Topic: Critter's Animated Film/Anime Marathon

[Tom]

As you have probably all realised by now I use the term 'marathon' very loosley in terms with this animated/anime thing. I call it a marathon when really itt's turning more into a continous and ongoing thread that I will just keep updated. And more animated films are coming out everyday, who knows if I will ever finish it.

The same thing happened to me with my Weekend Movie Marathon: Time-travel Movies thread. It started out as a weekend marathon, but now I use it for every time-travel movie that I review.
I should rename the thread someday. I also was thinking, that I move my not so random reviews to separate threads, like anime reviews, Bollywood reviews and superhero movies reviews.

[Critter]

I certainly understand how they can just grow Tom. At the moment I just have three, one for films I see at the cinema, one for animated and anime and one for random DVD watching. I've thought of moving this one out of the marathon section since that isn't really what it is anymore (I'm not sure if it ever was) but frankly I'm not sure how. I'm finding it a lot easier just to keep it here. Although I might someday change the title from marathon to reviews.

[Jimmy]

I also was thinking, that I move my not so random reviews to separate threads, like anime reviews, Bollywood reviews and superhero movies reviews.

Please no... I'm lazy and I will have to redo all your link in the review table if you do that

[Critter]

Jimmy I have been meaning to ask. If I have a film that can go in two different catagories, for example, today I saw an animated film in the cinema. Should I put it in my animated films thread or my seen in the cinema one? Or would it not matter if your list if I put it in both and you just added it once?

[Jimmy]

You can do it any way you want
I take always the first written for the link, the problem, and this isn't a big one, is when you delete them without telling me to move them on another topic. Sometimes it's not that much works like when you have done it, but if Tom do the same it will be since he had a lot of reviews.

[Tom]

I also was thinking, that I move my not so random reviews to separate threads, like anime reviews, Bollywood reviews and superhero movies reviews.

Please no... I'm lazy and I will have to redo all your link in the review table if you do that

I would of course leave the old reviews also in my old thread. I had thought of that, because I didn't want to burden you with such a big task
Also deleting the old reviews would make the discussions worthless. I wouldn't want that.

[Critter]

Fantastic Mr Fox



Year: 2009

Director(s): Wes Anderson

Run Time: 87  minutes

Plot: Angry farmers, tired of sharing their chickens with a sly fox, look to get rid of their opponent and his family.

Cast:
George Clooney – Mr Fox
Meyrl Streep – Mrs Fox
Bill Murray – Badger
Jason Schwartzman – Ash
Owen Wilson – Coach Skip
Eric Chase Anderson – Kristofferson

 DVD Extras:
•   Unavailable

My Thoughts

I am a huge fan of Roald Dahls children’s books. I have read all of them and still read them today, and unlike some others of the film adaption’s based on them, I think that if Dahl was alive today he would really be proud of this one. Fantastic Mr Fox has everything a film based off such a great book should have, it’s funny, charming, unusual and most importantly captivating from start to finish. Mr Fox himself is portrayed throughout the film as a lovable anti-hero who at times had the whole cinema laughing out loud, and at other times had us all close to tears in some of the more touching scenes. This is Wes Anderson’s first animated film, and only the second of his works I have seen. I am know hoping to go back through his filmography and watch many more of his works as I have enjoyed the films I have seen of his so much.

The voice acting in this film was sensational, the voices just sounded so natural and never felt forced or false and this gave the character puppets within the stop-motion animation a truly believable life around them. The film was visually stunning, with fantastic detailed backgrounds and characters, every tiny little detail from a spoon to a chair was carved for the film in miniature scale which shows how much time and effort was really put in, and it pays off. Stop-motion animation was said to be a dying art some time ago but with the successes of such films as Coraline, Mary and Max and now Fantastic Mr Fox I think it is safe to say that this great art form is safe in the filmmaking business. 

My Rating

[Critter]

ICE



Anime Type: OVA (3 Episodes)

Year: 2007

Director: Kobayashi, Makoto

Plot: By A.D. 2010, all men have died off quickly due to a dramatic change in the environment and an unknown contaminant. The population decreased to the lowest number ever seen...until only the women were left alive.

My Thoughts:
A friend of mine lent me this 3 episode OVA anime on the basis that I have in the past like sci-fi anime, especially those with Yuri themes throughout. This one however was just too weird for me, I felt that the story was under developed the whole time and that I didn’t get to know the characters well enough to even care about them, or in fact sympathize with them at all. Out of all three episodes there were only a couple of scenes that I actually enjoyed and aside from those I just spent the whole time thinking that the show has to get better, but it didn’t. Visually there were some neat designs and the backgrounds were at times stunning, but as far as post-apocalyptic and sci-fi anime goes this one is defiantly not on the top of my list.

My Rating

[Critter]

Elfen Lied



Anime Type: TV (13 Episodes)

Year: 2004

Director: Kanbe, Mamoru

Plot: The Diclonius, a mutated homosapien that is said to be selected by God and will eventually become the destruction of mankind, possess two horns on their heads and have a "sixth sense" which gives them telekinetic abilities. Due to this dangerous power, they have been captured and isolated in laboratories by the government. Lucy, a young and psychotic Diclonius, manages to break free of her confines and brutally murders most of the guards in the laboratory where she is being held, only to be shot in the head as she makes her escape. She survives, falling off a cliff into the ocean and manages to drift along to a beach where two teenagers, Kouta and Yuka, discover her. Having lost her memories, she was named after the only thing that she can now say, "Nyuu," and the two allow her to stay at Kouta's home. However, it appears that the psychotic side of Lucy is not dead just yet...

My Thoughts:
Now this is a bloody, brutal mess of a show. Without a doubt one of the most gruesome anime I have seen, and I have seen some pretty messed up ones. Elfen Lied leaves nothing to the imagination as characters with supernatural powers and psychotic ways tear each other’s limbs off, these characters also happen to be young girls just to add to the disturbance. It is within these characters multiple personalities and visits to their past however that make this show so compelling. It may be violent yes, but Elfen Lied is not just mindless excuse for violence, instead , I found myself actually caring for these characters and involved with their various plights throughout the series.
Within this series themes such as hate, rage and inhumanity drive one of the most intriguing plotlines I have watched in an anime yet.  As the story progresses we discover more and more about all of the characters and how they are all connected to each other in mysterious ways. These connections are explored through ways such as flashbacks. Flashbacks sometimes annoy me in anime but I felt they used just the right amount here so that they didn’t become tiring.

My Rating

[Najemikon]

hmmm... ever seen Legend of the Overfiend? That is worthy of a BAN THIS SICK FILTH Daily Mail headline if ever there was one! I wonder how Elfen Lied compares?

[goodguy]

I wonder how Elfen Lied compares?

Especially with such a sweet title that inevitably makes me think of that saccharine Ferrell comedy.

[Tom]

Elfen Lied is a great anime. Two years ago they even had special screenings of it in a cinema in Munich. Even though I already had seen it, we went to see it. And took some along who didn't know it yet.
I am also reading the manga. Soon the last volume of the manga is released here in Germany

[Critter]

hmmm... ever seen Legend of the Overfiend? That is worthy of a BAN THIS SICK FILTH Daily Mail headline if ever there was one! I wonder how Elfen Lied compares?

Hmm I have never even heard of Overfiend but now I am interested in seeing it. I am watching another quite violent anime at the moment which I will probably review when I finish.
It's another one that involves all quite young characters who...

(click to show/hide)

Rip each others fingernails off, bash each other to death with baseball bats, and inject a drug into one an another which makes the carrier go crazy and kill themselve by clawing at their own throat.Just to name a few...

It does actually have pretty good storyline though so I am just going through the gore.

Tom I'm jealous of those special screenings in Munich. I live in such a lame area where they never do cool things like screen anime. I'm glad you liked Elfen Lied though, I agree that it's great.

[Najemikon]

I used to follow the Anime/Manga craze when it hit the UK in the early to mid-90s. There were a bunch of established movies us newbies were only just catching up with; Akira was the classic, of course, but also Crying Freeman, Fist of the North Star, Ninja Scroll, etc. It quickly became apparent how relaxed the Japanese writers were about violence and nudity and how it actually made the story work properly. I remember loving the Anime of Street Fighter II, specifically because of a near-rape scene. Such cold violence against women in a cartoon? Brilliant. That said, Legend was something else and the stories of how much survived the BBFCs scissors were intriguing.

What I find surprising is that according to the Wikipedia Anime section, the version I saw was already a cut-down version of the original three parts! I'm curious about seeing it properly now. I wonder if it still has the power to shock?



Oh wow, I've found the Chun Li scene! Enjoy...



And this brings back memories. It was on the start of all Manga Entertainment video releases...

[Critter]

Hey Jon that first link didn't work, something to do with not being available in my country.  That Chun Li vs Vega fight was great though, really makes me want to watch Street Fighter.  And that manga trailer really reminded me of some of the AMV Hell stuff I have seen. If you haven't watched any AMV Hell movies I highly recommend it, they are all on youtube and comprise of clips from 20 seconds up to a couple of minutes, but there are so many that two of the AMV Hell movies go for over an hour. They are, as the titled suggest just AMV's but instead of just using music they use sound bites from everything, such as The Simpsons, Martin Luthur Kings speech and even clips of Hitler.

Here are three of my faves.