Dir.
Kazuaki Kiriya, 2004, Japan, 141 mins
Cast:
Yusuke Iseya, Kumiko Aso, Akira Terao, Toshiaki Karasawa , Fumiyo Kohinata, Kanako Higuchi
Already a huge success in Asia the sci-fi epic Casshern will more than likely divide audiences in the UK. While Manga action junkies will be drooling with anticipation having only an action packed trailer to go on they may find themselves disappointed from a movie that does astound but at the same time is fiendishly complex, full of big ideas and big stories that even it's 2 hour 20 minute running time can't completely play out. Unsurprising as the film is based on a 70s anime that itself was spread over a whopping 35 episodes and to fully appreciate the movie some knowledge of the TV show's legacy is going to be required. Not that it'll mar your enjoyment of Casshern if you're a bit clueless, it's one of those movies where suspension of disbelief equates to transporting to another world, you might not know what you're seeing but it's magnificent to behold.
The dense story is set on an Earth where the Greater Eastern Federation have taken control of the Eurasian continent after years of bloody battle. While they have taken control of metropolis cities and their heavy industry the population remains ravaged by disease from pollution and the war of attrition with Zone 7 rebels. Dr Azume (Terao) has a solution, 'neo-cells' which can regenerate human tissue but without official government backing he is left to carry out shadowy research in an attempt to generate spare body parts for the war effort while his own son Tetsuya (Iseya) goes off to fight. A seeming act of God brings Azume's neo-cell bodies to life and a group of them, dubbed Neo-Sapiens, retreat to an abandoned Zone 7 factory to build a robot army to destroy humanity. Meanwhile Tetsuya has been killed and his body brought back to his father who resurrects him to become Casshern, the guardian of mankind against the new threat led by the mutant Burai (Karasawa). As you can see, exhaustive stuff and even amongst that there are love stories, governments being overthrown and general pain and suffering as huge robots sweep through the cities and homes of the local people.
While Hollywood sci-fi tends to stick to the more psychological angle, following a single protagonist, Casshern is quite the opposite creating an entirely deep and tangible alternative reality with it's own individuality. Where the West bolts bits on to a familiar history, such as the futuristic cities of Minority Report or Blade Runner , pop video directory Kiriya has come up with sweeping vistas of a tangible universe where armies of robots goose-step through the streets and even mobile phones have the charm of a bakelite ringing tone. It's a place informed by 1930s futurism from the towering buildings of Fritz Lang's Metropolis to the powerful imagery of communist Russia . Where The Fifth Element may tantalise you with a chase through the sky scrapers of futuristic New York , Casshern beautifully keeps it's landscapes painted onscreen throughout the running time never taking the viewer out of the world it's so diligently pulled them into.
The main subject Casshern focuses on is the futility of war. Its anti-war message comes close to home with Tetsuya's army flashbacks showing him engaged in all too familiar ethnic cleansing and the climax of the movie proves that Japan is still a country feeling the effects of nuclear destruction. The apocalypse has long been a mainstay of sci-fi Manga and here it's no different. Those expecting a huge all-out action movie will be overjoyed and possibly let down in equal measures. While the battles are supremely handled, Casshern taking on an endless horde of robot nasties being a particular highlight, they constitute a low percentage of the overall film. The one-on-ones with the Neo-Sapien leaders are again shot with dizzying velocity but to some will boil down to beating a boss on a video game.
Casshern is an astounding sci-fi spectacle, other than that it's hard to label it in any other way. Some parts are gravity defying set-pieces while others are poetic stories of a world torn apart by war, whatever you take away it can be safely said that's it's like nothing seen before. With Kiriya employing the latest digital backlot techniques, adding CG backgrounds in post-production, Casshern may be unfairly compared to future releases such as Sky Captain and Sin City also making use of advanced methods but what can be said is that it pulls off it's intentions flawlessly. A dark, violent, operatic movie that takes all the impossible aspects of Anime and presents it with a poignant human face.
Richard Badley
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