[Categories: OAVs, Movies and Full Series]
Appleseed
In the year 2131 the human race is on the brink of self-destruction after years of war. The United Earth Government has created the Utopian city of Olympus as a fresh start for a new, peaceful society; overseen by an AI computer system named Gaia and day-to-day duties aided by a breed of pacifist cloned beings named bioroids, it is intended to be a model city for humans to live in peace and prosperity. One human who is rescued from the harsh outside world and brought into Olympus is the young female warrior Deunan Knute, who is called up to defend the city from a group of renegade humans who try to bring down the computer’s mainframe and wrestle control of the city from Gaia and the bioroids. Alongside her former lover Briareos, once feared dead but now reborn into a cyborg body, Deunan is given the task of foiling the revolutionaries’ plot and unlocking the secret behind the mysterious ‘Appleseed’ that holds the key to the fate of both bioroids and humans.
Deunen Knute: girls with guns are always a winner
This film is based on the acclaimed manga penned by Masamune Shirow; not surprisingly this means that Appleseed has its fair share of feisty heroines, high-tech cities and superb mecha designs that come to life on screen and make for a thrilling and convincing future world. The city of Olympus has been stunningly recreated here, giving a breathtaking mixture of Huxley’s Brave New World and Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner with the typical cyberpunk twist that also borrows much from director Shinji Aramaki’s enviable CV. There has been an anime adaptation of Appleseed before in the form of a 1980s OVA directed by Kazuyoshi Katayama of course, but the feature length version has more depth, atmosphere and most obvious of all, greatly updated visuals. When I mean updated, I mean the slick, shiny, cutting edge of animation: this looks downright spectacular.
A new life in Olympus
It has to be said that Appleseed’s greatest strength is that of the innovative animation techniques used: it was created entirely in 3D CGI, with ‘cel shading’ to give the traditional anime look that fans are familiar with. The end result is a feature whose action scenes and panoramic views are at the cutting edge - the cityscapes, mecha designs and other weapons are outstanding and greatly add to the film’s visual impact. The only drawback here is that the same techniques were used to animate the characters: because of this their movements and expressions owe more to (admittedly very good) computer game graphics so are a little lifeless. No matter how up-to-date the motion capture methods are, they have yet to match the realism of live-action or the charm of traditional cel animation in terms of the portrayal of human movement and expressions - it’s a brave attempt at marrying the two but falls somewhere in the middle, which may be offputting for some.
The token panoramic cityscape shot
In films that rely so heavily on set-pieces and action the characterisation often suffers but in Appleseed this is thankfully not nearly as serious as I feared: I found myself actually caring about the characters and their motivations. Shirow’s complex tale of conspiracies, moral dilemmas and philosophical questions is condensed reasonably well into the running time, giving an interesting plot with a few twists without making it too confusing. The questioning of the morality of a city that uses a computer system to control the population is explored more fully here than in the OVA (a theme revisited in I, Robot, which bears quite a few similarities to this film), not to mention pointing out some harsh truths about human nature’s thirst for violence along the way.
The Elders
While we’re on that subject I was particularly intrigued by the fact that, even when technology has advanced, human nature is essentially the same - we are our own worst enemy in a very literal sense. What was interesting in this case is how the film condemns our destructive instincts but in that very process almost celebrates it by presenting us with some of the most meticulously-rendered military gear in the history of animated film: we’re destroying the world and ourselves but the hardware we’re using looks so damn cool! Every now and then during movies like this I wonder about what the real message is supposed to be - perhaps for a blockbuster such as this it’s all about the futuristic shiny-ness.
Behold the awesomeness of the Mobile Fortresses
In Summary
Appleseed is a visually stunning and surprisingly thought-provoking film that any sci-fi fan should find the time to see, if only for the visual ‘wow’ factor. Unfortunately, the new animation technology still has some way to go with the finer details of the character designs but it is still a worthwhile visual spectacle - sure, it is eye candy but it is eye candy of a most polished and sophisticated order.
Posted on September 5th, 2007 @ 7:19 am
I rented the OVA a while back and later watched this film. As far as the animation is concerned, I have to agree it was on par with the best I’ve seen. The character animation only bothered me for a while before I learned to ignore it and “just go with the flow.”
Many of us prefer the classical “cel” style for characters. When the entire world is rendered in 3D I find the contrast to be too much most of the time. I prefer a conservative usage of CGI to the point that there is seamless integration into a standard look and feel. While I will watch a show no matter the animation style, the preference is not to be visually abused by drastic changes in the way the world appears.