Ranked #331

Akira

Note: The following review DOESN'T contain spoilers.

Akira is a very controversial piece of art — but a piece of art regardless. It isn't easy to watch it, and it isn't easy to review it, either: Akira the movie is such an ambitious and influential project that grasping it in its entirety is far from being trivial.

Story
Akira's story is among those where you need either high intuitive and perceptive abilities to understand everything that goes on, or to watch it several times. It doesn't really help that Katsuhiro Otomo stuffed almost 2000 pages of story into 2 hours of screen time, but at least the movie has considerably good re-watch potential, which might help to release part of the strain.

What we have is a post-WWIII Tokyo of not-too-distant future, led by greedy politicians and torn apart by terrorists trying to bring down the corrupt power and biker gangs that roam the streets. There is no usual hi-tech cyberpunk fantasies about living online, free information or global communication — just a demonstratively dystopic setting involving modern society abandoned to rot on its own. This is driven up further by the secret military experiments in attempts to magnify and control human psychic powers, which actually led to the WWIII in the first place. These social, political and semi-scientific, semi-mystical aspects mix and intertwine as a couple of teenagers get accidentally involved in all this mess.

Art
Where Akira definitely wins is the art department, being a clear milestone in animation. It's been almost 20 years since its release, and I've yet to see many movies, especially anime, drawn with this amount of detail. There are very few still shots, every movement is scrutinized and animated at 24 frames per second, creating a remarkably fluid image. Dialogues are all lip-synched and everything looks as natural as it was possible to do at the time.

Character design can be called dubious, but personally I like it, since it's considerably truthful to actual real-life images, where people actually tend to have noses instead of some weird pointy bumps, and eyes that don't take half the entire face. Most of the characters are pretty much ugly, and it helps them match the gloomy setting really well. The only weak spot in it is considerably small difference in facial design, which is why some characters (especially younger ones) look similar to each other.

Sound and music
Akira is actually rather silent most of the time. However, when the sound plays, it's almost always highly dynamic and spot-on. Most of the soundtrack is dominated by industrial beats, minimalistic ethnic motifs and chants, and is intended to set the certain ambience in the movie, so you'll likely fail to enjoy it too much outside of it. But for what it's worth, the sound work is really good in the movie, especially considering the time of its production.

Characters
I can't say there's too much to it when it comes to characters. The movie's limited length (compared to manga at least) didn't leave too much for character development, so you mostly see more-or-less clear manifestations of certain archetypes rather than complex emotional and psychological twists, even though not all of them are simple to read through. Some appear initially negative but proven to be decent later, while others appear good at first but eventually show themselves to be corrupt.

Pretty much the only characters who let you get some insights into their backstory are Kaneda and Tetsuo, especially the latter. Both are almost equally confused by the events engulfing them (kinda like the viewer, actually), and it's very interesting to track their relationships throughout the movie.

Enjoyment
This is a very subjective matter, but personally, Akira is one of the most enjoyable movies I've ever seen. It has a lot of shock value (assuming you're shocked by immense amounts of graphic violence), it has furious action, it has plot riddles, it has mystery, drama and horror elements, all presented in a coherent (but sometimes overly gruesome) manner. Some people regard Akira to be a gratuitous bloodbath, but there's much more to it than the amount of gore, it's just that those people are unable to look deeper than that. There is a lot of symbolism ingrained underneath the visual layer, and it takes some time and effort to find all the links to cultural and other contexts.

That being said, if you enjoyed watching it for the first time, chances are you will enjoy it the second time around, and probably even more at that. The final 20 minutes literally eat my head from inside every time I rewatch them, much like End of Evangelion or other similar movies. And for this alone I think it deserves its 10.


Overall, I'm still of the opinion that Akira is a masterpiece and deserves watching, whether you like anime (or any form of animation, actually) or not, at least for its great cultural and historic value. There are many movies and cartoons that are far more enjoyable, and it's not like Akira is the absolute limit of anything and everything. But as more and more titles surpass it in various respects, Akira stays like the Colossus of Rhodes, being a great achievement on its own and one of the most influential landmarks in the history of anime for years to come. read more

This anime definitely deserves its spot among the classics. The details and politcs of the film coupled with its interesting characters and mind-boggling themes make it highly enjoyable to watch time and again. But be warned, this is most certainly NOT for everyone.

One thing that is sure to turn many viewers away, and that should be mentioned, is that this anime is rated as it is for a reason. If language, graphic violence, protrayl of drug use, and sexual stitautions bother you, then stay away. There is an attempted rape scene that I find to be difficult to sit through. The world in which this movie occurs is a very corrupt one on all fronts: morally, socially, politically, psychologically, and physically. It is very dark at points as such. However, they do not go over the top to make you terribly uncomfortable, I feel. The aim, while it does want to shock you, is not specifically geared towards grossing you out. Yes, it looks at the darker vices dwelling in human nature, but it's not as in your face about it as, say, Elfen Lied. Everything unsettling about the movie is all meant to enhance and make more real the world in which it occurs, it does not go beyond that. I'm not sure how best to explain it, but let me put it this way, Elfen Lied did not sit well with me and I didn't like it, but for some reason, Akira, while also full of violence and sinister themes, I enjoyed. The evil undertones of the Akira world make it seem real and less repulsive, if that makes any sense.

Another thing that can turn people off is the art style. Personally, I very much like the art style, but I will admit that the first time I encountered it, I was a bit reluctant to keep watching. It's very unique and the aim of the film isn't to make really pretty characters to look at but realistic ones. The buildings and vehicles of the film seem to have a life of their own and were awarded just as much thought and attention to design as the characters. For this reason, Kaneda's motorcycle, the coolest design of one I've ever seen, I consider to be a favorite character of mine; yes, character. The bike is so full of personality that it deserves character status.

While I would argue that the film does have some amusing moments, it is not at all light-hearted. Plus, said amusing moments are mainly amusing to me because I get a kick out of sarcastic, satirical humor. So, you humor lovers won't get much out of this one. It's also not for you romance people. Romance, while present, is not one of the main drives of the film and is almost tacked in as a short of after thought. This one is mainly for those of you out there who like to think about things or watch something and ask "What....the....". If you like Stephen King novels, then I'd wager that you'd like this, even though it's not strickly horror. That is just an opinion of mine. I am a Stephen King fan and if you think about it, Akira has an attitude akin to one of his books. If I'm wrong on that though, sorry.

The major themes of the film seem to be the nature of friendship and betrayl and how far man can truly force his evolution and pursuit of progress before it overtakes him and leads to a regression. Basically, it's about limits and knowing where they lie.

I forewarn you now that the one big downside of the film is that many, many things go unaswered and unaddressed. This is likely because the film attempted to condense a manga of monsterous proportions into a single movie. As a result, the two are very different. In fact, while Akira the manga actually deals mainly with a boy named Akira, Akira the movie awards the same boy I think a total of a minute of screen time. It might be even less. I'm including dialogue spoken by him as well as the images shown of him. The movie is really more about Testuo, an underappreciated social outcast and weakling gone berserk, and Kaneda, a street smart but book ignorant punk who's head of a street gang. The relationship between the two and polarity of their characters makes their interactions highly entertaing to watch.

All in all, I would recommend this movie. You should try it out if only to say you've seen it. read more