The movie begins with that famous opening scene where the cyberpunk is presented visually in its purest state, years after the trend had already begun in earlier Japanese films such as BURST CITY, and DEATH POWDER, but it took until 1988 to perfect it and complete it into its final transformation and most solid state. It is presented in Neo Tokyo in 2019 after a first bomb. The night sky is black and the teenage biker gangs, the Capsules and the Clowns, are out, as if the Government has lent over the keys to the city at these hours and the streets belong to them. The film takes a chance to scan and admire the city, and bustling futuristic advancement with 3 dimensional holographic billboards and neon signs atop business, and tall skyscrapers and neon lighting everywhere. The kids chase each other over nothing too rational, or at least we get no reason other than that they are rival street gangs... probably territory. The music score is as iconic as the score in PATTON during Patton's speech, or in THE GODFATHER at the dinner table, or PSYCHO, RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARC, JAWS or STAR WARS. They bust members of the opposing gangs off of their bikes into restaurant glass windows and beat each other from their rides with lead pipes and run over arms and bodies, and the Capsules seem to have a closer kinship and concern and sense of 'family,' than the clowns who attribute their gangsters to just a number.
Tetsuo when we first meet him makes it obvious that he has an adamant desire to prove himself, admiring his friend Kaneda's bike, custom made and unable to drive than any other that Kaneda himself. "I could drive it," says Tetsuo. During the ride, Tetsuo runs into an elderly looking kid who has escaped from a man earlier in the film trying to help him escape, but a governmental authority shot the guardian dead, and the boy ran off. Now faced with Tetsuo almost running into him, he uses some force to push him away, and his friends quickly show up. The authorities show up as well, and they bring each boy in, but Tetsuo under separate circumstances. The other boys are put into an alternative school, but Tetsuo is experimented on, and only regroups after escaping from the hospital, noticing a difference in his mental state, and the film so effectively paints this psychological alternation without overdoing it, making it believable. He envisions his guts spilling out from beneath his stomach, and we see it, and afterwards, the camera pans from a point of view of everybody else, seeing nothing but Tetsuo putting his invisible guts back into his belly. We know it is from their viewpoint, but it does not tell us. It is very well done. The authorities come and take him back.
Kaneda begins to involve himself with Kei, a girl he met earlier in the film, and within the movie, her involvement can be a bit puzzling. It really takes the manga to completely understand her role in the plot and story. Within the sole spectrum of the film, she is best used by the elderly children to explain Akira and Tetsuo, stating also that the universe has many particles of energy compressed, old, and stored. Tetsuo is like giving an ameba an abundance of power, consuming all around it. The elderly children speak through Kei and explain this to Kaneda. Tetsuo enjoys a newfound power he receives, and escapes the hospital he's held in and wrecks havoc after a fantastically animated scene in which he halucinates and sees the childhood toys around him, a bit demonic, but never stated that way. The genius is that it is so subtly implied. He kills those that stand in his way, including an old member of his gang and the bartender and drug dealer at their old hangout. Kaneda is warned and goes to approach Tetsuo, who finally feels as if he's on top, or above. He isn't below Kaneda anymore. Kaneda always saved him. He had the cool bike and was the ladies man. Tetsuo battles Kaneda and mocks him, asking him if he feels frustrated. The military is also in full swing, shooting from space at Tetsuo with satellites, as his power is far more expanse than anything before ever. It is a massive scene, and he is scene as a 'god' with followers, but his empathy is dead and he is past the point of controlling himself, not caring whether they die or not, killing them. He even travels into space to destroy the satellites that attack him. It doesn't look overdone and silly either, or outrageous and unbelievable. Sure, there are no explosions in space because a flame cannot ignite without oxygen, but we are able to gloss over this fact as sounds leaves the scene. Otomo included this detail, and it sort of cancels out the fictive element. It even expands more, the scene that is. Tetsuo literally expands and his control goes beyond his grasp. The elderly kids use Akira to kill him, sort of. He's brought into an area out of reality and condensed, like the particles storing energy. The film ends on a hopeful note. If you wish to know the style of anime, think GHOST IN THE SHELL.
