Flak Magazine: Review of Metropolis, 1-30-02

The eponymous city of the animated Japanese feature Metropolis bears about as much resemblance to Fritz Lang's silent film as it does to the home city of Clark Kent and Lois Lane. Osamu Tezuka, godfather of manga and the man behind anime's original stateside crossover, "Astroboy," claimed he drew inspiration for his 1949 comic not from Lang's 1927 classic, but from its poster — he had never actually seen the film. Not to worry; directed by Rintaro, scripted by Katsuhiro Otomo, and animated with grandeur by Mad House, this animated adaptation recalls enough other material to warrant a sea of copyright infringement suits. And that's a criticism as much to the film's credit as to its fault.

Count the ways: The loosely structured story centers on a technophobic revolution in the über-utopia of Metropolis, a marvel of mechanics and plastic precision (see Lang's Metropolis). In the center of this picturesque city-state (see Disney's Tomorrowland), rich big-shot Duke Red has erected the Ziggurat, a monolithic skycraper that functions as the city's nerve center, which Red aims to use as a means to world domination (see the Book of Genesis). Red is also covertly building a perfect android the likeness of his deceased daughter Tima (see A.I., which conversely co-opts anime's robotic turn of phrase, "mecha"), whom Red aims to use as a key to said domination (see Otomo's Akira). But Rock, Red's adopted but unwanted son, is a soldier with a bad case of sibling rivalry and a violent grudge against robots (see Blade Runner). Additionally, a private detective newcomer to Metropolis, Shunsaku (see Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, if Bob Hoskins' character were a 'toon), gets mixed up with things when his young nephew Kenichi disappears with Tima. Neither child realizes that Tima is robot, and this is where the story nimbly delves into sci-fi's age-old humanity vs. circuitry debate, a theme as familiar to anime (see Ghost in the Shell) as it is to A.I., Blade Runner and 2001: A Space Odyssey, among so many more.

As you might predict, darkening the story's path the most is its own convoluted script, which throws in scattered genre tropes — a P.I. in a trenchcoat, a scheming zillionaire and even a mad scientist — plus a postmodern kitchen sink. This all gets in the way of an obvious attempt at an allegory for Japan's post-World War II renewal; the film's baggy story structure saves this point for far too late — the end — after riding out too much time as a Metropolis travelogue.

When all is said and done, Tima is a man-made weapon who proves a little more destructive than bargained for — she's a veritable atom bomb. And as history keeps painfully repeating, explosions leave a mess to clean up that's larger and more horrible than simply their blast radius. In this case, it's a feeling of confusion over national identity that pervaded post-war Japan at the time Tezuka wrote his comic, made flesh-and-wire with Tima's unanswered human-or-robot crisis — her final line of "Who am I?" echoes her first learned words (2001, anyone?). Despite this upheaval, Kenichi emerges hopeful through utopian rubble (99 percent of sci-fi anime is apocalyptic), adding another humanist notch to the film's bedpost.

Though the film is derivative, the best anime usually is, spitballing liberally from American pop culture — TV's Cowboy Bebop is able proof. That parts of Metropolis are patchwork on paper does not stop its fiercely artistic originality. Its use of so many media memories is expert. From frame one, the film's comfy, mostly Dixieland jazz score sets a mood of retro-futurism that, along with Shunsaku's old-fashioned detective, evokes what Ray Bradbury likes to call "nostalgia for the future." Undeniably, Metropolis presents a much more pleasant worldview than most of its genre ancestors. You need only compare the bleak landscapes of Rintaro's own X to the bright colors and roly-poly citizens of Metropolis, the heroes of which exhibit more spirit than those seen in even the most positive of dystopia stories.

As atypical as the clarinet licks in its opening sequence, Metropolis offers an intense climax scored to a reedy Ray Charles love dirge. It leaves a very soulful resonance for a story conceived four years after Japan's most devastating attacks and arriving in theaters five months after America's.

— Tony Nigro (tony@superheronamedtony.com)