Love & Pop

[Naguib Razak]

Julien,
your criticism of Anno and Love& Pop's ending seem a bit unfair, even to one
who hasn't seen the film nor read the book ...

if there was one thing i didn't like about Bounce Ko Gals (which i liked
very much) was in fact the ending, and for the very same reason you denounce
Anno and his film ... it featured, as far as i can remember, the girls also
"walking fiercely towards their future, their hair flying in the wind" ...
in fact they were even skipping and giggling oh-so-innocently in that
precious and supposedly telling technique of slow-motion ... i could only
have imagined that the director (or the producer's invisible hand) was
selling out the film for a pleasant "commercial" ending at this point ...

in spite of this, i'd grant Bounce Ko Gals credit as a rather good film in
being courageous enough not to rely on sympathetic stereotypes like
innocence and victimisation (except for that end bit, of course) to gently
relate its tragic and disturbing story and give a fair exposition & insight
of a cultural reality (ill or providential) in today's Japan ...

considering this, i'd hesitate to jump up and wag the critical finger at
Love & Pop for being, at most, politically incorrect ... having at least sat
through 13 hours of Anno Hideaki's other work (i.e. Evangelion) i'd say the
director does frequently tap and manipulate the visual fetishes of his
audience (mini-skirts, mecha and all), but he does so without discarding his
earnestness in exploring a very mature and relevant subject matter ... in
fact, it may just be the fact that he is getting so intimate with the
subject matter that he is able to capture their spirit genuinely on his
visuals (animated or no) ... that he fails, or rather refuses to become
judgmental whilst telling the girls' story doesn't make him irresponsible
nor indulgent ... sometimes, one has to crawl into the skin of experience to
understand the stirrings of the people/phenomenon you wish to understand ...
step into other shoes ... it kind of reminds me of another Murakami's
approach in storytelling (Haruki this time, not Ryu) ... gosh, in "Dance
Dance Dance", the hero (or non-hero) gets to into every sex fantasy role a
man might fancy and never once moralized over it ... but it informs, no
less, the reader like myself of things i found very hard to decipher from my
visit of Tokyo last november ...

now ... if i could only get ahold of that tape somehow ...

naguib


-----Original Message-----
From: owner-KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu
[mailto:owner-KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu]On Behalf Of Julien
Seveon
Sent: Tuesday, May 09, 2000 5:47 PM
To: KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu
Subject: Re: Love & Pop


One more note on the subject.
Not only Anno isn't criticising this new trend, but he glorify these
high-school girls ! The ending even shows them ... This scene reminds me of
propaganda movies from North Korea or Mainland China !!!

Julien Seveon
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