The Sky Crawlers

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Alternative Titles

Japanese: スカイ・クロラ

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Information

Type: Movie

Episodes: 1

Status: Finished Airing

Aired: Aug 2, 2008

Producers: Bandai Visual, VAP, Yomiuri Telecasting, d-rights, Warner Bros. Japan, Nippon Television Network, Hakuhodo DY Media Partners, Sapporo Television Broadcasting, Miyagi Television Broadcasting, Shizuoka Daiichi Television, Hiroshima Television, D.N. Dream Partners, Yomiuri Shimbun, Hochi Shimbun

Licensors: Sony Pictures Entertainment

Studios: Production I.G

Source: Novel

Genres: Award Winning, Drama

Theme: Military

Duration: 2 hr. 2 min.

Rating: PG-13 - Teens 13 or older

Statistics

Score: 7.27¹ (scored by 24,851 users)

¹ indicates a weighted score.

Ranked: #2924²

² based on the top anime page. Please note that 'Not yet aired' and 'R18+' titles are excluded.

Popularity: #2900

Members: 57,447

Favorites: 319

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AniDB

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Synopsis

In an alternate timeline, the world has seemingly achieved peace. Bereft of international conflicts, wars are now waged between private corporations in place of peaceful nations. Yuuichi Kannami, a recent transfer in Area 262, simply does his job as a contracted fighter pilot. However, the more time he spends at his new base, the more mysteries come to light.

The Sky Crawlers exhibits this reality through the eyes of Kannami as he endeavors to understand the "Kildren," humans genetically altered to be teenagers forever with faster reflexes, and his predecessor, the ace pilot known as "Teacher." However, what troubles Kannami the most is how all this connects to the base commander, Suito Kusanagi. Area 262 has the answers, but the truth comes with a price the young pilot may not be ready to pay.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Background

The Sky Crawlers won the Best Animation Film award at the Mainichi Film Awards in 2008.

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Related Anime

Adaptation:	Sky Crawlers Series
Other:	The Sukkiri Crawlers

More characters

Characters & Voice Actors

Kusanagi, Suito

Main

Kikuchi, Rinko
Japanese

Kannami, Yuuichi

Main

Kase, Ryo
Japanese

Teacher

Supporting

Tokino, Naofumi

Supporting

Tanihara, Shosuke
Japanese

Mitsuya, Midori

Supporting

Kuriyama, Chiaki
Japanese

Bartender

Supporting

Takenaka, Naoto
Japanese

Yuri

Supporting

Hishimi, Yuriko
Japanese

Bus guide

Supporting

Saiga

Supporting

Aihara

Supporting

Hirakawa, Daisuke
Japanese

More staff

Staff

Ishii, Tomohiko

Producer

Kawaguchi, Tooru

Producer

Terashima-Furuta, Maki

Assistant Producer

Oshii, Mamoru

Director, Storyboard

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Opening Theme

No opening themes have been added to this title. Help improve our database by adding an opening theme here.

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Ending Theme

"Konya mo Hoshi ni Dakarete..." by Ayaka

Reviews

Mar 17, 2024

MichaelMorbius

Recommended

This movie isn't for everyone; personally, in fact, I consider it the anti-film. In the sense that it is a dull, pessimistic, slow film that most would define as boring. The protagonists are apathetic and do nothing to change their situation within the film. Furthermore, every key moment, every twist or revelation is greeted coldly. Plus, the action scenes, especially for a war film, are very few. Essentially the anti-film. But that couldn't further from the truth. This is not the anti-film, this is the film. An absolutely incredible experience that will take your breath away and leave you speechless.

The story is about the Kildren, ... these boys created artificially and incapable of dying or aging who are sent to a battlefield to fight a "fake" war between two multinationals. War that takes place in a world of peace but whose aim is precisely to maintain peace and not to make man forget the horrors of war as well as to entertain them. In essence, the Kildren are cannon fodder sent to die and somehow resurrected only to be killed again and again and again... A sad and dark plot, very philosophical and profound. Narrated in a masterful way with ideas such as making each plot twist arrive in the most anti-climatic way possible, absolutely brilliant.

The characters are all expressionless, emotionless, unaware of the truth about their existence and they don't make you feel the slightest apathy for them as they are simple puppets built and manipulated by the strongest. Yuichi, the protagonist, is the exact opposite of a protagonist. Instead of fighting to find out who he is or where he comes from, he simply exists. He exists and is a puppet like the others. Only in the ending does he try to redeem himself with an extreme gesture and this leaves a glimmer of light which, in my opinion, is destroyed by the true ending in the post-credit scene. The characters, however, work. Their apathy and unawareness mixes perfectly with the sad and dark tones of the film. They involved me much more than many other characters in many other anime where, in theory, the characters are the strong point.

The animation is absolutely brilliant, visually it's one of the most satisfying experiences I've ever seen. A perfect use of CGI with the animations of the flying combats which are the flagship of an incredible technical sector. The tones and atmospheres are muted, making everything even more unique. Oshii does a masterful job of directing with some excellent ideas, such as using the subjective view for some scenes during the flying combats. The soundtrack is wonderful with the absolutely perfect main theme which, with its sweet tones, clashes with the atmosphere of the film but which, in reality, hides a lot of melancholy.

Must-watch for any fan of animated films, I can't believe there's so little talk about it. Do yourself a favor and watch one of the most atypical yet brilliant works ever.

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Oct 5, 2022

Duckielover151

Mixed Feelings

I saw this movie for the first time when I was maybe 13. Throughout that two-hour experience, literally all I could remember was that scene in the backseat of the car... and melting into my couch for what felt like at least 3 hours, just waiting for it to finally end. This was a movie I've always wanted to revisit, because I've definitely made an effort to better appreciate this kind of quieter, subtly beautiful storytelling as I've gotten older. But even now, I'm not sure I can recommend this one wholeheartedly.

Make no mistake, it's stunningly beautiful to look at. And the music in ...

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Dec 27, 2023

Drakestalker

Not Recommended

The Sky Crawlers gets its name from the fact that it's a movie about fighter pilots. It's the closest thing to the Japanese Top Gun that I can think of, in that it contains amazing dogfight scenes, but doesn't have much of anything else going on.

The latest of Oshii Mamoru-sensei's creations, the director of Ghost in the Shell, it also features the same composer, Kawai Kenji, and sound director, Wakabayashi Kazuhiro, as GitS. However, rather than the original GitS movie with its thought-provoking themes, Sky Crawlers feels a lot more similar to the GitS sequel with its mind-numbingly slow pacing and pretentious quotes. Thankfully, Sky ... Crawlers doesn't bombard you with obscure quotes every 2 minutes, but it will invite you to ponder fairly superficial and uninteresting philosophical concepts in the company of uninteresting characters. Suffice it to say that I do not believe Mamoru-sensei is in any danger of overshadowing his magnum opus any time soon.

In all fairness to the film, it does present one idea that is fairly poignant and merits discussion. In a conversation between characters, or more precisely said, one character's monologue, Mamoru-sensei posits that true peace can functionally not be achieved because war and conflict are some of the deepest instincts humans have. As such, even if you achieve peace at a surface level, armed conflict is still necessary, even a contained, controlled armed conflict, to channel that ancient instinct into. People need to know that other people, somewhere in the world, are fighting and killing each other, in order to psychologically be at peace, to keep the world balanced, if you will. Otherwise, in the absence of that controlled conflict, people's psyches are liable to become unstable and give in to their Hobbesian urges. Like, I said, it's an interesting thought, but not so revolutionary that it's enough to carry the entire movie on its own, and since this is a film that relies almost entirely on its themes to carry it, I was not sold.

Comparing Top Gun to Sky Crawlers could not make the difference between Eastern and Western storytelling any clearer. It was so exciting to watch a protagonist make the same expressionless face for 2 full hours. It was so interesting to look at a cast of characters who, bar one, all have the same stoic, bored, jaded, cynical face all the time. I really appreciated the constant breaks in animation where the characters just sit there and do nothing so as to give me time to consider themes and ideas I didn't care about in the first place. It was truly an experience I am glad I spent my time on.

If you read the MAL description, it says that in addition to the dangers of aerial battles, the protagonist has to uncover the mysteries of the base he's been assigned to. That makes it sound like there's some really suspenseful shit going on. I had a good to fair understanding of what was going on after about 20 minutes. After that, all of the reveals mostly just confirmed what I was already suspecting or gave me new information I didn't think of, but which nonetheless substantiated my theory. As such, the whole mystery shpiel was dead to me for 75% of the movie. The best it got out of me were reactions like: "Mhm, yeah, sure, figures."

It felt essentially like watching A Cure for Wellness with the occasional flight scene sprinkled in there, except even A Cure for Wellness was actually creepy and unpredictable.

Everyone praises the movie for how well-animated and realistic the dogfighting scenes are, and while I cannot speak to their realism, I have to confess I found them extremely exciting. Reminiscent of Ghost in the Shell, Kawai Kenji-sensei composed some really beautiful soundtracks for this movie. As such, I fell in love with the film from the very first minute. It opens with an impressive dogfight while the main OST is playing in the background. Beauty incarnate!

Alas, that's when it started to go downhill for me. I kept waiting for the movie to "start" and I just waited right through to the end.

P.S.: Like pretty much all other media portraying aerial combat, aircraft machine guns are portrayed here as making a "RAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT" kind of sound. Even in movies that portray the machine guns as faster and more efficient, the best you get is still a "DU-DU-DU-DU-DU-DU" kind of sound. The point I am making is that you can always hear individual bullets in movies. That's a huge Hollywood myth. It ain't not how aircraft machine guns work. They fire thousands of bullets per minute. Even WW II planes (which is roughly where I would chronologically place Sky Crawlers based on the technology displayed, though it's a fictional timeline) could fire hundreds of bullets per minute. There is no classic machine gun "RAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT" noise like in Rambo. All you hear is a constant "ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ". That's how fast they are.

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Kusanagi, Suito

Kannami, Yuuichi

Teacher

Tokino, Naofumi

Mitsuya, Midori

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Yuri

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