PinkuBentoBox

Well, as promised, welcome to part two of Nagi’s Animu Spring Break. Where my last entry focused on the TV and OVA series I watched over the last week, this entry will focus on the films I watched. Most of it is Studio Ghibli stuff taped off of last January’s month-long celebration of Miyazaki on local cable station Turner Classic Movies, but there’s also some relatively newer releases, as well as some extremely rare items that I’m proud to say I was able to get my hands on.

So let’s get on with it, shall we?

Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam II: Lovers
What. A. Letdown! Okay, when I saw the first Zeta Gundam movie, Heirs to the Stars, I thought we were in for a helluva trilogy. Though it clocked in a little short at just over 90 minutes, and though the old and new animation clashed a bit, the first movie remained a solid retelling of the first fifteen or so episodes of one of the best Gundam series ever.

Now, with the second movie, I’m beginning to wonder if Tomino hasn’t gone senile or something.

First off, the good points. All two of them. The old and redone animation blended much better in this film, and as with the last film, the new stuff was top notch. And some of the new scenes—chiefly the meeting between AEUG leadership following Char’s return to space, the improved banter between Bekkener & Emma, and the introduction of Axis at the end—were all improvements over the original series.

That aside, though? This thing was SLOPPY. Really, it was compiled about as well as the SEED Special Editions. Unless you’ve already seen the Zeta Gundam TV series, I honestly doubt you’d really be able to follow even half of what was going on. The only thing that really saved this movie from being as complete a piece of shit as the SEED SE is the fact that you do get the ample amounts of new footage—at least the promise of eye candy is getting fulfilled—whereas the SEED SE was…what, maybe five minutes of new footage across all six episodes? And half of that was detrimental alteration to fill in plot holes for SEED Destiny? Anyway, point is this thing was an incoherent mess, made worse by some blatantly obvious script fuck-ups that weren’t even in the original series. Shinta & Qum are hiding in a spacesuit not three feet from where Sarah’s being detained as a prisoner. You KNOW they hear Reccoa & Co. addressing Sarah as being highly suspect. And yet once everyone leaves? They assume Sarah’s an AEUG pilot and let her go! The fuck!?

And the decisions as to what was cut and what stays were just plain retarded. I know, I know, it’s scorching heresy to call decisions by “THE GR8 TOMINOE!!!111″ retarded, but this? IT WAS RETARDED. Admit it. The failed Titans operation that reduces Daningham into a colony dropping madman? Cut. The fact that he’s randomly a colony dropping madman with no NO provocation? Remains. The relationship between Four & Kamille, the single most pivotal point of character development for our main protagonist? Reduced to a near-inconsequential fifteen minutes. Jerid’s development as Kamille’s bitter rival? Fuck, Jerid barely gets three minutes in this movie, so that’s out the window. Proper introductions for Mouar & Yazan? Added fuel to the Jerid rivalry and the debut of one of the main antagonist pilots? Cut.

Oh, and here’s the really fun part. For whatever reason, they felt it necessary to keep HALF MOON LOVE in its entirety! Some pointless little misadventure between Kamille & Sarah that lends little to either character OR the plot, what could arguably amount to a filler episode…is left in instead of all the important crap I just listed above? It bears repeating: that is retarded! Honestly, what was so great about Half Moon Love that it apparently had to ECLIPSE Four and Kamille’s relationship in importance to the story? Nothing that I can see. Really, what was so bad about cutting out Half Moon Love, extending the movie to a full two hours, and adding in Operation Apollo, Mouar’s intro, Yazan’s intro (or a proper one, at any rate), and expanding upon Kamille & Four’s relationship and Kamille’s rivalry with Jerid? That alone would make for an infinitely superior film to what we actually have.

If it weren’t for the fact that I’m a horribly slutty faggot for Haman Khan, I likely wouldn’t even bother with the third movie after this. Hell, the fact that the third movie cuts two more VITAL points to the series—the campaign at Kilimanjaro and Char’s speech at Dakar—leaves me worried already.

My Neighbor Totoro
Okay, so I lied. I didn’t actually watch Totoro over the past week, I watched it a few weeks ago. Same with Porco Rosso. But it was on the same tape as the other Ghibli movies, so I figured “why not?” and added it in here. I actually feel kinda ashamed that it’s taken me this long to see one of Miyazaki’s best-known films, but hey, better late than never, right? Very cute movie, very sweet, and I definitely see myself showing this to my kids one day if I ever have any. I have a sudden urge to purchase a life-size Totoro plushie, too (do those even exist?). Also, Disney’s dubbing earns more respect points from me with this movie. The Totoro dub is, to date, the only…ONLY…instance I can think of where an English dub has pronounced the name “Satsuki” correctly. I’ve heard voice actors pronounce it “sat-TSZOOOO-ki,” “Suzuki,” but the Totoro dub finally got it right. Kudos, Disney.

Only Yesterday
One of the two Miyazaki-produced Takahata films aired as part of January’s celebration of Miyazaki. And probably the biggest chore to watch, too. I’m sorry, but this one just struck me as dull. Good, I guess. But very dull. Very dry. City woman goes to the country, reminisces about fifth grade, falls in love, stays in the country, the end. And there’s almost no emphasis on any of this. It was a very “monotone” movie. There were no dramatic ups and downs—no peaks & valleys in the story—to keep the audience hooked. Just yarn after yarn about grade school mixed with ho-hum days picking flowers for dye. I’m committing two heresies in one blog entry now, but this just wasn’t a success for either Miyazaki or Takahata.

Pom Poko
The second Takahata film aired in January, and a MUCH more enjoyable experience. Another Ghibli commentary on the environment, but a much lighter one in tone than, say, Nausicaä or Princess Mononoke. I really enjoyed this one. Had some great comedy, some fun characters, and a decent message, though it did get a bit heavy-handed and preachy in places. I liked that it showed the raccoons going through multiple perspectives on how to deal with the problem, too. Violent fanaticism, passive protest, moderate planning, and even some who just plain gave up. I liked that slightly realistic touch that the raccoon tribe had different idealogies about the matter instead of all thinking as one. All in all a solid, unique offering.

Porco Rosso
Another one I watched a while ago, but figured I’d include. Lemme be blunt, if I had to compile a list of my favourite Miyazaki/Studio Ghibli films? Porco Rosso would be in the top five, easily. I adored this movie. It was a unique departure for Miyazaki that worked very, very well; he moved away from the fantasy for a bit to give us this historical fiction offering that, though not totally devoid of that patented “Ghibli magic,” was still a much more “grounded” and less mystical film than the studio’s standard fare. I loved the throwback to the old 1930s & 1940s Casablanca-style movies, and the solid characters and dubbing helped it out greatly. Porco himself has to be one of my favourite Ghibli characters, and Michael Keaton’s role as the pigman just makes him that much more likable.

Silent Möbius, movies 1 & 2
So, these two came out of nowhere. I randomly saw the torrents for them on Tosho one day and about did a spit-take. If you’ll recall, the first Silent Möbius movie was one of thse old, old Streamline licenses from back in the day, whose domestic rights got lost, tied up, and fucked around when the company went under. The chances of the movie getting a license at any point EVER are about zero, and it’s just a rare find all-around. And fuck, I didn’t even know a second movie existed. So of course out of more curiosity and excitement over a rare find than anything (I had seen the Silent Möbius TV series on TechTV and thought it was extremely average, so needless to say I wasn’t so much a fan, per se) I downloaded these two movies and only now got around to actually watching them.

These…actually tuend out to be a pretty good pair of movies. Pretty short, too, both of them only averaging out to about fifty-five minutes each. They seem to be part of an incomplete trilogy, as the first movie focuses on main character Katsumi’s exacting revenge on the Lucifer Hawk that took her mother (and in flashback, how she first arrived in Tokyo and became involved with the AMP), the second movie focuses on how she finally accepted her new role as an AMP member and apparent fate as a descendant of the Lucifer Hawk herself, and the third, presumably, would’ve detailed how she came to possess the cursed sword, Grospelina (seeing as the end of the first movie showed her using him, and then he was never seen again…he was just…there for a couple scenes). Personally I would’ve liked to have seen them produce a third movie to that effect. This version of Silent Möbius was much less annoying and much less sleep-inducing than the later TV incarnation. Of course, the fact that the movies never got around to the mindnumbingly frustrating romance angle between Katsumi and resident stupidass Robert de Vice likely helped out immensely in that regard. My only real complaint about the movies was the lack of development the supporting cast got. Actually knowing them from the TV series helped, but characters like Rally and Nami were woefully underdeveloped here. And there was no Mana at all (no Lum Cheng, either, but given how late she appears in the series, I half expected that). Oh well. Solid films all around. Shame the producers apparently couldn’t finish what they seemingly set out to do.

Also, they sure as hell picked the right seiyuu for Katsumi. I have never heard a more terrifying, blood-curdling scream…probably anywhere…than the one Naoko Matsui belted out in these movies on several occasions.

Whisper of the Heart
The final film from January’s Miyazaki celebration, and the only Yoshifumi Kondo film in the lot (regrettably, the only Ghibli film he directed before passing away, it seems ). In some ways, it was a bit of a chore to get through like Only Yesterday, but was still magnitudes more enjoyable. It had some lulls, but all in all was a great film with some rather lively and interesting characters. Things flowed well, and the romance between Shizuku and Seiji developed very believably (much moreso than most teen anime romances, that’s for damn sure). Very sweet film with some rather inspiring messages. I don’t quite get the continuing reference to John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” though. But that didn’t really take away from the film. It was slow, but enjoyable all the same.

XXXHolic: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
You’ve already heard Negs rip this one apart for the horrific proportion issues, so I won’t dwell too much on that. I will say, though, that the first thing that came to mind while watching this movie was this flash video that I snagged off of 4Chan a while back (one or two scenes potentially NSFW). Just watch it for about a minute or so and wait for Kira & Athrun to start dancing and you’ll see what I mean. Really though, I can see where the animators were making the attempt to emulate the manga’s thin and lanky character designs—and I think doing so is possible and can be accomplished under more favorable circumstances—but they just completely fucked it up. It was too distracting, and certainly didn’t fit my impression of the manga character designs at all. For one thing, I don’t remember Yuko having breasts that sagged down to her feet. Way to make an extremely hot character exponentially less attractive, Production IG…

That aside, though, I thought it was a fairly enjoyable movie. It worked well as a separate little adventure from the main XXXHolic story, and effectively captured the mood of the manga for the most part. It was short, but it seemed to use that time well, I think. Aside from the proportion issues, the animation was very solid, and the backgrounds and scenery created a wonderful atmosphere that wavered between manga-styled surreal and almost Resident Evil in places.

Really? If the characters weren’t made to look so fucking ugly half the time, it’d be a much more enjoyable experience. Oh, and Negs? I think I now see what you find so adorable about Mokona…