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The crowd applauded the efforts of Production IG founder and producer, Mitsuhisa Ishikawa, as he tumbled painfully over the English dialect to introduce the latest piece of his studio’s work. Requiring a budget of over 14 million US, ‘Blood’ is refereed to as the first animated feature to be comprised of complete digital effects. And it wasn’t hard to see why. From the action-sequence that interwove itself with the opening credits, the audience was imediately immersed in an incredibly rendered 2D and three-dimensional environment that surpassed the boundaries of anime and approached more of an artistic perfection of the genre. Only having recently been completed the Sydney Olympic Japanime film festival was honored to bear witness to Blood. While not totally original in story, this is a high-density action fest of small proportions and amazing feats. At the Yokota Base in Japan, the US military is on the brink of the Vietnam War. But a greater threat exists within the walls of the heavily guarded compound and the adjourning school: Vampires. A team of undercover agents learns of the blood-sucking fiends as more incidents accure of what appear to be suicides. Thus Saya enters the scene with the appearance of a 17 year old girl, but with the attitude and cold-staring eyes of a battle-hardened women. This beautiful, yet deadly, vampire slayer must use her extraordinary abilities to save the humans from these sinister creatures of the night. Blood most definitely takes after its title as blood can be found everywhere in this darkly macabre story of this mysterious vampire killer who is forced to kill her brethren and takes great offense to any reference to God’s involvement over humanity. I have to agree with many of the fans responses who stated this film is to short, as you are barely being drawn into the lives of the characters when you are kicked out again having only made brief introductions with the main character. The time is neatly devided as one dedicated action-sequence with little character development in the midst of the blood-shed. But in a whole, the quality of the animation is the formost appeal of the flick and its short length allows you to enjoy a real nice slice of action without you having to worry about plot. This is proven rather prominently as 80% of the film is spoken is English for an audience whose national language is Japanese.
This piece of anime is definitely an important landmark in the animated genre as the growing popularity of the art-form enters a new millennium of un-tapped possibilities and adventures that can only be limited by the imagination. |
