The world will be saved by steam!
Added 11/18/2009
Katsuhiro Otomo decided to go from cyberpunk with Akira to steampunk in this adventurous epic. The movie had the mild cost of over 25 million dollars, and was in production for well over a decade. Even though it didn't really make the kind of impact that Otomo's previous works did, it is still a compelling film.
Set in the 1860s, Ray Steam(yes, his last name is Steam!)is the prodigal son of the steamologist, Edward. Edward and his genius father Lloyd have spent the last few years developing a highly compressed form of energy in a containment called a Steamball. Lloyd sends it to Ray for safe keeping from the conniving O'Hara Foundation, of which Edward has alligned himself with. Ray eventually gets kidnapped by the O'Hara thugs, and confront his father, along with the very bratty Scarlett O'Hara. He makes of with the Steamball, and tries to seek help from Edward's rival, Robert Stephenson(based on the actual scientist). However, Stephenson wants to use it to fight Edward and the O'Hara Foundation who have created a giant steam-powered flying fortress called the Steam Castle. The castle begins to assualt London during the Great Exhibition, which leads to some great battle sequences between the O'Hara and Stephenson forces, with steam-powered tanks, battlesuits, airplanes, and submarines. Ray uses the Steamball to create a portable rocket, and flies into the castle to stop his father, and rescue Lloyd and Scarlett. Ray gets Scarlett away before the castle eventually falls, although both Lloyd and Edward apparently surivived according to the montage during the closing credits.
Steamboy is one of the shining examples of steampunk's influence on anime, more so than some Miyazaki movies like Howl's Moving Castle. It incorporates some of the best from the genre including the outlandish 19th Century technology and the bounding spirit found in the works of Mark Twain and Jules Verne. Now, the major faults with that though are it spends too much time debating on the morals of science and what it should be used for. The time they waste showing Lloyd and Edward arguing over philosophy alone would've taken at least thirty minutes off the movie. The other problem is that it's a little longer than necessary, and seems like it seriously lost alot of its direction during the last act. It does however leave a bold mark in the annuals of animation, and worth checking out at least for some exhilirating visuals. Very recommended for fans of children's literature.
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AWEASOME, GREAT CUSTOMER SERVICE
Added 8/29/2009
Great customer service, even though I had entered the wrong address for shipping, the seller re-shipped to me once he got the movie back no questions asked.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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Great Movie!!!
Added 7/6/2009
This is a great movie. My brother read it was 10 years in the making!! It was a great great movie. I love Howl's moving castle, prinvcess mononoke and spirted away laready. I think this one might have made the collection!
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
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An Interesting Homage to Steampunk and Old-School Speculative Fiction Through Eastern Perspectives
Added 6/28/2009
"Steamboy" is a well-dubbed, well-animated movie produced by Sunrise, the studio which contributed to the animation of "Batman: the Animated Series," and directed by "Akira" (1988) creator Katsuhiro Otomo. With the reputation of the most expensive animated film in Japan, the attention to detail in regards to cultural accuracy in its storyboards as well as the animators depiction of Western characters are commendable. I watch and read many anime and manga enough to give an opinion on those artforms, but I also try to be unbiased in what I've witnessed in order to judge its worth as a film studies student and what I've tried to view as art. Many people have many opinions on what they view, and in this case regarding anime, and I hope that in order to judge something, it might be a good idea to curb enthusiasm and look at what's presented rationally.
So "Steamboy" tells the tale of Ray Steam, a boy whose the next in the line of great scientists which includes his father, Edward Steam, and his grandfather, Lloyd Steam. The setting is Victorian era England, a common motif in the Steampunk genre, where steam technology has taken to exaggerated heights as a great source of power. The central conflict to the story is what role should science take: as a source of power in order to dominate or as a source of hope in order to make a better world.
The characters that represent both sides of the conflict are Ray's father Ed Steam, and his grandfather Lloyd Steam respectively. The two men once shared the same drive in their research in steam technology, but a tragic accident in the film has changed their outlook on science to the extremes. Ray, the protagonist, represents the uncertain future of technology, given his status as a child who is at the age where he is not quite certain on what to think of the future. This role is exemplified when he was swayed by both his father and grandfather to follow their ideals, but through the course of the film he was able to form his own opinions on what his role in the future should be. Although the film has a rather bipolar stance to the issue of ethics, that being that Ray's father represents the evils of science and Lloyd Steam being the idealistic and most agreeable form of science, the director has taken care to show that although there are two groups who represent those ideals, Ed Steam's O'Hara Foundation's weapon merchants and Lloyd Steam's English Government's representatives, both sides show that they are not completely dark characters nor are there completely righteous people. One, in fact, can only say that Ray's father and grandfather are the only pure characters in their stance of science than the people they represent. The difference between those two men and the protagonist Ray is that he cares about the immediate consequences of the actions of those two men. When the conflict eventually escalates into the possibility of London's destruction, he immediately voices the problem to the two men, driving them back into reality and trying to rectify the problem at hand. Thus, Ray not only exemplifies the possible future and attitude of science, but also as the down-to-earth reality of how science affects the present.
There have been some reviews stating that the plotline is contrived and/or that the characters are flat. In some ways it's somewhat true. To me, I compare the film to the stock characters of pulp fiction. Not the movie by Tarantino, but the nickel paperback sensational fiction that haunt newstands and drugstores back in the 1920s to 1950s. Before the heyday of Jack Kirby who gave fairly well-rounded characters like the Fantastic Four and Spider-man during 1950s, fictional characters in science fiction and fantasy weren't very 3 dimensional. Charles Dickens is a great writer, and even though he created sympathetic heroes and heroines capable of change, they all start off as stock people with its designated Cad and Plucky Waif. Famed science fiction writers Jules Verne is no exception, and "1984" writer H. G. Wells created complex protagonists but that doesn't extend to the lesser characters. In "Steamboy" there are characters who fit designated roles, but sometimes there are some scenes where the characters perform outside of their given roles. Ray's grandfather may fit the Altruistic Scientist role, but he at times display lucidity and far-sightedness, but I personally think that he could be a potential altruistic terrorist. Ray's father Ed Steam also fits the trope of Mad Scientist with the typical megalomania that befits the likes of Magneto, but I also think towards the end he has his own bit of redemption. What some viewers would feel as the egregious example of flat characters is Scarlett O'Hara, the admittedly vapid daughter of the O'Hara foundation, does show some three dimensionality in some scenes regarding her. Many would find her annoying, but consider: this is the 19th century. Women are still confined in traditional values and young girls aren't yet as independent as they would be as the decades roll by. Scarlet is a spoiled Southern Belle whose wealth commands her whim to be accomplished. In a historical perspective, it would realistic. It's only through the course of the film that she grows outside of her enclosed world into someone who is beginning to be aware of how actions affect the whole of the community.
In all, this is a film that pays homage to a respectable genre just as "Batman: The Animated Series" pays homage to the timelessness of the 1950s. Although it's anime that's mainstream in the fact that the film takes place in a Western world with decidedly Western values, which is admirable feat because any other anime series or film that attempts to take place in a western setting still maintains some of the mindset of a regular Japanese, it's still a bit of a niche film in that a person who is not familiar with the Steampunk genre would feel a bit overwhelmed to not quite decide what sort of decisive opinion to give outside of whether it's entertaining or not. I think that it's a great film and I probably overanalyze these concepts a bit too much, but I do so because I really like it. Every dub has its highs and lows, but there is an overall naturalness that makes listening to it comfortable.
I do not wish to be demanding, but I feel that anyone who watches this shouldn't think that they are watching an Anime film. Although it's a rather stylized Anime, I think that the overall content is enough to be that of the traditional film made in America. Do not compare it to Miyazaki, who really extols the traditions of Japan in most of his films, or to Satoshi Kon of "Paprika" (2006) fame. This is a film that tries very hard to be true to its roots and to its setting to the point where the only things that are remotely Japanese are the people who work on this film and the character style of which this film uses.
Afterall, "Anime" came from "Animation," and really, the root of all modern Anime, that being Osamu Tezuka and his "Astroboy" series, really was a homage to Disney.
(Forgive the pretentiousness of that comment).
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Beautiful but flawed
Added 5/4/2009
The visual art of this film are unquestionably excellent, but the film just seems to keep going on and on. Set in Victorian England the suspension of disbelief has to go into overdrive. One of the characters keeps talking about zeppelins but von Zeppelin would not be experimenting for a couple of decades yet. Other elements of the plot are incongruous as well. Even this could be forgiven if the plot was more coherent. Good for a single watch.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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The world will be saved by steam!
Added 11/18/2009
Katsuhiro Otomo decided to go from cyberpunk with Akira to steampunk in this adventurous epic. The movie had the mild cost of over 25 million dollars, and was in production for well over a decade. Even though it didn't really make the kind of impact that Otomo's previous works did, it is still a compelling film.
Set in the 1860s, Ray Steam(yes, his last name is Steam!)is the prodigal son of the steamologist, Edward. Edward and his genius father Lloyd have spent the last few years developing a highly compressed form of energy in a containment called a Steamball. Lloyd sends it to Ray for safe keeping from the conniving O'Hara Foundation, of which Edward has alligned himself with. Ray eventually gets kidnapped by the O'Hara thugs, and confront his father, along with the very bratty Scarlett O'Hara. He makes of with the Steamball, and tries to seek help from Edward's rival, Robert Stephenson(based on the actual scientist). However, Stephenson wants to use it to fight Edward and the O'Hara Foundation who have created a giant steam-powered flying fortress called the Steam Castle. The castle begins to assualt London during the Great Exhibition, which leads to some great battle sequences between the O'Hara and Stephenson forces, with steam-powered tanks, battlesuits, airplanes, and submarines. Ray uses the Steamball to create a portable rocket, and flies into the castle to stop his father, and rescue Lloyd and Scarlett. Ray gets Scarlett away before the castle eventually falls, although both Lloyd and Edward apparently surivived according to the montage during the closing credits.
Steamboy is one of the shining examples of steampunk's influence on anime, more so than some Miyazaki movies like Howl's Moving Castle. It incorporates some of the best from the genre including the outlandish 19th Century technology and the bounding spirit found in the works of Mark Twain and Jules Verne. Now, the major faults with that though are it spends too much time debating on the morals of science and what it should be used for. The time they waste showing Lloyd and Edward arguing over philosophy alone would've taken at least thirty minutes off the movie. The other problem is that it's a little longer than necessary, and seems like it seriously lost alot of its direction during the last act. It does however leave a bold mark in the annuals of animation, and worth checking out at least for some exhilirating visuals. Very recommended for fans of children's literature.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
AWEASOME, GREAT CUSTOMER SERVICE
Added 8/29/2009
Great customer service, even though I had entered the wrong address for shipping, the seller re-shipped to me once he got the movie back no questions asked.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
Great Movie!!!
Added 7/6/2009
This is a great movie. My brother read it was 10 years in the making!! It was a great great movie. I love Howl's moving castle, prinvcess mononoke and spirted away laready. I think this one might have made the collection!
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
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