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I never know quite what to expect from a Masaaki Yuasa film. From early releases, trailers and the idiosyncratic animator's own descriptions, there's always some bit of insight into the mood or style of the film, but it's never quite enough to prepare you for the finished product. With Mind Game, Yuasa wove a life affirming tale of isolation, connection and the sheer overwhelming number of possibilities that life holds for anyone. It's funny, it's touching, and it's full of a raw, seething energy, a lust for life apparent from looking at any still from the movie, but it isn't something you really understand until you've felt it. Like in a dream, you know this place but the color and contour of the space around you are warped and disorientating. You're home, but you've never been here before.
Yuasa's latest project, Kaiba takes this uncanniness to an entirely new level--outright surrealism. Nothing at all in Kaiba is familiar. There are no rules, here. No borders. This is a world where your whole life can be pawned off for some extra scratch, where the poor must constantly ward off irritating if not deadly memory thieves, where the wealthy, the criminal and the lucky are granted any body, any experience they desire. Faces can be molded as easily as Silly Putty. Thoughts can be shared between multiple individuals. Dreams can invade upon the world and swallow the unwary and the unwise. Check your coats at the door, please; you don't know this place and you've never been here before. This isn't home. This is the Bad Alley you hoped you'd never have to cross.
Kaiba is fantastic. Just started airing in Japan not long ago, and the English fan subs have been trickling down through the tubes since. An official North American or European release looks iffy at this point. I'm not sure any of Yuasa's films have ever left their native homeland; Mind Game never quite jumped the shore, though for a time it was a film fest darling. Kemonozume is probably a little too weird, and a little too adult to find much of a US market. And Kaiba, well... How many ways can I say it? Kaiba's just frikkin' weird.
The Story so far for Inquiring Neurons:
Advances in technology have both freed and destroyed humanity. Odd medical techniques allow for the transference of consciousness (whole or specific memories) from one medium to another and the production of custom tailored bodies. The result of which is a society in which the wealthy live in perpetual paid for delusions in a city above memory-wiping clouds, and reality for the not so wealthy means having your consciousness stored in a tank while waiting for a suitable host body; should the tank's data capacity exceed a certain amount, your whole existence might be erased forever in an apocalyptic defrag. Into this scattered environment comes Kaiba/Warp, a cute little blond boy with a massive hole in his chest and no idea who he is or what's going on here. His only possession is a locket which holds the blurry photo of a woman he no longer recognizes.
The action takes off right from the start. Kaiba is discovered by a friendly but shady young man named Popo with a Very Large Gun, who is in turn discovered by a swarm of memory-devouring creatures. The brain gobblers attack, Mr. Big Gun fights them off, and Kaiba flitters off on an ostrich in a green space helmet. It doesn't take long for city officials to notice Kaiba's apparently illegal body, and the chase is on. Things get weird from there on in, but no matter how weird, shadowy or unsettling things get, Kaiba moves from moment to moment in a state of perpetual naivety, optimism and trustworthiness. He's just a sweet little guy lost in a dirty, scary place. It's his naivety and passiveness that really get him through all these weird experiences. Only someone with no memory, no identity, and no real knowledge of the world can safely traverse the Cognitive Dissonanceland that the world's become. Kaiba may not say much, but he's instantly likable if only for his simple, obvious innocence. How long can that innocence last in such a hostile world, I wonder? What strange turns does the future hold for little "Warp"? Will he find the woman in the locket? Who is Popo, and just what does he want from Kaiba? What is the relationship between Kaiba and Ms. Mystery (Neiro?)? Where is Neiro, and what does she mean to Kaiba? To Popo?
Anyone else watching?
Some found images from the series below. I haven't mentioned the particulars of the art style yet, largely for lack of adequate description, but needless to say, it's quite the gorgeous looking little film.
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