P L E A S E   L O G I N

Username: Password: New to Animeniacs? <Click Here> to create a login

Davisbri Overall Rating: 9.50
Story Quality: ¤¤¤¤¤ Enjoyability: ¤¤¤¤¤ Charactor Design: ¤¤¤¤¤ Video Quality: ¤¤¤¤¤ Sound Quality: ¤¤¤¤¤ Subtitle Quality: ¤¤¤¤¤		like glitzboy said it was like a weirder more complex version of a pinnochio type story. The characters are what get you here, you feel for each of them as they go through struggles and for only being shortly over 2 hours long there is quite a bit of character development, very much like a miyazaki film has. The sound and video were beautiful, although strange at times. The subtitles were well done, and completely understandable. The story is action packed, but contains a few slower scenes that kind of drag on, but it doesnt take away from the enjoyability of the movie much. Overall, a very good buy for the price and definetely worth checking out.

Glitzboy Overall Rating: 9.17
Story Quality: ¤¤¤¤¤ Enjoyability: ¤¤¤¤ Charactor Design: ¤¤¤¤¤ Video Quality: ¤¤¤¤¤ Sound Quality: ¤¤¤¤ Subtitle Quality: ¤¤¤¤¤		I bought this not knowing what the heck it was about and was pleasantly surprised. Very strange story to say the least. I don't want to ruin anything so I'll just say that, basically, it's the story of a wooden puppet named Palme who wants to become human. Think a whacked out Pinnochio with a much more complex plot. It's got deep meanings about humanity and what it means to have a soul and all sorts of other intellectual mumbo jumbo. Definitely not the kind of movie where you switch your brain to off and let the TV do the thinking for you. That being said, I enjoyed it quite a lot. Will probably require repeated viewings to squeeze all the plot points out of it, but that's OK but it's an absolute pleasure to view. The animation is some of the best I've ever seen in an anime and not just because it is technically well drawn ... it is also EXTREMELY imaginative. The creators have fashioned a wondround, wild and utterly weird alien world that serves as backdrop for the unique characters. OK, some specifics about the DVD: SOUND: Sounded beautiful on my Dolby Digital 5.1 setup. The music was atmospheric and fit the story perfectly. All speakers are utilized well in this movie which is kind of a rarity with most anime I've watched. Lost of directionality. Really envelops you in sound. VIDEO: I don't have a big screen or theater wide TV, so some things may be more apparent to viewers with higher grade setups. I noticed not pixillation, but my guess is the video is a bit grainy. Still, on my TV, I thought it looked pretty darn good ... just not QUITE as good as an official release probably would be. Also, I downgraded things here a bit because the menu is presented totally in Japanese. I just had to push buttons on my remote to figure things out by trial and error. SUBTITLES: These have to be from some kind of official release because they are too perfect to be HK originals. I didn't see anything wrong with them at all. Perfectly constructed english sentences with consistent names and punctuation. They may be just a TAD small for some people, but I had no trouble reading them. They look professional. CHARACTER DESIGN: I read somewhere the creators spent a decade on this movie and it shows! The characters are VERY unique and imaginative. STORY: Good, but I downgrade it a bit for being needlessly complicated and a bit ham-handed. Numerous "flashback" scenes are inserted in the movie and many times it wasn't apparent to me, at first, they were flashbacks. Also, I felt like they were trying to beat me over the head with the philosphical points of the film. Also, there's whole races of people (desert warrior nomads, strange subterranean humans, and even tall earth-worm like animals) that play central roles in the move but I never really understand what their motivations all. It's like a whole bunch of wild, alien things are thrown at you with now history or context in which to place them. ENJOYABILITY: If I talk about a movie quite a bit after watching it, that means I enjoyed it. The fact that my girlfriend and I have been debating some of its finer points back and forth proves it stuck with us.