Directed by
Takuji Endo
Fumihiko Takayama (Bubblegum Crisis, MS Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket)

Written by
Yuuki Masami (story)
Tori Miki

Starring
Shigeru Chiba (Dominion Tank Police, Previous Patlabor 1&2, Battle Angel Alita)
Toshio Furukawa (AD Police, Patlabor 1&2, Metropolis)
Issei Futamata (Patlabor 1&2, Ronin Warriors)

Pioneer Animation

Review: by Don (e-mail your faithful reviewer)

Okay, this is technically an Anime title, not a horror film, but there was a huge man-eating monster involved, so I feel justified in reviewing it here.

The good people at Pioneer invited myself and several other Musicland employees to a private theatrical screening of this film, so we could talk about it with our customers before the DVD came out.  They gave us free stuff and popcorn and what have you.  It was neat.  I even briefly met the president of Pioneer animation.  Nice guy.  Smiled a lot.  Made you feel comfortable.

Bah.  Who cares what happened there?  Not you.  You want to know if the movie was any good.  At least, I hope you want to know if the movie was any good.  For all I know there's no one reading this thing at all.  On with the plot.

So... it seems that something is causing a lot of mechanical equipment to be destroyed.  The cops can't figure out what it is.  They are, in a word, stymied.  But they continue the investigation.  All the equipment seems to be made by the same company and terrorism is suspected.  At least it is until a video showing something with a huge fin attacking a submersible.  It is, of course, obscured in mud and not clearly seen.  That's when our hero Detective Shiba starts to figure out something seriously weird is happening. 

There follow a series of lengthy interludes of police legwork that would be almost boring if it were not for the fact that this movie is so damn pretty to look at.  Seriously good animation quality here.  But still, it does move very slow in places, but stick with it, the ending is worth the wait.  Of course we finally meet the monster face to face, and what a face it has.  A few crazed chase sequences later and the great big ugly faces off with the local military.  All in all a pretty standard Japanese Monster/Cop flick.

There are secret histories, strange behaviors, corrupt individuals, and briefly big robots.  That's one of the things I kind of liked about this Patlabor, was that it focused less on the Mobile Police mechs than previous films.  All in all it was an enjoyable experience, made all the sweeter by the fact that I didn't have to pay for any of it.  I won't get into all the reasons why it shows the cultural differences between our two countries in ways that other anime films don't, and how incredible the backgrounds looked.  It entertained me.  That's really about all I care about.

DVD Details:

None yet.  It's coming in April in two editions much like the Jin-Roh DVD did.  A regular edition and a big 3 disc monstrosity that should be fun.  Haven't a clue what's going to be on them yet.

Further Information:

Internet Movie Database