Morimoto's 40-min "Magnetic Rose" is stunningly animated, the most amazing of the two, telling of a space ship's investigation of a distress signal discovering a magnificent world created by a woman's memories the music takes advantage of the operatic aria, Madame Butterfly, arranged by Yoko Kanno, who also supplies an excellent original score. Otomo's is especially unique in that there are no cuts the "camera" moves fluidly through every scene without a jump or a stop. They are amazing vignettes with some stupendous animation in three different styles. Don't know how easy it is to get a hold of, but it seems to be very popular at least in Japan.Īmazing anime trilogy from AKIRA's Katsuhiro Otomo, who presents three unrelated sci fi stories directed by different directors (he did the last one, writers/first-time directors Tensai Okamura and Koji Morimoto did the other two). If you like to watch the occasional anime, this is a very good choice. All set to a classic opera score, it is chilling and eerie and grand-scale in a way Hollywood never seems to get right. Some scenes are gut-wrenchingly emotional and disturbing. This is more like Otomo's Akira stuff epic but with great characters. Here the humour of the two others is gone, and we have a very gripping and serious story set in a sci-fi environment. The first of the three shorts, which in my opinion should have been saved to last, is Magnetic Rose. The whole thing is funny and bizarre, and easily a classic. It's very well made, with insanely detailed tanks, helis, airplanes etc, and lots of explosions. The second short is called Stink Bomb, which is a crazy, fast-paced disaster/action story with a healthy dose of black humour. It features a very cool style unlike normal anime, some neat "camera" tricks and illusions of 3D, and a heavy but playful mood. The last short of the three is called Cannon Fodder. This collection of short movies(all more than 20 minutes though) is a fun, action-packed and imaginative reminder why anime is among the best genres, and NOT restricted to kids(or in the case of these shorts, not really for kids at all). I'm glad I'll never forget them.Īfter seeing Akira it's natural to be curious of what Otomo's produced.
MEMORIES 1995 MOVIE
As I said before, most movie and anime fans don't seem to know, or don't have any memories about this surreal collection of animated storied. The music accentuates this strange feeling (very much like in Aeon Flux), and the unusual rendering style makes this a little strange jewel, not only from anime, but from all styles of animation. It's a one shot segment, so I can hardly imagine the size of some background panels and the animation logistics of this. Some reminiscence of Orwell's 1984 is present, but the execution is really like anything I have ever seen or read before. A metaphorical world where a country is in a war against an unknown (and probably inexistent) enemy, and how the cannons are not only weapons, but the complete essence of the cultural, economical and social layers of this surreal "totalitarian" country. Finally, "Cannon Fodder" is the segment which I feel is the true masterpiece in this little anthology.
Real funny in a way most kid's animes aren't. "Stink Bomb" is funny as hell, taking the typical idiot hero in the Nintendo kind of plot (thhink Koji in Mazzinger, or Seya in Knigths of the Zodiac) as for what he should be (an idiot, every day man with the flu), the story revolves around on the accidental creation of a human stinking bomb who treat hens the whole island of Japan. The opera music plays a most important role, since it's the soundtrack what gives depth to the happenings here told. How a simulation program triggers the memories of the explorers and gets mixed with synthetic memories is done in a very intriguing form. The "Magnetic Rose" segment feels at times like an homage to Kubrick's "2001 : Space Odissey", and now I could say it's a straight antecedent of the sci-fi tendency about the human mind in a simulated space which we have seen in "Dark City", "Matrix", etc. Now that finally I own the DVD, I can say that it's the same as I remembered: magnificent. The first time I saw Memories in a film festival in 1998 left me with such an impression that I never forgot about it.
Memories conveys three of the best anime segments ever done, even if so many anime fans don't know about it.
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