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Akira

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Q

Quick

Banned
I saw Akira for the first time when I was a kid, so I never really got to appreciate the deeper stuff embedded in it at the time. Having seen it again recently definitely made me appreciate it even more.
 
D

Decado

Member
Whelan said:
£8.99 on Amazon, babes.
Click to expand...

Region locked. Useless for those of us in N. America without a region free player. I've had bought it a long time ago, but the cheapest I've seen it is around $35 Cdn. My ceiling for individual releases is $20.
 
N

Nibel

Member
Saw it for the first time on BluRay in 2010 and was blown away. It looks incredible to this date and has such an awesome setting.
I remember watching Ghost In The Shell after it since I was hyped by those futuristic anime aesthetics.

Is there something similar to Akira?
 
S

Suairyu

Banned
When you guys say you're looking for something "similar" to Akira, what exactly do you mean? Because if you just want more of the cyberpunk aesthetic that is served by a lot of anime. Few of them have the intellectual bite behind them, though.
 
Z

Zebra

Member
Jesus, I had no idea this went out of print. $99? I feel lucky to have gotten it so long ago.

BGBW said:
How does it look in HD? I have the two disc DVD version that has both the original and remastered version already.
Click to expand...

It looks fantastic. I used this movie to show off what blu-ray could do because one could easily make out all of the fine details of the artwork.
 
D

Dragoon En Regalia

Member
ezekial45 said:
If you love the movie, then I highly, highly recommend you read the manga. While the movie is still great in its own right, the original material is much detailed and extensive.
Click to expand...

Going to vouch for manga superiority here myself. The manga was essentially better in characterization, character development, and using the various side-plots and intimate encounters all throughout the series to bring it to a fitting climax. And it helps that Katsuhiro Otomo is insanely-good at line-art and penciling.

Btw: "Disney-quality animation" is a laughable term, because the only Disney animation ever had over the animation in Lantz and WB productions was smoothness, technical feats that meant little to characterization and acting, and massive budgets that allowed for an epic scale for each production. Akira, if anything, used the stylized nature of Japanese animation in place of actual actors, both a crutch and a performance-boosting prosthetic.
 
T

TheJollyCorner

Member
also, as far as just phenomenal animation, I highly recommend The Wings of the Honneamise


imagen-the-wings-of-honneamise.jpg




sure, it's a slow burn purely based on character development, but it's a beautiful story with an extreme level of detail that (almost) rivals AKIRA. Wonderfully realized fictitious world.
 
S

Suairyu

Banned
Dragoon En Regalia said:
Btw: "Disney-quality animation" is a laughable term, because the only Disney animation ever had over the animation in Lantz and WB productions was smoothness, technical feats that meant little to characterization and acting, and massive budgets that allowed for an epic scale for each production. Akira, if anything, used the stylized nature of Japanese animation in place of actual actors, both a crutch and a performance-boosting prosthetic.
Click to expand...
I don't know whether to read this as you not understanding when people say Akira is "Disney quality" they mean in terms of framerate or if you just wanted an opportunity to criticize Disney's historic animation pedigree.
 
H

Host Samurai

Member
I loved this move even though I had no clue on what the fuck was going on. I hope one day somebody decides to make an OVA of the manga because I hear its a lot better than the butchered anime movie.
 
L

lethial

Reeeeeeee
TheJollyCorner said:
also, as far as just phenomenal animation, I highly recommend The Wings of the Honneamise


imagen-the-wings-of-honneamise.jpg




sure, it's a slow burn purely based on character development, but it's a beautiful story with an extreme level of detail that (almost) rivals AKIRA. Wonderfully realized fictitious world.
Click to expand...

Amazing animation but I found the story to be zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Mind you I saw it in like the early 90s when I was a teenager.
 
R

Risette

A Good Citizen
Suairyu said:
You're a goddamn troll yet I love you.

But you get what I mean. Anime doesn't normally have decent animation quality, even the best stuff out of places like Ghibli. It's all about the art. Akira had both the art and the framerate to go with it.
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Well, it depends on what you view as decent animation. I think the first step into attaining a better appreciation of anime is to rid yourself of the mentality that smooth and lots of frames = good and nothing else. Certainly, that is one type of good animation but it's good to diversify. Working with limited frames forces animators to convey a good sense of motion and expression with what they have to work with, which leads to some serious visual creativity. Art through adversity or something.
 
P

Parallax Scroll

Banned
TheJollyCorner said:
also, as far as just phenomenal animation, I highly recommend The Wings of the Honneamise


imagen-the-wings-of-honneamise.jpg




sure, it's a slow burn purely based on character development, but it's a beautiful story with an extreme level of detail that (almost) rivals AKIRA. Wonderfully realized fictitious world.
Click to expand...

hell yeah this movie kicks ass
 
R

Risette

A Good Citizen
Also, two things to address lots of posts within the thread:

-Listening to any audio track other than the Japanese one is Doing It Wrong. Unlike most anime, the voices in Akira were recorded prior to the animation production and characters were animated with lipsync to the JP voiceactors.

-The manga is a fucking terrible bloated mess with no sense of pacing that goes nowhere fast. It's a good series of artbooks, but a terrible manga. The movie is much better.
 
S

Suairyu

Banned
pizzaroll said:
Well, it depends on what you view as decent animation. I think the first step into attaining a better appreciation of anime is to rid yourself of the mentality that smooth and lots of frames = good and nothing else. Certainly, that is one type of good animation but it's good to diversify. Working with limited frames forces animators to convey a good sense of motion and expression with what they have to work with, which leads to some serious visual creativity. Art through adversity or something.
Click to expand...
Oh, I know. I was talking in strictly technical terms. There are fantastic animation artists working in the anime field, obviously.

... I just wish a lot more of them used a Western framerate. It's no artistic accident that an anime film with a high framerate is also still one of the best looking, nearly three decades on.
pizzaroll said:
-Listening to any audio track other than the Japanese one is Doing It Wrong. Unlike most anime, the voices in Akira were recorded prior to the animation production and characters were animated with lipsync to the JP voiceactors.
Click to expand...
Yeah, this is true. Well, almost. For years on DVD the only English subtitles available were for hard of hearing folk, so you'd get:

Tetsuo!!!!

[sound of laser firing]

Kaneeeedaaaa!
 
D

daevv

Member
As a kid I bought Akira on VHS at a yard sale from future me and loved it. I pretty much wore out the tape. Got Blade Runner, and The Lord of the Rings (animated) the same day from that dude for $10 which was half my allowance. :)
 
R

Risette

A Good Citizen
Suairyu said:
Oh, I know. I was talking in strictly technical terms. There are fantastic animation artists working in the anime field, obviously.

... I just wish a lot more of them used a Western framerate. It's no artistic accident that an anime film with a high framerate is also still one of the best looking, nearly three decades on.
Click to expand...
Why? Some animators build their entire style around a limited number of frames. Look at Mitsuo Iso.
 
A

Adamm

Member
I bought this blu-ray a while back but haven't watched it.
Judging by this thread, im assuming I should? :D
 
S

Suairyu

Banned
pizzaroll said:
Why? Some animators build their entire style around a limited number of frames. Look at Mitsuo Iso.
Click to expand...
If an animator genuinely builds his style around limited frames and does it well, sure.

But, say you could take a man and train him to be an artistic genius. You have the option of training him in limited frames or lots o' frames. In both cases, he will be a 'master' of that technique.

I would say it would be preferable that he be trained in using a lot of frames.

I'm not saying that limited frames means bad art, because it obviously doesn't. I'm just saying that if an animator can use them well, giving them a good frame 'budget' will let their art soar.
 
W

Weenerz

Banned
Ha, I bought that Akira blu-ray from Amazon like a year ago for like $20. Wouldn't sell it though, one of my most favorite movies.
 
T

TheJollyCorner

Member
I always liked how mysterious the actual character of Akira was in the anime vs. the manga.

The reveal of
his body parts in the frozen containers
was great.
 
R

Risette

A Good Citizen
I got the Blu-ray from my Frys for $30. I think they still had some (maybe one) last I went there a month or so ago.

Suairyu said:
If an animator genuinely builds his style around limited frames and does it well, sure.

But, say you could take a man and train him to be an artistic genius. You have the option of training him in limited frames or lots o' frames. In both cases, he will be a 'master' of that technique.

I would say it would be preferable that he be trained in using a lot of frames.

I'm not saying that limited frames means bad art, because it obviously doesn't. I'm just saying that if an animator can use them well, giving them a good frame 'budget' will let their art soar.
Click to expand...
I'd train him in limited frames because he would be more unique!

Also there are some styles that I don't think would work without at least a somewhat limited amount of frames, like Kanada-esque animation.

Decado said:
My ceiling for individual releases is $20.
Click to expand...
lol
 
K

Kanyon

Member
This movie is simply a classic and was one of the very first anime films I bought on VHS back in the 90s. I had first come across it in the video store and decided to watch it, out of pure curiosity and I have loved it ever since.

This and Space Adventure Cobra were pertty much my first forays into the world of anime.
 
B

Branduil

Member
It's been a while since I've seen it, so I don't know how much of the film is animated on ones, but it must be a significant portion if the film really has 160,000 cels.
 
I

Iskander

Neo Member
Like many, Akira is what got me into anime (aside from shows on TV like Robotech). Like it or hate it, it's a seminal technical achievement in anime and will likely never be equaled or surpassed.

Probably the most underrated aspect of the Blu-ray release is the sound design. The sound effects and music are unbelievable - wide dynamic range without being too loud, powerful bass without being boomy. It has the best audio of any movie I own, anime or otherwise.
 
G

GDGF

Soothsayer
bjork said:
State of the art Japanese animation.

Still love the original dub quite a bit, awesome soundtrack too.

[edit - Also, as far as cheap blu-rays go, there are bootlegs. My old boss had a big batch of Oldboy BR copies that were identical to the Tartan release.]
Click to expand...

The original Streamline dub is best in my eyes. Wish I still had my VHS.
 
S

Stencil

Member
I saw this movie at a very young age. I can't even remember when, or where (Sci-Fi (SyFy)'s Saturday Morning Anime maybe?) but it has gone on to be a formative film of what I appreciate today, 12 or so years later.

The soundtrack, as I've realized in recent years, is amazing. Exodus from the Underground is one of my all time favorite tracks, and this is coming from a record-store employee music junkie.

I began reading the manga recently too, and got stopped after the prices were just too high on places like eBay (PM me for any tips where to pick it up for cheaper -- please!!)

I'm sure I'm just repeating what everyone is saying in this thread already, but, I'm usually just a lurker and bottom line:
I cannot sing the praise of this movie enough.
 
Stahsky

Stahsky

A passionate embrace, a beautiful memory lingers.
One of the best animated films. I absolutely loved it. Time to watch it again!
 
M

maniac-kun

Member
Just got the Bluray yesterday and it was great to watch Akira again. The level of detail is insane and adds a lot to the atmospere. The ending is one of the greatest things i have ever seen in animation.
 
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