Metropolis, now

>> A post-war manga classic gets a modern makeover

by RUPERT BOTTENBERG

That the new Japanese anime feature Metropolis bears the same name as the classic Fritz Lang film is no coincidence. The Japanese cartoon is based on a comic book by the late Osamu Tezuka, the manga legend who created the seminal anime figures Mighty Atom (known here as Astro Boy) and Kimba the White Lion (which Disney blatantly ripped off for Lion King). Tezuka was in turn indirectly inspired by Lang’s political sci-fi masterpiece.

Tezuka created his vision of Metropolis at the end of the ’40s, establishing his penchant for Western influences that, at the time, were unusual in the manga environment. Drawing primarily on sci-fi serials and second-hand familiarity with Lang’s film (he hadn’t even seen it), he fashioned a lightweight, retro-futuristic epic heavy on rather cinematic visual tricks.
Upon graduating to animation, Tezuka would work with a young director named Rintaro, whose credits now include the aforementioned Astro Boy and Kimba, as well as the famous Captain Harlock. It’s appropriate, then, that Rintaro should helm this tribute to Tezuka. Working with Katsuhiro Otomo, the guy behind Akira, Rintaro has revamped the manga, intensifying its criticism not only of violent, fascist elitism but also of unfettered popular revolution.

The story drops a gruff private eye and his greenhorn sidekick into the thick of a multi-player power struggle in the titular city-state. While robots, human labourers and fascistic thugs scrap it out below, the creepy Duke Red sets the wheels of world domination in motion. An interesting plot, which you just might catch if you can tear your eyes off the ornate splendour of the city’s architecture and infrastructure (think Blade Runner on a sunny day).
Metropolis joins the likes of Big O and Giant Robo in a wave of nostalgic anime revisionism—recalling the days when bold geometric shapes, rather than complicated organic forms, informed anime’s aesthetics. The film is faithful to Tezuka’s simple character design style, if almost unparalleled in the vibrant complexity of the backgrounds it presents. Oh, and Akira fans will get their Otomo fix—the burst of technorganic chaos at the climax has his stamp all over it. :

Metropolis opens Friday, March 8