odd spaces and stretches images out, it’s very unique. While doing research for this review I discovered that my comparisons were right on the dot becauseTakeshi Koike, the director for Redline, served as a key animator for Afro Samurai, so that explains the similarities in style. The stretched out angles are obviously part of Koike’s style. By the way, this was Takeshi Koike first full length anime film and it’s an impressive debut. Obviously, he put to good use all that experience as key animator in films like Ninja Scroll (1993), Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust (2000) and Memories (1995), not to mention his work in series like Samurai Champloo. The result was this impressive break out film for Takeshi Koike.

Redline reminded me of various films, but ultimately, what it felt like was a mash up between the pod racing scenes in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999), the premise for Death Race 2000 (1975) and finally, the crazy kinetic nonstop chase sequences you’d find in a Mad Max film. Redlinefeels like you took all the crazy racers from the pod race in Episode I and expanded on them, gave them background stories and made a whole film around that world. There’s an awesome race in the beginning of the film, a couple of races in the middle and the grand finale, The Red Line race. Of course, the two book end races are the show stoppers of the film, but in between we get a bit of political intrigue (Roboworld’s government doesn’t’ support the Redline Race) and even a bit of romance between JP and Sonoshee. This movie is so nuts that suddenly it’s the racers vs. the tyrannical government who’s trying to stop the race! This movie is so crazy, so outlandish, that there’s even space for giant Kaiju in this film! I literally couldn’t believe they managed to squeeze in giant monsters into this movie! I mean, this movie is about race cars! But suddenly, there I was, watching giant monsters destroy stuff.  

Visually, you’ll never be bored because the Redline Race is a no holds barred type of deal where anything goes, there are no rules, so it gets to a point where cars are shooting missiles at each other, the government is shooting lasers from space to stop the race while the racers are feverishly trying to make it to the finish line! There’s this moment where one of the racers transforms into a giant robot car! There are many visual surprises in store for those who decide to give this visually stunning film a shot. Redline is an experience you'll want to watch and re-watch over and over again.

Rating: 4 out of 5

           

Lensman: Secret of the Lens (1984)

Lensman: Secret of the Lens (1984)

Director: Kazuyuki Hirokawa, Yoshiaki Kawajiri

You've probably never heard of Lensman: The Secret of the Lens because for whatever the reason, this film is very obscure, it’s not talked about a lot amongst anime fans, or even science fiction fans, which is strange to me because this movie is so damn entertaining, so well animated, that it’s a pity it isn't more popular. Even finding decent pics for this review was a small task! But whatever, I’m here to spread the goodness and inform you lovers of anime out there that this is one of those movies you've never heard of that you should give a chance to. Lensman was one of the first anime movies that I watched, along with Miyazaki’s Nausicaa of theValley of the Wind (1984), that taught me that animation could be so much more than what we got in Saturday morning cartoons; something far superior and complex than a 20 minute episode of He-Man and The Masters of the Universe. Speaking of which, the animation was fantastic on this film! You could see the filmmakers were going for something special, which is something I always look for in anime films, it has to be something special. So, what’s Lensman all about and why should you take your time to check it out?

Lensman is the story of a young boy named Kim, who lives a happy life farming with his father on the peaceful planet of Mqueie. One day, a spaceship is about to crash land on their corn field, but Kim, being the excellent pilot that he is, boards the ship before it crashes and lands it himself! He quickly explores the ship and comes upon a dying member of ‘The Galactic Patrol’, who hands him a magical Lens which immediately adheres to Kim’s hand. Kim doesn't know it yet, but the Lens will give him enhanced mental abilities and telepathic powers. Soon, Kim learns that the Boskones, an evil race of beings enemies to the human race, are after this particular lens because it holds the location of the ‘Devil Planet’, home planet to the Boskones. The film is a chase sequence, as the Boskones chase Kim and his friends across the galaxy, trying to destroy the Lens. Will Kim unite with the Galactic Patrol in order to hand them the location of the Devil Planet? Or will the Boskones destroy Kim and the Lens first?

The cover for 'Grey Lensman' one of the many Lensman novels written by Edward E. Smith

Basically Lensman is this amazing property which has been around since the 1930’s when its creator Edward Elmer Smith wrote the first Lensman story and published it in the legendary science fiction magazine ‘Amazing Stories’. Since then, there have been a whole series of novels, comics (from Eternity Comics) and manga. There was even an anime series entitled ‘Galactic Patrol Lensman’ and a couple of board games. At one point director Ron Howard was developing a film adaptation through Universal Studios and Imagine Entertainment, unfortunately the project fell apart because it was deemed too expensive by Universal. But of course, it’s a whole universe were talking about here. This is a story that spans planets and many alien races. We’re talking spaceships and wars in space, of course it’s going to be expensive. If you ask me, this whole property has an amazing potential to become a successful franchise, but Hollywood has famously backed out of many a good opportunity, so it doesn’t surprise me. I guess they won’t take a chance with it because it isn’t an ultra popular property like say Marvel comics and a film adaptation could go the way of the dodo like say for example Ender's Game (2013), a film based on a well established science fiction series of novels, that went nowhere. But then again, that movie kind of sucked anyways. But Lensman is all sorts of awesome! Well, at least this anime film version is. I loved every second of it.

The thing about this film is that it feels a lot like Star Wars. This film was released in 1984, so I think its safe to say that Star Wars fever was in full force back in those days (has it ever gone away?) so it doesn't surprise me that for every character in this movie we have a counterpart in Star Wars. Hell, even one of the characters has her hair made up like Princess Leia’s famous hair do. But whatever, Star Wars rip off or not, where this film excels is in its designs. The spaceships, the aliens, everything looks amazing! For example, the Boskones are all organic beings, so their spaceships, their armor, their everything looks organic and alive. This is a unique looking universe that I’d love to see translated into a live action film. Yet while live action films usually have to deal with budget limitations, the cool thing about anime films is that they don’t rely so much on a budget. Everything is done on paper, with traditional animation. There is no limit as to where the imagination of the filmmakers can take us because they don’t have to build sets or costumes, all they have to do is draw and animate whatever cool idea pops into their heads! And in this respect, the animators behind this film really out did themselves. What I loved about Lensman is that they focused a lot on doing these long takes of action where they don’t cut and the camera moves all over the place, following our heroes around. Best example of this would be the amazing escape sequence when they rescue Buskirk and the good guys escape on these hover cycles. Awesome action! Wonderful animation. So be ready for a movie that has some amazing animation techniques that were pushing what could be done in traditional animation.

Back in those days, computer generated images where giving their first baby steps and so animators kept trying to mix computer animation with their traditional animation often times with bad results. Examples of films that tried this are films like Rock and Rule (1983) and Disney’s The Black Cauldron (1985), not bad movies on their own right, but those computer animated sequences just stick out. I personally hate it when they do this, but whatever, lets chalk it up to experimentation. Lensman: Secret of the Lens opens with Boskonian ships that look like giant pulsating brains, but rendered in computer animation. There’s also some computer animation towards the end, but again, this sequence just doesn’t look as awesome as the rest of the traditional animation. Thankfully, these CGI sequences don’t last long and the film reverts back to the awesome traditional animation that Japanese are so good at. The traditional animation side of the film is what really makes it special for me. The computer images seem crude and less detailed then the awesome traditional stuff. Obviously, animators where trying the next hot thing in animation and this is probably why we get some bits of crappy computer animation, which was in diapers back in those days. Still, those scenes are a small hiccup in an awesome movie filled with fantastic moments of animation.  

Lensman: Secret of the Lens is none stop action from beginning to end. It never stops. It’s a huge chase sequence, we go from rescuing one character, to rescuing the next. From planet to planet, with all these crazy alien creatures! There’s this character who is also a Lensman that is just so cool, his name is Worsel, he looks like a man bat or something, cool character, again, this movie is all about the uniqueness in its design. The story for this film is all about the proverbial ‘chosen one’, the farmer boy who becomes a hero, so you see why I make the Star Wars connection. Still, the concept of the Lens and the Galactic Patrol is an awesome one with enough original elements to them to keep you entertained. If you feel like checking out some cool sci-fi anime, with fantastic animation and awesome action, give Lensman: Secret of the Lens a chance, you won’t be disappointed. Or bored.

Rating: 4 out of 5

Osamu Tezuka's Metropolis (2001)

Osamu Tezuka’s Metropolis (2001)

Director: Rintaro

Writer: Katsuhiro Otomo

The first thing that attracted me to this anime film is that it was heavily influenced by Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927) and seeing an anime version of one of my favorite science fiction films ever was too tempting to ignore. Fritz Lang’s classic silent film inspired this film from inception, right down to when it was first conceived as a manga way back in 1949 by Osamu Tezuka; who by the way is also the creator of Astro Boy. You see, Osamu Tezuka saw a still image from Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927) and that was enough to spark his imagination. He then wrote and drew his own sci-fi opus which he also called ‘Metropolis’, I guess as a homage to the landmark film. According to Tezuka, he wasn’t inspired by the film itself, which he hadn’t seen.  I’ve never read the manga, but supposedly it doesn’t share plot elements with the film, save for the fact that part of the story is centered around a female robot. So anyway, fast forward to 2001 where to anime juggernauts, Rintaro and Katsuhiro Otomo, decide to join forces to make a film based on Tezuka’s classic manga. Rintaro is the director behind the classic anime films Galaxy Express 999 (1979) and The Dagger of Kamui (1985). It was Rintaro who took over the directing duties for Metropolis, while Katsuhiro Otomo, the director behind Akira (1988) and Steamboy (2004) took care of writing the screenplay. What was the result of joining these two anime legends on one film? Nothing short of brilliance! 

In Metropolis, the people of the city are celebrating its magnificence! According to the architects of this advanced city, it represents the culmination of mans knowledge and intelligence. The city wide celebrations are due to the creation of a huge structure called “The Ziggurat”, a giant building that, unbeknownst to the people of Metropolis, is also a giant weapon. But, in the midst of this celebration, a rebellion is brewing and it’s all about Humans vs. Robots. You see, the rebels want to destroy the robots because according to them; they are taking their jobs away. So there’s a strong anti-robot sentiment throughout the whole city. Meanwhile, Duke Red, one of the wealthiest men in Metropolis is secretly orchestrating a coupe de tat by building a robot that will rule the entire city (and eventually the world) from a robotic, mechanical throne. Will he achieve his goals? Will his robot end up controlling the world?

The interesting part about this film is that while Osamu Tezuka said he wasn’t influenced by Fritz Lang’s 1927 silent film when he created his Metropolis manga, the filmmakers behind this 2001 film were. If you’ve seen Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927) you will see parallels between both films, some images are extremely similar. It is obvious that the filmmakers were not hiding the fact that Fritz Lang’s film was inspiring them. And if you ask me, that’s awesome because Lang’s film is an amazing film to be influenced by. Yet, while there’s no denying the similarities between both films, Rintaro’s Metropolis is actually very original in its own way, it’s not a rip off or carbon copy of Lang’s Metropolis (1927) because while Lang’s Metropolis centered around classist issues, Rintaro’s Metropolis is more about power and who ends up controlling it. It’s more about what makes us humans. You see Tima the robot is always questioning what makes us human, why we are the way we are. She is this films Pinocchio, she wants to be human, but ultimately can’t. It’s also about mans obsession with destroying and controlling each other. That thirst for power, the obsession with controlling the masses. It asks the question: should all that power be bestowed upon one person? Metropolis shares this ‘abuse of power’ theme with Akira (1988), which makes sense since both films were written by the same guy. As you can see, this is a film that can’t be blamed for being shallow.

At the same time, it’s visually dazzling. It never stops amazing us with its imagery. Rintaro went for something different, which was mixing traditional Japanese style animation with computer graphics. Now normally, I don’t like this mix because to me the two don’t mix. Something feels off about movies that mix traditional animation with computer graphics, to me they just don’t go together visually. For example, Ghost in the Shell 2.0(2008), which took the original Ghost in the Shell film and added computer animation and backgrounds to it, didn’t exactly work in my book. I'd much rather watch Ghost in the Shell in its original traditionally animated form. To me, animated films should either be in traditional animation, or computer animation, but not a mix of both. Still, in the case of Metropolis I think it was handled beautifully. The film has a unique look to it, things feel retro, yet there’s robots and advanced technology. The whole film uses jazzy music, which gives an old fashion air to it. They even use Ray Charles’ ‘I Can’t Stop Loving You’ during a climactic scene, so there’s this merging of the old fashion with the futuristic. Another interesting visual aspect of Metropolis is that while the backgrounds are rendered in a somewhat realistic fashion, the films characters are done in an extremely cartoony style, paying homage in this way to Osamu Tezuka’s original manga. This Metropolis is a world on its own, a very unique looking film. So anyhow, in my book this is another amazing milestone in Japanese animation. If you ever feel like watching some of the best anime has to offer, you’d do good in including this one on your list.

Rating: 5 out of 5  

  

Memories (1995)

Memories (1995)

Directors: Koji Morimoto, Tensai Okamura, Katsuhiro Otomo

Katsuhiro Otomo, the director behind the seminal anime film Akira (1988) is one busy dude. He not only produces, he also writes and animates! His productions include some of the best anime anthologies around; I’m talking about films like Robot Carnival (1987), Neo Tokyo (1987) and most recently Short Peace (2013), an anime anthology that I will try to get a hold of soon, so expect a review for it in the near future. Otomo also produced the anime anthology I’ll be reviewing today: Memories (1995). I’m really enjoying watching all of these anime anthologies because they offer a quick jolt of awesomeness. Though each individual story lasts about forty minutes or less, they are always entertaining because the filmmakers involved in each short give it their all in both the story and animation departments. Memories doess just that, visually it packs a wallop, yet it also has some depth to it. Let’s not forget these anthologies are an artistic tour de force, compiling a lot of talent into one single movie. As you can see, animated anthologies have a lot to offer. So, what’s this particular one all about?

Anthologies are usually connected by a theme, something that holds them together.  But in the case of Memories, the shorts have no real connection to one another; all three stories are totally different. The first one is called ‘Magnetic Rose’ and it comes to use from director Koji Morimoto, a director I’m not entirely familiar with, but whose work I have seen a lot of. For example, he’s worked as an animator in films like The Animatrix (2003), Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989) and Space Adventure Cobra (1982). He also directed the ‘Franken’s Gears’ segment in Robot Carnival (1987). So anyways, he’s the director behind ‘Magnetic Rose’, a short that shows many interesting influences. The story is all about these space garbage men, who are suddenly given the responsibility of responding to a distress signal from a derelict spaceship. When they board the ship, they discover that the ships A.I. has created a holographic world completely composed of one woman’s memories. As they explore the ship, the astronauts begin to encounter visions of a woman called Eva. Who is she? And why are they all experiencing supernatural shenanigans?

This short reminded me of various films, but most of all, it reminded me of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) because for example, the whole short uses classical music, just like Kubrick used classical music in 2001. The similarities don’t stop there; the short is all about discovering a derelict spaceship and a ghost like entity living in rooms furnished in European style. It’s also about astronauts drifting through space for all eternity, so, if you’re a fan of Kubrick’s 2001, then you’ll more than likely spot the parallels because the filmmakers behind ‘Magnetic Rose’ obviously loved Kubrick’s classic sci-fi film. Magnetic Rose also reminded me of Event Horizon (1997) because it deals with astronauts facing their fears due to a supernatural force that’s messing with their minds, so you can expect a “ghost in the machine” type of story with this short.

Then we move on to ‘Stink Bomb’ my favorite short in the whole anthology and in my opinion, the one they should have closed the anthology with. This one was directed by Tensai Okamura, a director who’s concentrated most of his career on television series like Samurai Champloo(2004) and Wolf’s Rain (2003) rather than on theatrical features, but you wouldn't know it from seeing this short. As it turns out, Stink Bomb is the most entertaining of the three shorts on this anthology. It’s all about this lab technician named Nobuo. A regular Joe who works in a science lab. Unfortunately, he also has a cold! When he mistakes a bottle of experimental pills for cold medicine, he unwillingly becomes a walking weapon of mass destruction! When he took the experimental pills, he really took pills that are part of a weapons experiment being conducted in collaboration between the Japanese and American governments! After he takes the pills, he becomes a walking death bomb! Wherever he goes death follows! Anybody who comes within a few steps of Nobuo instantly dies! This short turns real epic real fast, my recommendation is stick with it till the very end, it’s a very entertaining and rewarding short. Because of its funny tone, you don’t expect it to get so epic, but it does!  This short speaks about weapons of mass destruction, but it’s really just a fun short that plays out a bit like a Godzilla movie, with Nobuo being the destructive force headed towards Tokyo, while the military tries their best to stop him.

Finally, the anthology ends with Katsuhiro Otomo’s Cannon Fodder, a short that takes place in a fantasy world where society is built around war. Every single building in this walled city has a cannon or a gun sticking out of it. The story takes place in a city where its people only live for making bullets for their giant cannons, to shoot at an enemy they don’t even know. All they care about is shooting their cannons. It’s interesting, thematically, it reminded me of George Orwell’s 1984, because it’s a dreary, sad society whose only focus is producing, producing, producing. When they are not producing, they are being programmed to hate an invisible enemy they have never seen themselves. Since the short focuses on how a child sees the world, it comments on how the environment we grow up in forges our dreams and aspirations. The idea being that if we are surrounded by guns and violence; chances are we will want to become something associated with that world. Hence, the little boy who stars in the short draws guns with his crayons and aspires to become the man who pulls the trigger of the big cannon.

When this anthology was released, the short that received the most acclaim was Magnetic Rose, and I agree, it is the deepest of all the shorts, playing in the same ball park as Kubrick’s 2001, but also Andrei Tarkovsky’s Solaris (1972). ‘Stink Bomb’ was heralded as the most entertaining and funny of the bunch, though it wasn’t praised for its depth. Interestingly enough, it was ‘Cannon Fodder’, the short that comes from the most acclaimed of the directors involved on this anthology that got the worst reviews. Not that it’s a bad short; actually, it’s very unique visually. It focuses more on style and a certain type of tone. Stylistically, Cannon Fodder is amazing, very unique looking and it has a distinctive anti war message to it, which I think is where its thematic strengths lie. It sticks to its one theme through and through. I personally dug all three shorts for different reasons. One is deep and haunting, one is entertaining, funny and epic and one is stylish and offers social commentary. So we get a little bit of everything on this anthology. When we see it as a whole, it’s another gem in the world of anime anthologies. Highly recommend it.

Rating: 5 out of 5