Anime Review: Redline #blogpost

no, NO, NOOOOOOO! NO IT IS NOT THAT SH!TTY MOVIE FROM 2007. It is an animated film made by the famous (for otaku-s) Madhouse.

I have never seen a movie/anime more stylish than this. This is why I love anime, over the top while making it impossibly pretty. I call these kind of anime “every single shot is pretty”. Just look at the picture above, it is not really related to the plot. However, it is still pretty. Take a very close look at the cyan eyewear. Little bit out of proportion, right? However, it is intentionally out of shape. How do I know that? This anime is 100% hand-drawn. Every scene takes weeks, even months to complete. They intentionally made it like that to trick our eyes to thinking that it makes sense even though it doesn’t.

Enough geeking out, let’s talk about the anime itself. It is absolutely captivating. I watch it from time to time just to make myself feel better. It is like if someone took an idea from an arcade game like F-Zero and made it in to a movie. But unlike F-Zero, the main character actually drives a car. Not just a car, but a badass 1976 Pontiac Firebird Trans-am. The anime even calls the car “Toranzamu” because Japan.

The movie is set in a far future, where transportations don’t use wheels anymore. They use anti-gravity engine and fly places. However, a race called Redline is held annually to feel the thrill of speed again. They don’t fly; one character drives a hovercraft but the rest of them still use the anachronistic wheels. The race is a 3 stage event; Blueline, Yellowline (where the movie begins), and Redline as a finale.

This won a big point from me. I don’t like spaceships racing each other, I want cars to race each other. The main character’s name is JP and like I said, he drives a 1976 Trans-am. He’s the only one who doesn’t use any types of weapon. He wants to keep a race, race and not a battle. However, he does have some tricks up his sleeve.

That little pill is called a “Nitro Booster”. He puts the pill inside that steampunk-ish tank, the pill explodes, and gives you this satisfying boost moment you’ll never get from recent FnF films. The boost is so strong, he experiences one of those astronaut G-force test.

Besides the main guy, rest of them are just as characteristic. They have their own very unique vehicles and backstories. You can really see the makers effort when you take a close look at each racers. They made the characters simplistic, yet well designed.

I felt great when I decided to write about this movie. It is one of the best anime/animated movie I have ever seen. However, as I was writing I erased most of the review and I wanted to stop because it is such a well made movie and my writing skill isn’t good enough to write about this movie without spoiling it. I hope that the pictures I have chosen convinced you to go find this movie.

Next time, I will lower my hurdle and review an anime movie about planes!

Kaede out