Originally published in South China Morning Post, Jul 31 2011
To many, the recent Fukushima nuclear crisis was a harrowing ordeal, one which most people sat through with bated breath, wondering whether Japan and its neighbouring countries would be left in radioactive ruins. But to some, this would seem a familiar and almost favourable future. Otakus (obsessive Japanese fanboys) no doubt ran rampant on internet forums, hoping to see a real-life version of their favourite movie: Akira, a bold animated film where a futuristic Tokyo is obliterated in a beautiful spectacle of animated glory.
For film fans who gush about the adult themes and gorgeous CGI of Pixar, may we offer up Japanese animation – anime, for short – a genre that for decades has pushed the limits of hand-drawn creativity and craftsmanship. Everything from child-friendly fantasy epics (anything by Hayao Miyakazi) to ultra-violent samurai adventures (Ninja Scroll), existential sci-fi explorations (Ghost in the Shell) and mind-bending alternate realities (Satoshi Kon films) are available to open-minded viewers.
Akira is arguably the genre’s crowning achievement, the Citizen Kane of anime, with the cyberpunk story being familiar to any fans of sci-fi: post-third world war Tokyo has been taken over by the military and turned into a police state where the last vestige of freedom is held by the biker gangs who battle on the streets in medieval-style jousts. On a routine run through the roads, one gang encounters a battle between a telekinetic child and the oppressive military. Kidnapping one of the weaker gang members, the authorities begin to experiment, and the plans of project “Akira” soon begin to emerge.
Granted, you’ll be lucky to have caught all that on first viewing. Japanese manga are quite unlike their Western counterparts, more often than not being an intellectually provocative medium. Akira is a deeply layered affair, mixing the adventure and energy of American superhero comics with intellectual aspects of philosophy and social satire.
Filmmaker Katsuhiro Otomo also wrote the 2,000-page manga the film is based on. He did an admirable job of adapting his book into a two-hour film, but Akira is riddled with page-to-screen compromises: the barely intelligible plot and thinly drawn characters being the most obvious. And while much of that can be blamed on Otomo ditching the intellectual aspects, he made sure to hold fast to the pure energy.
On its release, Akira was the most expensive animated film ever made, with more than one billion yen spent on its 160,000 hand-drawn cells. Much of that can be felt on screen: an excessively detailed, extremely engaging film moving at such a breakneck speed that one all but forgives and forgets its flaws.
See its fluid, almost multi-dimensional vision of a neon-lit Neo-Tokyo, where crowded skyscrapers and derelict traces of the past live in a distorted harmony. Hear its technologically advanced motorcycle engines (but please, stay away from the almost embarrassing English dub). And more than anything, experience this film – because Akira is a film that shouldn’t be so much read about on paper, but experienced, a classic that revolutionised its genre and is still an astounding piece of pure animated creativity.