BELLE (2021) Film Thoughts

It truly never gets any easier, the moment we see our creative beacons arrive only to feel underwhelmed by their biggest work to date. So when I put off catching Mamoru Hosoda’s latest in a theater during one of the most frightening spikes in the COVID era, it was with the feeling that I had indeed missed out on something, and that home viewing wouldn’t compare. But the truth is, it is possible that had I done so, there might have been a mild possibility that the spectacle of BELLE (aka..The Dragon and The Freckled Princess) would overpower what I could inevitably see as a wall of limitations. Which is to say that in spite of glowing word from trusted voices, and a stunning ad campaign complete with awards talk, the film tends to rely on the robustness of its production to obfuscate genuine issues that could have been rectified at the writing stage.

BELLE ostensibly attempts to be a director's culmination of every work that has come before, meaning his themes of personal transformation in an ever expanding online world complete with his love of Japanese high school heart tugging are on display. In this case, he spins the tale of Suzu, a quiet country teen who's innocuous nature save for a constellation of freckles on her face who is living a double life as a shy student, but is a beloved and beautiful virtual idol in the massive online community known as U. It is in the no-boundaries realm of U that Suzu's alter-ego has amassed millions of fans through her life's passion as a song writer and vocalist. And it is through this double life we are host to her estrangement from her father, whom she shares a countryside home in the years after tragedy takes mom away. At school, Suzu's life takes on its own litany of complications as her best friend serves as virtual manager for her online life, while her childhood pal continues to loom protectively over her as he has since they were both six. Other friends fill the equation with requisite longings and dreams seemingly ripped from hundreds of anime productions over the decades. 

But it is within her latest and largest concert event that she is drawn to a lone dragon avatar seemingly causing chaos across U suddenly turning this confluence of elements into a major spin on a familiar fairy tale that BELLE ultimately establishes its identity. 

On the production level the film is certainly a major affair on par with the largest anime works to date. Taking Hosoda's obsessions to levels never before expressed on such a grand canvas as singers explode in trails of color and expressiveness in contrast to the deceptively simple backdrops of daily small town life complete with his love of confessions in front of flowing bodies of water. Fans of The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (2007) will immediately be hit with a swath of deja vu. But within the realm of U lies Hosoda and team's grandest visual strokes as we are awash in shapes, colors, architecture, and plays on space that evoke the wearing of VR gear. It's a pretty wild final statement that the director has seemingly been heading toward for over twenty years. 

There's also Suzu's very personal and lauded music which is meant to serve as something of an emotional backbone to the piece with songs that are effectively spectacular within a few scenes. A collaboration that includes the talents of Ludvig Forsell, Daiki Tsuneta, Miho Hazama, and composer Taisei Iwasaki, seeks to be the film’s larger lifeblood.

The ambition inherent in his works have been a constant since as far as I can remember. (The Digimon feature immediately comes to mind.) And the level of juggling required has been something Hosoda has been successful at before. Where BELLE runs into problems is in the execution of the impressive number of themes the film is attempting to link together. Whether it be about Suzu's double life, internet fame, love troubles, the long standing gulf between her and her father, or perhaps the film's most challenging aim, in encouraging empathy for randos online, it's clear that in spite of previous efforts, somehow these threads find themselves either insufficiently explored or poorly connected. 

Issues that could have been rectified at the writing stage dog what on the surface feels like a dazzling creative statement from an artist who has been capable of delicately threading character and thematic material before. One possible culprit might be the absence of former screenwriting collaborator Satoko Okudera who's work made both Girl and Summer Wars sing with equal doses of grandeur and intimate character work. Being the only scribe with this ultra busy narrative must have proved exhausting. Another possibility is something I have been dreading for years as an lover of anime, the fear that generations beyond the Miyazakis and Takahatas of the world where the real world as well as cinematic language were the central north stars of a production, are now in the throes of replicating anime tropes instead. It’s something that has become something of a refrain as of late most evident before this in the form of one Hideaki Anno’s end to his Rebuild Of Evangelion series of films where lore and tropes take the place of organic storytelling. And while BELLE does make attempts to be more holistic in its narrative approach, it ultimately buckles to assumption and incomplete threads of information that would normally make the story as a whole gel.

Add to what Hosoda seems to want to say through his internet storyline, along with a truly challenging abuse aspect that requires a great deal more coverage, what we get is a series of disparate moments that must have seemed powerful on paper, but have a hard time landing in the execution. And one of the major casualties of this is garbled messaging. For my money films like BELLE and even Rebuild of Evangelion 3.0 + 1.0 represent a striking and possibly even troubling new culture within anime production that overflows with creative ambition, but cannot help but reveal deficiencies in having all the keys at one team’s disposal. And whatever does land, tends to be in the service of strangely regressive, toxic ideals. Without going into too much detail, there is another aspect that I have yet to mention regarding a cadre of self-described guardians within the realm of U, led by a blonde haired, blue eyed caricature of an American superhero obsessed with bringing down the Beast through what is known as “Unveiling”, which can be translated as doxxed. And because this is yet another spinning plate added to the film’s already busy palette, underexamined this path borders on less seeking empathy between internet and social media users, but of defending toxic trolls from a potentially “woke” mob out to quash them from existence. This is where Hosoda’s almost 1990s idealism of the internet collides with more complex, well understood realities of our daily lives online. It’s a misread that almost hobbles the film completely for me.

The muddled spectacle finds further evidence as the finale approaches in a sequence where Suzu finds herself in need of doing away with her online mask, becoming vulnerable for all to see in a sequence that is meant to be the larger emotional culmination of the film (One of two btw). And it is a truly stirring scene of music and animation that would work if again, the connections were made between all of Hosoda’s aims. As such, it’s a beautiful several minutes that feel strangely removed from the rest of the story, as if this were the ending to another film entirely.

While visually astonishing, BELLE can't decide what kind of work it wants to be, nor has the willingness to meet audiences halfway. Sure we could chock it up to a cultural difference when talking the internet, but for all its aims to keep character front and center, the thing never figures out how to make us care about its arguments. It's to the point that it feels like creators like Hosoda simply can't get around a world where accountability might be a consequence of being a problematic figure online.

And it also brings to mind why it's so important to thread through needle with vital character information early in the story in order to properly merge the human story with the thematic meat. Because on the surface, the elements are definitely in place in BELLE. The issue comes in when the film needs us to connect these vital components through recognition and behaviors. We've seen this in other films of this shape where protagonists empathize with a misunderstood quantity. The problem here is that in spite of Hosoda's larger intentions of "don't judge others as we don't know their truth", we never get a proper planting of the flip side of that equation. We never know Beast at the outset because it's pretty hard to do this without making his behavior look dismal at the beginning. While she sees him at her concert, we never fully get what she is seeing in him. There's no established connection, so all we get is something assumed rather than at least vaguely understood. For something making such references to classic stories, it feels like a crucial misstep to me. What this conveys to me sadly is that Hosoda either doesn't really know how to give the audience more information about this empathic connection, or he's simply indirectly railing against what he views as "woke mob" behavior, which is its own can of worms. Either way, I don't think it's an easy challenge with so many of us witness to online behavior over the course of 25-plus years. You can't just dazzle us and call it a day.

And we've seen that Hosoda loves using virtual worlds as backdrop since the very beginning of his career. It's just interesting that it really overshadows everything else to the point that I never grok any real point to any of it. Not to mention a feeling that we're also witnessing a near complete jump into digital animation which is kind of a bummer to me as what I loved about his work initially was the unmistakably hand drawn nature of it. I understand that near total CG animation was applied to the bulk of the scenes in U, but the effect of it for me is distancing as it contrasts relatively harshly in contrast to the scenes in the real world. Of which include some sterling moments of expressively animated comedy and warmth that evoke the best of The Girl and Summer Wars not unlike a victory lap for the fans, but also a reminder of those few lives that Suzu has and is affecting in the real. By wedging in this wild twist on Beauty and the Beast, the whole becomes almost too unwieldy to hold together. Other great casualties of this attempt include the wrap around regarding our heroine and her relationship with her father which has one really affecting moment, but is all too brief considering the event that pulled them apart.

The flip side for me with all of this is that ambition can itself be lauded, even when the whole doesn’t work. There are many ideas and human touches to BELLE that do ask for more from these types of productions, and in a way they to provoke valuable conversations about the nature of story, and what it takes to bring new and challenging questions to light. And while I do find this to be another lesser Hosoda entry, it has been a gift to see this artist and many others shoot for so much in the decades since the medium reached maturity with feature length narratives. And sometimes it’s only because we admire creatives so much that we can’t help but clock when reach exceeds grasp.

Belated Thoughts: Evangelion 3.0 + 1.01: Thrice Upon A Time (2021)

Had been putting this one off for the kind of time and bandwidth needed to finally digest it, and unfortunately it's pretty much everything I feared it would be.

Visually strong, but so far up its own ass that it ends up designating the entire Rebuild concept to KY Jelly status.

With the original series, the enemy/obstruction was growing up and perpetuating the awfulness of our previous generations.

With Rebuild, the enemy/obstruction is Anno's indifference.

Again, another case of being given all the toys, but no clue as to what to do with all of them. The finale ends up being less a functional dramatic piece of work, and more a grand canvas to get out years of latent, unrealized ideas whether or not it tells a story or evokes an emotion. In the end, Rebuild is little more than an increasingly overwrought rag more interested in fan service and fetishism to the point that it all feels pretty perfunctory and without much left to say. Twenty four years after The End of Evangelion (1997), it's pretty clear that whatever personal turmoil led to the epoch making confessional that is the original series has come around, and it isn't terribly interested in anything outside of objects. The once very compelling character landscape of NGE is now pure spectacle with nothing driving it all but fleeting baubles of interest. Despite all its incredible production muscle, the entire affair is an inert one punctuated by assumptions of depth.

For me there is no sensitivity to incident which is to say that nothing really breathes, which is what I need for moments to build and deliver. There is a lot thrown at us, but those aren't really scenes. Rather they are wildly complex ideas and opportunities for animators to strut their best, but with no authentic purpose outside of how cool it might be. It's something that pervades the Rebuilds, but it is in overdrive here to the point that I felt nothing for anything or anyone.

Worse yet, it's clear that Anno has only learned the wrong things since the original series. The conclusion he comes to here is so backward, so toxic, that it's hard to believe it was written by the same person. If anything, it kind of taints the original if these feelings were always at the back of his mind. That, or marriage and life beyond has rendered him into something the opposite of what made the original so powerful to me.

The fact that it's now all about objects and incident without humanity is the wrong kind of depressing. It decides that the finale of Gunbuster with its Black Hole Bomb was infinitely more interesting than the choices pilots were making or exploring. Give an artist everything they could possibly want, and the end product might be telling of their deepest intentions.

This is another one of those "careful what you wish for" moments. Sure, the original "End" was an emotionally overwhelmed and deeply angry mess, but at least it was a vulnerable, honest mess.

1997 presented us with the Shinji outcome.

3.0 + 1.0 is the Gendo outcome.

Flattening The Curve PRESENTS: Ghost In The Shell SAC_2045

Now, as some friends have known that after completing the impressively mounted-if overlong fantasy prequel, The Dark Crystal: Age Of Resistance, the goal for me was to cut off the Netflix behemonth completely, as the service had become less and less a home for interesting cinema, and more a receptacle for mid-level long form stories with an often samey visual sheen. And despite my best efforts to cut that cord for myself, since friends and loved ones continue to subscribe, the months long announcement that my personal favorite anime and manga franchise would indeed be returning in a twelve episode event, well the current Stay At Home situation, felt like a stage was set for a brief return. Original Ghost In The Shell Stand Alone Complex television series director and his team collaborating with mecha design legend, and prolific mocap CG fest director, Shinji Aramaki stoked me with both curiosity and nervousness. It’s a high wire risk that could surely sink a series beloved for its unusual levels of visual grit. So my coming back to the streaming service could be seen as a morbid move, especially sporting more youthful designs via longtime Behance and DeviantArt icon-turned character designer, Ilya Kuvshinov. This unique combination of elements reeked of risk for a multimedia franchise that has seen a number of them over the last decade.

Surprisingly, or unsurprisingly, Ghost In The Shell SAC_2045 is at best an interesting experiment featuring the further adventures of the Japan’s once legendary/notorious anti-cybercrime unit, Public Security Section 9; a team of heavily augmented and skilled agents tasked with the detective and military prowess to save the nation numerous times over, led by the fully prosthetic, Motoko Kusanagi, whom the team has long dubbed, The Major. Where the risks emerge on the story front, is in the opening crawl which describes the world falling into chaos mere years after the events of the 2006 SAC film, Solid State Society. Everything from governments collapsing, creating what is known as Sustainable War, or rather a global scavenger campaign for whatever remains as economies have all but completely dissolved. Our once very busy heroes, now unmoored by government oversight, is working overseas as a group of mercenaries, taking on patches of raiders throughout the Americas. Currently, their trip to my childhood background of PALM SPRINGS (jarring) pits them against teams of amateurs claiming to be fighting malevolent one-percenters. It is in these first five minutes that despite the sunny, clear skied backdrop reminiscent of Aramaki’s APPLESEED films, that my worry collided with a genuine curiosity at the series’ dramatic break from SAC’s twilight landscape often complimented by hard greys, and intense LEDs. It’d almost seem like a poor fit if this scenario didn’t feel like an inevitable consequence of the previous installments’ overload of unmanaged interconnectedness. It’s all been blown to hell, and Section 9 is still out there torn between attempting to pick up the pieces, and simple nostalgia for the wartime life.

While the team finds itself stalled in a barricaded part of the city, former member and still the mostly human detective, Togusa in Japan receives a call from the still kicking and now working for the Minister of the Interior, Daisuke Aramaki, who’s work with a new and very caucasian prime minister, seeks to locate and get the old band back together in the name of a new potential alliance with the American Empire. Togusa, since last we saw him is now divorced, the casualty of his workaholic ways as he attempts to find out what has happened to his former colleagues. All of this while The Major, Batou, Saito, and newly joined member, the appropriately named, Standard find themselves tumbling into a plot involving PMCs, fabled “good one percenters”, and a suited man in dark shades that feels like a far too late nod to Aramaki’s past. I say Aramaki’s past, and not the Wachowskis since this shady man-in-black character is much closer to the shadowy B.D. of Megazone 23 than to a certain Agent Smith., so it’s more of a cycle back..to the beginni- YEAH YOU GET IT.

And this is pretty much the deal throughout this initial season. I say initial since the ink has dried on a planned two-parter, with Aramaki taking over fully next time. Which still leaves me mildly nervous. Saying this as a longtime fan who is more than happy with the material that has come before. Particularly prior to Kazuchika Kise’s ARISE, which felt like a muddled overture to a mainstream viewership. SAC_2045, feels more authentic to the classic Stand Alone Complex experience, while wearing this occasionally awkward outfit that makes every character not a think tank doll-like and lifeless. Oh, and did we mention the return of the irrepressible, and hopelessly cool tachikomas? The cute cadre of badass tanks make a splash here as the medium change suits them perfectly, which was probably one of the biggest reasons for the transition. It’s just too bad they don’t really find much to do here except provide backup and comic relief from time to time.

A lot of SAC_2045, finds itself so mired in plot mechanics that it often neglects the more personal sides to our heroes, making this a more detached affair than is usual for the franchise. And even as the GiTS world is suddenly paying off almost two decades of story implying that human evolution has taken a dramatic turn, which is causing the strife at the center of things, the new series has a hard time pausing long enough to let us take it in. Perhaps where the Aramaki stuff hinders matters. His action is fantastic, but a huge part of what made the original Stand Alone Complex and 2nd Gig so powerful to me, was its ability to humanize the stakes of such technological advancement. Where upon the original manga by the one and only Masamune Shirow, presented a world that was at once overwhelming to the point of humorous, the Oshii helmed feature films rendered the world haunted and contemplative, while SAC television series fashioned the mythological landscape into one that is at once enthralling, thought-provoking, and ultimately wholly relatable.

With SAC_2045, the best we get is an action gamer’s playground version, which might work better as a one-off feature. But like most Netflix projects, continuously threatens to wear itself thin. so while it isn’t ARISE levels of flat, there is a lack of humanity on display that renders this incarnation a little lacking. And as giddy as I am to hear the old voice cast from the best incarnations back in fighting shape, the mask only leaves me longing for something more literate and thoughtful.

And as a finale note, while I still lament the loss of one Yoko Kanno as music composer powerhouse, the current Soundtrack via Nobuko Toda, is pretty engaging and is as musically diverse. Again, the problem being that the direction here despite the return of master scribes like Kamiyama and Dai Sato, there is a decided lack of depth to the proceedings, which is ironic considering the whole affair is attempting a three-dimensional approach. Again, as an experiment it’s an occasionally fun diversion, albeit a wildly unnecessary one.

It really is summer isn’t it?

Blockbuster it up, I guess.

And yes, despite all this I prefer it to the 2017 Hollywood film.

Lastly; If Purin Ezaki is what the future of Koukaku Kidotai holds, check please. .

FLCL Progressive's debut episode, RE-STA: Inverted Dreams

Opening on what seems to be a desolate planet awash in mostly monochromatic colors, we follow what looks to be our headphones-sporting new central character, Hidomi not looking terribly well. Surrounded by destruction and detritus from what looks to have been a cataclysmic event that has left her equally as tattered. With each step, her form seems to also be exhibiting signs of damage. To the point where she loses both hands as the landscape is soon humming with the familiar incoming of a row of giant steam irons. No means of taking control when she stares into the eye of an alien giant. Only a moment later, the horn protruding from her forehead overtakes, leading to the emergence of an entirely new humanoid robot ready to take on the domestic hordes of normalcy. The buzz of an alarm goes off. Another vivid dream for a girl seemingly gone numb in a world so weaned on her particular brand of disconnect. Her headphones to block out the world, and "tsundere" demeanor, now an accepted part of the daily mosaic that it's only a matter of time before either she disappears, or is confronted head on with these nagging dreams of robots, irons, & guitars. Well, whaddaya know? It's a spiritual sequel!

So here we are at last, catching up with a proper introduction after Toonami's April Fool's event, which was passable at best. And my impressions here are largely no different, save for what scribe Hideto Iwai, and the FLCL team hint drop for us in regards to what happened to our favorite Space Fraternity misfit, and the children she pesters in the name of her own plans. In a town that in many ways resembles that of the original Mabase, we are introduced to a world that has seemingly embraced many corners of questionable maturity in the name of a new status quo. Hidomi's mom is hopelessly chipper, and wildly accepting of her daughter's disinterest to the point of systematic expectation. It has become such an expectation that even Hidomi's part-time diner job is strewn with patrons who praise and fawn over her apathy. These regulars, now an aged version of the generation of fans I have grown up around. It's to the point where upon introducing the franchise's (Wow. I actually said the F word regarding FLCL) latest Spacecop, the more focused and steadfast Cadillac riding, Jinyu, reflects a potentially startling reveal that the battle between factions over the youth of the Earth indeed continues on, and that the intergalactic troublemaker, Rahau Haruhara, is indeed on the prowl again for fresh potential.

We also get to know Hidomi's class, in particular her classmate, Ide who not only has a penchant for stories, but is sporting both glasses and a familiar head bandage. Potential does indeed attend this class, and that teacher's voice should ring a few fan bells. Also worth making a note of, is Hidomi's mother who may have dropped a huge hint regarding the whereabouts of an important character from the original series. Considering Hidomi's current predicament, it makes all the sense in the world.

Now, the episode does finally reveal its hand in regards to where she is and what she has been up to all this time. But the implications of it, made a deeper impression on me than anything else in the episode. Production value vacillates between on par with the original 1999-2000 OVA, and standard television work. But the notion that Haruhara, has indeed been secretly infiltrating the youth in the town, helping engender a population of overgrown infants, is a sobering one. Growing up under the auspices of more conservative leaderships, one of the most popular colloquialisms regarding playing the role, and "overtaking from the inside", has now taken on a borderline malevolent tone. Considering the Japan and the West of today, our dreams may indeed have found themselves corrupted by those eager to exploit for their own gain. Indeed, its seems that FLCL's needle might have indeed shifted, by presenting what could go wrong when unchained youthful exuberance finds itself subverted. It's an interesting turn in what largely felt like already well-treaded ground. So until the next installment, I remain a little ambivalent about the existence of this return, save for some lush animation, and the ever reliable soundtrack by The Pillows.

There is potential for a serious upending of the past, but like the sneak peek from April, all I'm getting here is a nice smell from the kitchen, and no dish in sight.

Still Thinking Your Name

Caught it on Sunday, and I'm still of a scrambled brain about Makoto Shinkai's latest. And I've gone ahead and written a few words about it for good ol' Anime Diet. I'm still pretty surprised at the film's now immense status, as it doesn't speak to me quite as much as high ranking anime titles of the past. But I wonder if it's because time has surely passed me by. Or that the priorities for anime viewers in the years 2016-2017 have harshly shifted. Or, I'm completely wrong, and that these have been the priorities of fans since the 1990s, and they've finally found a piece that best encapsulates certain dreams, wishes, and ideals of many.

Whatever the case, for me it's an occasionally endearing jumble at best. And for what it's worth, I'm grateful it's here.