# is the animated movie "The Last Unicorn" an anime title? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 10, 2007, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-animated-movie-the-last-unicorn-an-anime-title/391586 "2007-02-10T02:10:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2007, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-animated-movie-the-last-unicorn-an-anime-title/391586/21 "2007-02-10T20:27:29Z")
[QUOTE=Elysium] These days a lot more comics and cartoons are being in in manga or anime style. To me, adapting typical Japanese style does not make them anime or manga. To be categorized in those genres IMO they must be made by Japanese companies or artists for Japanese audiences. Anything else is just appropriating the style. [/QUOTE] What if it’s done “manga-style,” for a Japanese artist, but is drawn by someone who isn’t Japanese? What if it’s done by a Japanese artist, for a Japanese audience, but is illustrated strictly in a Western style? If, for some reason, Hiyao Miyazaki decided to release his next movie only in North America, would his movie not be anime simply because of where it’s distributed? This doesn’t strike me as a terribly useful definition. Manga/anime ought to be defined by its visual style, not the vagaries of how it is marketed or, even more disturbing, the ethnicity of the artist who created it. ---
**Author:** ![Kiros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/439d5e/32.png) [@Kiros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kiros)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2007, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-animated-movie-the-last-unicorn-an-anime-title/391586/22 "2007-02-10T22:10:31Z")
[QUOTE=Miller] Manga/anime ought to be defined by its visual style, not the vagaries of how it is marketed or, even more disturbing, the ethnicity of the artist who created it. [/QUOTE] I agree pretty strongly… especially since myself, and most of the other people I know who avoid anime, do it on the basis of the specific visual style rather than a broad denunciation of all of the story-types and cultural origins of what that style is covering. ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2007, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-animated-movie-the-last-unicorn-an-anime-title/391586/23 "2007-02-10T23:07:07Z")
[QUOTE=RealityChuck] It was produced by Rankin/Bass – the same people who did **Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer** for TV, so it’s definitely American. But it was filmed in Japan as a way to cut costs. [/QUOTE] Most of _Rudolph_ was filmed in Japan, too, as were most of R-B’s stop-motion specials. And regarding animation: most American animated shows are animated in Korea or Taiwan, but that doesn’t make them anime, either. ---
**Author:** ![Elysium](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3be4f8/32.png) [@Elysium](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elysium)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2007, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-animated-movie-the-last-unicorn-an-anime-title/391586/24 "2007-02-11T00:42:58Z")
[QUOTE=Miller] What if it’s done “manga-style,” for a Japanese artist, but is drawn by someone who isn’t Japanese? What if it’s done by a Japanese artist, for a Japanese audience, but is illustrated strictly in a Western style? If, for some reason, Hiyao Miyazaki decided to release his next movie only in North America, would his movie not be anime simply because of where it’s distributed? [/QUOTE] I may not have been entirely clear. What I consider anime is an animation (film, OVA, or TV series) created and shown in the country of Japan. I definitely agree that within that definition lies all manner of styles, genres, and artistic choices. Miyazaki’s style is just as much anime to me as is the more “typical anime” (by which I mean that which is often imitated by Americans and interpreted by Americans as anime) styles of say the CLAMP team. There are obviously gray areas. (What if it’s for a Japanese audience but done in a western style? etc) But a movie produced by an American company, made for an American audience just doesn’t fall into the anime category to me. I consider that American animation, even if the artists’ style is influenced by anime. To address your example of Hayao Miyazaki, I would consider any of his works anime, regardless of where they are distributed. So that’s another gray area. [QUOTE=Miller] This doesn’t strike me as a terribly useful definition. Manga/anime ought to be defined by its visual style, not the vagaries of how it is marketed or, even more disturbing, the ethnicity of the artist who created it. [/QUOTE] You and I seem to disagree in this. I can definitely understand why you would feel the visual style is a more important factor in categorizing the genre, as it’s clearly the most recognizable aspect. But I guess I just feel that anime, when the term was first appropriated for use in this sense, referred to animation from Japan. So that’s how I continue to categorize. Animation from Japan is anime. All other animation is animation. But that’s only my opinion, I can see how your system would work better for you, and that’s just as acceptable I think. ---
**Author:** ![OtakuLoki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ac8455/32.png) [@OtakuLoki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OtakuLoki)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2007, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-animated-movie-the-last-unicorn-an-anime-title/391586/25 "2007-02-11T06:30:21Z")
[QUOTE=Miller] Mostly, no, but [the unicorn herself](http://www.thegline.com/dvd-of-the-week/2006/06-04-2006.htm) looks very anime to me. [/QUOTE] **Miller** , it may look in the anime style, but it was also a major point in the book that unicorns were not supposed to look like horses, so I’d always thought that the different look for the unicorn in the movie was rather important, too. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2007, 6:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-animated-movie-the-last-unicorn-an-anime-title/391586/26 "2007-02-11T06:59:42Z")
Artistically speaking, I would say that: Unicorn 90% anime Female characters 70% (compare [her](http://www.thegline.com/dvd-of-the-week/images/2006/unicorn-211.jpg) to [her](http://www.simex-iwerks.com/filmlibrary/3d4d/images/galaxyexpress999.jpg)) Male characters 30% (for instance the way the guy in the last picture’s head has a [conic thing going on](http://www.i-paradise.jp/~dhiaborosu/P1000044.JPG) in the back) Background art 100% But I would agree that it’s not anime. What anime-ish look there may be comes from the artists not the production. The script was written by an American for Americans and the art and animation-acting approved by Americans. ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2007, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-animated-movie-the-last-unicorn-an-anime-title/391586/27 "2007-02-11T14:35:43Z")
I say it’s not anime but it has some anime elements, even if that term didn’t exist at the time it was made. It was animated by a Japanese studio, and Japanese animation studios had been around for a good long time even then. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2007, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-animated-movie-the-last-unicorn-an-anime-title/391586/28 "2007-02-14T03:51:22Z")
“Anime” is pretty much the Japanese form of the word “animation.” And the idea that there is a defining “look” that separates anime from cartoons is, well, ignorant. So, no, while defining something as anime by the visual style may make a sort of colloquial shorthand sense, it’s not strictly denotatively correct. Oh, & that unicorn was very Japanese-cartoon. Oh, my! It jumped out at me when I saw the movie. (I’ve read a fair bit of Tezuka, & seen some Matsumoto Reiji movies, & it fits in that tradition.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-animated-movie-the-last-unicorn-an-anime-title/391586.md?page=1)