Mistakes of Youth: The Blog (Powered by EXCELLENCE!)

Even though I came out of the first Kara no Kyoukai film with something of a negative reaction, upon finishing the seventh and final film I can quite easily say that it’s been a fine ride. A bumpy ride, mind you, but I more or less enjoyed it. However, more so than the characterization or stories, where these films really impressed me was in their sheer technical excellence.

But before I lavish praise upon these movies, let’s get the bad stuff out of the way first–I hate Nasu Kinoko. Well, I don’t hate him personally, as I’ve never met him. I’m sure he’s a fine gentleman. In fact, I don’t really hate his work on its own, but the animal cries of fanboys have changed my indifference into hatred. And it’s not as if the stories he writes are bad–they’re not, really. They may be be boring or a touch simple, but they’re not bad. What I don’t like is how he layers on a bunch of mumbo-jumbo dialogue that makes no sense, and warps otherwise simple tales into something way more complex. This actually works for some of the episodes, like the 100% awesome fifth episode which felt like a total ’80s anime throw back, but at best his style is a slight annoyance one has to deal with while admiring some of the most beautiful animation ever produced, and at worst it’s annoying as hell. I probably wouldn’t be too annoyed about this if I didn’t know there were hundreds of fanboys stroking their cocks to this same shit. Anyway.

These movies are awesome in every other way! The animation is awesome! The direction is awesome! The music is awesome! Think about it–there hasn’t been much in the way of big-budget anime productions lately. Giant Robo was probably the last time the anime industry considered doing a huge OVA project like this, and we all know how that went down. (If you don’t know how it went down, it was awesome, but it took 10 years to make.) With that in mind, along with the fact that the world is in financial turmoil right now, it’s easy to understand why we don’t see the same volume of long-form, big budget OVA project that we saw in the 1990s. And that’s why these movies are a breath of fresh air technically.

The animation across all of these movies is downright sex. I’m no animation expert like all of the sakuga-nerds out there, but I know pretty moving pictures when I see them, and these pictures are fucking pretty. What Kara no Kyoukai does is create a world that’s super real–the backgrounds contain a fetishistic amount of detail, and character movements are vivid and lifelike. However, in the world of Kara no Kyoukai, the lights shine a little brighter, the darks are a little darker, and the movement is a little smoother. Hence the “super”. This beautiful super reality illustrates the super-real events of these movies perfectly, and it shines its brightest during action sequences.

The action across all of these movies is some of the best animated action I’ve ever seen. It’s expertly choreographed, clever, and ever so smooth. Never has cutting people up looked so beautiful, and almost gentle in a way. Sequences that involve moving the background around a lot are especially impressive, and very cinematic. Everything just comes together perfectly visually in these movies starting from the thin lines on the character lineart, the strong colour palette, the mystical glow of the lights, to the fluid-as-water animation. It’s damn near perfect, and actually is perfect a lot of the time.

All of these amazing cuts of animation are framed and directed wonderfully, as well. A lot of the movies struck me with their beautiful storyboarding which at times brought to mind the better episodes of Evangelion. I don’t remember much in the way of old-school, maniac Shinbo-style compositions, but a lot of the shots in Kara no Kyoukai are simply framed very well. The wonderfully haunting score complements all of these shots very well, and creates a tone that’s perfect for what’s going down on screen.

If it’s not clear enough from those 700 words, what I’m trying to say is that these movies are fucking awesome, except for the story and characters parts, which are just okay. Well, they’re not to my taste. Anyway, I highly recommend Kara no Kyoukai simply for the high level of technical execution alone, even if you don’t care for Nasu’s crap. But since I’m in the minority here, you probably do.

So watch them!

(And just to piss off the Nasu lapdogs some more, the only other exposure I’ve ever had to the man’s work was the Fate/Stay Night anime.)

…and I still fail to see what’s so great about this series of movies, and what attracts people to Type-Moon’s work in general.

This fourth episode was terribly disappointing, especially considering that I actually liked the second and third episodes. Their stories are painfully simple, but if I recall correctly, they don’t try to hide how dumb they are, and are free of a lot of the amateur philosophizing that fucks up the first episode. Episode four, however, is an extremely boring story of some girl in a hospital bed. For forty-five minutes. This movie is demanding that I watch a sick girl in bed for forty-five minutes. Sure, it’s all very pretty, but I can only look at some person fighting little blue ghosts with their mind in a hospital bed until I just… get totally and completely bored.

To make it even worse, the movie tries to hide its pedestrian narrative by throwing the viewer off with wishy-washy dialogue that makes no sense, and presents things in a manner that makes it all seem more confusing than it really is. It is actually not that dissimilar to ef – a tale of emo douchebags.

It sure is pretty, though! I said that before, and I feel it needs repeating. These movies look good. I actually love their visual style, and I’m quite sad that this great aesthetic is wasted on such tripe. Well, like I said in paragraph two, at least episodes two and three were kind of good.

I’m going to put forward a question to conclude this miniature rant, that being: What’s so great about this shit? Actually, what’s so great about Type-Moon’s style of story telling in general? Each time I ask people, they never give me real explanations, and it all boils down to I LIKE IT. I want real explanations here.

Liking where the flash is falling in that last pic.

I’d love to put up the Kure-nai poster, but I’m currently in my parents’ house, and the Kure-nai poster is one of a naked seven-year-old taking a bath. I mean, I’m already pushing it with the Kojika and Yotsunoha posters. I also ordered the March Megami from J-List because it had that poster of Kokonoe Rin covered in nothing but chocolate. Won’t be able to put that one up, either.

I’ve never had a good relationship with Type-Moon. My first run-in with them was in the form of the Fate/Stay Night anime over two years ago, and I went into that with the bar set quite high due to the original’s high level of praise. I came out of it severely disappointed. The fans did, too, but that doesn’t change the fact that this was my first impression of Type-Moon, and first impressions are everything. Since then, I’ve had something of a bias against them. So naturally, when Kara no Kyoukai was announced, I hardly even cared.

My fanboy ears did perk up a bit when I heard UFOTable was on the job, though. While I’m not a fan of everything UFOTable puts out, they’re a good studio and I was confident they’d do justice to Type-Moon’s allegedly legendary brand of writing and produce something that wasn’t an insult to my intelligence. They almost did it, too! If only they had more than 50 minutes…

I’ll get the ugly stuff out of the way first: this writing is pretty bad. I understand that this one movie is the first in a series of seven, but a complete lack of introduction and/or exposition about these characters is pretty unacceptable. The movie should spend less time talking about flying and floating and more time establishing who these characters are and just what the fuck it is they do. The plot progression is pretty choppy, too, but I think that actually works. They way they present the story makes it seem more complicated than it actually is, but it works decently. Aside from that, though, this writing sucks. Too much wishy washy BS and pretentious musings about nothing for my tastes. Give me Eva over this any day.

Thankfully, the movie is just about perfect in every other way. UFOTable can put out some pretty good TV animation, so them plus a sexy movie budget is quite the site to see. It’s almost GITS:Innocence level, except for with less bad 3D graphics. Lighting effects, backgrounds and character animation are all top notch. The cinematography is great, too– the movie has a lot of great, well composed shots that almost distract me from the silly dialogue. Sure, they’re not Shinbo or Anno level, but what is? As far as music goes, the soundtrack doesn’t especially grab me but it works well in the context of the film. I’m not really a Yuki Kajiura fan anyway.

I know I sound like I’m taking a crap on this movie, but in retrospect it wasn’t an all together unpleasant experience, I just wasn’t all that impressed. The visuals and the rest are captivating, but the story is just so stupid that it leaves something of a giant stain on the whole affair. Type-Moon fans will eat it up, but I guess guys like me will still wonder just what all the fuss is about.

also: badass female leads suck. women should fate/stay in the kitchen