6.4 | / 10 |
Users | 4.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
The rebirth of the past from the ashes of the future.... A young boy named Agito enters a forbidden sanctuary where a glowing machine resides. This machine preserves a young girl named Toola, who has a mission entrusted by her from the past. Three-hundred years into the future, the Earth's environment has been ruined by the interference of mankind, and in between the 300 years, the forest has come to life and is at constant war with man. It is an unsteady peace in an unnatural time. Only by searching their souls and examining the past will Toola & Agito realize the origin of all things and unite mankind with the forest.
Starring: Ryo Katsuji, Aoi Miyazaki, Yûko Kotegawa, Masaru Hamaguchi, Ken'ichi EndôForeign | 100% |
Anime | 99% |
Sci-Fi | 32% |
Romance | 13% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: Dolby TrueHD 5.1
Japanese: Dolby TrueHD 5.1
English
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (locked)
Movie | 3.0 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 3.0 | |
Extras | 2.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
One aspect of anime that’s always fascinated me (and drawn me in as a fan over the years), is the incorporation of moral undertones in the plot of serious-themed productions. If you’re familiar with Grave of the Fireflies, or the films of Hayao Miyazaki, you’ll easily understand what I’m talking about. In recent years, we’ve seen an increased use of moral themes in animated productions from Pixar and other Hollywood studios, but you still have to give credit to anime for paving the way and demonstrating it’s possible to entertain and educate at the same time.
Origin: Spirits of the Past draws a great deal of influence from environmental issues plaguing our current society and attempts to incorporate those themes in a thought-provoking way. Making his directing debut, Keiichi Sugiyama shows an incredible spark of potential, but the screenplay by newcomers Naoko Kakimoto and Nana Shiina doesn’t formulate a cohesive story, resulting in a collection of major plot blunders along the way. I’d assume this is partially a result of editing the original story by Umanosuke Lida into a bit-sized film, but as we all know, even the largest novel can result in a fantastic film if the screenplay is well-done (Lord of the Rings is a perfect example).
Toola contemplates the new environment that surrounds her.
Presented in 1080p utilizing the AVC codec (at an average bitrate of 27Mbps), Origin: Spirits of the Past is a film tailormade for high-definition viewing. During the initial half hour of the film's runtime, I was entranced with the clarity of the visuals, and the precision in every aspect of the animation. Adding to the visuals, the color spectrum contained bold hues throughout every environment on display, with the highlight being the crystal blue water of the reservoir. Adding to the depth of the picture, black levels are inky deep, and contrast never exhibited a problem with handling differentiation between the dark and light portions of the picture. The only real problems I noticed during the film (which may seem a bit nitpicky), were a noticeable softening of detail during a train sequence around the 43 minute mark, and one instance of banding within a large plume of black smoke at the 44:36 mark. Oddly, detail took a slight hit through the second half of the film, but it's not very noticeable and likely won't bother many viewers.
Overall, this is a wonderful visual treat, and I have no trouble recommending you ditch your prior DVD version for this beautiful 1080p edition.
There are two audio offerings on the disc, with a primary Dolby TrueHD 5.1 mix dubbed in English, and a secondary Dolby TrueHD 5.1 mix in the native language of Japanese. Here's where things get a little dicey, since there was clearly more emphasis placed on the quality of the English dub. As I've stated before, I prefer to watch any foreign films in their native language (with subtitles), so I immediately switched to the Japanese track as the film began. The opening song was playing at that point in time, and there was an immediately identifiable difference in the quality of the two tracks. I switched back and forth on multiple occasions trying to pinpoint the problem, before arriving at a conclusion that the dialogue in the Japanese track was similar in volume and quality to the English track, but there is an extreme softening of the musical score and sound effects. After doing some tinkering around with volume levels and still not arriving at an audio experience I felt satisfied with, I noticed that the sampling bitrate of the two tracks showed a wide disparity. The English track averaged 3.5Mbps, while the Japanese track averaged 1Mbps during the same sequence. I did some further testing at other points in the film, and it became clear that although both tracks are TrueHD 5.1 at 48Khz, there is a big difference in quality and bitrate.
The English track is incredible, with a wonderful level of detail and excellent spatial separation within the sound field. There's a great deal of action that takes place throughout the film and everything is handled with the utmost care. The volume balance between the dialogue, music, and sound effects never waivered and each element was afforded appropriate focus given the demands of each sequence. As stated above, the Japanese track is a big letdown. In fact, I eventually switched to the English track for the remainder of the film, since I felt I was missing a large chunk of the overall entertainment experience. Fortunately, the voice-acting on the dub is some of the best I've heard in an anime feature, so it didn't bother me all that much. Bottom line, if you absolutely must watch anime in the native language, you're going to be disappointed with this release. For everyone else, the English track is highly competent, with a level of quality that almost approaches reference levels. I'm scoring the Japanese track a 1 out of 5 and the English track a 4.5 out of 5 (which explains the overall score of 3).
The Making of Origin (480p, Dolby Digital 2.0, 51:38 min): This lengthy supplement consists mainly of interviews with the main players in the film's completion. A wide range of topics are covered, from the film's themes, production schedule, scope, and animation process. I may have found the supplement a little more interesting if I'd enjoyed the film to a greater extent, but I can still appreciate the seven year effort that went into its completion. Of note, this supplement is presented in Japanese with English subtitles.
Screening Event Special Preview (480p, Dolby Digital 2.0, 3:57 min): Containing clips from the film, and brief interviews with the two main Japanese voice actors, this was likely intended to give the audience a taste of what to expect from the film.
Rounding out the extras, we have standard definition trailers and television spots for this film as well as other releases from Funimation and textless versions of the opening and closing songs performed by KOKIA.
While I can't recommend Origin: Spirits of the Past as an anime masterpiece, it still has enough entertainment value to warrant one or two viewings. The animation quality is worth the price of admission alone, and aside from the disappointing lack of a proficient Japanese audio track, the overall technical presentation is impressive. If you have a completist outlook on your high-definition anime collection, you probably already know this will be an easy purchase. For anyone else, I'd recommend a rental first, since you'll need to determine if you can get past the marginal elements in the plot.
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