released 07 jun 04 / last mod 01 jun 07 / greg goebel / public domain
* METROPOLIS, a Japanese animation film by Katsuhiro Otomo (of AKIRA fame) and colleagues, is an adaptation of a late-1940s manga (Japanese comic) series by Osamu Tezuka, the godfather of Japanese animation and comics. The manga was in turn inspired by Fritz Lang's silent-film sci-fi classic, METROPOLIS.
METROPOLIS takes place in a city of breathtaking skyscrapers sitting on top of underground complexes populated by humans and robots. The society of Metropolis is caste-oriented, with an elite at the top of the skyscrapers and a downtrodden, restless underclass at the lowest level of the underground, with armed fascist gangs maintaining their idea of order while a revolutionary underground arms for an uprising.
The story begins with the opening of the "Ziggarut", which despite its name is a skyscraper, not a step pyramid. It is the creation of the aristocratic Duke Red, an ambitious man with an obscure agenda. His adopted son, Rock, leader of the fascist gangs, idolizes the Duke but has an agenda of his own, which he carries out by indifferently shooting anyone in his way. A lad from Japan named Kenichi arrives with his uncle, a detective in pursuit of a fugitive, and the two become involved in the intrigues, which revolve around a pretty android named Tima.
METROPOLIS is, particularly by anime standards, an impressive production job, mixing elaborate computer-generated visuals with excellent character artwork in Tezuka's style, though they made the legs longer. It takes an interesting "retro" approach, with airships flying over the city and a soundtrack mostly focused on old-time pop tunes and New Orleans jazz -- SAINT JAMES INFIRMARY in an anime, what a surprise! -- and also makes good use of a Ray Charles song.
The end result is a movie that is visually dazzling and technically impressive but fails to be memorable, not in spite of these things but because of them. There is a fundamental clash between the computer graphics and Tezuka's artwork style, and more to the point the characters end up being lost in the scenery -- sort of like a theatrical stage that is so elaborate it's hard to spot the actors. Somehow I ended up thinking of annoying web pages that are full of bells and whistles, but don't have any content.
The story actually seems basically sound, and the irony is that METROPOLIS appears like it could have been a very good movie if substantially less effort had been spent on the computer graphics and more on getting up-close with the characters. In practice, METROPOLIS never really picks up much momentum. It's interesting to watch, but doesn't have much impact. Fritz Lang's METROPOLIS, though very dated, has a lot more staying power and will be around for much longer.