February 23, 2004
An evolution in Sci-Fi
For a long time it's been pretty much a given that the flashy science fiction film was pretty much the sole province of Hollywood - after all, who else had the immense amounts of cash available that you needed to make one of these monster spectacles? Sure, some were filmed in other countries, but all the money and the bulk of the talent originated in the good ol' U S of A. Not any more. Check out the trailers for these two upcoming films:
Casshern is a Japanese live action adaptation of an old anime and it looks staggering in a classic Alex Proyas sort of way. The production design on this stands with some of the very best stuff I've EVER seen on screen and between the mechas in this and the giant robots in Sky Captain I'm starting to get very excited about just how good the live action adaptation of Neon Genesis Evangelion (arguably the greatest anime series ever produced) could be. All the links on the film's main page are clearly labelled in English, so the trailer isn't at all hard to find.
The French film Immortel's fusion of science fiction with Egyptian gods brings Stargate to mind but this one looks to put Emmerich et al to shame with it's incredible visual style. Sure, the dialog is a bit stilted in the way it pretty much always is when non-English speakers direct in English, but there are an awful lot of pretty pictures to look at ... links to two different trailers are at the bottom of the main page in in both 'Standard' and 'Fullscreen' modes.
Posted by John Campea at February 23, 2004 04:00 PM
Comments
Posted by: Day-vuhl at February 24, 2004 12:12 AM
Sweet merciful crap!!!
That's about it really. I also have nothing really profound to say about the Casshern trailer other than that.
Go! GO NOW!!!
Posted by: KungFuGuy at February 24, 2004 09:25 AM
Ummm... wow! That's stunning!
Posted by: John Campea at February 24, 2004 09:55 AM
I'm going to france in the first week of april - that means I get to see immortel - yeah for me. Dear dave- can I be the "woman" your website needs
Posted by: nikki bangs at February 26, 2004 09:38 AM
meep^^. I see no dates for the USA for Casshern (even with my ability to read small amounts of Japanese) but it looks incredible!
this combined with Appleseed/Ghost in the Box made my day!
~eebil Mistress K
Posted by: Kestra at February 27, 2004 02:13 AM
Yeah, I don't think that Casshern is getting a US release ... gonna have to wait for the DVD to come out. Pretty sure Ghost in the Shell will get at least a limited run, though ...
Posted by: bubba at February 27, 2004 07:59 AM
wow this is a very stunning movie...just the pics will stop you dead in your tracks.....and the trailer...wow, you should put finaly fantasy advent children on your site thats looking to be a good flik 2
Posted by: BranDeeno at February 27, 2004 05:34 PM
i searched on msn under Casshern.. and found this site. and eee! now im very very excited about the movie. i found the trailer through a friend. he didn't find it near as awesome as i did. haha. thanks.
Posted by: morgan at March 4, 2004 03:15 PM
Does any of you know any other movies resembling "Stargate", "The 5th Element: or "Immortel"? I really like thse movies, but they are so rare. Please let me know if you know about some more from this category. Thanx a lot!!!
Posted by: Nox at September 30, 2004 04:53 AM
Casshern left me wishing for more eyes. One 15 minute stretch of battle (first one-on-one, then one-on-one thousand) surpassed EVERY CG/Studio blended fight sequence I've ever seen. Alas, this "climax" came midway through the movie, so while the visuals more than validate the film, you're left with a (very "Japanese") storyline in slow decline. (I ordered a region-free DVD from Hong Kong -- no US release or sales to speak of). Love the site.
Posted by: tokyocrunch at February 18, 2005 12:12 PM
I'll just throw in my two cents and say you really should be watching the CASSHERN trailer by now if you haven't already.