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Producer : Katsuhiro
Otomo Katsuhiro Otomo presents MEMORIES, one of the most intensely moving, beautiful, humorous and inspiring collection of animated short-stories ever put to film. Magnetic Rose is the first of three unique and contrasting vintages that complement each other for their individual daring, tenacity and intrigue. When screened as part of the Olympic Japanime Film Festival it gained much praise from viewers for this anime classic that hasn’t as yet been purchased in the current anime bidding war of America. Thus its screening was a rare opportunity to view this amazing piece of work from the director of the internationally acclaimed ‘Akira’. Magnetic Rose was the piece that caught everyone eye above the later. Everyone who saw it describes it simply with one word, ‘Beautiful’, and I whole-heartedly agree. But in addition I have included individual summaries of each of the episodes to introduce you to the works of these talented directors and hopefully inspire you to track down and view it if you haven’t already done so. EPISODE 1 Who expects to find an opera diva Who expects to find such cinematic beauty in the dark recesses of space? The final frontier that is hardly associated with depth of plot, meaning and foremost opera and usually sees mankind struggling for survival against an alien race. The ‘Magnetic Rose’ will leave all that behind as you are swept off this usual platform and are systematically drawn into the lives and insanity of the characters. As a dull yet ever-present signal makes itself heard over the SOS terminal of the salvage ship Corina, the ship’s crew are astonished to hear the beautiful sweeping melody of Pucchnoi’s Madama Butterfly. Under obligation to investigate the distress signal they follow the melody until reaching its source lodged within the scrap-metal graveyard of space. Finally a closed rose of twisted metal appears from the surrounding rubble as two of the ship’s crew enter the mysterious vessel to look for survivors and the signal’s source. What they find inside is far from the expected, a world of royal luxury and overwhelming grandure. But as the pair progress into the ships heart it soon becomes clear of the disturbing nature of the ships owner that lay beneath her smiling exterior. Lost within her memories, she will play with their hearts and own memories until a climax that utilized the opera to its ever note, that left everyone in the theater in awe. In my eyes I saw this perfect short-story of Memories as the pick of this collection of three stories and took away from the later due to its sheer magnificence. Of coarse its hard to compare all of the stories of the collection together due to their extreme comparisons, and it will fall to personal taste and opinion. But to all of the fans with which I spoke, ‘Magnetic Rose’ had touched everyone with this alternative emotional tragedy of Madam Butterfly. EPISODE 2 He's under odors -uh, orders, How far would you take a joke? Mr. Tensai has pushed the boundaries of mankind oldest and most immoral joke, the fart joke, and taken it to the extremes, yet still managed to initiate a sense of simple plot and unrelentless comedy. When Tanaka, an employee of Nishibashi, Japan’s leading medical research center, has a bad winters cold, he is trying every tablet and medicine under the sun to dispel the awful flu. But when his colleagues suggest a tablet that is found labeled top secret on his Boss’s desk strange things start to happen. Lying down to a nap he awakes to a building full of dead bodies, and naturally panicing contacts the facilities higher authorities who are shocked at the turn of events but appear to know the motives behind the occurrence. Ordering him to collects a selection of papers and the jar of tablets which he took one of himself earlier he starts out for Tokyo, suitcase in hand. Outside trees lie in full blossom in the dead of winter and wildlife and people alike lie dead on the ground. He cannot understand whats happening as a strong green mist begins to surround him. Its not long before national security steps in the find the cause and pin-points it to this clueless man on a mission. What follows is a hilarious showcase as every resource of the county’s military force is applied yet Tanaka seems unstoppable. Will he full-fill his mission or be blown sky high trying? I guess you’ll have to watch it to find out. EPISODE 3 Know your place. Oppressive forces can dominate a society’s thinking for so long that it becomes a way of life. A lie can be feed to us for so long that we can forget what the truth is. Cannon Fodder shows how war and conformity can create a way of life for a small family that knows only their daily routine and the fear of persecution yet still manage to live in a world of childhood dreams with a social life that is always the basis of rebellion in an unstable cultue of war and oppression. The detailed mathematics of war are observed through the obsessive detailing of the loading and aiming of a cannon that fires into nothing but thin air. ‘The Moving City’ which they fight is never seen and you are lead to doubt its existence as the cannon is fired by a military commander whos motives you are lead to question as he repetitively follows the same procedures of firing the cannon in full uniform. The most noticeable and amazing achievement of this short story is its constant panning shot for the entirety of the film. Never once does a shot change location by cutting footage but instead follows the characters without a shoot change. I found Cannon Fodder a very frustrating completion to the Memories saga due to the fact of the lack of purpose behind an entire civilizations way of life compared to the incredibly satisfying stories of Magnetic Rose and the humor of Stink Bomb. But Cannon Fodder definitely has its own inner beauty through the themes it deals with and the characters you come to feel for in their lives of oppression, insuring you to fight for freedom in our own daily lives. But are we fighting against an unseen enemy or an oppressive government? LINKS Song Files - Magnetic Rose
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