I reviewed "Akira" and watched it several times in my life. In various editions, be it issued on DVD or Blu-Ray discs, which differed mainly in technical details. Exceptionally, I didn't refresh the film before writing the text, and there were several reasons for that. First of all, it would be a waste of time because I remember the title relatively well. Secondly, the time spent on screening (from 3 hours cut from the biography), and thirdly, this is not an anime that can be watched with a feeling of lightness, and for relaxation. I don't know, I can't approach production a bit more complicated than ordinary, not particularly intellectually engaging screening. And although you can accuse your iconic "Akira" (mainly it is about the hypertrophy of form over content), as well as his fandom, you can stick all those texts of "extremely ambitious production" in the ass and enjoy the cult production of Mr. Katsuhiro Otomo. And there is something to be excited about! Apart from my allegations about the short presentation of the plot (or at least that is how I understood some of the manga allegations), this is what this image praises. Great, timeless animation, line, cross-cut beautiful drawings (feel the budget, a little over a billion yen) music, interesting creation of the city-moloch of the future, after another global war. I have a lot of allegations against the Japanese, but I can certainly give them one. They are brilliant and extremely hard-working craftsmen who have instilled in the creation of the best products. Is it about the production of equipment, skillful use of raw materials (these people were able to use minerals after WWII, which were considered by the Americans to be worth nothing!) Almost 100% or some animations? The film I am discussing is one example of this. He earned nearly $ 50 million in the world and 750 million yen in his home country.
"Akira" nowadays is remembered mainly because of its incredibly smooth animation, which is getting more and more impressed with each passing year. I know various series for which the passage of time was no less kind. For example, both parts of "Ghost in the Shell", various "Macross" cinema screens, or the recently discussed "Gundam Zeta" series (by the way about the brand). At the moment I don't want to evaluate which series or movie has better animation, which is more accurate, detailed, and how complex it was in the creation process. However, at the moment of writing this text, I probably appreciate "Akira" the most. On the other hand, when it comes to assessing the film's screenplay, from year to year my opinion is less and less flattering about it.
When I was younger, I was excited about most of these titles (and from what I see, I was not a minority). Today, I treat most of this type of work with pity. For various reasons, sometimes they are unnecessarily complicated (I don't know why they are so young, maybe it is another aspect: "Wow, how much I want to be an adult ... they can do/watch what they want and what is forbidden."), cluttered with unnecessary things, which are often the display exposition itself (like most religious motifs in the anime, with particular emphasis on one of my favorites, ie "Neon Genesis Evangelion"), and by themselves are not really an added value for the production itself. However, the older I am, the less I am bothered with creations intended for teenage edgy-lords, in which elements such as dark in kids way of thinking, blood, dark colors, and an excessively complicated story are usually something standard.
When I watched Akira for the last time, and it was 5 years ago, I was bored more than I could: dialogue, character development, their creation, etc. It may sound controversial and silly (comparing cinema movies to tapeworms, sharply!), but Eiichiro Oda from OP, and Togashi from HxH did a much better job. Well, sometimes in a really short time they better presented specific characters that there is nothing to talk about creation. Maybe the manga is better in this respect, but when it comes to animated adaptation, the plot is largely an ordinary shell. You can present the same, but a lot simpler and the whole story would not lose its overtones. Anyway, smoke the tapeworms. In this place, you can put a whole bunch of different productions.
Don't get me wrong, it's not like I consider "Akira" to be exclusively for teenage, pimpy "emo-lords". Maybe I'll use this example. Someone on Tanuki.pl once wrote: "Too positive opinion about a given anime [the author meant" Gundam Zeta "and" Neon Genesis Evangelion "] can work for him in a harmful way. The title will lose under the pressure of praise, listing the advantages that sometimes they are searching for what is not in the given work. " Put yourself in the place of someone who totally does not embrace the given medium (in this case anime). The highest scores found on industry websites can sometimes be a burden. Man expects something special, a title through which he will learn something new, maybe develop somehow, appreciate a species.
But okay, hit all this criticism. Let's talk about Akira's strongest sides. We have 1988. The year when "Die Hard", "Prince in New York", "Juice of Beetle", Who Framed Roger Rabbit? "," My Neighbor Totoro "," Tomb of Świetlików "," Blood Sport " "etc. It had its premiere on June 16, 1988. Imagine how the geeks were turning up then. I missed" Akira "mania (I was born in December 1989, and at first I was interested mainly in computers and games, for the first 13, 14 years I've been talking about M&A in my life apart from what I was watching on TV or I had on VHS tapes), but I can imagine how "our" teenagers who had read Gambler's numbers must have felt (yes, I know, this magazine came out since 1993) in the gray blocks of the Polish People's Republic. I imagine watching the first "copies from copies" on VHS cassettes, the image of which was often barely visible, snowy ... I don't remember those times myself, but today I asked Dad and, well ... they were quite uncomfortable in the past watching conditions. We had games with rather primitive, unfamiliar ones only conventional graphics, and the Japanese left with such a film. Just space.
But back to the main story, the city design in "Akira" is simply wonderful. This game of lights, holograms like in the drawing "Blade Runner" or the adaptation "Ghost in the Shell", huge blocks of flats. The first sequence of the film is simply a masterpiece. Meticulous drawings, rich in various details, dynamic and extremely smooth animation of motorcycles as well as characters. Watching this production on the screen of the monitor comes to heresy. If you watch, it's only on the big TV! Dash only annoyed me with the characters, or rather, most of them. I associate them with monkeys too much. This, however, I can experience, because all the rest makes these small "deficiencies" completely insignificant. There is probably no time for something in this film to be underdeveloped from the technical side, but we have a few opportunities to take nice screenshots. If my memory is correct, Akira was shown at one of the Cannes festivals (in 1988 or 1989), but I could not find any legitimate source on the internet, and I do not want to rely on memory (I am sure 'only' in 90% and I don't want to sow unnecessary fake news). He was also appreciated by the festival jury.
As for the soundtrack, I probably belong to the smaller group who liked the music of "Akira". I find it atmospheric and suited to the action we are watching on the screen. In the initial segment, which I discussed earlier, it was perfectly adapted to the image. It is not much worse with scenes that are more or less psychedelic (and there are plenty of them in "Akira"). Dolls' Polyphony's song is quite bewitching. The final song known as "Requiem" is simply epic (I know this word is often abused, but I don't like the other term). One of my favorite anime songs altogether. I can't imagine another song in the final minutes of "Akira". Very organically blends with the end of the film and completes its overtones.
Rather, I will never come back to this creation, and if so, in a dozen or so years. And only to refresh the technical side. I watched, wrote my impressions, the film had some impact on my life and eventually went to the "cabinet" with the signature - "Watched, not tick". However, this does not change the fact that it is worth watching this image and form your own opinion.