|
|||||||||||||||||||||
|
Origin ~Spirits of the Past~
Plot? We have pretty pictures! 
Studio: Gonzo Format: Movie Released: 1/7/2006 Written by: Aisakku 
Picture the flight of a beautiful bird, soaring around the backyard. With great precision, it proceeds straight into the glass door, breaking its neck. Agito presents itself stunningly, with great captivation, only to suicide dive off of a cliff, destroying all promise it may have had. At least it looked cool right?
After an experiment gone wrong on the moon, the Earth is left devastated by genetically altered plants. Mankind, grasping to survive any way it can, must now either live and cooperate with the sentient life of the forest, or fight the forest to regain lost human supremacy. All is to be thrown into chaos as Tula, a girl from the past who holds the key to regaining human supremacy, is awoken deep under ground. Having been awoken and saved by the mischievous Agito, Tula returns with him to Neutral City. The appropriately named city stands as a neutral ground between the last stand of human superiority, Laguna Empire, and the thriving forest. Tula must decide whether she will accept the co-existing ways of Neutral City, or whether she will use her key from the past to help bring civilization back to it's former glory. It would be a lie if I were to say that this kind of story has never been done before. Post-apocalyptic Earth, years into the aftermath, Mankind is striving to survive and make-do with the circumstances given to them. Insert special person with a secret here and there, throw in some action and we have a plot. Agito, in all honesty throws in nothing that hasn't been seen before. However, that does not mean in any way it doesn't show potential. The first thirty or so minutes of the movie awakens Tula, shows a great potential conflict between the Zulide forest people, the forest, and Laguna army, hints at a love triangle between Agito, Tula, and Minka (one of the native village girls), and it does all this with amazingly skillful art that rivals what one would expect from a Ghibli film. This brings us to the point in the movie where Gonzo seems to well... stop caring. The conflict, while seemingly trying to happen, never develops into anything dramatic. The Zulide forest people just like to pop out occasionally and bang their sticks a couple times then disappear back into the unexplained depths of the movie. The love triangle quickly disintegrates into nothing, as Minka's powers of annoying the audience seem to grow stronger by the minute. No character growth occurs, no true conflict ever happens, and potential is beaten into the ground and burned. 
Agito's escapades as an "Intensified Human" (A human with the power of the forest imbued into him, noticeable by silver hair) are interesting for a while, but like the rest of the movie are poorly explained and seemingly stumbles around in the dark looking for the end. Agito conveniently becomes a super-human to get into the action of the movie, for the well-planned purpose of getting into the action of the movie.
Don't get me too wrong, the movie is enjoyable on a base level, and I truly wished to see more come out of it. The eye candy visuals and adventurous beginning caught my attention, and Gonzo smashed it to pieces with a half-assed, mostly unexplained and utterly cliche follow-through. The script: generic, the second half of the movie consisting of mostly "Tula!" cries from Agito. The plot: finished lazily with the least creative thinking done possible. The climax: uneventful and just flat out lame. Agito is a movie you can sit down to on a lazy afternoon and just turn your brain off to enjoy. Just don't expect too much from anything presented- you will end up completely disappointed. *1/2 (Very Poor) Posted: Tuesday, October 24, 2006
|
||||||||||
