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Dreamworks Delves Into Anime
peter_gzowski writes "Dreamworks has acquired the license for the worldwide distribution of Satoshi Kon's latest picture, Millennium Actress. Satoshi Kon is best known for directing the anime classic Perfect Blue, but has also worked on Patlabor 2 and Roujin Z (the latter two from the director of Ghost in the Shell & Akira, respectively). Read about it from Yahoo! Movies or Anime News Network, whichever you prefer. I guess Dreamworks was feeling left out after Miramax (with Princess Mononoke) and Columbia Tri-Star (with Final Fantasy and Metropolis) got into the anime distribution business. Maybe Spielberg and company will fare better trying to convince North American audiences to watch serious animated films."
I've always thought that Macross Plus would make a kick-ass live action movie, or even re-released for American audiences in the movies, would make for something that they could follow.
JoeLinux
Strip Mining prevents forest fires.
Metropolis was the shit, by the way. A little slow to get started, but worth it in the end. Everybody go rent it, and be sure to watch it in Japanese.
Back to your point: I could not disagree more. Big distributors selling anime is good news. For all your ADV snobbery, I am compelled to point out that some of these small distributors are doing a half-assed job at best. A friend of mine has had to return his Slayers DVD boxed set three times now because the audio track was all fucked up.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
But then I tried to find some.
And looking at this list, I came to the realisation that... bugger... there really aren't any, at least no big films that are serious and aren't Anime... well I'll be buggered!
I like Anime... at least some of it, but sometimes I think the quality of animation in the films is over praised... I feel that the fluidity and realism in many 'western' animated features far outdoes that seen in most Anime, which always seem to skimp on frames, or animates the bare minimum that's required to get the image across.
I had a co-worker who LOVED princess Mononoke, but after watching it I was left quite underwhelmed.
Ghost in the shell was pretty good... Ninja Scroll was fun, but I'm just yet to see something that really makes me think "Wow! So that's what they've been talking about!"
Someone, please point me to the definative quality Anime so I can be proved wrong! :)
If there is one thing good about a big company like Dreamworks licensing Millenium Actress, it's the fact that it will actually get some international exposure without having to go to a local distributer or somesuch. I live in Australia, and it's particularly hard to come by anime in the stores (due to our just about single distributer) let alone the cinemas. Take for example Metropolis, the only reason why I can see it next week (albeit way later than people in the US but something is better than nothing) is because Tri-Star licensed it. Princess Mononoke was also shown here a while back, but as that got an R rating I couldn't see it at the time. I think that it's good that some of the big companies are paying attention, if only to get a little more screen time here in Australia and other countries other than America.
meanwhile ive waited too long for my password to be sent so blah
-lainster
Actually, Gaiman didn't do the translation from the Japanese - someone else did that (in the subtitles) and Gaiman just re-wrote from the translation to capture the spirit of the Japanese text.
i.e. - In the subtitles there's 'the deer god'
In Gaiman's reinterpretation of the translation used for the English voice track, it's 'The great forest spirit' - which is more the meaning of what is said rather than a literal translation.
"Information wants to be paid"
not being a big anime otaku
do any anime series in japanese have sponsors drawn in?
Dreamworks sees these niche movies that cost next to nothing to distribute and always make money in their limited runs. Sure they'll never play as big as MIB2 but they are a hell of a lot bankable.
Dreamworks also wants to break into animation so it is also about marketing. THE IRON GIANT is a very good movie...the kind of stuff Dreamworks wants to make. But as Warner Brothers found out they couldn't drag people into THE IRON GIANT because of the stigma of US Animation. You only take kids to light and bubble US Animation while THE IRON GIANT definately was something different. Anime however has a different aura around it. People expect slick visuals and complex themed stories from Anime movies. While Dreamworks can make movies like SHREK they'll never be able to market anything they make as "anime style" at the moment or it will be such a tremendious risk that no producer will back them even if Dreamworks fronts the production facilities. The next best thing to do, and by far safer, is to get the real stuff from the source.