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Directed by Rintaro
Produced by Tezuka Productions/Metropolis Project
Based on the unfinished manga by Tezuka Osamu. Metropolis is the tale of a boy, his robotic friend and to some extent urban sprawl and the greed of mankind. In a sense it’s a godsend that the manga was never completed because it allows the screenwriter, Otomo Kitsuhiro [Roujin Z and AKIRA] to weave his own ethos into the script and general atmosphere. The film’s theme is in many ways similar to AKIRA reflecting the downfall of man through his pursuit for power. Rintaro [Galaxy Express 999] occupies the director’s chair and he also has a simple message for the Japanese people, well not so much a message as a reminder he wants to show Japanese people the art styling of yesteryear through traditional cell animation and fantastically rendered CG backdrops.
Foe the most part the two succeed in bringing Tezuka’s art up-to-date the visuals are sharp and look fantastic when still however when characters begin to move about they do look a bit out of place in their high tech surroundings. Onto the characters themselves many of Tezuka’s “Star” characters appear in this including Rock and Sansuke Ban [both appeared in Tetsowan Atom] as well as new characters including the protagonist Kenichi and his lady friend Tima. Sansuke Ban takes the role of Kenichi’s uncle and the two are visiting Metropolis on the trail of an organ smuggler named Laughton. While there the two uncover a sinister plot for one of the cities political leaders to seize control of the entire world.
The political leader in question is one Duke Red, his daughter died when she was very young and Laughton has been hired to remake his daughter [Tima] as a cyborg. Rock [the psuedo son of Duke Red] is not impressed by his “father’s” trust in a machine and feels that he will be replaced by nothing more than a computer. In an act of rage Rock destroys Dr. Laughton’s lab causing a fire to break out in the underground of Metropolis. Kenichi and Sansuke get separated and Kenichi meets Tima for the first time. The two build a strong relationship and Kenichi becomes a father figure to Tima she does not realise she’s a robot and so is naïve to the ways of the world. While they separated Sansuke dedicates most of his time to uncovering Duke Red’s plot and searching for his lost nephew.
Kenichi on the other hand spends his time wandering through the sewer systems of Metropolis and eventually gets caught up in a coup d’etal against the machines that have taken the working class peoples’ jobs. This is good because it shows that this is truly an Otomo movie, the anarchic undertones and themes in the story are a throw back to his earlier work [e.g. AKIRA] and add a welcome air of familiarity to the proceedings. As the plot progresses Kenichi and Sansuke meet again and find out about Tima’s secret [that she is the centerpiece of a weapon of mass destruction] the climax of Metropolis comes in the form of Kenichi getting beaten around by Tima while Ray Charles plays in the background. Nice.
It is interesting to see how Rintaro has gone about updating the 1940’s manga. The character designs have not been updated much and stay true to Tezuka’s style of drawing [basically playing off Disney films and American newspaper strips of the time] the whole movie has an overwhelming retro air.
From the soundtrack to the designs of machinery the designs and sounds are indeed retro-centric at first people may be put off to see just how unsexy Metropolis is but with perseverance the viewer is soon sucked into the fantastic world that Rintaro has successfully updated [to a degree] for the 21st century. I say to a degree because he has not been entirely successful the characters are cell animated and look very good indeed while the backdrops are pre rendered in CG [a la Blue Submarine No. 6] this makes for some odd contrast between the background and the characters that is to say the characters look out of place most of the time.
Another problem is the story itself while heart warming and pleasantly presented it lacks the real scope of a “new milestone in anime” and falls down in the heart-warming stakes to Princess Mononoke and again in the scope race to AKIRA. While pleasing and fun it lacks that certain something that would make it an instant classic. Perhaps the world isn’t ready for Metropolis, or perhaps Metropolis was never ready for the world.
Seven out of Ten
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