Watching the Boogiepop Movie

[GigaSheep]

It's finally arrived, it has no subs, and I understand 2% of the dialog. But it's here.

I've only watched parts so far, but here are some general thoughts.

1) the music plain sucks. it is cheesy piano music very different from the series. The vibe really ruins the mood of the story.

2) the acting is generally good, but bad in places.

3) the story does not seem to be exactly in keeping with the series. For example, at the 'light' incident, echoes is not there until after boogiepop has left minako hanging. In the movie boogiepop strangles her while another kid shoots a vial of type-s into minako's neck with a bow and arrow. Boogiepop then dissapears, and minako (now dead) is pinned to the wall with the arrow. Echoes comes *afterwards* and turns to light, etc. saotome comes at that later point too. This is clearly not how it happens in the series.

4) Boogiepop's face is veiled most of the time! she will only sometimes lift the veil.

5) Type-S seems to be the Manticore's tears. It is also not red.

6) SAOTOME KILLS NAGI BY SLITTING HER THROAT. Nagi comes back to life as though it were all an illusion after Echoes ascends.

7) Echoes is a homeless man during the movie. He is taken in and looked after by a shinyo girl, but dissapears again one day.

MORE COMIN...

etc

P.S. I general I do not like the movie. It is far less subtle than the series and is cheesy in many respects, certainly not helped by the music. While the music is well-produced, it is just plain wrong for the movie. That said, it is making for an interesting watch and there are some great scenes.

I NEED SUBS !!!

[heart havok]

one important thing to make note of... is that the film was done before the series. none the less... i think the novels are going to be the only true way to clear things up. perhaps the series is less on story, perhaps the film. certainly the dialogue makes the most of everything.

all in all... i ordered the same DVD but my DVDplayer isn't Regionless... so until i can find a place that will upgrade it for me to regionless, i'm not watching it :(

[Nairohe]

bad review... sigh*

but well, it's still interesting to get a hold of the movie... ^_^ i'm still planning on getting it and wiating to see if the local japanese video store around here will get it since i asked.

[sunset]

My DVD copy of Boogiepop and Others has finally arrived on the mail today and I imediatelly slipped it into the DVD tray.

Verdict:
I have mixed feelings about it since there are good things and bad things.

To clear the music controversy, I did like the music. It´s well executed and in any other show I would have loved it. I still love it. It´s just that it doesn´t match the mood set by the soundtrack of the series.It´s generally warm and intimate and it works on this film if you see it as a standalone. You put it next to the Boogiepop Phantom series it looks (and sounds) awkward. And misplaced.

What I liked
- Most important of all, it tied many loose ends that were left hanging in the series. Explained a lot of them but also created a couple I liked learning more about Echoes (and seeing him), learning about Nagi and Suema´s relationship (it´s not this well fleshed out in the series) , about Toka and Takeda and about Saotome and Manticore. It changed some things (like the fact that Type S is not red, it´s ingested instead of inhaled and is secreted as Manticore´s tears), it took some liberties (the aforementioned fight scenne between Boogiepop and Manticore) but altogether, it works.
-It was great to see their interpretation of the characters; I like the concept of a short haired Nagi better, it makes sense for her to be this boyish. Toka is really short and that makes for a not-so-imposing Boogiepop, but fortunatelly she´s also quite pretty, which makes her easier on the eye.
- I like the Boogiepop uniform; not very practical when she lifts the veil to show her face (and it looks somewhat unconfortable), but it looks very well done. Plus it´s more reallistic than the one in the series; this Boogiepop can walk in broad daylight looking like that- people will look and stare, but it won´t necessarilly stop the traffic like the series´would. ;)


What I didn´t like
- Takeda. The kid simply cannot act and comes this close to ruining certain key scennes, especially those in which he confronts Boogiepop.
- Too many people know who Boogiepop is. In the series, Nagi is the only one. In here, I´ve counted at least four.
Five,if we assume that Saotome pays attention to the girls in the Shinyo Academy.
- The Boogiepop Phantom uniform colours. Too saturated and purple, the director should have taken lessons from Brian Singer and his handling of the X-Men.
Too much light - Boogiepop Phantom takes place in a dark and gothic universe where even scennes that take place in broad daylight are still moody and creepy.

[Cookiepop]

I bought the movie a while back, and overall I have to say I have to say I was a bit dissapointed. The parts I was dissapointed with went as follows:

They changed/left out several key scenes that I felt were extremely important to the story. For instance, nearly all the scenes between Takeda and Boogiepop seemed to be left out so that by the end of the first part of the film we don't get the idea that they're friends at all. In fact Boogiepop appears to be rather aggressive towards Takeda at one point. Then there's the Manticore who is left virtually without any personality because all the scenes between her and Saotome were left out. Likewise with the relationship between Kirima Nagi and Suema Kazuko. Overall, I just felt that these three relationships weren't fleshed out and in some cases were next to non-existant.
There is some bad acting present in the film, though this is mainly limited to the first quarter of the film or so.
Overall, I just felt that although the plot was the same, the spirit of the novel had been left out. This isn't a simple loss of material through a novel to film translation. Many of the problems of the film could have been solved simply by adding in some key scenes and dialogue which frustrated me a lot since I knew it could have been done.
The manticore was pretty non-threatening in the film.
Why did they change the school unifroms? Really, the dull greys used in the film don't compare to the actual blacks described in the novel.

On the plus side, I did actually like the music. Especially the song Forget-Me-Not played to thematically match Kamikishiro Naoko and Kimura Akio which I thought fitted really well. Apart from that, I thought they could have used music better suited to some of the other themes of the film. Think "Devil Is A Loser" by Lordi as the Manticore's entrance.

Really, there's not a whole lot of other uppers I can think of for the film. Since it was Boogiepop I still enjoyed watching it, and I likely will atch it again. Perhaps it will grow on me. But for someone who's read the novel I was more concerned during the watching of the film about the distinctly amateur feel of the production and parts of the story which could clearly have been made better had they just included the corresponding sections of the novel. It still frustrates me to this day. And I'm not the type to whine about adaptation changes. These were clearly things which could have been done but someone chose not to do them.

Ah well, at least I have the Boogiepop animated films inside my head *goes inside his own head*. It's so awesome here...[list]