Now, we have a new animation film fresh out of Japan being released in its country of origin just last year and was brought to North America only a few months ago. This film is titled "The Empire of Corpses" making for an attention grabber kind of title. " The Empire of Corpses" was created by Wit Studio, the same studio that graced audiences with "Attack on Titian". AOT looks amazing visually aided with a great storyline so this fact alone is enough to make AOT fans take a look at "The Empire of Corpses".
Creators decided to make the films plot tell the story on characters from different places around the world. This does not only include Japan but America, Britain, and Russia. John H. Watson is a scientist who is trying to find a way to further an already existing technology that brings people's corpses back to a place of function. The corpses is not completely like a human body as the soul has left the flesh so John wants to restore his friend's body known as Friday, to the point that his corpse can feel emotion like he did before he died. On top of this, there is a rumor that a scientist had once created a method to giving Corpses real rational thoughts with emotion. This causes the world to be on the brink of war as every country begins using Corpses as a way to fight in wars and do everyday chores. I don't know about you but I can't live in a world where people's dead bodies are tipping around the streets. That would freak me the hell out.
I normally have zero to no interest in Japanese anime that involves plot lines and characters outside of Japan. The whole idea seems fake to me. Not saying that A Japanese person can't know about these places but the essence of what makes anime great(or Asian) is stripped away when dealing with this type of idea. My curiosity still managed to make my buy a copy just because Wit Studio was involved in the creative process. All the character models look like they were drawn with an urge to release pinned up emotion. Kind of funny I would say this considering one of the main characters in expressionless for most of the film. In some of the character's faces you can see the long curve of the chin as it connects to the higher section of the face. This makes certain characters look sinister at times. Except for the main leads, The rest of the character models look like people who would be either in a Rudolf: The Red Nose Reindeer special or hanging out with the Captain Crunch guy. The film visually doesn't have that cinematic feel like other works. Scenery jumps out at you but only in the normal typical anime fashion. Everything put you in the right frame of mind to believe that your looking at different areas of the world but I wanted to see qualities of anime action that mixed a good amount of CGI and drawings come to live. Scenes such as these are in the film but not in an artistic way and the most CGI that was used was during the final conflict before the conclusion.
I'm not the type of person to say this a lot but I felt no connection with any of the characters in "The Empire of Corpses" One of the main character's origins were hidden in mystery even to the end of the film and the other characters all wanted the same thing. Deep emotions between the two main leads made me feel upset all the while making me hate everything about the decisions that they choose to make. It was just super selfish and the film drives it home that its ok to be selfish even if you hurt your loved ones also including yourself.
While the plot was interesting at intervals, These intervals were often interrupted for an emotional scene or someone trying to explain some scientific details. Like the audience needs anymore to be explained to them. The emotional scenes got on my nerves too because its just fuels the impression of selfishness that the character's already created for themselves. Thoughts such as, "this movie isn't over yet?" started to pop into my mind until the explosive final battle.
"The Empire of Corpses" is a film that I would watch again ....... WITHOUT THE OVERDUB! Those accents in the english overdub were God awful to me. Were they natural accents because I couldn't take them seriously. I'm interested in how my outlook on the film will change watching the original Japanese voice acting as well. There are good points in this film but I'
m afraid the bad points overcome the good causing me to like the film but not LOVE it.
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