Appurushdo (1988) Appleseed

Directed by Kazuyoshi Katayama

Although this was made in 88 the storyline follows after (for the most part) the 2004 film, it has taken parts of the original manga and has tried to make a cohesive plot that ultimately fails to deliver.

You are dumped into the story without any idea of who the characters are, what their relationship is with each other and there is scant information as regards the history of the Utopian society that is Olympus. There is also little background as to what has happened to the rest of humanity, this may seem picky but all this info and a lot more was related in the later film.

The story itself is easy to follow (at least easy if youve seen the 2004 film) but for some strange reason, they changed the Bioroids clones, into Biodroids cybernetic creations. That is an important point of the story and makes a big difference to the overall mood.

The animation is poor, there is no excuse because films like the wonderful and beautiful My Neighbour Totoro were produced the same year. It looks and feels like a rush job and even the action scenes are lacking in any sort of dynamic, also because so little info is given about the characters, you get to the point where youre not bothered whether they succeed or fail in their quest. 

As with the later film, too little time is given to plot development, the lack of background makes it even more obvious with this film, who, why, what? In the end it's more a case of who cares?

For the latter incarnation I said See it for it's visual styling (though hopefully this type of anime will never replace the hand drawn beauty of a Miyazaki film) but don't expect a deep storyline. Unfortunately I cant even say that much for this version.

Cheers Trev.

BBFC rated 15

Available on Region 2 dvd from Palm Pictures/Manga in the UK.