Japanese Movie 2009 Evangelion 1.0 You are Not Alone
Cast And Crew
Starring: Kotono Mitsuishi, Megumi Hayashibara, Megumi Ogata,
Akira Ishida, Fumihiko Tachiki, Motomu Kiyokawa, Yuriko Yamaguchi,
Hiro Yuuki, Tetsuya Iwanaga, Tomokazu Seki
Director: Hideaki Anno, Kazuya Tsurumaki, Masayuki
Genres: action, drama, psychological, science fiction
Themes: Mecha, Military
Running Time: 95 mins.
Additional Notes: dialogue Japanese
Country Of Origin: Japan
Reviews
A reluctant young hero is called upon to pilot an immense robot in a battle against alien invaders.
When Neon Genesis Evangelion was first released in North America back in the mid-90's, I bought into the hype. And yes, there was hype for it, in anime circles, which, admittedly, were much smaller than they are today. I devoured the series as it came out, two episodes at a time, on VHS. And I liked it, a lot. I even thought the original ending was decent. Even though Studio Gainax ran out of money to finish the show, leaving the final two episodes devoid of action. Oh, and that creator Hideaki Anno seemingly embraced the lack of budget as a way to abandon the action aspect of the series to hammer home the point that the show was really always about sad-sack, damaged hero Shinji Ikari and his mental state and all the giant robot fights were just window dressing. Still, it was watchable. A few years later, I saw the follow-up films, hastily assembled in the wake of Evangelion's amazing success in Japan. Consisting of two awkward short movies recounting the high points of the tv series and the incredibly bizarre and nihlistic End of Evangelion, I hated them. The postscript films soured me on Evangelion big-time and I have never returned to the series. So I didn't exactly jump for joy when it was announced that Anno, after a decade of messing around with other people's franchises to limited success (Kare Kano, a live action Cutie Honey movie), would be returning to the Evangelion cash cow and rebooting the story yet again as a series of four feature-length films.
But circumstances lined up perfectly for me to spend a night out at Houston's Alamo Drafthouse with some anime-loving friends to watch a one-time showing of the film on the big screen. So I went. And I was impressed. Mighty impressed. Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone starts the story over, and you don't have to have any knowledge of the original series to watch this movie. Shinji Ikari, a 14-year old boy, has been summoned to Tokyo-3 by his father, but he doesn't know why. But since he hasn't seen his father in years, he jumps at the chance to re-establish a relationship with him. We don't know this right at the beginning, of course. All we know is that this kid is in the middle of a war zone and that a hot chick in a sweet car arrives at the last second to pick him up, just as the street he's on is destroyed. Turns out that the woman is Lt. Colonel Misato Katsuragi, Shinji's new boss, and that Shinji's father, Gendo, intends for him to pilot Eva-01, a giant robot that is mankind's last hope. Japan is being ravaged by monsters from outer space called Angels, and even the military's most destructive bombs have no effect on them. Only the Evas can go toe to toe with and defeat the Angels.
But Rei, the pilot of Eva-00, has been badly injured and is in no shape to fight the Angel currently destroying Tokyo-3. So Shinji is coaxed into getting into Eva-01 and attempting to fight, despite having no training whatsoever. Predictably, he does very badly, but his Eva somehow develops a mind of its own, goes berserk and destroys the Angel. The rest of the film is more concerned with showing how Shinji gets settled in to his new life, adjusting to sharing an apartment with Misato and going to school. Interestingly, everyone at school knows who Shinji is and what he does, but it makes him more of a pariah than a celebrity. Despite the fact that the Evas are the only things that stand between humanity and total destruction, it turns out that people still don't like it when huge swaths of the city are destroyed by monsters, not to mention the ancillary damage the Evas cause while fighting them. While focusing on Shinji's domestic life, though, the movie doesn't forget about the threat. There are two more desperate Angel battles in the film, including an incredible climax against a rapidly shapeshifting diamond-shaped Angel.
All along, there are hints that there is more going on here and that Gendo is keeping a lot to himself. While everybody thinks that humanity is in a fight for survival, Gendo and his associate Fuyutsuki seem to have larger concerns in mind. Which is pretty presumptuous considering the stakes, but Gendo is all haughty attitude, all the time. He doesn't seem to care about Shinji one bit except as a piece to use in his game against the Angels. And, despite the stakes, it does seem to be a game to him- at one point he mentions that he expects eight more Angel attacks before it's over. Gendo's attitude is a huge disappointment to Shinji, who doesn't get any of the attention he hopes for. To make matters worse, Gendo actually has conversations with Rei and seems to show affection for her, confusing Shinji even more.
Some things never change. Since this is essentially the same story, Shinji is just as much of a damaged sad-sack here as he was in the original. We know a lot of the reasons why he has these issues, but that knowledge doesn't really make him more appealing as a main character. Still, You Are (Not) Alone tells a focused, complete chapter of the story and makes it engaging. The comedic interludes (Misato is a slob; wacky misunderstandings involving showers, towels, and nudity) are well-placed and quite funny. The action scenes are spectacular, and this is where the animation technology of 2007 vs. 1995 really shines. The Angels and Evas look great, particularly Ramiel, the final diamond Angel. Anno also does a great job doling out morsels of a bigger picture, letting us know that Gendo and his UN contacts have a lot more on their minds that simple survival. Another interesting aspect of the update is what elements Anno has chosen to leave alone. Shinji, in his scenes away from the Eva, is forever using earbuds, constantly listening to his SDAT cassette player. When his classmates leave him a good luck message, they find a phone terminal. There are no cell phones in this world and no iPods, giving the movie a peculiar sort of just-barely-retro sci-fi setting. I never thought I would get sucked back into Evangelion, but Anno has managed it. I'm officially on board for the next three films, and hopefully this time he'll come up with an ending I actually like. 4/5
After the second impact, all that remains of Japan is Tokyo-3, a city that’s being attacked by giant creatures that seek to eradicate the human kind, called Angels. Last hope for survival rests with a government agency and its gigantic Evangelion fighting artillery, a human-mechanical hybrid designed by Shinji’s distant father, Gendou. Before I continue I should note that I last saw the series about five years ago and haven’t retained much in the way of exact plot recollection. What I do know, is rather than a straight remake, Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone, is an expanded retelling of the opening to a story that began as a 1995 TV series and was concluded by mastermind Hideaki Anno in the 1997 feature Neon Genesis Evangelion: The End of Evangelion. When you’re dealing with a classic anime series that has been around for many many years, you can expect confusing plot jumps like this.
The art in this film is probably not what you are used too from earlier episodes. Tech package is geared up with the latest CGI software without betraying the sharp lines and simple facial expressions of the original material. The character designs are the same, streamlined and tweaked a bit, but when it comes to the layout, placement and style of the film, it’s like watching a glossier version of what came out back in 1995. Of course, they are condensing six episodes, about 120 minutes, down to a 90 minute runtime so things are cut. But they deal with it well enough.
Allow me to explain that last part, Rebuild 1 is basically a retelling of the first 6 or so episodes from Neon Genesis Evangelion. In a real rarity, the Evangelion TV series is being "remade" into four new movies, the first of which is entitled "You Are (Not) Alone". Once you get past the dubbing and shotty backstory given, you begin to really think this movie is is really quite predictable and inane. I felt this flick lacked basic plot development to form a basis for what is to come in future films. While the storyline basically follows that of its sister anime it has been completely remade. For instance, there have now been a few changes in design as well, EVA Unit 1 has had a slight rehash with a few armor additions and some new weaponry.
I can’t really talk about the film without talking about the series because… well… It’s a reboot, one that stays fairly close to the story of the original. Then again, if you aren’t familiar to this series I won’t be able to catch you up to speed in the limited amount of space in my reviews. This is not to say that it’s not a good movie. It’s just that like I said, it’s like watching the series again. The music, composed by Shiro Sagisu follows the ways of the story and visuals in regards to the original anime. It sounds familiar, though outright different. Despite the quality of this film, You Are (Not) Alone is only held down because of the reasons why it was created. Many fans might look at this and see only money, or others might say that the original series never needed to be made. Frankly, I like to look at it like another take on the Evangelion universe, expanding on ideas that were not touched on in the original series.
fter two drastically different endings that left fans seriously irate and not a little bit confused, Hideaki Anno, the series creator of the popular and influential anime Neon Genesis Evangelion, had a lot to answer for. Today, the show is infamous for its convoluted financial troubles and Anno's inability to give closure to what is probably the most ambitious anime to date. His new film, Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone, sets out to integrate crucial plot points that he unceremoniously hurled at the viewer at the last minute in the show's now-infamous TV finale. But getting Neon Genesis Evangelion to make some semblance of sense is a mammoth undertaking considering the show's literally Biblical scope (it ends after all life on Earth, save for its adolescent protagonist Shinji Ikari, has been reduced to primordial goo).
As a TV series, Neon Genesis Evangelion was wracked with financial and philosophical burdens, ending without enough funds to develop Anno's bat-shit crazy finale. Even after making the ending he had always wanted in The End of Evangelion, two extra-long episodes later repackaged as a single film, Anno still left fans feeling cheated. There was too much to keep track of, what with philosophical references ranging from Schopenhauer to Sartre and Judeo-Christian imagery being bandied about with flippant alacrity in a show about robots and teen introspection, to say nothing of the scene in which Shinji masturbates over a colleague's comatose body. The story needed to be drastically simplified, making You Are (Not) Alone the first of four proposed films that would make the story a cohesive, if not accessible, single unit.
Unfortunately, the series's story is no less complicated, and it shows from the amount of plot You Are (Not) Alone crams into a single 98-minute film. The movie takes place in a future where—spoilers herein—giant monsters called Angels have destroyed the bulk of the world in an event referred to only as the Second Impact. Within minutes of Shinji's (Spike Spenser) arrival, an Angel attacks and his father Gendo (John Swasey), who abandoned Shinji at a young age, asks him to help stop it by piloting an Eva, a robot designed to battle to the Angels. A colossal migraine just waiting to happen, this is only just the tip of the iceberg in a story rife with double-crosses, self-analysis, and questionably re-appropriated Christian iconography.
Though Shinji is essentially humanity's only hope of survival (the Angels seek to destroy the human race by causing a Third Impact), his struggle to fight the Angels is secondary to his internal struggle to rely on other people. Everyone from Misato Katsuragi (Allison Keith), his handler and tentative friend, to Rei Ayanami (Brina Palencia), a fellow Eva pilot, try to get him to break out of his mopey little emo shell—he spends a lot of his alone time listening to his Walkman and staring at the ceiling—and accept that he's, as the title inexpertly puts it, not alone.
As our introduction to Shinji, You Are (Not) Alone is very much a psychodrama where supporting characters and Shinji himself inexpertly tell us and only sometimes show us what his personality is like. This is a result of Anno's heady ambition to elevate the Mecha anime subgenre with philosophy and religious symbols. His lofty ideas have always overshadowed his characters, even when they're ostensibly about those characters.
Analogies, such as Schopenhauer's concept of the Hedgehog's Dilemma, are used to explain the character's angst because images of him failing to gain acceptance with his scholmates, Eva, co-pilots, or his superiors are not enough to show that he's socially inept. No, Anno's trying to present Shinji's struggle as a grand drama, showing that his alienation is the focal part of the show's existentialist malaise regarding how little agency mankind has over their own actions. Selling material that dense to a teen audience is tough but Anno persisted in making in the show's finale, no matter how many glaring plot holes he created in the process.
It's impossible even in You Are (Not) Alone, which is essentially a condensed version of the first few episodes of the series with a few elements from later episodes tossed in to make the show's climax appear more grounded, to understand the logic of a show where only children are able to pilot robots, that are themselves sentient creatures, that fight Angels whose destruction causes blood to rain down around a giant cross with a rainbow at its pinnacle. It's a kid's show, I know, but Christ on a crutch, why the hell do things happen the way they do in it?
There is no right answer because Anno was and apparently still is more interested in provoking than explaining. In You Are (Not) Alone, he refuses to add anything new except better special effects during the robot-monster fight scenes and scenes of expository dialogue that spell out in a few seconds what took whole episodes to explain before. There are no new explanations here, just a better packaged version of what Anno already delivered, which makes You Are (Not) Alone very attractive but fundamentally pointless.
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