gaffa, while I understand your issues, to a lover of anime you sound like someone decrying books because of the possibility of paper cuts. You’re focused so hard on trivial superficial elements that you don’t even see the art itself. Also, several of the elements you point out are stereotypical of anime, but not omnipresent (strange lip movements not mirrored in nature, for example - typical of anime aimed at children but not usually present in feature films).
Anime is a huge genre. If one hates Sailor Moon they may love Grave of the Fireflies. You can’t group in Dragonball Z with Princess Mononoke nor with quality series anime such as Evangelion (science fiction) or Maison Ikkoku (romance).
Many anime fans, by the way, are unbothered by lip sync issues as we watch the films in the original Japanese but with English subtitles.
Jim Henson’s the Storyteller - The Definitive Collection is a treat. It features many incredible Henson Studios creatures in dramatizations of European fairytales and Greek myths. It’s not cutesy, and it’s not drastically revisionary.
Actually, he has a point about sync. Even Haruhi, which has some beautiful animation during the concert sequence, has places where things don’t match up in either language. It’s kind of frustrating, since they did an awesome job in other places.
That said, most of the things he doesn’t like are things I do like.
Well, a closer comparison is hating that a magazine I like, Wired, insists on abusing metallic inks and printing them on light colors, so I have to hold the magazine in various positions so I can read the damn thing.
Superficial? Sorry, but when we’re talking about animation, there are only four major elements - drawing, voice, music and story. If the drawing is repulsive, how can anyone get past that? That’s like someone trying to appreciate Shakespeare based on a production of “Macbeth” put on my Ms. Smith’s 3rd grade class.
Feature films? Like “Spirited Away”? I said above, I watched the English dub then sat in on a reel of the original Japanese language version at the same theater. In neither case did the lips match, and the behind the scenes documentary revealed that the audio track was not recorded until the animation was completed.
I’d like to know of a feature anime film that has lip sync.
Dammit! Sorry, but I am sick to death of anime fans waving about that particular film. One heavy dramatic film does not redeem a genre that is rife with saccharine cuteness. I’m curious…can you name an anime that is like “Grave of the Fireflies” that is not “Grave of the Fireflies”?
It’s the stylistic elements shared by all of them that are so annoying. If they didn’t share those stylistic elements, they wouldn’t be anime.
I just checked YouTube for “Evangelion” and found a clip that had every dreadful anime stylistic element - “Bambi” eyes, pointy chin, freakish gestures unrelated to any known universe (37 seconds in), limited frame cheats (51 seconds in), fetishistic “cuteness” (the schoolgirl outfits) - all in all, something that I hope never to see again as long as I live.
See above. I’ve seen original language, and it didn’t sync there either.
Well to move back to the OP, I guess I may be relatively rare but I love both 2D and 3D animation, and don’t feel the need to denigrate either medium. I’m in awe of the stunning, larger-than-life realism of 3D, whereas I find 2D animation more … well, magical, I guess the word is. Pixar’s best films make me gasp in wonder when I see 'em. The best 2D films feel warmer, more ethereal, graceful.
So yes, I do miss traditional, somewhat ‘serious’ (or at least humor that isn’t pseudo-edgy – by which I mean, pop culture references laden with poop jokes) 2D animation. My favorite ‘modern’ 2D animated films date all the way back to Beauty and the Beast and, later, Iron Giant – which oddly hasn’t been mentioned in this thread yet, I don’t think – so to me it’s all been kinda downhill since then! But I’m an adult, not a kid, and obviously not their intended audience.
Actually I think The Incredibles and Finding Nemo (my favorites of the Pixar flicks) would have worked equally well in 2D. The writing and acting were what mattered most to me. OTOH, the effects in The Incredibles were astonishing, though, so I guess it would’ve been less “super” in 2D.
Anyway, I am hoping for good things from The Frog Princess. Maybe finding properties that haven’t been adapted too often is a problem. Sometimes I wish the Harry Potter films had been animated.
So to change the subject slightly, what stories – other than originals – do you guys think would make good 2D animated adaptations?
Thank Og. I can’t stand Snow White’s voice. It ruins an otherwise good movie.
gaffa
I don’t know much about anime, but I like one called Monster (Youtube link). I can’t speak for lip sync because unless it’s really out of sync I don’t/can’t notice it.
There’s another one called Twelve Kingdoms (Youtube link) that I like and it has more realistic body proportion then most other anime I’ve seen. School uniform skirts that actually go to the knee! Just like they actually do! gasp
I don’t know if you’ll like the look of those two, but I hoped that they might pass muster.
I don’t disagree with you about the stylistic points you mention (I don’t dislike them all, and I don’t think they exist in all anime, but they’re pretty common) - but I really wouldn’t say it’s a genre “rife” with cuteness. To the contrary, I would say that anime in general is considerably less cutesy than Western animation in general. Generally it’s just the cutesy stuff (and cutesy-drawn stuff) that gets translated and put on mainstream TV over here.
Even though I am with gaffa in disliking anime for the same reasons as he does, I can’t blame them for being so similar really - most Disney movies are also very similar in stylistic touches, and yet I like them just fine. And I even tolerate things like Hanna Barbera even though they are probably worse offenders than Anime for homogenous design and cheap shortcuts.
The thing that I dislike most about Anime is that it’s filled to overflowing with superficial flashy bangy stuff, absurdly sized swords and big wheeled futuristic motorbikes, and the story is all gasps, sweat, and overwrought melodrama. And stop it with the giant robots, for deity’s sake.
Then and There. Here and Now
The Wings of Honneamise
Akira
Darkside Blues
The Hakkenden
Berserk
Cowboy Bebop
Evangelion
Patlabor
Vampire Hunter D
Etc. etc.
Non-cutesy serious stuff is in the hundreds. Sure, vapid stuff is ever present, but if you don’t call Iron Man vapid, I don’t know what you would call it. Vapid cheesewhiz is what most customers want so if you just go by what most people are watching and stereotype everything on that, you’re just being silly. The prevalence of comic book movies doesn’t negate the existence of Amadeus and Monsters Ball. But like those, most people won’t have even seen them.
Please read my response about “Evangelion”. It is on your list - and it displays every single one of the things I loath about anime (see above). I’m not saying that the stories are bad, I’m saying the graphic design and animation are bad. I’ve never seen “Cowboy Bebop” or “Vampire Hunter D”, but I’ve seen TV ads for them, and they displayed all the things I loath about anime as well. Sorry, but I’m not willing to slog through a bunch of YouTube links to clips from all the others on your list to verify what you and I already know - that these anime titles have the distinguishing characteristics of anime. The best anime is still anime.
You didn’t ask for a list of movies you would like. You said you wanted something that was serious, contemplative, and could tug at the heart strings–like Grave of the Fireflies–so I listed some off. Certainly some of them have giant robots and what-not, but why make an animated movie if you can make it live action just as well? Grave of the Fireflies only gains anything for being animated in that it would be hard to get acting performances from child actors of sufficient quality. So sure, it’s one of the few animated movies from Japan that could essentially have been presented just as well as a live action film–but again that’s not what you asked for.
If you want a list of movies that could just as well be live action, The Wings of Honneamise, Tokyo Godfather, Millennium Actress, and Perfect Blue are perfectly good films. But again, I’m not saying you would like any of these, nor am I trying to sell you on anything. I’m giving a factual answer because you raised the question.
Really? To me all these movies have the same look to them, just like all the old claymation specials did.
I don’t like Pixar movies much either, and am also confused by the rabidness of many fans. They’re sort of pretty, but I’ve never been a big fan of any movies, animated or live action, that force the visuals to carry the movie rather than invest more in plot and characters.
I wonder if some of you in the know could clear something up for me. I’m not a particularly discriminating animation fan, but I tend to like the current Pixar offerings, as well as the old Disney stuff.
From reading this thread, I gather that I will never again see any feature-length movies from Disney that will look like the old 101 Dalmations, or The Rescuers, or any of those movies. I watched a DVD called The Tigger Movie (of Pooh fame) with my 12-month old son the other day, and was struck by how much it resembled those old films. The movie was nothing special, but even our resident college student commented on how beautiful the animation was. IMDB says it was made in 2000.
Except that it isn’t. 3D CGI and 2D cell animation are two distinct style of animation. That doesn’t mean 3D CGI films are inherently technologically superior. Most modern “2D” animation has a large CGI component to them anyway.
Shrek is fine in the 3D style and Miyazaki’s fims wouldn’t work in anything other than the traditional 2D style. What I can’t stand is the sort of hybrid style of movies like Appleseed or Titan AE. They are really 3D animation but they use a special paint & ink filter to make the characters look like flat hand drawn cell animation. But then objects in the background might be more 3D so it ends up looking like you are watching a diorama or something.