Director: Kazuki Akane
Screenplay: Kazuki Akane and Ryota Yamaguchi
Voice Cast: Maaya Sakamoto as Hitomi Kanzaki; Tomokazu Seki as Van of Adom; Jouji Nakata as Dune / Folken; Aki Takeda as Millerna; Chafurin as Mole Man; Ikue Ōtani as Merle; Jūrōta Kosugi as Dryden; Mayumi Iizuka as Sora; Minami Takayama as Dilandau; Shinichiro Miki as Allen
Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles
I admit I hesitated watching this, a theatrical reinterpretation of a 1996 television series that I am a huge admirer of. The Sunrise produced television series, spearheaded by Shōji Kawamori, was a fantasy series, proto-isekai, where a young teen girl named Hitomi is whisked off to a realm where there are giant robots but the world is entirely high Western fantasy in iconography, with a huge emphasis on romance as much as drama. It is held with high regard to the modern day, with note to the fact that, whilst gendered audiences are an absurd thing to consider, Escaflownehad a lot on its side to appeal to a female audience, which it did, as well as being an excellent show for any viewer to watch. That aspect of a gendered audience though was a huge influence for Kazuki Akane, director of the series, to take a huge leap in an opposite direction for his theatrical version1 by changing the narrative and, effectively, making it a more serious story for a more male audience as a contrast. The theatrical film is not well regarded at all, as time has passed.
Notably, this film sets a different tone in that, with the original series heavily influenced by Western aesthetics, including medieval iconography and high fantasy tropes, the world of Gaea the film is set in is instead heavily influenced by Eastern and Japanese aesthetics. It is also a beautiful film to behold, and for any comment I will make, Escaflowne the film is a feast for the eyes. Tragically, this also leaves this film in the cursed world of theatrical anime which were gorgeously put together, but divisive in content. One of the biggest changes in terms of the tone is that Hitomi, a bright optimistic figure in the series for those uninitiated to the narrative, is here a depressed teenage who even flirts with suicide, being caught by a friend with a suicide note and her shoes left by her side laying on a school building rooftop when she had changed her mind.
Even if you do not include the shadow of the television series, and view this film as its separate entity, there is a fascinating suicide and depression theme that could have been the most rewarding aspect of the film if fleshed out considerably. It is the most rewarding aspect still in the actual film as, feeling lost and wishing to isolate herself, Hitomi is not connected to a past as was the case in the series, but instead entering Gaea as a person at the point she wished to just disappear as a person. The only lore is that she is the "Wing Goddess" connected to the Escaflowne, a mythological giant robot which can either destroy Gaea or help save it, itself hinted at in this simplistic lore with connections to the depression metaphors. This is effectively a darker take on the material, even if light still thankfully brightens its edges, but that in itself would have been a fascinating new direction to take with a series which did, to its credit, have a lot of serious moments.
In this, there is still a sense of the emotion connection from the series, and even as its own separate story some can be found. Even if Van, the male protagonist, is introduced cutting off limbs without care of his enemies in bloody effect, this film is not as grim as its reputation suggested to me. Even Hitomi herself becomes the optimistic figure of the show eventually, just with some legwork. A lot of the streamlining is due to how extensive the plot and the cast were, for a twenty six episode narrative, and even if you have no idea of the series, the biggest problem is that this film has an overt sense of a film post-Star Wars and eighties high fantasy films that wished to form a plot in 90 minutes with short hand, McGuffins and simplified characterisation, cinema which can entertain from any country but can also be very reductive and unoriginal. I can bang on about the details changed - Princess Millerna has less scenes and now dresses as a warrior woman, important figures like Allen no longer of any real importance, or Van's brother is now just a villain who destroys only because he was snubbed from their throne - but that would be reductive baring the amusing touch that Mr. Mole, a comedic figure in the series, is the one character who gets upgraded to a quack fortune teller in the one progression in roles. Honestly, the real issue is condensing the premise of an epic into ninety minutes and being very conventional, borrowing from other sources.
That characters like Van and his brother Folken suddenly have mental force powers, borrowed from Star Wars and anime's flirting with psychics in the eighties, exemplified this. The original series, whilst unbelievably eccentric, was unpredictable with more time to flesh out its cast and leaning heavily on esoteric mysticism, both in Folken being the henchman for a villain never included here and altering fate being a huge narrative (and moral) drama, even managing to make the mythical city of Atlantis a huge plot point. Some details here are interesting especially in contest to the series - the beast people of the world get prominence here, and in mind to the dangers of piloting the Escaflowne originally, as it connects to a person's spirit, this brings in body horror of literally bleeding the pilot into the machine itself to run it. The suicide and depression metaphors, finding hope and purpose, including Van as a king with no land to rule and Hitomi gaining a bond to him, would have worked. But the Achilles' Heel is that this is an oversimplified and bland take undercut as much by its length as it is by the story changes.
This is more miserable as the visuals offer moments of pure beauty. The white wings characters produce from their backs, feathers falling in the air. Hitomi's entrance to Gaea, of a sports stadium in twilight, and suddenly water rising up to her knees as she enters an alien world. The fantasy world itself, of lush natural landscape of green foliage and animals in the wild. The music as well by Yoko Kanno, with Hajime Mizoguchiand Inon Zur, even having to challenge her work against the series is special to consider too in its ethereal and even quieter tone. There will be moments which I will not forget from this film, enough for it to eventually gain a fondness to the feature, but there will be the unfortunate emotion lingering of how it made many mistakes still.
Even without the emotional connection to the series, this has issues, and even in the world of theatrical anime which look beautiful and yet have huge plotting issues, it has a lot which is too predictable to fully embrace as I have found in other titles. I think of Rintaro's X (1996), which must have frustrated fans of CLAMP's unfinished manga, trying to cram a narrative including its own ending into just ninety minutes, yet I still see a gothic dark piece of incredible beauty I admit the flaws of but also adore. Escaflowne the Movie could end up in the same place for me, but knowing as well the original series was also weirder as much as more emotional - blood transfusions which provide luck based powers for example - Escaflowne the film also has the issue that the creators decided to take less risks in places as much as do so in others. As a result, it turned into a bad idea.
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1) Taken a 2002 Bandai interview him for the US R1 DVD, referred in an Anime UK News review HERE: "I wanted the Escaflowne television series to be supported by female fans. And it happened. But it turned out to be too popular among girls (80% of the fans are female in Mr. Akane’s opinion). In addition, there were certain elements that were not allowed on TV – I wanted to show a battle of life and death. To emphasize life, namely sword battles – that automatically requires there to be more graphic visuals – blood, swordplay etc.. These elements led the theatrical version to be different."
