Time Capsule Series: 1984: The Neverending Story

We pick up today exactly where we left off last week, looking at films from the year 1984. Last week, we looked at the follow up to a beloved and renowned Star Trek movie. It was a good review. I recommend that you check it out. Today, we’re going full-on nostalgic because I’m an 80s kid, and this particular movie has kind of a dubious reputation.

The Neverending Story is a wonderful exercise in not saying what you can show. It’s one of those films where the audience is just dropped into the story without any context, and then the context is carefully built as the plot progresses. We start with the main character, Bastian, having a dream. He’s dreaming of roiling clouds of all things, but we’re told it’s his mom, who recently died, that he was dreaming about. This movie goes right for the nostalgic jugular from the start as the film opens with the pop song of the same name. I’d be really surprised if any of the readers of this fine blog haven’t heard it. It practically defined a generation. During the opening scene, we get shown that Bastian is having trouble with school, skipping classes, and generally disappointing his dad who is a grieving dick apparently. Dad tells him to forget his dreams and keep his feet on the ground, and thus the theme of the film is established.

Bastian heads off to school, only to run into a group of bullies. Man his life sucks. During the encounter, Bastian stops in a bookstore where he steals a copy of the titular book. The real world action at the beginning serves as the bulk of the context for Bastian, who is the main hero, but unwittingly so. He goes to school, and when he realizes that he’s missing a test, he hides away to the attic to read his ill gotten gains. This is where the show really gets interesting. We’re dropped into the realm of Fantasia. We find out through minimal exposition that a great nothing is devouring the land, and a handful of representatives have been sent to visit the Childlike Empress to plead for help. There’s a giant rock eating guy, and a goblin looking guy with a pet bat, and a gnomish looking guy with a snail. They’re not terribly important to the story, but they look really cool, and they do a good job getting things moving.

We cut to the capital, and some guy is talking about a hero named Atreyu. Atreyu shows up, but no one believes that he is who he claims to be because he’s a boy. But don’t let the age fool you, Atreyu is a bonafide bad a. He accepts the quest to save Fantasia a sets off with his trusty steed, Artax… who… dies in the NEXT SCENE?! Excuse me for a moment…

...okay, so Artax dies, and not well, but Atreyu presses on. He talks to a giant turtle who tells him that he needs to consult the Sphinxes to the south. But they’re ten thousand miles away. So that seems helpless. And in the meantime, there’s a giant wolf stalking Atreyu, and he’s about to eat the poor kid! Atreyu, look our! But at the last possible second, Falcor swoops in and saves the day! Yay Falcor! Falcor takes Atreyu to the south where the boy has to pass by the Sphinxes, who totally have naked boobs by the way. They vaporize anyone who tries to pass that is not possessing of true confidence. Atreyu isn’t, but he makes it past somehow anyway. Next, there’s a mirror thing, and it’s in the mirror that Atreyu sees Bastian’s face. This is the trippy cool part about this movie. As Bastian is reading, he’s not just a passive observer. He actually interacts with the story, and has an effect on how things play out to a degree. Because of this, as he’s reading, he’s going through some really cerebral character growth.. It’s the only effective use of vicarious character development that I can think of right now.

Anyway, Atreyu tries to go back to the capital, but he falls off of Falcor and has to fight the wolf thing. We find out that the wolf is helping the nothing, and he says something that I found really profound. He says that the reason that he’s helping the nothing is to rob people of their hope. He says that people without hope are easier to control, and those who have control have power. It’s a great tie-in to the the primary theme. Bastian is told to discard his dreams, and bend to the realities of life, but the movie is telling us that submitting completely puts us under the control of someone who isn’t ourselves. It’s pretty deep for a kid film.

Atreyu is once again saved by Falcor, and taken just as the noting consumes that last of Fantasia. There are bits and pieces floating around in space, but there’s nothing coherent left. However, the capital still remains, and Atreyu pays a visit to the Childlike Empress. She tells him that she knew that everything that happened was going to happen even before it happened. This pisses Atreyu off because this, and he presses for some existential answers. The Empress tells him that through his trials, he brought Bastian back with him to her, and that to save Fantasia, Bastian just needs to give the Childlike Empress a name. This is something that the naked Sphinxes already told Atreyu, but whatever. At this point, the narrative could have been handled just a little better I think. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still great, but it’s a little too cheesy to match the tone of the rest of the film. Bastian has to reprogram his brain and think his way out of his dad’s terrible advice so that he can grasp that he is contributing to the story. At that point, he gives the Empress a name and the day is saved! The name that he gives her is Moonchild. There’s thunder and it’s hard to understand, but I got great ears and that’s totally what he names her, which is consistent with the book, actually. The funny thing is, there’s a point where Bastian muses that he would name the Empress after his mom, who he said had a beautiful name. So apparently, his mom was a hippie.

Anyway, Bastian gets to meet the Empress, excuse me, Moonchild, and she imparts him with a magical grain of sand that will rebuild Fantasia as he makes wishes. He therefore wishes to take flight on Falcor, and I guess he also wishes that all of Fantasia were made whole again because in the next scene, everything is back the way it was before the nothing. Even Artax gets resurrected. And then we get the most blatant bit of nerd wish fulfillment ever. Bastian wishes Falcor into the real world, and together, they bully the bullies! Now, let’s look at that ‘real world’ statement real quick. During a monologue, the Empress explains that there’s an entire multiverse of readers reading the stories of everyone. Bastian is reading about Fantasia, and in turn, someone in a different universe is reading about Bastain. It’s pretty convoluted, but it’s a nifty concept all the same.

So what can be said about The Neverending Story? Well, I love it! It’s hard to not get caught up in. The level of imagination behind it is spectacular, the vistas are breathtaking, the story is fascinating, and the music is fantastic. The acting can leave a little to be desired at times, but not too often. Also there are a couple of cheesy lines, but it’ s just a fun ride. There is a lot packed into a 90 minute runtime, which could have made it feel extremely disjointed, but it holds together well enough. It’s a wonderful representation of great 80s fantasy movies, and I’m not sure why, but I enjoy it a ton better than modern fantasy films. There’s a weight to it visually, and a general feeling behind it that just enraptures me. I dunno, but if you haven’t seen this one, drop everything and give it a watch! And stick around next week to see what other treasures we’ve dug up from 1984!

Time Capsule Series:1984: Star Trek III: The Search for Spock

So I promised some big changes this year, and I'm keeping good on my word. A while back, I switched publication days from Friday to Thursday. This was out of necessity because I had a chaotic Friday schedule due to work. Now I'm in school, and have a chaotic schedule on Thursday due to that. Hence, the big change coming down the pipeline right now is that we're officially going to go back to where we were at the beginning, and publish on Fridays! But wait there's more! Today marks the one year anniversary of this blog! We started humbly with only a handful of readers, but we've grown far beyond what I ever thought we could. I couldn't have done it without all of you fine readers so thank you!

Now, I’ve been mulling over this concept for quite some time as I’ve tried to analyze this conundrum. And certainly I can’t be the only person thinking this, but 1984 was a really good year for movies. Don’t believe me? Chew on this:The Terminator, Ghostbusters, Amadeus, Repo Man, This is Spinal Tap, A Nightmare on Elm Street, The Killing Fields, The Karate Kid. What do all of these movies have in common? They’re all rated above 90% on Rotten Tomatoes, and they all from 1984! The list goes on, too. If we keep going down the list based on rating, we’ll bump into classics like The Neverending Story, Romancing the Stone, Once Upon a Time in America, Beverly Hills Cop, Gremlins, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Revenge of the Nerds, Purple Rain, Police Academy, Footloose, Splash, Sixteen Candles, The Last Starfighter, Red Dawn, The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension, Starman,Johnny Dangerously, and Star Trek II: The Search for SpocK, not to mention a film adaptation of the George Orwell classic 1984 because the irony of that situation was lost on no one. If you look at the aggregated Wikipedia page on movies that have a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, 1984 has an astounding 11 films! Go ahead, look it up. What I’m saying is 1984 was kind of a fluke year for Hollywood.

Why then, was 1984 such a stellar year at the theaters? Was it due to our collective fears of this:

Had the studios been executing incompetent executives? I haven’t quite gotten to the bottom of this mystery yet, but that won’t stop me from looking at a few of these films to see if there are any commonalities among them. I don’t think criteria is necessary, but if I start to see emerging patterns over the next few weeks, we’ll start to tabulate things a bit more thoroughly. Now before we do actually move on, just let me say that I know Rotten Tomatoes is not the most ‘scientific’ way of quantifying things, and I’m also aware that 1984 doesn’t even clock in as the year with the most 100% rated movies on the site. That honor would go to 2014 with a whopping 26 movies that carry that rating. However, 1984 has a huge collection of memorable films, and the highest rated films are pure, mundane entertainment, as opposed to documentaries, or foreign art house films. So am I being a little judgy in formulating my examination, sure, but I would like to be entertained through this experience as well. That said, let’s look at our first 1984 film!

Ta DA! Oh, come on, you had to have known this was coming. As far as this Trekkie is concerned, this is the lowest hanging fruit in our 1984 film examination. I could practically quote this movie in my sleep! That doesn’t make this any less exciting though! I love this movie. However, I will attempt to remain level headed about the whole experience. SInce we’re discussing the year this was released already, I won’t bore you with too much background. But we need at least a little bit. So this movie came about because Leonard Nimoy had grown tired of playing Spock for nearly 20 years, and he felt like making a clean break with the franchise would help him overcome his typecasting problems. That’s why Spock dies in Star Trek II. But then TWOK was super successful and Paramount wanted to chase a little more of that sweet, sweet money. That meant that it was time to strike a deal, and as a result of that deal, Nimoy got to write, and direct his own movie. Thus, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock was conceived because it wouldn’t be much of a Star Trek movie without Spock in it.

Hence, after this:

And this:

And this:

We got the Spock is Jesus story. Ok, ok, I jest a little. But basically, after what is considered to be the best Star Trek film of all time, we were treated to the follow-up where everyone involved had to figure out a way to bring back one of the most beloved characters in Sci-Fi history, and undo one of the most poignant moments in cinematic history in a way that wouldn’t royally piss off the fans. That’s no small order. So how did they do it?

Well, TSFS picks up right where TWOK left off. The Enterprise is limping home after everyone narrowly escaped death at the hands of the formidable Khan Noonien Singh, all except a handful that is, and she looks terrible. There are temporary hull plates haphazardly attached to the superstructure, and wires and conduit are hanging out of the ceilings all over the place, and it’s just bad. Kirk and crew are hoping for a hero’s welcome when they return to Earth, but what they get instead is a jumbo sized kick to the junk. They find out that everyone basically has to sign an NDA concerning the events of the previous film, and oh yeah, we’re decommissioning the Enterprise. On top of all that, Bones has been acting incredibly strange since the end of the last film. Kirk is paid a visit from Spock’s father Sarek during which Sarek accuses Kirk of being an uncaring bastard because Kirk left Spock’s body on the Genesis Planet. We find out that when Vulcans are about to die, they can transfer their souls into another vessel, be it artificial, or organic so that the soul can live on. It’s further revealed that McCoy unwittingly became Spock’s soul’s vessel. Weird. However, this explains why old Bones has been acting out of sorts. So armed with this information, Kirk vows to return to the Genesis world and retrieve Spock’s body so that Spock can be properly put to pasture.

In the meantime, Kirk’s son David, and Saavik, played by not Kirstie Alley, return to Genesis to see how it’s developing. There’s a lot of oooh-ing, and aaah-ing as the discover the extent of the variety of climates that exist, and the proximity of each climate to the others. It’s literally unnatural, but breath taking all the same. But wait! There’s a lifeform reading coming from the surface! But wait there’s more! None of the Genesis scientists programmed in lifeforms other than plants! So now David and Saavik want to investigate, which the ship’s snooty captain is completely against. But eventually he relents and they get to do their thing. They discover that it’s just a bunch of space microbes that latched onto Spock’s burial torpedo and evolved to something that would more easily register on ships’ scanners. And they’re bummed. But they’re about to be more bummed because a rogue Klingon ship shows up and blows their science ship out of the stars! Now David and Saavik are stranded. To compound matters, they hear an ominous screaming in the distance.

We jump back to Kirk and crew, and Kirk is trying to get legitimate permission to go back to Genesis and retrieve the body of his friend. Of course the admiral tells him to shove it, but that’s okay because Kirk has a backup plan! They’re going to steal back the Enterprise, violate a treaty stipulation with the Klingon Empire, kidnap a mental patient, and sabotage the Excelsior in order to facilitate their escape. Great plan guys. But they do it anyway. They violate, like, a thousand laws, but they do successfully kidnap McCoy, steal the Enterprise, sabotage the Excelsior, and make their way to Genesis in order to get on that breaking treaty law thing. All sarcasm aside, this whole sequence is one of my favorite Star Trek movie moments. We get to see all of the different crew doing what they’re good at, and everyone plays a role. The entire plan wouldn’t have had a chance of success without the contributions of our heroes. It’s wonderful to see them rally together around their fallen comrade. Oh, and the music is fantastic!. On their way to Genesis, they try to raise the science ship, but get no reply. This leaves us in suspense, at least until they arrive. Then we get a tense battle between the Klingons and the crippled Enterprise.

By this point, Saavik and David have realized that the creature they’ve found is Spock, although he’s pretty young. They postulate that his body reset with the Genesis planet, and that his growth spurts are causing the planet to age rapidly and destroy itself. In actuality, David cut some corners that left the entire process unstable. Anyway, Kirk gets off a lucky shot on the Klingon ship, temporarily crippling them, but absolutely destroying the Enterprise in the process. This prompts the Klingon Commander, played by Christopher Lloyd, to try and force a surrender from Kirk. Lloyd does make one mistake though. As he’s talking about prisoners and their imminent death should Kirk not obey, he kills Kirk’s son. It’s a sad, but touching moment as Shatner tries to articulate the feelings of loss, and despair associated with such an event. To his merit, Shatner does a pretty good job. As a result, Kirk surrenders and tells Lloyd to beam over a boarding party to take the ship. It’s never that easy with Kirk though. He sets the Enterprise to self-destruct, and as the Klingons are beaming over, Kirk and crew beam down to the planet’s surface. The Klingon boarding party all die, and the Enterprise is destroyed in glorious fashion. If this movie has any failings, though, it’s the fact that the destruction of the Enterprise was a more emotional moment for me as a viewer than the death of Kirik’s son. I mean, we only met the guy in the last film, and to be honest, he was a little whiny, but perhaps more effort could have been made to get me invested in the character a bit more. I dunno.

Anyway, now stranded on the planet, Kirk, and his gallant crew must pit themselves against the wretched Klingons. This entire last bit doesn’t take too long to unfold as our heroes locate Saavik and Spock almost immediately. They seize control of the situation, but are again thwarted by Lloyd, who beams down with a disruptor and acts like the bad a that he is. Because prisoners were still a thing to the Klingons at this time, Lloyd has everyone except Kirk and Spock beamed up to the ship. Now at this point, the planet is tearing itself apart. There are flames everywhere, and giant chasms opening up all over the place. It’s pretty spectacular. There are words exchanged between Kirk and Lloyd, and then there’s the fight scene, and eventually, Lloyd falls into one of those chasms, and gets burned alive by magma. Kirk uses Lloyd’s communicator to get himself a Spock beamed up to the Klingon ship where they easily take the one guy hostage. Sulu is able to get the ship moving, and they warp away just as the planet goes up in a fiery ball of awesomesauce. They go to Vulcan, and there’s this ritual thing, and Spock gets his soul back, and McCoy doesn’t have to be two minds about everything anymore, and it just makes me so gosh darn happy. The implication is that now that Spock is back, the universe is as it should be, and we can all breathe a little easier now, and that’s the feeling that I personally have by the end of this movie, no matter how many times I’ve already seen it.

What’s to be said about this classic? Well, it’s not as beloved as TWOK, but I think that’s an unfair rap. TWOK was super intense because it primarily dealt with the themes of self-consuming hatred and revenge. Ricardo Montalban took those emotions and cranked them to 11. Shatner reciprocated tit for tat. There was a palpable feeling of tension in that film that this one didn’t need because thematically, that wasn’t what was being explored. In this film, we explore themes of loss, and anguish, and family. We look at those rare occasions when the universe gives us a second lease on something. We get to explore the ‘what if’ scenario of suddenly getting back something we’ve lost that was deeply important to us, and we get to see just how incomplete Kirk’s crew is without one of their core players. Because this was the focus, the tension was less. There were scenes that were more esoteric; that were meant to make the viewer do a little introspection. There was still a little action, and the heist sequence was really exciting, but it didn’t hit with the same magnitude that TWOK did, and I honestly think that it’s because TSFS didn’t have to. It could be softer because its predecessor played out at a fever pitch. It could take its time because, again, the previous installment had moved at a rather furious pace.I’m not calling the comparison an apples to oranges one, but what I am saying is TSFS benefitted in some interesting ways from the tone, pacing, and themes of TWOK.

From a production stance, I think this movie is really well done. There aren’t any plots that are left unresolved by the end, except what actually happened to that last Klingon that was kidnapped. I’m working on a novel about that right now, actually. True story. I felt like the acting was pretty solid. The special effects were, of course, excellent, and the music was incredible. The lighting, the framing of the shots, and a lot of other easily overlooked aspects were very similar to the previous film, and I wonder if that was done intentionally because it really helps to ground the film in that universe that Nicholas Meyer established in his film. I really enjoy that you could string these two films together and it would basically just seem like one long film. It’s a fun film, and a great ride, and I can’t recommend it enough! We’re just getting started with this series so stick around because who knows where we might go from here!

Going on Vacation... A Look at a Foreign Film

We’ve looked at a variety of different media types over the last few weeks as I’ve tried to branch out in order to review things that maybe might be a little more foreign to you guys, and I’m pleased to say that the response has been really good. Thank you, readers, for helping make this blog a successful one! If not for you, I would simply be writing to entertain myself, which, believe me, I would totally do anyway, but this is a much more rewarding arrangement! Our subject matter this year has basically been geared towards American media, and I can only recall doing two foreign films in the past. So today we’re going to take another little trip across the vastness of the Pacific to that lovable little archipelago, Japan. They brought us weird fetishes, strawberry Kit Kat bars, and anime, and we love them for it! Or despite it depending on which noun you evaluate there. I’ve actually been sitting on this one for a while because I had wanted to watch the show that the movie is based on before reviewing the film, but DVDs of the show are prohibitively expensive, and none of my alternative sources turned up anything useful so we’re just going to do this!

Today we’re looking the full length, live action movie Space Battleship Yamato. In case you’re not aware the movie is based off of an anime of the same name. Now, where anime is involved, things can get a bit murky when it comes to stuff like which show within the mythology we’re referencing, and whatnot. The original SBY anime has had something like four spin-off TV series, and six animated films, as well as an OVA (original video animation), in addition to the live action movie that we’ll be discussing here. For our purposes, we’re just going to look at the original show as that’s the primary source for material that was used in film. Oh and in case this wasn’t confusing enough, as sometimes happens with popular Japanese shows, an English dubbed version ran in America as well. It was call Star Blazers. Now that we finally have all of that out of the way, let’s take a look at Space Battleship Yamato, shall we?

The film opens in the year 2199, five years after first contact with a species called the Gamila. The Gamila’s idea of first contact involved declaring war, and working to systematically destroy the ecosystem of the planet Earth. Which we see during some prologue action. At this point, the surface of Earth is totally uninhabitable so humans, and the remaining flora and fauna that they saved live underground. They used to also live in space stations orbiting high above the Earth, but we’ll get back to that. Anyway, humanity seems poised on the brink of extinction when our hapless hero, Susumu nearly gets impaled by what he thinks is a meteorite. However, it’s revealed to be a mysterious alien device. The Earth Defense Force seizes control of the device, and Susumu so that they can study it. Typical military, am I right?

It’s established that the device contains engineering schematics for a faster than light drive system, and coordinate for a planet referred to on the device as Iskandar. The device itself also has the innate ability to decrease radiation. Armed with these bits of information, the Space Battleship Yamato is pressed into service, and a worldwide call is made for crewmen to man the ship. Susumu volunteers, and is made the leader of the same fighter unit that he led way back in the day. He even gets his old fighter back. That’s important. The ship gets its staff, and plans are made to launch, but in true action movie fashion, the Gamila are on to them, and launch a ginormous meteor at the ship launch site. Little did the Gamilia know, the Yamato comes equipped with a secret weapon. It’s got a devastating mega cannon mounted to the front of the ship! It’s theoretically capable of destroying planets, but they don’t actually cover that in the film. But, the ship destroys the meteor, and makes for a daring escape. However, the Gamila have different plans and they launch a fleet of fighters at the Yamato. This sequence is astounding! There’s this massive space battle going on, the Yamato has turret mounted guns that are raining hell on everything within reach, and the fighters are zooming everywhere, and in the meantime, the Yamato is trying to make a jump so that they can regroup from the fighting.

The fighter squad, led by Susumu, take off to help defend the ship. There are some pretty sweet sequences that result from this. Anyway, one of the other pilots in the squad, Yuki, has been knocked unconscious, and is drifting towards certain death. She’s Susumu love interest so he defies orders in order to save her. They narrowly make it back to the ship just as it jumps, and Susumu gets thrown in the brig. There’s some expositional stuff, and Susumu does a lot of sit-ups. Then it’s announced that the next jump will be for Iskandar, and everyone aboard is given a short time to contact loved ones whom they will probably never see again. We find out that Susumu has no family to contact, and we find out a few touching things about some of the side characters as well. Ultimately, it all boils down to Susumu leading an exercise to deflect asteroids away from Earth. During one such exercise, Susumu’s squad accidentally deflected an asteroid into one of the habitat satellites. Susumu’s parents were on board.

During this little aside thing, Yamato manages to capture a Gamila ship, and inspect it. There’s a weird thing where the creature operating the vehicle hijacks the brain of one of the fighter squad guys, and sends a message to the rest of the fleet regarding Yamato’s plans. Susumu is called to the captain’s quarters where there’s a conversation about how the captain is dying. He asks Susumu to assume command, which Susumu initially refuses because he’s upset at the captain, whom he believes used Mamoru, Susumu’s brother, to save his own hide, also because the captain informs him that there’s no device that can reverse the radiation on Earth, and the whole mission was pointless. However, Susumu realizes, as his brother did, that the knowledge and experience that the captain possessed were Earth’s best chance of survival, and so Susumu reconciles his feelings and takes command.

Yamato makes their jump, and arrive at Iskandar only to find it crawling with Gamila! They’ve been bamboozled! Just kidding, turns out that they simply jumped to the wrong side of the planet. That’s kind of the big reveal of this film. Sorry… Spoilers! The Gamila and the race that sent the message are the same race. A plan is made to use Susumu’s custom ship, which can’t be tracked by Gamila technology at low power, to dive for the planet center. The Yamato will jump in and clear a path as well as lend distraction. So that’s what they do. A bunch of marines board some drop ships, and the fighter guys run escort, and the Yamato acts as cover/distraction/Trojan horse for this task force. Many uninteresting characters die, but our main cast make it to the caves below the surface! The marines launch some vehicles to protect the personnel while they journey, but most of them get mowed down before the party reaches their destination. But when they do reach the destination, they are not disappointed. One of the benevolent aliens seizes control of Yuki, and uses her to communicate some exposition, which basically boils down to the planet breeding two races. The Gamila love the barren wasteland of death, and the Iskandar love life and peace.

The being tells the group that they’ve essentially turned Yuki into a device that can rid Earth of its little radiation problem. Win! And it sends them on their way. There’s some central node thing that I think can shut down the bulk of the Gamila, and so while Susumu gets Yuki back to Yamato, a couple of entertaining, but ultimately expendable guys offer to blow up the core thing. They die in a blaze of glory, or should I say blazer of glory! Oooooh…. Yeah that was awful. My apologies. But in true anime fashion, they die gloriously. However, the ordeal is far from over. The crew of the Yamato has to get back to Earth and let Yuki loose on the surface so that she can fix the planet. In order to do that they have to beat the boss battle. There’s one massive ship orbiting Earth with more firepower than you could shake a stick at. They sit between Yamato and Earth as if daring Yamato to try and make a run. The mothership launches a thing, and the thing jams the mega cannon! Now all Yamato has are puny little, just kidding, they’re still respectably sized guns. They just won’t be terribly effective against the mothership. And so Susumu order everyone still alive to evacuate and he plots a course for ramming speed.

There’s a flash, and roll credits, but as we do, we see Yuki on the surface of a lush a vibrant planet, and she’s playing with… Her son? Yean so apparently we’re meant to assume that Susumu and Yuki got it on and she got pregnant and bore him a son. I mean, I guess it’s possible, but the way that the film presents the story, you just have to wonder, when did they have the time? But, it’s a happy ending, and a satisfying conclusion nevertheless.

Alright, so this movie is based on an anime. Let’s all remember that. As far as the story goes, I think the film does an exquisite job of cramming 26 episodes worth of material into one two hour feature. All of the elements are there: the Gamila, the escape to Iskandar, the romance between Susumu and Yuki, and the declining health of the captain. It’s all there. Some of it has been… abbreviated, but it all gets touched upon. Again, this film is based on an anime, and all of the wonderful elements that we’ve all come to love about the genre are well represented here. There’s the cheesy overacting, the over-the-top story lines, the soap opera quality romance, and they even manage to sneak in some over-the-top action sequences complete with gratuitous use of slow motion. I applaud the cast because they captured the anime experience perfectly. Now let’s talk about something that may go against some of what I’ve stated in the past:

I know in the past I’ve mentioned that I’m not typically a special effects guy, and especially when they involve CGI. However, without deviation, this film delivers absolutely gorgeous visual effects. From the vehicles, to the landscapes, everything in this film is rendered exceptionally well. That capture is a CG model, but it has weight to it, it has deep, and rich textures, and it looks like a practical model. I tip my hat to the VFX crew of this movie. They did an astounding job! Also, the composer did a bang up job on the score, and as an added bonus there, Steven Tyler has a track that plays in the film. Overall, I’m going to have to recommend this one, at least to the anime fans out there. As a casual fan, I really enjoyed it. As a Robotech fan, I can only hope that when the live action version of that film happens, it’s at least half as good as this one. It’s a fun watch and kid appropriate. Bonus! Take a look sometime, and stick around to see what we step in next week!