Announcement
Collapse
No announcement yet.
Harlock: Space Pirate
Collapse
X
Collapse
-
Harlock: Space Pirate
Released by: Twilight Time
Released on: January 19th, 2016.
Director: Shinji Aramaki
Cast: Yí» Aoi, Jessica Boone, Ayano Fukuda
Year: 2013
Purchase From Screen Archives
The Movie:
Directed by Shinji Aramaki, the man behind a few recent Appleseed features, 2013's Harlock: Space Pirate once again brings to life the exploits of Leiji Matusmoto's famous manga creation and this time with the largest budget ever given to one of Toei's animation productions.
As you'd expect, the story takes place in the distant future where the different human colonies that have gone out to resettle throughout the galaxy have fallen on tough times. The Homecoming War breaks out as a massive exodus back to Earth occurs, but there are too many for Earth to handle and the Gaia Communion is put into place to block the huge resettlement. This serves its purpose of protecting the planet but simultaneously leaves scores of would-be human refugees alone to die in the wilds of outer space.
Enter the titular Captain Harlock of the ship Arcadia, space pirate by trade and the commander of a formidable force of like-minded cohorts. He and his crew set about strategically placing a hundred explosive devices throughout the area in question that, when detonated, will give birth to the so-called Genesis Clock. The point? To basically hit the reset button and bring about the rebirth of the planet Earth and basically even the playing field. Of course, the powers that be in charge of the Gaia Communion don't see eye to eye with Harlock on this, and so they come up with a plan to take him out of the picture all together.
A grim space opera mixing the expected science fiction elements with some interesting politics, Harlock: Space Pirate takes some pretty clear (and deserved) pot-shots at corporate rule and at first seems to wear its socialist leanings on its sleeve. As the story evolves, however, it becomes clear not just to Harlock and his crew but to the audience as well that there is no easy solution here and that nothing is really and truly as it seems. There are betrayals aplenty and more than enough plot twists to go around and while it wraps things up quite nicely before it ends, less attentive viewers expecting a slam-bang action anime feature may find themselves a bit befuddled. Stick with it, however, because even if it's not necessarily what you might expect, the payoff to the story is a satisfying one.
If that weren't enough, there are the visuals. The amount of detail worked into every facet of the production is nothing short of amazing and the scope and depth that the animation team and the production designers have come up with for the movie is often times breathtaking. The end result is a movie where the visuals really come to life and pull you in. We get the right mix of realism and slightly exaggerated fantasy here, so that the alien beings in the film looks quirky enough to catch our attention while the human characters are grounded in just the right way so that we can accept them as just that - human characters. On top of that, the action sequences are dynamic and exciting.
Note: Twilight Time provides both the full length one-hour and fifty-five minute Japanese cut of the movie here as well as the one-hour and ffity-one minute international cut of the film.
Video/Audio/Extras:
The two different cuts of the movie are presented in two different ways on two separate discs. So on the first disc you get 2D and 3D versions of the Japanese cut of the movie, and on the second disc you get 2D and 3D versions of the international cut of the movie. Transfer quality is pretty much the same between discs, and that's fine, because the picture quality here is top notch. This is, visually speaking, a very dark movie so you don't get the same sort of 'pop' that you might out of a more colorful production but the look of the movie is in keeping with the story and it works. The animation appears fluid and detailed from start to finish and the strong bit rate keeps compression artifacts at bay. There's as much detail and texture here as the source material provides and generally speaking the visual side of the presentation here is fantastic.
DTS-HD tracks are provided in Japanese for the Japanese cut and in English for the international cut, with English subtitles provided for each version. There's nothing to complain about here at all - the 5.1 tracks sound excellent, they really open up the action scenes but even during the quieter, more dramatic moments in the film there are interesting little bits in the background that attentive viewers will pick up on. Dialogue is clean, balance is perfect and there are no traces of anything even close to any hiss or distortion. Bass response is strong as well, while the subtitles are clean, clear and easy to read.
The main extra for this release is the twenty-six minute long featurette The Making of Harlock: Space Pirate. This does a nice job of delivering the basic history of the character and his origins before then going on and exploring the technology used to bring the animated feature to life. The disc also contains just under a half an hour's worth of individual interview segments. Here we get some more succinct input from Shinji Aramaki and the writers, Harlock's original creator Leiji Matsumoto, Aramaki on his own and then writer Harutoshi Fukui. There's also thirteen minutes of footage from the movie's premiere at the Venice Film Festival, including clips from the press conference, the red carpet walk and then the ovation that the film received after it was shown.
Rounding out the extras are an isolated score (on the Japanese cut's disc) in DTS-HD 2.0, five TV spots, four separate trailers, ten distinct still galleries, static menus and chapter selection. Inside the case, alongside the two discs, is an insert booklet containing an essay on the film from Julie Kirgo and a selection of stills from the feature.
The Final Word:
Harlock: Space Pirate does occasionally get a bit too convoluted for its own good, but when it's on, it's really on. This is, with a few middling criticisms here and there, high concept space opera done right. The animation is fantastic, occasionally even stunning, and the sound design consistently impressive. Twilight Time's Blu-ray release is a good one, offering 2D and 3D versions of both cuts and a healthy smattering of interesting supplements to complement what is a genuinely impressive audio/video presentation of the feature.
Posting comments is disabled.
Categories
Collapse
article_tags
Collapse
- album review (218)
- album reviews (274)
- arrow video (271)
- blu-ray (3225)
- blu-ray review (4140)
- comic books (1392)
- comic reviews (872)
- comics (988)
- dark horse comics (484)
- dvd and blu-ray reviews a-f (1969)
- DVD And Blu-ray Reviews G-M (1711)
- DVD And Blu-ray Reviews N-S (1757)
- DVD And Blu-ray Reviews T-Z (878)
- dvd review (2512)
- idw publishing (216)
- image comics (207)
- kino lorber (385)
- movie news (260)
- review (318)
- scream factory (279)
- severin films (295)
- shout! factory (537)
- twilight time (269)
- twilight time releasing (231)
- vinegar syndrome (496)
Latest Articles
Collapse
-
Released by: Severin Films
Released on: April 30th, 2024.
Director: Lee Frost
Cast: Joseph Mascolo, Virginia Goodman, John Alderman
Year: 1969
Purchase From Amazon
Hot Spur – Movie Review:
Director Lee Frost and Producer Bob Cresse's film, Hot Spur, opens in Texas in 1869 with a scene where a pair of cowboys wanders into a bar where they call over a pretty Mexican waitress and coerce her into dancing for them. She obliges, but...-
Channel: Movies
03-22-2024, 11:53 AM -
-
Released by: Mondo Macabro
Released on: April 9th, 2024.
Director: Max Pecas
Cast: Thierry de Carbonnières, Jean-Marc Maurel, Denis Karvil, Lillemour Jonsson
Year: 1985
Purchase From Amazon
Death Squad – Movie Review:
Also known as Brigade Of Death, French sleaze auteur Max Pecas’ 1985 film, Death Squad, opens with a night time scene outside of Paris in the Bois de Boulogne Forest where cars pass by a small gang of transsexual...-
Channel: Movies
03-22-2024, 11:46 AM -
-
Released by: Quality X
Released on: February 28th, 2024.
Director: Chuck Vincent
Cast: Samantha Fox, Vernoica Hart, Kelly Nichols, Jerry Butler, Jamie Gillis
Year: 1982
Purchase From Amazon
Roommates – Movie Review:
Directed by Chuck Vincent and released in 1982, Roommates opens with a scene where a young woman named Joan Harmon (Veronica Hart) gets a hotel room with an older man named Ken (Don Peterson, credited as Phil Smith),...-
Channel: Movies
03-15-2024, 01:10 PM -
-
Released by: Blue Underground
Released on: March 26th, 2024.
Director: Jess Franco
Cast: Christopher Lee, Maria Rohm, Dennis Price
Year: 1970
Purchase From Amazon
Night Of The Blood Monster – Movie Review:
Directed by Jess Franco, The Bloody Judge (or, Night Of The Blood Monster, as it is going by on this new release from Blue Underground) isn't quite the salacious exercise in Eurotrash you might expect it to be, and while it...-
Channel: Movies
03-15-2024, 01:07 PM -
-
Released by: Vinegar Syndrome
Released on: March 26th, 2024.
Director: Saul Bass
Cast: Nigel Davenport, Michael Murphy, Lynne Frederick, Alan Gifford, Robert Henderson, Helen Horton
Year: 1974
Purchase From Amazon
Phase IV – Movie Review:
Saul Bass’ 1974 sci-fi/thriller Phase IV is an interesting blend of nature run amuck stereotypes and Natural Geographic style nature footage mixed into one delicious cocktail of suspense and...-
Channel: Movies
03-15-2024, 01:02 PM -
-
Released by: Radiance Films
Released on: March 26th, 2024.
Director: Shigehiro Ozawa, Eiichi Kudo
Cast: Tomisaburo Wakayama, Minoru Ôki, Arashi Kanjuro, Bin Amatsu, Chiezo Kataoka
Year: 1969-1972
Purchase From Amazon
The Bounty Hunter Trilogy – Movie Review:
Radiance Films gathers together the three films in Toie Studios’ Bounty Hunter Trilogy, starring the inimitable Tomisaburo Wakayama. Here’s how the three movies in this...-
Channel: Movies
03-13-2024, 11:30 AM -