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Animation Features Movies

Blood
The Last Vampire
(2000)

Director – Hiroyuki Kitakubo – 2000 – Japan – Cert. 15 – 48m

****

Part English, Part Japanese with English Subtitles, Widescreen (1.85)

REG 2 DVD / PAL VHS review from Starburst (UK Edition), 2001.

The animation weighs in at a mere 46 minutes on home video formats, although on both you also get an informative, 20 minute Making Of documentary which goes into a lot of fascinating detail about the project’s innovative production processes via interviews with most of the animation staff involved.

Set largely on an American Air Base in Japan in 1966’s early stages of the Vietnam War, Blood’s tale cleverly employs both American English for the US military and Japanese (here subtitled in English) for the indigenous population. Sometimes, of course, the Japanese speak English to Americans and on one occasion, an American schoolgirl is told by Japanese heroine Saya (voice: Youki Kudoh from Heaven’s Burning, Craig Lahiff, 1997; Mystery Train, Jim Jarmusch, 1989; Typhoon Club, Shinji Somai, 1985; The Crazy Family, Sogo Ishii, 1984) to back off in American English after attempting to greet Saya in the Japanese tongue.

Language wise, there’s therefore no need for a separate track, but the DVD includes two sound mixes of which the 5.1 scores hands down since every implement dropping to a stone floor or every bullet flying into a wall springs to life in the 5.1 mix, but sounds comparatively flat in the stereo.

Astounding use of language and sound aside, the visuals (transferred to the DVD with impeccable clarity) are amazing too. Certain scenes, like the opening where Saya sits brooding on a subway train seat then unexpectedly slaughters a man in her carriage with some splattery samurai swordplay, contain naturalistic character animation in perspective as impressive as the Japanese (or anyone else) have produced.

This is coupled with state-of-the-art digital environment in numerous scenes that makes you feel you’re watching a Who Framed Roger Rabbit type live action/animation hybrid – except that the background here is CG, not live action.

On top of this, computers have been used to completely redesign the lighting effects upon environment and characters, with stunning results. Blood would be a coup had it not been trumped by high profile Japanese offering Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (Hironobu Sakaguchi, Motonori Sakakibara – 2001).

If technically amazing and showcasing some compellingly designed demons, Blood nonetheless still achieves some neat explorations into characters under pressure – the mysterious heroine, the traumatised school nurse, and others – even as it descends into straightforward kill them before they kill you territory. In this latter respect, its strengths and weaknesses recall Assault On Precinct 13 (John Carpenter, 1976).

Director Kitakubo previously made Roujin Z (1991), the A Tale of Two Robots segment of Robot Carnival (anthology, Katsuhiro Otomo & others, 1987) and Black Magic M-66 (1987). Writer Kenji Kamiyama would go on to a career as an anime director via such TV series as Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex (2002-5) and Blade Runner: Black Lotus (2021-2) plus the feature The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim (2024); writer Mamoru Oshii, already the director of Ghost in the Shell (1995), would subsequently make Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence (2004) and The Sky Crawlers (2008).

Trailer:

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