Tekkon Kinkreet

Tekkon Kinkreet

This Anime motion picture was amazing, if not a little too abstract for my taste. Directed by an American named Michael Arias, this Japanese animated feature has some amazing landscape shots and with beautifully incorporated CGI effects. The mixture of the 3-D and 2-D styles are seamlessly weaved into this color film.

Based on the manga series Black and White, this story was sometimes difficult to follow, because it tried to force the watcher to figure out what was real and what was in their imaginations. However, we get the feel of the fictional city of Treasure City through the eyes of the corrupt, if sometimes likable, characters. The story merges Mob based reality with alien bounty hunters in this very strange story.

The basic theme of the story is about the way the Asian culture views the dark and light aspects of our souls. There is the notion that both Black and White need each other to survive. That they each keep each other in check, so there must always be a balance between the two. This is seen through the orphan characters Black and White.

Now, the character designs will take a few minutes to get use to, because they are very un-Japanese like. However, I liked it, especially compared to some of the more extreme facial expressions some anime designs have today. No one is completely over the top, and most of them are serious nearly all of the time, except for White.

The American voice acting is simply wonderful to hear. If you liked the English voice acting in Spirited Away, you’ll enjoy it here. So, take that you snob fanboys that only listen to it the Japanese voices.

This movie isn’t for everyone, but at least take a chance with this movie. You might be surprised how much you may enjoy it.

Grade: B+

Why take a taxi? You can simply jump between building Batman style.