Brave Story (UMD Animation) (Japan Version) UMD, DVD Region 2, PSP

Their first feature-length production, Gin-Iro no Kami no Agito (known as Origin: Spirits of the Past in the West), was criticised for placing style squarely over substance, skipping past all manner of plot holes, character development and entire sections of narrative in favour of further opportunities to dazzle the viewer with the skill of Gonzo's animators, designers and CG artists.

Brave Story is their second such feature within a year, adapted from a novel by Miyuki Miyabe, the author behind (among many other things) the pyrokinetic Japanese horror production Crossfire. A young boy - Wataru - discovers the way into a fantasy kingdom known as Vision, where a series of trials will grant him the right to impeach a goddess for a single wish - through which he plans to return his problematic childhood to "normal". Already adapted into a manga series spanning twelve volumes and counting, Gonzo elects to tell the story in a little under two hours.

If one expects anything different from Gonzo's usual approach to storytelling, initial signs are far from encouraging. Barrelling through the pre-title sequence in a matter of minutes (discovering the gateway to Vision in an abandoned tenement building), Brave Story begins at a fairly rapid pace. Characters are sketched in as fast as possible. Our hero's reticent and not especially capable, but basically good-hearted; his mysterious opposite number (the new arrival at school who also seems to be headed through the gateway) is withdrawn, self-centred and nurses a Dark Secret. We have the bumbling sidekick, the amazon, the flower vase and various other predictable supporting roles, all of whom are swiftly sidelined next to the central thread. This being plotting by numbers, Gonzo is content to stick with the video game tropes that made their name - Wataru's initial trial sees his physical attributes scored on points, or more importantly, an audience with the goddess can only be achieved through collecting five jewels to be stored in the "hero's sword" he's awarded. Backstory for the various political, theological and military factions introduced to us, such as they are, is mentioned in passing and just as quickly discarded.

Yet basically, what was a source of frustration in Origin is markedly less so here. Obviously not everyone will agree - the film rarely if ever attempts to persuade the viewer to forget this is disposable genre entertainment first and foremost - but where Origin suffered from dour, apocalyptic pretension and a lack of human warmth, Brave Story charges forward with a lightness of tone and an eye for spectacle which never gets in the way of the gist of the narrative, however simplistic that might be. Where Origin tried to floor its audience right from the word go, Brave Story is far more restrained - the journey into Vision proper doesn't begin until just before the twenty-minute mark, and arguably the first attempt to outright wow the viewer doesn't come until twenty-five. Brave Story adopts a far more pastoral aesthetic, where against the rural and urban backdrops, Gonzo plays with downtime, simple comedy, or whole sequences largely for the uncomplicated visual pleasure they afford. The closest the film gets to a femme fatale, feline Meena, may not have much to do in service of the narrative, but her brief trapeze performance is a delight the studio's television output rarely measures up to.

Though it still suffers from the impression that it's talking down to anyone over a certain age, Brave Story manages a sense of fun and adventure, a scope and scale which makes a good case for its initial release in cinemas. Though not up to the best of Studio Ghibli's work (the obvious high water mark), the world it presents is often startlingly beautiful - the mid-point time lapse sequence which sums up a long journey by the main party, or the climactic resolution after evil has been overcome to name but two instances. And if it resorts to a crushingly predictable deus ex machina near the end, at least it does so with a thrilling visual flair. Plus, unlike some recent high-profile productions, Studio 4C's Steamboy or Square's Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, it does ground these fantasy pyrotechnics with some degree of consideration for the basic human emotions involved and their physical and emotional costs. The nominal villain's motivation is nothing wildly new or surprising, but it's laid out with more sympathy than one might expect, and the impact of his unleashing ultimate evil - while glossed over to a significant extent - is still given far more real, tangible impact, even a touch of genuine horror, than Steamboy's laying waste to vast sections of Victorian London or Spirits Within's planet-wide devastation. And ultimately, though Brave Story's resolution still simplifies and commercialises certain privations of childhood, it does deserve some applause for not taking Hollywood's way out, firmly avoiding the temptation to insinuate everything can be tidily concluded if we only try.

The voice acting is generally of a high standard, never descending to outright histrionics even in those soliloquies or moments approaching moralising afforded by the script; while most of the dialogue is merely serviceable, the film does give people more to do than, say, Takashi Miike's live-action The Great Yokai War, which for all its good points reduced a perfectly capable child lead's performance to little more than impassioned screaming every few minutes. Dance act Juno Reactor's orchestral score has few outright standout moments, but remains more than competent throughout, never grating on the ear or intruding too heavily on the action. Many of Gonzo's television series have suffered frequently from obvious lapses in quality - while Brave Story obviously lacks the same budget as a Ghibli or Production I.G. film, it never seems the producers took the budget from one scene to shore up the animation in another.

Overall, while one has to keep in mind that this is a blatant attempt to court a very specific demographic and can be rightly criticised as such, Brave Story is a vast improvement on Origin and one of the highlights of Gonzo's history thus far. Simplistic, flawed and not terribly profound, it is also entertaining, captivating, pleasing to the eye and even somewhat emotionally moving. Mainstream audiences will doubtless eat it up, but there is definitely enough of worth here that anyone who appreciates skilled animation, artistry or even simply top-flight commercial filmmaking should also appreciate it. Most definitely recommended.

by Eight Rooks - Twitchfilm.net