A short post on a short, years after its release!Before getting his other big spotlight by animating the entire OP of Samurai Champloo by himself (along with Mamoru Hosoda directing that), Koike was allowed to work on this massive project even when nobody outside of JP animation enthusiasts knew who he was. Koike had worked closely with Kawajiri on Kawajiri's previous movies with Madhouse, so with that in mind it's not surprising that someone of Kawajiri's stature would help out on the script of this short. In contrast to Kawajiri's methodical way of pacing fights and movement, Koike is definitely one who's more in-tune with the razzle-dazzle aspect that can be expressed through animation. I find this piece to be a real spectacle and it's easily one of my favorite anime shorts. Running in slow-mo is an easy to build up tension, but it takes a special kind of vision to express it like Koike does. The muscles expanding and contracting all across the runner's body, the exaggerated expressions and the scenes in-between do a good job of building up the drama, even if it isn't exactly revolutionary. Definitely an underappreciated gem. Though, so is The Animatrix in general when it comes to anime fans' opinion about it, I guess.
Koike is also the director for the upcoming Redline movie, but it's been hit with production delays, so who knows when it actually will come out. On the other hand, you can check out a list of his filmography here (NOTE: it's actually kinda outdated, but it's a good starting point).
World Record Credits:
Director/Animation Director: Takeshi Koike
Script: Yoshiaki Kawajiri
Key Animation: Norimitsu Suzuki, Masahiro Emoto, Kunio Takahide, Takeshi Koike
And here's the mandatory MAD for Koike:
2 comments:
Given that I saw Redline in London last week, I wonder if the problem is now finding a distributor?
I got the impression that Manga Entertainment are hopeful of releasing it in the UK (they were the ones showing it at the event I went to), but I wonder if Madhouse are finding it difficult to find a distributor elsewhere.
I wouldn't be surprised if they are having trouble finding a distributor in the US. Seemingly everybody else has gotten Mind Game, the Eva Rebuild movies, Genius Party, etc., before we have and this might go down the same path. Though, we're still waiting on Mind Game and Genius Party.
I'm pretty sure the expectations of how much US companies should pay to get these movies are well above what companies in other countries pay. I don't blame the Japanese companies for wanting to get the most out of their product, but it definitely sucks for the consumer since we can't get these titles available in our country and there aren't that many companies who can actually release these type of movies in the first place.
At this point, I can definitely see Sony distributing it since they've handled some of Madhouse's works before. Perhaps they could package it together with Kon's new movie.
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