:9.09.2004

A couple of weeks ago I’ve had the luck of attending a screening of “Ghost in the Shell 2 - INNOCENCE” at ILM. At the event I had the pleasure of meeting director Mamuro Oshii, who struck me as a very down to earth, intelligent, likeable and silent guy. Production IG’s cofounder and producer of Innocence Mitsuhisa Ishikawa was also at the screening. Through the years I have had the luck of meeting with Ishikawa San several times and I’ve always been amazed at what a funny and playful man he is, while also being one of the most influential figures in Japanese animation. A few years back in New York he even briefly introduced me to Kanno Yoko, a fantastic composer I’ve been a big fan for years (yes, I am a geek after all). More recently I chatted with Ishikawa San at my friend Justin’s wedding in Kyoto. I met Ishikawa in fact thanks to Justin, who worked on GITS2 for him in Tokyo. Waiting to be seated at the banquet, Ishikawa and I cracked each other up regarding Pixar’s movie “Finding Nemo” … in his broken English he told me that he and I should make a movie together: “Finding money” …. X)
The joke is rather silly (and we hadn’t even drunk any sake yet) but it does tell a lot about Japanese animation and how cheaply and painstakingly it’s produced. Men like Ishikawa have the talent pool to make groundbreaking movies but struggle to find the money to produce them. They often make lower budget commercial projects to try and pay for the more substantial and artistic movies. A wholly commendable enterprise. Well, with Innocence Ishikawa certainly did his job right.
The movie cost 18 million dollars to make, peanuts for animation productions over here, but a huge budget for a Japanese production, and I can tell you one thing: it shows every yen spent.
Saying the movie is visually rich it’s an understatement. Some sequences are truly amazing in their intricate and sophisticated visuals. This movie puts together CG backgrounds with 2d animation. The result, while not always consistent, is in most sequences a feast for the eyes, in some even ground breaking.
Oshii’s story, while a tad hard to follow here and there (but no surprise here), comes together quite well, especially in the end. Under a few layers of “technofuturisticstuff”, lies quite a satisfying detective story. Maybe the only thing I found a tad repetitive was the characters’ quoting from scriptures quite often, it got a tad tiring, but it might very well be just a cultural thing. The movie left me wanting to see it a second time (I bet Ishikawa will be happy to hear that) for two reasons: the visuals and the story that as expected, with Oshi at the helm, will be better understood after a second viewing. Kenji Kawai’s soundtrack hits the mark with similar themes to the first movie’s music, but it felt even stronger and emotional.
The movie comes out in selected theaters this month. I warmly recommend it … you’re in for a visual treat and a few amazing action sequences from the top talents of Japanese 2d animation.

Well, there goes my review ... Oh and my life is going pretty well … my back is getting much better, been swimming a lot to strengthen it. Oh and guess what, big news … toward the end of the year I am gonna have a little time off from Pixar to focus on my projects and maybe rest a tad too … Looking forward to it! It’ll also give me a chance to spend sometime with my family back in Italy.
And on that note … here’s a couple of photos from there …
Ok, ciao!
E

:: Uliveti

::Stazione di Manarola

Listening to Cat House by Takako Minekawa from XIMER-EP.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::