Umfeld, 2007

This film is a mostly abstract film just under and hour in length. It's an audiovisual trip. First off, this film is not for epileptics or people sensitive to quick, contrastive imagery. That Pokemon episode that gave people seizures has nothing on this movie. You've been warned.

The film was directed as an interplay between music and visuals with Scott Pagano doing the visuals and Speedy J doing the music.

This film has 8 movements. Each movement has a generalized style of motion. Some shake back and forth, some pulse like a heart, some crossing imagery. I won't say too much because it will ruin the surprise to those who watch it. Unlike other abstract animated films which are more like a progressive dance through visual elements, this one is more convulsive like a more focused early night dream sequence. There are windows and other fragments of technical structures that occasionally appear so the film isn't fully abstract.

I don't think it's going to be everybody's cup of tea, being rather back and forth and convulsive compared to other abstract or experimental animations, and in its similarity at times to visions one experiences when one can't quite fully fall asleep, but I really enjoyed it. I give it an 8 out of 10.

If you want to check it out, I'll embed it here and you can then choose to watch it on YouTube. I hope that one or both filmmakers make another feature length project. Scott Pagano's website

Speedy J's Soundcloud

Check out the movie or the other work of either Scott Pagano or Speedy J. Once I find another gem I'll be back again.

Thematic Trajectory: Mamoru Hosoda

 What about the other Mamoru? Oshii has a very large output but I excluded him for two reasons: One, his output contained more franchise films than original or adapted works, and two he seems to have dove into live action more recently.

So, what is the trajectory of Mamoru Hosoda like? Well, before going into feature films, he started on shorts in the Digimon franchise and did a couple other projects like Kitaro short and Superflat Monogram. His first film, One Piece: Baron Omatsuri and the Secret Island was similar in some ways to Miyazaki's Castle of Cagliostro in that it's based on a TV series but takes it in a different stylistic direction. I can't find the film available in English so I'll just say that it's a cartoony sort of fantasy.

His breakout film, though, was The Girl Who Leapt Through Time. It's a sci fi adaptation, screen written by Satoko Okudera, and is set in a relatively current version of Tokyo. It is more of a straightforward story than Hosoda's later films. Personally I find it a bit too traditionally anime with the characters but I'm sure others will disagree. After this film, comes Summer Wars. It had the same screenwriter and was his last film at Madhouse. This film is science fiction again but is his first internet oriented sci fi movie. It arguably panders too much to male anime fans but I like it regardless because it has some of the most in depth character drama of any of his films. This film starts to crystalize some of his traits as a filmmaker by staying in the present day for one and keeping the focus on everyday people but not so everyday situations.

His next film, the last written by Okudera, was The Wolf Children. This is the first film made at Studio Chizu and is a fantasy film about a woman who raises two children after the death of her partially wolf husband. It deals with her children slowly growing up and finding their way and how she deals with it as well. This film is notable for being fantasy instead of sci fi like his last two films but also for a more rural setting for most of the film which is like Summer Wars in that respect. The next film, The Boy and the Beast, Hosoda wrote himself. It's a film about a boy who is raised in the world of beasts by a fighter of a hairy beast. It has good visuals but the characters aren't too interesting. The next film, Mirai, also written by him, has better characters but a stop and go storyline. It's a family oriented fantasy about a boy who learns things with the help of other members of his family, from the past, and through his older baby sister from the future, whose name also means Future in Japanese.

For his most recent film, Hosoda combines Summer Wars with Beauty and the Beast. This film has its flaws too, but in my opinion, is the best of the films that he's written himself. It is called a 'science fantasy' film on Wikipedia. It's appropriate because it focuses largely on fantasy beings inside of the web world and because some of the technology is a bit too futuristic for the time it's set in. It's a bit drab and the characters are often a bit too tropey again, but it's got some very compelling drama that somewhat makes up for it.

So with Hosoda, he went from a fantasy franchise film, did two films in science fiction, branched out into fantasy, only with one that's partially set in a different world, and otherwise kept focused on contemporary real world stories. And then went back from fantasy to a more science fantasy story. Hosoda's filmography has one thing in common with Miyazaki and Takahata by ending with fantasy, at least for the moment but shows more sci fi commitment than the films of either of them, or from Makoto Shinkai.

Thematic Trajectory: Hayao Miyazaki

I'd like to talk about for a bit, the thematic trajectory of anime directors for a post. I don't want to focus too much on anime, but let's face it, they're the only industry with directors with long careers. First there's Hayao Miyazaki. I will focus mainly on his feature films but his other works are important as well, though they're not my primary focus here.

First he made a TV series called Future Boy Conan which was sci fi. He started off in films with a cartoony caper film based off of an animated franchise which was based itself on a manga. Lupin the Third: Castle of Cagliostro. His second film was, as most people know, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind which was futuristic sci fi again. After that, Studio Ghibli was founded and he directed its first film, Laputa Castle in the Sky. Here there is a notable switch from science fiction to a semi-post apocalyptic fantasy. In Nausicaa he focuses on teenagers and adults, in Laputa on children among adults, and in My Neighbor Totoro he focuses on two young sisters and switches to a recent past historical setting with fantasy elements. It's interesting how he switches from sci fi to fantasy in his films. Perhaps he wanted to do something different from the Nausicaa manga which he finished in the early 90's and was thus working on concurrently.

Then came Kiki's Delivery Service, originally supposed to be directed by Sunao Katabuchi. It was the first film of Miyazaki's with actual magic human characters. It was recent historical fiction again, this time set in a war-free Europe instead of Japan where My Neighbor Totoro was set. After this came Porco Rosso which was again set in historical Europe around the Adriatic Sea. This film was about a former war pilot who has a nose shaped like a pig's, possibly for abandoning his fellow pilots. It is a film which is dramatic, cartoony and historical. It is primarily for adults unlike his last several films. It seems at this point that Miyazaki is willing to set a film in the relatively recent past, the present, or far future and it can range from sci fi to cartoony real life to fantasy. 

For the next few years he will work on other projects but come back to feature film with Princess Mononoke, made based on an earlier manga but which evolved into a very different movie. This is Miyazaki's first film set before the 20th century and is fantasy again, but Medieval Japanese fantasy and squarely tackles the theme of human civilization and its tension with nature. The film uses more Japanese mythology than any of his earlier films, though Isao Takahata's film, Pom Poko, does so first in a present day setting. Spirited Away takes many themes explored in Princess Mononoke and Pom Poko but goes a step further into a realm of spirits that exists in the modern day. Miyazaki's next two films, Howl's Moving Castle, set in a fantastical Medieval Europe, and Ponyo, set in the modern day Japan but with oceanic magic in a film aimed at children like My Neighbor Totoro, seem to be caught under the cape of Spirited Away with their further explorations of its magical themes. Though Howl's was originally supposed to be directed by Mamoru Hosoda.

He then worked mainly in a supervisory role after Ponyo, but returned to the director's chair for The Wind Rises which combines reality with historical fiction. And now he's working on his last film which is based on a book which he read as a child. So basically, thematically, Miyazaki started with a caper, went into sci fi, gradually transitioned into deeper and deeper fantasy themes only to end up working an exaggerated historical biography until his last film which we've yet to see.

Thematic Trajectory: Makoto Shinkai

 Makoto Shinkai started out on video games before releasing his shorter film, Voices from a Distant Star. A sci fi love story. Even though it's not quite feature length, it is an important stepping stone in his fulltime transition into anime. His first feature film, The Place Promised In Our Early Days, combines friendships lost and renewed over time, and romance in an alternate divided Japan. The next film of his, 5 Centimeters Per Second, loses the sci fi themes and deals with romantic feelings lost over time as two people lose their connections.

Children Who Chase Lost Voices is a fantasy film. It deals with death and fantastical realms. After this film, Shinkai released The Garden of Words, a film under feature length by some standards. It is about a teenage boy who wants to be a shoemaker who comes to adore an older woman who is an unsure teacher avoiding class too. It is a film which starts to especially push the realism of setting which he is known for.

Next comes the film Your Name, the first of three high concept contemporary fantasy films that have made him a more popular director, being called the next Hayao Miyazaki, due to their popularity, though obviously his films are thematically very different to Miyazaki's. Weathering with You takes an especially unusual direction in that it is set in Tokyo, but a flooding Tokyo. Suzume no Tojomari is a fantasy about magical doors which need to be closed for the safety of people in Japan.

One thing that all most of Shinkai's works have in common is a focus on teenage love and the change in it over time, whether fulfilled or abandoned. And it's notable that like Miyazaki, he has started from sci fi, though more from video game roots than comic and manga roots, and then gone more into fantasy over time. He said that he wanted to get away from romance for this film and focus on female friendship but his producers meddled in the project and wasn't able to. I think it's a shame. Since I first started this post I've seen the film in theaters and it didn't quite live up to his past two films.

I only have one director outside of anime who has enough variety to deserve a thematic trajectory post: Francois Laguionie. I will publish the posts about other directors soon.