Vexille

Ooooh... New feature=D Clicking the title of this blog entry takes you to the movie's imdb site.

Soooo... It's a movie festival going on^^, I have no money so, I have been ignoring it. As best as I can anyway. I know there are heaps of great movies that I would have loved to see, so best not to read about it at all.
But I did go and see Vexille today. There is something special about seeing a movie that you know nothing about. Well I knew that it was made by the same people that made Appleseed, which I saw a few years ago.
Anywho, Vexille (or ベクシル: 2007 日本鎖国, which translates to "Vexille: 2077 Japanese isolation), is an animation with plays a bit like a mathematician of computer programmers wet dream. The animation on the water was gorgeously animated, as opposed to the animation on the hair, which was just weird... When they do all the math on the water, and take all that time to make it look amazing they must have had someone on the team with a least a small knowledge of basic physics, but still they manage to have chunky hair that reacts to the slightest breeze, but not at all to gravity. In one scene Maria, who was the only character with long hair, which she wore in a ponytail, sits leaning forward, which in real life would make her ponytail drape down her neck. But not in Vexilleverse, no no, in Vexilleverse they the use so much hair gel that the ponytails stand horizontally behind their heads when they bow them. Jupp jupp jupp...XP
Getting sidetracked here. The story had something as rare as Japan against the world, with Japan being the bad guy. This is overly simplyfied ofcourse, seing as going deeper into it would give away the whole ending.
On the whole the story was interesting, but not really captivating. It was a clear social comment hidden it, but I can't really tell you about it without spoiling you. Bah! This is a bit frustrating, I can't really talk about anything but the visual, because I just feel like I am spoiling you all...=j
But the visuals, I can talk about that=D
All of the things that need math and reality simulating was amazing (except the hair of course). There were these monsters, called Jags, that were made of metal shrapnel, which kept twisting, and sometimes they crashed into each other making these gorgeous shrapnel fountains. They were amazingly done, and probably took a team of mathematician a years to calculate. The people left something to be desired thou. They were stiff and expressionless. This one scene at the end, they did the classic movie trick of showing the mouth of someone speaking in slow motion with music but no voice, but the whole point of that is kind of lost when it is impossible to read their lips. Some of the people, for no apparent reason, had a bend in their knees, the type you see on long time drug addicts. I think they prioritized badly with the budget, because I think readable facial expressions is more important than amazing water, or ultra realistic smoke. If the people all look like puppets being controlled by an extremely untalented puppeteer, even if the main characters moved moderately realistically, the ultra realistic water doesn't do much for me.

Overall I thought it was a good movie, and I would highly recommend it to computer programmers and demosceners. And to people who like science fiction, and to fans of the darker, slightly more realistic anime.

4 out of 6 from me.

Word of the day:
日本鎖国 - Nihon sakuko - Japanese isolation