TOONAMI ADULT SWIM
“In stories you always have a beginning, middle and an end. This includes an overall timeline and events that need emphasis with a slower tempo. The emotion of characters also has ups and downs. The emotional expression and modulation of the action scenes also have similar structure, so as to harmonize the designs and styles. Again, using the method of doing something that hasn't really been done before as well as always seeking for originality are very important.”
From the now-classic AKIRA (1988) alongside the influential and often-referenced, but barely-known cult classic MACROSS: DO YOU REMEMBER LOVE? (1984), two of the most influential films of Japan’s golden age of animation will be discussed here in this portfolio and its subsequent effects upon animation as a medium.
For the third film, the more contemporary 5 CENTIMETERS PER SECOND (2007) was selected, a down-to-earth story of two teenagers in love who drift apart due to the lack of mobile technology to convey their feelings for each other during the late 20th century. This film was chosen to showcase the very differences that Japan underwent during its “Lost Decade”, from the end of the 1980s which lasted until 2001.
With two of Japan’s most ground-breaking films of its golden age to the modern counterpart documenting Japan finding its identity; Anime by Japan remains one of the best mediums to convey stories where destruction and emotion have struck a tenuous, if not ultimate balance.
ABOUT
Since the early 1980s, Japanese animation – widely known as “Anime”; has set one of the highest standards in animation quality since the Orwellian year of 1984.
Originally content to creating disaster, or “Kaiju” (monster) movies, their deep-seated sense of spectacle and emotion derives from having been on the receiving end of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War Two, helping influence their subconscious outlook in the way they produce and consume media and entertainment for the next two decades to come.
With this influence hanging over them for years, their subsequent film output comes from this period of animation during the 1980s. A regional golden age for Japanese animation while setting a new international standard in animation, Japan’s animated films from this period that struck the mainstream made Japan the new transnational kid on the block that everyone paid attention to.
– Shoji Kawamori, Director of Macross: Do You Remember Love?