Video Backlog: "Genius Party"

Publisher: Siren Visual (Australia)
Format: Region 4 DVD, PAL, Japanese and some Cantonese and pidgin Swedish Dialogue with optional English Subtitles
Length: 98 minutes
Production Date: 2007
Currently in Print (as of writing): Yes

The boom economy of the 1980’s coupled with the OVA format produced some interesting pieces of animation in Japan. Films like “Manie Manie (Neo Tokyo)” and “Robot Carnival” stared to become more prevalent. However it was a short lived trend. Hardly any alterative or experimental animation is produced in Japan. However Studio 4°C is the exception to the rule. They’ve produced a great number of experimental works, mostly shorts, which must be pretty tough for them. I can’t imagine they’ve made much money outside of contract work for other studios. “Tekkon Kinkreet” seems to be the only real hit for them, besides the mild success of “Detroit Metal City”. Harking back to the mid 1980’s, the Genius Party project (two films in total) takes a couple well known directors and a host of lesser known animators and churns out a film full of shorts. The end result is a little bit of mixed bag as you might expect.

The first film is the titular "Genius Party" by Atsuko Fukushima. There are so very few women in the industry and it’s great she’s given a chance to shine here. She is a full time staff member of Studio 4°C as I understand it. Her film is rather abstract, focusing on some sort of fantasy/alien world and the habbit of what seems to be a race of ball-like stone animals. I really liked this film. It’s what I’d expect from an omnibus film like this one. Next is Shoji Kawamori’s "Shanghai Dragon" where a snotty nosed Chinese child ends up living out his daydreams of being a Kamen Rider-esque hero when he acquires an alien piece of technology that falls from the sky. I really liked the concept that the “wand” could crate anything that you drew. However Kawamori seems intent on making almost the entire film a mindless action piece. Next up is "Deathtic 4" by Shinji Kimura. This is a surreal and a hilarious short where in an alternate universe a bunch of zombie children attempt to return a from to the land of the living. They are chased by the zombie police who are dressed all in red and ride tricycles. Totally bizarre and fun.

Yoji Fukuyama’s "Doorbell" is a “Twilight Zone” like piece where a high school student finds his life being taken over by a doppelgänger. It’s a really fun film and also quite a bit unsettling. "Limit Cycle" by Hideki Futamura is initially quite interesting, but probably goes on for too long. It is heavy on philosophical babble, but the visuals are quite nice. In the end it’s all a bit too much and I was hoping it would end sooner than later. It feels like a bit of the mess when it’s over. Masaaki Yuasa’s "Happy Machine" is much like “Kaiba” in a way. It’s almost like a pilot film a bit due to its style. Like “Kaiba”, I didn’t take to this much at all. The whole childhood coupled with the beauty and horrors of the world thing wasn't exactly subtle. The ending really left a bad taste in my mouth as well for some reason. Didn’t like this one at all. The final film is "Baby Blue" by Shinichiro Watanabe. This is probably the least experimental film of the lot. It’s about two high school students who wag school for a day, which is highly unusual for them. It’s very melancholic and perhaps a bit too sentimental, but it is a great little film. You probably could have easily made a live action piece with the script.

So overall this omnibus film is pretty damn good. There’s only one film I really didn’t like, the rest were good. It’s a real shame that so very few films or any type of anime like the ones here get made, outside of Studio 4°C. It’s mostly all fan pandering stuff or anime for kids now days. This was the first Siren disc I had bought for a number of years. I can’t believe the change in the company in that time. First of all, the video looks just as good at NTSC releases which blew my mind. The packaging is also pretty damn good (digipak with removable slip with the ratings make and synopsis), and dare I say it better than anything Madman put out. The disc also comes with a bonus disc, but I haven’t watched it yet. 7 out of 10.

Remaining Backlog: 24 months (it's much easier this way than listing the number of discs).