Jin-Rou

Well animated and there is a good story (albeit a complex one) at the heart of it but it's so slow and the characters seem so unemotional it's hard to care about what's happening on the screen by the time it reaches its fascinating if rather depressing climax. There is a good film in here somewhere but it's just presented in such a dull and uninvolving way that it seems like a wasted opportunity.

I WILL NOT ABRIDGE THE STORY IN ANY WAY, BEING THIS A (SHORT) REVIEW FOR THE ONES WHO HAVE ALSO SEEN THE MOVIE.

"Jin-Roh, The Wolf Brigade" is an old movie, and its characters' drawing style and primitive animation won't surprise anyone, but neither is that, nor the competent soundtrack, the reason why I'm truly unsatisfied.

Then, why did I score it with a 5?

Well, the movie starts with a brief explanation of the stories' context that does not impress, and I felt bored since the beggining, but then became progressivly attached to my computer screen as the first 45 minutes roled... The recorrent memories ... of the terorist girl, Fuse's relation with a woman that says she's the suicide-bomber's sister, the military dialogues and street riots: everything pointed Jin-Roh as a movie that should enter to the Hall Of Fame of japanese animation.

However, Jin-Roh lost itself and became one of the biggest cinematographic mistakes ever made in Japan, and that happen no more, no less, than in the sudden moment where a prostituted version of Little Red Cape started to enrole the part of mantra in almost everything Fuse did in the second half of the movie.

And like if that wasn't already enough, the pseudo dramatic ending (an absolute failure of a tearjerker) only confirmed the self-destructive tendence that Jin-Roh had been pointing out since Little Red grabbed the horsereins of the movie: Fuse's "friend" dies, the picture book she had given him drowns in mud... Well SO WHAT?

These are the reasons why I scored "Jin-Roh, The Wolf Brigade" with a 5.
Now that I've unleashed the angst from 1 hour and 40 minutes of Jin-Roh, I'll see if I can get some food. I just hope my meal doesn't start tasting like garbage when my dish is still half-full.

Jin-Roh is a strange beast (no pun intended). It's like seeing an amnesiac searching for his identity being strangled and suffocating by Mamoru Oshii's ridiculously overbearing and silly script. Each of the creative minds behind the film are trying to deliver something potent and beautiful, but are constantly thrown under the bus by Oshii to the point where it seeps into each other aspect of the film and makes them decay; the creative dissonance is really felt here.

Let's start with the story and direction. The film begins with an introductory narration over screenshots of fictional news articles in the film's universe talking about some ... of the politics and chaos surrounding it before we jump into the current turbulence, but it brings up several factions that sound very similar and generic and it keeps jumping between war and economics and their respective rises and plummets, becoming kind of unfocused; by the time we get to the action, the ideologies feel kind of lost and the first skirmish feels rather weightless. As things escalate, we start to hone in on some of the key players and ideas of the film: lead Fuse and his actions in the civil war and the existential conflicts he faces. Fuse is probably the standout component of this film, but I'll divulge on him later.

Fuse meets a girl named Kei visiting the ashes of the young suicide bomber girl he encountered prior, and Kei informs him she's her older sister. Fuse, haunted by the image of the younger sister dying, wants to talk to Kei and make amends, and she holds no grudge for him since he didn't pull the trigger on her. Following this, the story just kind of goes between segments of the Special Unit's training and their dynamics along with some more affairs with Public Security and such and scenes of Fuse hanging out with Kei.

Both portions are largely uninteresting however, as the military relations provide run of the mill procedural events and very basic discussion that hardly amounts to much while Kei is largely an uninteresting enigma, cheerfully and nonchalantly talking about some of the horrific events of the riots without much significance or constantly quoting from Little Red Riding Hood while Fuse just analyzes her and occasionally offers the odd bit of input.

Things just take a rather dull, mechanical progression until some of the twists start to sprout up, but the content prior has been so emotionally muddled and barren that the twists get engulfed by all of the boredom and confusion behind the scenes that any dramatic heft they may possess is nowhere to be found. There's a big sting operation transpiring, but it's played out like any other innocuous scene like everyone was half-asleep while they were making this.

By this time we're also supposed to believe Fuse genuinely cares about Kei and is nearly showing signs of a love interest, but they have next to no chemistry and have hardly expressed more than a few emotions to each other, let alone the whole film. Nonetheless they escape and another table-turner happens, but again plays out soullessly as a big coup d'etat just kind of happens and the film heads to its conclusion which has one final, pivotal dramatic moment to close things off, but sans the actual drama and pathos, being largely alienated by its own creative composition - pining for an emotionally staggering final act, a grand ultimatum to a big existential battle and a thought-provoking open ended political upheaval but instead being a dull nip in the bud with more ham-fisted Red Riding Hood reference exposition the movie was already wrought with.

With all this said, I think Okiura had the intention of making some powerful little piece of cinema with some of its visual guidance, understated emotions and socio-economic glances, but it's more regurgitated than fresh, more inundated than nuanced and more barren and half-formed than accessible and relatable. Being based on a small metaseries by the same man in charge of the script, it felt so restrained by his presence like he was just trying to meet Oshii's demands the whole time that it feels like a manifestation of the complications behind the screen unfolding and some enslaved product as opposed to something free and organic. It seemed like Okiura just made the pacing so slow so Oshii could counter-balance everything and take the reins as director while doing the script, becoming an awkward fusion of an empty, glacial direction and an obnoxiously overstuffed allegorical script.

Honestly, while Ridley Scott and Cormack McCarthy's The Counselor was similarly messy, it had far more hidden strength to it than this. With Scott's slow, but smooth direction, steady composure, great cinematography guidance and rich production values and coordination coupled with McCarthy's layered and poetic prose made things hella awkward with its contrast, it was a spring of potential.

Here, Okiura is trying to create something akin to Patlabor 2, but it just amounts to a really strained replication with Oshii's iron grip. Occasionally nice visuals of dream-like indulgence and emotional turmoil are softened by redundancy, some indifference and a forced sensation behind them all. Constant imagery of wolves and the main two women as Red Riding Hood being eaten by them just jam into the film and is all just eye-roll-inducing.

The world-building is so far removed that the only social commentary that can be pulled from it are incredibly small and underplayed visual cues and contrasts and just comparing the look of the Japan in Jin-Roh to the Japan in real life rather than actually dissecting it. Lastly, any potential the characters (Fuse) have for depth is truncated by general malaise, half-baked focus (no double-entendre intended) and an impersonal, nearing-indifferent care to these characters which only kind of roundaboutly achieves some depth.

On that matter, let's finally dig into Fuse and maybe even the rest of these "characters". Kazuki Fuse is a rather interesting character burdened with a really tumultuous movie on and off the screen - he's a man who has found his place in life and embraces where he is, his life choices and his role in the world and nothing more. He loves his job in the Special Unit as it gives him purpose and direction, and he gets satisfaction from the clarity and straightforwardness his job provides.

He is an aggressor, he has killed people and does his job successfully, so that gives him satisfaction in being a key cog in the machine and fulfilling expectations. Otherwise, he doesn't know how to live beyond that, he doesn't really find leisure in things outside of his job, and there's nothing inherently wrong with that, he's just a satisfied man with a controversial vocation.

However, while he is totally fine with his role in life and is there of his own volition, he questions how others are brought to where they are, particularly when it seems they were forced to become a part of something dangerous against their will as we see when he encounters the suicide bomber in the form of a highschool girl. Why is this young girl, seeking to get an education and make something of her life, on the frontlines with adult revolutionaries risking their lives?

By not pulling the trigger on her and asking "Why?", he essentially allowed that girl to follow through with her plan, the one she was roped into doing and destroy any chance she had to live a more meaningful life, whereas if he had killed her himself, while she would still be caught under a banner of terrorism, she would simply be a casualty of Fuse's job caught at the wrong time which initially meant less harm to Fuse, but both results had their ups and downs even if the outcome was the same.

And so he has his doubts; the man comes out with very insignificant wounds as this girl gave her life for some ideal she wasn't a large part of and it starts to linger in his mind, so he seeks to make amends somehow. Fuse is an interesting character because of his early self-satisfaction and steadfastness, and his existential dilemma is an interesting one as the nature of his ideas of what shape an opposition can take has now changed into something more disagreeable and frightening and as a result, his job has harsher moral implications.

As he meets Kei, he feels a sense of relief knowing he is still forgiven to a degree with his inaction in response to the suicide girl. However, this is also when things start to diminish a bit; rather than a probing analysis of Fuse's ideological changes and self-doubt, the direction just has Kei cloud his mind with all these premonitions of forming a friendly relationship with someone outside the military and Special Unit.

The constant Red Riding Hood and Wolf dynamics and metaphors keep getting pushed again and again and again and just buys time repeating the same ideas instead of adding more dimension to the characters. It's a decent cautionary thing to be sure, but it replaces any other pressing, complex developments with simple messages screamed in your face trying to form this hour and 40 minute movie as one inflated Aesop fable and moral anecdote and it's quite irksome. His relationship to Kei is more a matter of circumstance and necessity for story rather than something genuine, and Kei is far more of a caricature as well, so when half of the core dynamic of the film is a floundering RRH lover and distant person, it really suffers.

The other characters have even less focus really, following the basic Oshii dogma of ideas > story > characters, here they just kind of play their part in the story while providing MORE Red Riding Hood references while the story still has a few small hints of theming unfold. Henmi stages the sting while kind of looking out for Fuse a bit, there's the Special Unit leader who runs the Wolf Brigade and is Fuse's mentor and then a few other officers and politicians who weasel in and make a few moves.

So, as previously stated, things really rest on Fuse's shoulders, and his decisions hold a little weight even while battling and holding up everything else, so there's some intent there at least, but make no mistake, this is no RuroKen: Trust and Betrayal either.

As far as the audiovisual end goes, Oshii's authority permeates into those departments as well as really high end and gritty animation, dense settings with lots of accentuation and minor little ideas to share and a superb soundtrack are diminished by the uninteresting content.

Breathtaking scenes become uninspired and heavy-handed while characters' faces feel a little spare with their rendering and come off as basic, the intricacies of the setting are brushed aside to simply be a place for the story, and the wonderfully composed music pieces are rendered obsolete, typical and there for necessity when placed against uninteresting content trying to elevate it. Truly it's a shame that these people were trying to bring their all and deliver something grand but were left hung out to dry.

As much as I tear into this film, it's still above average; while there may be general ineptitude in its delivery all around, this film still has some modicums of depth to it, heck, pulling off a sting plot is in itself better than a lot of other mediocre anime can accomplish, and the production values--even if mismatched--are exceptional and some of the scenes still look marvelous and lastly the film can probably be watched if even just for those things and an interesting semi-character study in Fuse alone. If those are enough to satisfy you, then you can give the film a shot, otherwise I could say you can skip it.

If you want a more robust political thriller that digs into its ideas more, go with Patlabor 2. Even if Oshii's practice in storytelling mostly just centers around one random philosophical idea expounded by a character in the middle of the film, it's far less grating and more thought-provoking and satisfying than this. If you want to see an avant-garde departure from his normal style and what I'd argue to be his best film, watch Angel's Egg.

If you want to see Okiura stretch his directorial limbs, A Letter to Momo is currently his only other work, and while it isn't for everyone and has its stretches of boredom, it feels far more natural and is a sweet little film.

If you want to see another more visually resplendent and powerful fusion of history, politics, romance and thrills, do watch Rurouni Kenshin: Trust and Betrayal instead. It's received overwhelming praise and attention for a reason.

Jin-Roh is a stunningly produced but forgettable and strange political thriller that is completely outmatched by various others.

I liked the beginning and end but I was honestly pretty bored for most of the middle. Idk if I just didn't get it or not but it didn't do much for me. Personally in terms of enjoyment, I'd probably give it a 5/10 but I do feel like I just didn't get it or it wasn't for me so I'll give it a 6. At least a lot of the animation, especially during the combat sequences, were nice. I honestly did not care for any of the characters much, they didn't really connect to me on a personal level. Maybe if I rewatched this, ... I would like it more but idk.

6/10

You know, Jin-Roh does a lot of things very well, and I feel like based on how many things it does well it should have ended up with a higher score than a 7, but for whatever reason this is one of those instances where the sum of its parts does not amount to something greater.

For an anime over two decades old (reviewing this in 2021), the visuals and animation both hold up remarkably well today. I was actually really into the appearance of this anime and there's a high degree of detail on display here. We see subtle cracks in surfaces, reflections of light ... and shadow, faces that actually look distinctively Japanese... It's really impressive and ahead of its time!

Likewise, the soundtrack stood out multiple times, always feeling a cut above the norm and completely scene-appropriate. The voice acting probably wasn't as good as the soundtrack but it was at least passable and still above the standards of its time.

The story itself I liked overall, but I feel the Red Riding Hood readings, though plot relevant, were really forced in there. I don't find it overly likely or believable that the female lead would opt to begin telling this story to the male lead out of the blue. I appreciated the artistic message they were going for, but I feel there was probably a more subtle/less forced way to get there.

I appreciated the ending, which I can't really talk about without spoilers, but it's cool when a creator doesn't always take the cheap and easy way out.

So, all this praise later, why a 7? It's hard to put my finger on exactly what it was. I guess, for lack of a better way to phrase this, it just wasn't that entertaining. Don't get me wrong- I wasn't ever BORED- but I wasn't ever super compelled or engaged either. I thought most of the movie, even though I did genuinely like the story, was a lot of talking and lacking in moments that wowed me and commanded my attention. I appreciated what I was watching, but I wasn't ever captivated by it. I'd give the creator a pat on the back and a hand shake and tell him genuinely I think he did a good job, but I don't see this anime standing out to me in the future when I look back and think of my mental greatest or most interesting anything lists.

As a whole, I liked it and it was worth my time to watch and I'd say it's probably worth yours too, but I don't think it's anything more than that.

OBJECTIVE RATING- 7.5
PERSONAL ENJOYMENT RATING- 6.5-7

The world is on lockdown and you can’t leave the house so, what better way to spend that time than watching anime! I decided to switch things up and go back and watch older anime so that I could find any hidden gems. While browsing through the app RetroCrush, the first anime that caught my eye was an Original Video Animation (OVA) called Iria: Zeriam The Animation (1994) which was made to be a prequel for the live-action movie Zeriam (1991). The show is a short watch as it’s only six episodes but, is it worth your time to watch during this quarantine?

The narrative ... is a simple premise of a bounty hunter chasing a supposedly “indestructible” monster. It’s nice that the show had a simple premise because of the limited run time which made sure that every episode had impact and purpose. The world-building was it’s the strongest point and made the show interesting; they dropped hints of how the world operates through dialogue and visual clues that weren’t emphasized. Also, the first few episodes of the show did a good job of pacing and not trying to overload the viewer with a bunch of exposition.

Unfortunately, during the last half of the series the limited run time worked against it because it felt like the show wanted to reveal more of itself to the viewers but it had to quickly wrap up for the finale. So you can probably predict that there may have been some things that viewers would’ve liked to see or questions that they might’ve had that will never get answered because there were too few episodes.

Visually, the show was gorgeous and really stands up to the test of time. The colors in the show were vibrant and helped bring the world to life. The character designs were very original and felt very unique to this show. The suits had Batman-like compartments that characters could pull little gadgets, while that is a little ex Machina, it still was an interesting thing to see. Also, the gadgets looked great with having a less traditional look to them but were used in the manner they were designed to do so it didn’t take away from the show in any way.
Additionally, the backdrops in the show were really great. The show teases you with the wonders of what else could be out there to see in this universe.
The version of Iria that I watched was dubbed and with this show being made in a time where anime was very niche, it’s to be expected that the voice acting quality would not be to par to today’s standards. With that knowledge, the voice acting was still subpar. Almost, everyone in the show sounded like emotionless robots. That really took away from the show making you wish the characters would hurry up and shut up. The music in certain parts also failed because they tried to really hone in on the Sci-Fi elements by making experimental music that would really fit into the genre. The end result was that music was so different that it failed to draw on emotions in order to enhance a scene.

Iria herself wasn’t the most interesting character you will find in anime but that still makes for an enjoyable watch. She is your stereotypical good guy that believes in treating all humans as humans. The rest of the supporting cast wasn’t really that memorable, to be honest, but that is another fault of having a limited run time where you can’t flesh out every character. Now, the character of Zeiram wasn’t anything unique just like it’s protagonist counterpart. Zeiram is presented as an indestructible killing machine...that likes to kill. That’s it and that’s honestly all the show needed from it.

Overall, the show was an enjoyable experience and it left wanting more. I felt the universe of Iria was really original and had a lot to offer if it was given a chance to be a full 12+ episode season. As it stands, I wouldn’t rewatch but I would recommend it to those that haven’t seen it. There aren’t that many episodes and during these crazy Covid-19 times we have nothing but time, so I implore everyone to give it a watch.

Story: 7/10
Art: 9/10
Sound: 5/10
Character: 6/10
Enjoyment: 7/10
Overall: 6/10

I suggest not reading reviews before watching a story as it can ruin the element of surprise. I gave this a 10. What I will say is that it's an old animation that some people won't find that emotional due to it's 2000s storytelling style. Nowadays modern anime focus on flashy and "cool" animations without uniqueness and substance. Jin-Rou is a good example of a movie with unique substance. It's a rather straightforward and short movie that can leave a lot desired like Princess Mononoke. Keep an open mind that these movies are old and are what shaped similar animations, tropes and stories today. Whether ... it is left open for interpretation or not, that's what a story should do, to get the audience thinking and craving for what happens next. Some writers have different reasons to create their story, every person who watches this movie will not have the same level of understanding with historical events. For people who enjoys history, and a little of romance, you may or may not like it. Personally, I recommend watching this.

I have to agree with ZephSilver's review. The movie is indeed hyper-realistic for a show made in the year 2000, great animation for it's time. With other great semi-realistic titles/shows such as Rurouni Kenshin, Appleseed, Ghost in the Shell, and Akira (Some are 90s others 2000s), you will find this worth watching. It deserved the win for best movie of it's time. Jin-Rou is a realistic show with realistic characters that takes place in an alternative WW2 era in Japan. The theme of this movie is easy to figure out. There are some fade to black scenes-- without revealing the importance of said location or plot point which is classic narration technique. A lot of authors have their own way not revealing said information that is important for later (foreshadowing).

Most critics rate by how they feel about a movie or show than objectively. The ending is also left open ended for the audience. It gives off this dystopian feel as you don't really get to see most of the character's past lives that shaped them the way they are today. Not needed, since everyone in the story had all struggled from war. Love or duty. What it means to be human. What is sacrificed in the end. No one lives forever. Trust or lie. Man, beast or wolf. The prey or a predator. All lives are equal in that sense.