n its original incarnation, The Vision of Escaflowne was a 26-episode television series about a plucky young track star, Hitomi Kanzaki, who was magically transported to a world called Gaia. Thanks to her earnest hard work and her mystical talents, involving visions of the future and a magical pendant, she helped save Gaia from the predations of an evil empire while dealing with her conflicting feelings for young prince Van Fanel and more sophisticated knight Allen Schezar.
Now, Vision director Kazuki Akane has collaborated with Cowboy Bebop staff writer Ryota Yamaguchi to bring a very different version of Hitomi's story to the screen. In the cinematic version, Hitomi (Sheridan) is a morose track-team dropout who's considering suicide. When she allows herself to be drawn into Gaia, it's as though she's giving the universe permission to erase her from her world. Plopped into the middle of a bloody civil war in which the evil Folken (Dobson) and his Black Dragon Clan are fighting a ragtag group of rebels for control of a realm full of beast-men and technology ranging from swords to high-tech mechanical devices, Hitomi seems inclined to just curl up and whimper, hoping it'll all go away.
But one of the rebels is ousted King Van (Morrow), who suffers from his own apparent death wish; where Hitomi just wants to disappear, the fury-driven Van seems likely to get himself killed by charging headfirst into any combat, no matter the odds. Though Hitomi's hailed as the "wing goddess" by the Gaians, and she has some sort of instinctive power over Escaflowne, a powerful battle-mecha that may be destined to destroy the world, she's mostly an ineffectual lump. She spends half the movie calling Van's name and muttering to herself as she tries to find a purpose. Still, once she and Van get to know each other, it seems possible that they might give each other a reason to live. But Folken,
who suffers from yet another brand of suicidal impulse, intends to get his hands on Escaflowne and ensure that if he goes down, Gaia goes with him.
Not at all necessary, but not all bad
Vision of Escaflowne is a beautiful series, exquisitely paced and fantastically animated, with a solid script behind it. The movie version, which tries to establish similar but strikingly different characters and storylines in roughly one-eighth the time, can't help but suffer by comparison. Escaflowne the movie tends to feel rushed and often clumsy, especially in dealing with the somewhat vapid new Hitomi.
And the inevitable comparison is the biggest problem with the new movie. For those who've seen the TV show, the movie's likely to be unsatisfying. For those who haven't seen the TV show, it may be just confusing, as it leaves a lot to the imagination, glosses over complex plot arcs and then makes assumptions based on missing information and, in some cases, reduces elaborate events to iconic moments. The attraction between Hitomi and Van, for instance, is the source of episode after episode of development and thoughtful angst in the TV show. In the movie, it happens abruptly and without cause. And Escaflowne itself doesn't make a great deal of sense, except as a MacGuffin; the explanations of what it is, what it's for and why it does what it does all seem incomplete and prone to conflict.
But Escaflowne is still a gorgeous movie. It uses the same basic character designs as the TV show (minus the weird, pointy noses) but adds the depth, complexity and rich color of cinematic animation. Akane makes a point of keeping viewers distracted with lots of combat, rich fantasy landscapes and a great deal of motion. There's always something eye-popping on the screen, and it's always brightly colored, wonderfully detailed and moving in unexpected ways. The indispensable
Yoko Kanno (Cowboy Bebop, Macross Plus) returns to provide a gorgeous soundtrack, full of choral melodies and unexpected genre changes. Escaflowne may seem unnecessary, as a darker, bloodier, faster-paced retelling of a story that was told perfectly the first time. But even where the story doesn't stand on its own, the visuals make Escaflowne well worth experiencing on the big screen.
