Soratobu Yuureisen

Man... what a movie. This is a love letter to B movies verry fun while being at the same time deeper than it seems in the fisrt place by a subtle critic of capitalism, war, and polution. (Not so surprising when you know that the movie was half financed by soviet union)

Story: The plot is not so incredible but the sub text of the movie was really intelligent and still relevant. I think even if you are an alt-right guy you will not feel that what is depicted in this movie is wrong. It really was a good surprise. 8/10

Art: It's some of the best ... of what was done in 69, whith the great team of animators who worked at Toei Douga at the time (Hayao Miyazaki, Yasuo Otsuka, ...) really great. 7/10

Sound: Average but cool music. 5/10

Character: It's maybe the week point of the movie they are fonctional and not really developed. But the girl is a good prototype of miyazaki's heroin, woman with courage and the capitalist guys are really realistic. 5/10

Enjoyment: It is a really good movie and you don't feel the time when you watch it, really great. 8/10

Overall : 7/10

Flying Phantom Ship is a wonderful mystery spectacle for anyone who loves over the top anime. this film was hard to predict, so many events come out of nowhere. things like Giant robots kaiju attacking a city or A spectral skeleton that is out for revenge stepping out from the shadows that possess a flying ghost ship poised with lasers and rockets! if that doesn't make you curious how about a dog that carries around a bag of momentous? at its core this is a film about a boy and his dog and is a metaphor for the sudden moments of loss and hardships in ... life.

Not a very deep story by any means but much of the joy this film brings is brought from the old school animation and visuals, not to mention all the crazy things that just happen. I would recommend watching this with friends.

Now, this film may be 51-years-old, but it is well worth the time! That is... as long as you bear in mind that it is a kids film. Even so, the plot, although parts have been used a lot now, is actually very unique if you consider when it came out.


The visuals are about what you would expect... it is clunky and simplistic, but lovable all at the same time. I guess that lovable side comes from the fact that Hayao Miyazaki was one of the key animators.


The audio, as was all audio in anime in 1969, was a little crackly and makes it clear ... just how old this movie really is.

Pretty standard sci-fi fare for the time, with giant monsters and Tetsujin-type giant robots. Decent for what it is, but with only an hour runtime. Miyazaki worked on this anime, and you can tell by the art style, especially the main heroine who unfortunately appears for only the last 20 minutes. Character and plot development is minimal, and the film could've benefitted from an extra 30 minutes. Compared to anime just a few years ago, the animation is great and looks more like anime would in the 70s. There's an environmentalist or anti-capitalist message in this film, but because of the short runtime it's hard ... to make sense of it here.

Flying Phantom Ship is an interesting bit of animation film history as one of Miyazaki's earliest works but a little half-baked. It begins weak with a flimsy plot that seems a little worrying in how plain it is, strongly resembling Scooby Doo with the haunted house and dog. It rapidly changes later with an intriguing, underdeveloped plot and several big twists, almost reminiscent of Studio Ghibli's films decades later with how much it surprises the viewer, but not anywhere near as earned. The run time is only an hour, so there's little time to develop anything, and scenes transition without much weight given to any ... actions. However, it has solid characters and themes, if somewhat boilerplate by today's standards, feeling quite engaging with the always surprising way the narrative changes over time. I liked the Phantom Ship Captain, Kurosio, the "Boa Juice" subplot, and the idea of "Boa" later in the plot. Despite its shortness, it's almost two or three film's worth of ideas crammed into the hour.

As said at the top, it's a worthwhile bit of animation history, particularly for anime. You see glimpses of what the famous team behind this film would do later. The animation varies heavily in quality, starting very weak, but there are some solid moments later where it does have some genuinely good stuff. However, the animation shows its age and has many obvious cheaper bits of animation. Considering it's a 1969 film, it's hard to blame them for these shortcomings, but it's pretty hard to ignore. The music is also decent, but nothing memorable. For an hour of your time, it's worth it for the experience, especially when it's free on YouTube. However, it is no gem and has many apparent issues probably stemming from when it was made; frankly, it's impressive that it's as good as it is.

This is a strange Toei film. Dealing with loss of family and addiction to soda seems to be the points of this film, and I'm not joking. The movie switches focal points of the plot from a giant robot terrorizing the city, to a revenge plot on an ever escalating scale. Some points of this movie range from good such as showing familial love to an adopted child, to bad as the children towards the end of the movie seemingly embrace suicide as an attempt to stop the enemy, when an escape pod was ready and available the entire time. Overall, this movie is a ... good watch just to see what an adventure movie from Toei would be like back before anime exploded into what we know today.