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Erufen rîto (2004)
This has a higher rating than raxhephon and Gankatsuo??
Firstly, you will love this series if you want to cry, don't mind blood and have your brain completely disengaged. Elfen Lied has got the emotional subtlety of slaughtering a puppy and people regard it as the 'best anime ever'? Christ. Nothing in this series carries any weight it's sadness is the equivalent of sitting through a 6 hour slideshow of dying children, and just like that, it's morally repulsive, and thats coming from the guy who loves Cannibal Holocaust.
But, like I said, if you disengage your brain (that involves ignoring the sub par voice acting in both languages, awful, redundant, repetitive script, the complete lack of subtlety in it's 'horror' moments, the seedy sexualised nature of underage girls being dismembered, the cheap emotional manipulation, the cast of the most uninteresting and non characterised characters i've seen in a while, the complete lack of moral direction, confused tone and themes, the attempt at a love triangle involving a mentally challenged schizophrenic and the guys sister, nyu, the repugnant daddy complex mixed with insestual undertones, nyu and nyu... and that was from a 2 minute brainstorm) I can see why people enjoy this series.
The things Elfen Leid does well it does damn near flawlessly and can actually have you engaged in the series and emotionally involved enough to overlook the towering monolith of issues this series has looming over it. Now, i've been a musician and wanna be amateur classical composer for a while now and have done a few exercises in composing music to film, so with what little credibility that gives me, I can say that the soundtrack and general sound design of this show are absolutely astounding. most of the people who watch this most likely came to it from listening to the main theme lilium which is such an awe inspiring piece that makes me glad the show was created just so I could listen to it. The mixture of the excellent score and stone dead silence in the 'serious' sections make for some of the most genuinely haunting scenes iv'e seen in anime.
And yeah, the emotional manipulation kinda works really, really well mainly, again, due to the sound. These scenes sneak up on you and explode onto screen leaving an impact similar to that of a getting hit by a truck. However, most of these scenes involve some symbol of pure innocence, whether a child or a little woof woof getting repeatedly ripped apart and stamped on. Elfen Lied has a complete, vice like clamp around your heart but definitely not your brain, but that grasp is usually so strong that your brain does not register nor question what you're witnessing.
I think if you are a horny teenage emo/goth kid you will thoroughly love this series, and thats not an insult, this show seems purpose built for maturing emotional teenagers and from what i've seen meets that target demographic perfectly.
This series has the face of the best art house films but the brain of transformers, with a little nekromantik thrown in for good measure. The mastery of emotions and the astounding sound design knock this series up 2-3 stars. I would say to watch this series with your eyes closed but you would still have to endure the woeful dialogue. I guess I recommend subtitles then.
4/10
GTO: Great Teacher Onizuka (1998)
He really is the greatest teacher to ever grace our screens
The thing that saves this show from it's occasional character inconsistency, unsettling shifts in tone, predictability, repetition etc is that GTO is one of the most heartfelt anime I have ever seen. It completely transcends the 'newly appointed teacher solves all the world's problems' trait seen far too often by having that teacher be a juvenile, ex biker gang leader, virgin, short tempered, violent man who, despite this, knows whats right.
I'm not saying the comedies not funny because it definitely is. A few episodes out of the 43 can sometimes miss the point or be incongruous but the majority of episodes will have you laughing out loud even when you're alone. This isn't the general standard of anime comedy where underage sex, over the top actions and dipping into absolute obscurity are the norm. These things are still present but are used sparingly and to effect and... before I go any further, watch this show dubbed! You absolutely have to, not because of acting ability, god no, but because the jokes, language, expressions etc are all changed in the dub. No matter how much of an anime fanatic you are there is always a cultural wall between the East and West in terms of comedy, and the dub succeeds in breaking down that wall, shirtless, with a sledgehammer (viewer in joke) The jokes are specifically altered and re-worded in order for the comedy to become accessible to overseas audiences rather than being alienating as is usually the case. This makes the dub essential, though not necessarily better or even typically 'good' in the strictest sense, with a few performances dipping into laughable territory. And I have no problem with that as it just adds to the absolute joy of don't give a f*** airhead attitude that makes the show work.
And the greatest achievement of the show (except from Onizuka himself) is the fact that this show does not pull any punches when tackling the issues with the Japanese education system and schooling in general. The relying on financial success, abandoning or ignoring of troublemakers instead of turning them around, the blind eye turned towards bullying. These are issues that are all to familiar in school that not many series, films, books etc seem to address and is where the show succeeds best. GTOs lessons are truly of life and how to mature and better yourself as a person, I guarantee that you will find at least one episode you can relate to in your time at school and maybe even learn something from Onizuka himself and be a better person because of it, thats where the show really shines.
The reasons for this show being marked 8 rather than a 9 or 10 is purely because as much as it pains me to say, it does not really deserve higher. This is one of my all time favourite anime and a show that actually made me a better person because of it but there are some crippling flaws that I have previously mentioned as well as the shows plot threads and pacing being all over the place. From an objective, critical standpoint I cannot mark it higher, but I return to the same point I made in my opening lines. The heart and passion of the show whether that be the lovingly fun and deliberately awful in some places dub, The unflinching depiction of the education system and Onizuka's unorthodox methods of tackling these issues or just Onizuka himself, he is the greatest teacher who ever lived.
The Devil Inside (2012)
The Devil Inside
Now I wanted to come up with a clever title but realising that the moment you put something along he lines of 'OMG 2 hours of my life back please' as your title it just makes you seem like the most elitest **** ever.
Lets talk about the big thing first, it's not scary. Some may say thats subjective but honestly, people don't seem to get the fact that waiting for something to go bang and being scary are not the same thing. They both make you feel tense but waiting for the next loud noise to come never unnerves you, makes you feel vulnerable or lets your imagination do anything apart from wonder what form the next 'boo' was coming.
That being said there were 2 moments in which the film actually remembered it was a horror instead of being a succession of party poppers being let off at random intervals. First was the 'Connect the cuts' moments as seen in the trailer which managed to be unnerving but was handling the rest of that scene so badly it almost stooped into the realms of comedy.
The second was the scene after the baptism (no spoilers) where there was a genuine sense of overhanging dread before and after the big bang came. That would have meant nothing to you if you haven't seen the film but, in short, there are two relatively scary moments in the film and the rest borders on comical in how hard it tries to creep the audience out.
A film trying this hard to be realistic, what with the real world setting, the faux documentary style etc is always make or break in the acting department. You know where this is going. The acting isn't exceptionally bad but rather uninspiring and completely devoid of enthusiasm no matter how many times each character gets thrown across a room or cries.
You would think that after witnessing an actual demon be extracted from someone that it would leave a lasting impression on the sceptical protagonist. Maybe she would start to doubt and re-evaluate everything she has taken for granted until now? If there are demons could there be such thing as ghosts? Aliens? How much do we really matter in the overall scheme of things if these higher powers actually exist? Are we really disposable pawns in the overall battle between good and evil?
Well you and I know what I'm getting at so I'll just end this by saying that about five minutes after the encounter she is looking over the recorded footage making passing judgement about the size of the victims pupils with the futility of someone commenting on a picture of Jesus's crusty face on the bottom of a senile ladies frying pan in on their local magazine.
The ending is bad. A woeful cop-out 'to be continued' but never will be because of how bad the film is ending pretty much sums it up. Abrupt and so completely out of nowhere in an attempt to be shocking that as the credits rolled, someone in the audience of about 10 people on a Wednesday afternoon including me and a friend actually stood up and said "really?" which led to a greater emotional outburst from the audience than anything the film achieved.
The worst thing? I almost fell asleep during the first exorcism. That isn't some snarky brandy swilling, egotistical, made up want to be criticy talk no, I'm dead serious I was nodding of during an exorcism that lasted about 10 minutes but seemed about 30. If thats not a testament to this films failings I don't know what is.
The devil inside is either as dull as a powerpoint presentation assembled by a fumbling old history teacher who can't get the projector to work and so has to call one of the school 'techies' to stop him from rubbing the projector with oil, or merely average. the kindest thing you can say is that at least half of this film can be described as the latter.
Wanda to kyozô (2005)
7 years on and still as good as you remember
This game was released to such astonishing praise, and rightfully so, that I don't think there has been and game more universally loved since.
7 years on I picked the game up again to see how it aged and let me tell you, It is still as original, intense and beautiful as it was in 2005. I am happy at calling this game a classic without any shadow of a doubt, It's an absolute masterpiece and nothing else has ever captured the exhilaration of this game. The only way in which I could describe this experience is by saying it's like if Philip glass, Kurosawa and Godzilla decided to make a game in the middle of the Battle of Pelennor fields scene form LOTR.
You can already see that this game is amazing by everyone else's reviews but let me just discuss some of the few negative points about the game as there seems to be a complete lack of negative feedback.
1. The camera can sometimes be a little frantic and hard to control on those later colossi fights (especially the last) meaning you may have to resort to huge leaps of faith when trying to point the camera in the direction you're jumping. Just to reiterate, this is only a problem with a couple of the colossi and is not really a game breaking problem.
2.The recovery speed when knocked down. Sometimes a colossi will hit you especially hard and send you flying about 10 feet and leave you sprawled on the ground, the time it takes you to stand up again is around 5 seconds which might not seem much but completely breaks the fast paced flow of the action and is especially irritating when it happens multiple time in a row. Though this is only really an issue for the 11th colossi (the worst boss in the game).
3.The last boss Malus. Don't get me wrong, it's a fantastic last battle but there are a couple of controller smashing niggles about him. Firstly, throughout the game every single colossi has subtle points on it's body which, when attacked, open a new path to get to the main weakness (from what I recall). The same goes for Malus but when you're almost at the top of him the game suddenly stops giving these subtle hints, leaving you for a lost at what to do. This isn't necessarily a problem but the fact that this hasn't happened before this point means you are just not ready for this like being thrown in an Olympic swimming pool after only practising in a paddling pool. This leaves you taking drastic jumps in order to find your way further up the colossus, which normally results in you plummeting to the ground meaning you have to start your 5 minute climb all over again.
I spent along time coming up with those negative points ad they are honestly all I can think of. This is still probably the best game on Ps2 and one of the best games ever made. These flaws a re almost irrelevant when studying the game as a whole because of how awe-inspiringly beautiful and fantastically enjoyable of an experience it is. I would give this game a 9.5 because of these little gripes but everything positive I haven't mentioned have all been said before. This game is an essential purchase.
Drive (2011)
Bang!...................Bang!..................
...is about as good an explanation of the structure of the film as I could come up with.
Firstly, if you want a conventional story, coupled interesting dialogue this and over the top performances this is not for you. This is a film of scenes and atmosphere above all else. The thing I was reminded of most when watching this was listening to your favourite album of which you love every single song, on a CD, where there are 3-4 second pauses between each song. Most individual scenes are absolutely top notch stuff being expertly composed, with camera work, lighting and all other aspects of mise en scene working in perfect unison to create a visual feast with some of the most effective use of sound since There Will be Blood. Yet the way the songs or scenes are linked is basically non-existent with long pauses that will either annoy or provide a moment of calm before continuing to the next scene. This may be a deal breaker for a lot of you and looking over previous reviews this is the most common complaint along with the awkward dialogue. It would be stupid of me to defend the dialogue or lack-there-of with an argument like 'Oh but it's supposed to be like that,' because substance is always more important than style and entertainment should not be sacrificed for anything, but this again serves a greater purpose. This pause works extremely well at creating a jarring effect against the scenes of passion, action and extreme violence giving these scenes overall impact far greater as a result. This is a film of individual moments and the overall experience (if that makes any sort of sense) and not how they are linked together. But to be honest, what do you remember of a film after you watch it? The individual moments and the overall experience. And these are astonishingly effective and will leave a lasting impression for years to come. This film will stand the test of time despite its flaws, while The Help or Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close will not.