Back in March 2012 word was out that a new movie by Nitroplus, and almost consecutively Gen Urobuchi, was in the works, but few months ago it was actually revealed that this movie was in production ever since late 2009, that's 5 whole years in production, question is: was it worth it?
If you've come here expecting another Urobutcher hit you'll be most displeased, certainly the message present in most of his works is present here as well, it just lacks the execution to make it significant, it's but a thought in the sea of words this movie sports.
The movie doesn't hold back as it skips right to the best part – the beach scene. As if our kinpatsu heroine's shameful display of skin wasn't distraction enough some guy comes along and starts talking about personalities, memories, density and private maps? What seems like a bad pickup line straight out of a cheap hentai ends interrupted as everything freezes and the people themselves start glitching up, a black wall introduces itself as "Frontier Setter" and soon after our heroine strips all her clothes to chase after the thing in cyberspace, where she ends up cloning herself multiple times for an even bigger oppai per pixel amount, only to ultimately fail though. We end up learning her name – Angela – and shortly after she's assigned to track Frontier Setter down along with another agent called Dingo. It's location? Earth.
Seems like a lot to digest in just 6 minutes but worry not, the movie at least does a decent job of filling in the gaps as it goes.
Expelled From Paradise is set in the not-so-near future where Earth has been reduced to a wasteland and most of the people who inhabited it moved to space and were turned into raw data in an infrastructure called DEVA.
An utopia like many others, you work hard and help society? You get extra data, you don't do anything? Your data is frozen and given to other people, about the same as being killed but it sounds nicer so it's ok.
The movie's theme is nothing new if you've seen any other of Urobuchi's works – characters live in an utopia, find a bit more about it, don't really like it and end up going against it, but why would you change something that isn't broken? Ultimately that's the story behind most of Urobuchi's works, a story about characters who try to change their perfect world. Expect in Expelled From Paradise it's in a very raw and somewhat dumbed down state, world building is made more through the characters than through the world itself and most of it's message could easily be summarized in a single line, it barely attempts to make the viewer think about the topic, quickly shoving it to the side so it can move forward.
Nothing unreasonable happens either, there's no big plot twist or shocking event, leaving the main conflict in the movie to be generated by a "what did you expect to happen?" moment, the story just flows very naturally and without big surprises.
The characters are just as straightforward, Angela is actually an adult that ends up as a 16 year old because she wanted her new body to made faster so she could reach Frontier Setter first. And yes, I've seen that hentai before too.
Throughout the movie I was left wondering, multiple times, just how much of her body revert to it's 16 year old state though. Angela is portrayed as a pretty big DEVA agent but her actions, at least outside of combat, do suggest otherwise, one could argue that's thanks to having DEVA take care of her her whole life but in the end the problem is that, while her character does develop, it feels like the end result should have been the starting one.
She's also voiced by Rie Kugimiya, in other words, a tsundere.
Dingo is an easy-going guy who helps Angela in her mission and serves as a gateway for most of her development, from teaching her the dangers of the common cold to opening her eyes to what implies living in DEVA. He's basically the opposite of Angela and, throughout the movie, he ends up dragging her to his side.
If nothing else, Expelled From Paradise at least serves as an indicator of how far 3DCGI has come, an ironic one at that too as Angela got the short end of the stick as far as character designs go, you'd expect Japan to get their high school females right given how they're the backbone of the industry but Angela is one of the worst designs in the film, her hair sticks out so much and feels so out of place it never went through the funny stage, it was sad from the get-go.
One has to wonder why they'd replace her ponytail with a twintail when they turned her into a teenager, that was easily the worst decision anyone ever made in regards to this movie, not even on a personal level, it's twice the trouble and the people who handled her hair could barely handle the ponytail.
Aside from Angela everyone else looks alright, funnily enough her fellow female soldiers look amazing, these being in their adult state and with shorter hair however, who would have thought the day would come where you'd prefer a heroine with short hair instead of long? I sure didn't.
While decently looking for the most part the animation stills leaves a lot to be desired, more often than not, it feels really laggy, imagine playing a video game at half the FPS, that's basically the problem here, there are some parts in which it truly works and looks good but those are few and far inbetween.
Can't help but wonder if it has something to do with the fact that this movie has been in the making for 5 years but I don't know much about the process so no comments there, still, it's a mixed bag, some look great some look pretty bad, coincidently enough the better looking shots this movie has to offer are found more towards the end.
The fighting sequences are easily the highest point of the film but even those have their ups and downs, the mecha designs look stunning and the animation in these sequences is really good, the only problem with them would be the fact that they are simply too fast paced, it's hard to know what is going on when the camera switches angles every 3 seconds, it sure does a good job in showing just how capable 3D animation is, going from behind a mecha to the front without any quality drop, but in the end it's really hard to appreciate it most of the time.
On the other hand, the sound in Expelled From Paradise certainly doesn't require much effort to appreciate, with very experienced people behind both the sounds effect and direction, along with NARASAKI behind most of the OST, it's not too shabby at all with a wide array of, mostly, techno tracks.
The theme song "Eonian" by ELISA certainly does the rest of the audiography justice, topping the movie off very well.
Overall, an average of 7.5 – closer to 7 – is what Expelled From Paradise ends up with, not a bad movie at all but certainly not a movie for those with high expectations or for those who really want something meaningful to come out of their time investment.
Furthermore, while I personally didn't find the movie to be boring at all it does have lots and lots of talking so be aware, same could be said for the 3DCGI I suppose, it's not as bad as it sounds.
Paradise Expulsion: Was it worth it?
2014 has been a rather weak year for independent anime films and, unfortunately, it doesn't look like Expelled From Paradise is here to help.
Perhaps Urobuchi still lacked some experience back in 2009, perhaps the point wasn't to make something extremely meaningful that'd leave fans wondering just what it really meant years later, it's undeniable that it ended up being rather unimpressive though.
I'd argue it didn't even need Urobuchi to work on it at all and it certainly didn't need 5 years for the animation, but given how well received it has been in Japan I'd say it was worth the time investment on the producers' end.
If you hate Urobuchi with a passion then this will certainly be most enjoyable to discuss later down the line, for everyone else, it's a safe way to spend 100 minutes.
