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Metropolis
by Sara Ellis  
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synopsis

Sometime in the future, in the magnificent city of Metropolis, human kind enjoys life in a virtual Utopia. The denizens of the city celebrate the completion of their greatest architectural and technological achievement, the Ziggurat, a gleaming multi-towered structure at the heart of the city. President Boone, Mayor Leon, and the creator of the Ziggurat, Duke Red make merry and wave at the crowd. However, President, Mayor and the clamoring mob are oblivious to the knowledge that the Ziggurat is actually a terrible weapon of mass destruction, devised by the diabolical Duke to conquer the world. Inside this structure rests a device that, utilizing the power of sunspots, releases an electrical wave that drives the robot laborers of the city into a dangerous frenzy. The Duke has also secretly employed the skilled hands of one Dr. Lawton, a psychotic criminal scientist on the lam, to create a crucial part of the weapon's core, a highly sophisticated robot cast in the likeness of the Duke's dead daughter Tima. Hot on Lawton's trail, though, a kindly mustachioed detective (referred to simply as hige oyaji - the old guy with facial hair) and his nephew Kenichi, aided by a robot detective, Pero, manage to trail the criminal into the poor section of the city known as Zone 1. However, when a raging fire separates them and unleashes the newly sentient Tima naked into the world, Kenichi is fated to make an impression upon Lawton's new creation.

review
The opening shot of "Metropolis", with its flurry of lights, Dixieland jazz, and a low angle shot of an enormous floating ship, emphasizes that it is the city, not the individual characters, who is the star of this film. "Metropolis" has a strange feel to it, being retro-fitted in a seamless imitation of Tezuka Osamu's classic 1949 manga. It evokes a feeling akin to coming across old textbooks or magazine articles that make eccentric, and very erroneous predictions about human progress in the future. But Tezuka succeeds in creating a heavily populated world weathered by use and upheaval.

According to the program for the film sold in the foyer, the animators had a very difficult time realizing Osamu Tezuka's trademark mob scenes. Tezuka often opens his manga with a splash page featuring a multitude of characters in action. Transplanting this into a traditional animated film would have necessitated a prohibitively thick stack of cells. But by combining analog and computer animation, the animators were able to pull off the mob scenes with panache. And although this too they describe as a hellish procedure, the seamless blend of techniques in the film divulges no hardship.

Visually, "Metropolis" is a Byzantine milestone of the sci-fi cinema (a la Ridley Scott's "Blade Runner"), which is both the film's strength and its weakness. The rococo alloy of CG and analog imagery and the mix of modern story telling with a flood of philosophical and political questions make this film difficult for any single character to embody completely. And, consequentially, the human element becomes diluted by the onslaught of expression.

However, those who bewailed the lack of ideas in Spielberg's "A.I." will be more than sated by the profusion of concepts in "Metropolis". All of the major themes regarding artificial intelligence are covered - ownership, rights, rebellion, and the relationships of parents and children - which makes wanting to be "a real boy" seem trite by comparison.

Audiences will also be surprised by the grounded political context of the film, which discusses very earthy problems such as labor disputes and poverty. "Metropolis" also tackles questions about the nature of love, and fortunately, unlike in "A.I.," the answers are far more realistic. In Spielberg's film, the simplistic dynamic demands that a boy as unlovable as Martin Swinton eventually be one-upped by his infinitely more pleasant, albeit artificial, brother. "Metropolis" displays this same truth via the jealousy of Rock, the human son of Duke Red, whose all too humanly, underachieving character keeps him from gaining his father's love. Writer Katsuhiro Otomo does a far better job at equalizing the debate between the artificial and the organic by having Rock be, not the Duke's biological son, but his adopted son.

Unfortunately, Tima shows far too little substance to make her truly sympathetic until the film's cataclysmic and wrenching climax. Even then it's puzzling why Kenichi chases after her at great danger to himself. But the distressing scene, accompanied ironically by Ray Charles "I Can't Stop Loving You," gives the film the emotional impact it sorely needs at that penultimate moment in the story. It is an ending that sneaks up on you, and, unlike "A.I.," it makes sense.



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