Sukai kurora (The Sky Crawlers)

Three good documentaries, all shot on videotape but presented here in HD, are offered.....This is a slow, deliberately paced film, quite unlike any other anime I've seen recently (or even perhaps not so recently).....the CGI is amazing at times.....The Blu-ray Like the film itself, The Sky Crawlers ' AVC 1.78:1 image is restrained..... ... Full Review

this is clearly the work of Mamoru Oshii, anime's master of sublime mystery.....You'd think so from the lush, elegiac feel of THE SKY CRAWLERS.....tentatively courts Suito (Rinko Kikuchi), the air base's female commander, suggests the fine hand of a director who can distill beauty from strikingly disparate situations..... ... Full Review

Lucas divison Skywalker Sound worked on the crystalline dogfight sound design, and the wistful ambient music, by longtime Oshii collaborator Kenji Kawaii, is a delight.....The art direction is superb, placing sleek but unfuturistic fantasy double-prop planes....The story is told elegantly in gradual, slow-drip mode;.... ... Full Review

At this point in his career, director Mamoru Oshii has established a signature mood of detached, autumnal melancholy, which predominates over his films regardless of their genre, and no matter whether they're live-action ( Avalon , Stray Dog ) or... ... Full Article

Cult animator Mamoru Oshii -- best known in the U.S. for his "Ghost in the Shell" films -- adapts a series of novels by Hiroshi Mori into "The Sky Crawlers," a futuristic martial arts adventure about squadrons of genetically engineered,... ... Full Article

Surreal. first glance, the film seems nothing like any of Oshii's earlier opus. The central premise of the story, for instance, is revealed only in the last 15 minutes of the film. ... Full Article

You know Mamoru Oshii loves to go where other anime directors fear to tread (ahem... GHOST IN THE SHELL; BEAUTIFUL DREAMER). His latest, THE SKY CRAWLERS, debuts at Lincoln Center tonight, complete with a video intro by The Man himself. ... Full Article

The new Fullmetal Alchemist will commence on Japanese TV on April 2009. The original 51 episodes, BONES produced anime adapted Hiromu Arakawa's shonen manga concerning a teen who lost an arm and legs and while brother's soul was bound to... ... Full Article

Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here. Tons of stuff from our man in Sweden, TheNorthlander, as he wraps up his coverage of the Stockholm Film Festival in three or four more reports today and tomorrow. ... Full Article