Megumi Hayashibara Movies
- 2009
This 13th feature-length movie in the Case Closed anime franchise finds detective Conan in a tight situation, when the Black Organization - the crime syndicate who were responsible for transforming him into his pint-sized form -- finds out about his new identity. Now Conan is in imminent danger - and so is everyone close to him. ~ Cammila Albertson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Akira Kamiya, Kappei Yamaguchi, (more)
- 2007
- PG13
Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone is the first installment in a film series known as the Rebuild of Evangelion that reinterprets the story first told in the critically acclaimed anime series Neon Genesis Evangelion. Covering the material from the first six episodes of the series, this film sets the stage when 14 year old Shinji Ikari arrives in Tokyo-3. His mother dead and his father painfully distant, Shinji is lonely, quiet, and wracked with torturous self-doubt. But Shinji's arrival in the city signifies his chance to prove himself as one of three teenagers chosen to pilot a series of technologically unprecedented robots called Evas, mysterious hybrids of man, spirit, and machine created to fight the unrelenting monsters known as Angels that continue to attack earth, one at a time. Thrown into battle before he's had so much as a day of training, Shinji's desperate need for his father's approval isn't helped by the pressure of the world's survival on his shoulders, or the difficult time he has living amongst the other pilots, who very strangely, have suffered the same losses that he has. Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone directly follows the plot of the original series in some ways, but drastically diverges in others, focusing even more on the cryptic and symbolic nature of the story's religious themes. ~ Cammila Albertson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Megumi Ogata, Megumi Hayashibara, (more)
Groundbreaking animator Satoshi Kon (whose credits include Tokyo Godfathers, Millennium Actress, and Perfect Blue) directed this visually spectacular adaptation of a science fiction novel by Yatsutaka Tsutsui. Atsuko is a psychiatrist who uses advanced technology to study the human mind. Atsuko has developed a machine that will allow her to enter the dreams of her patients and study their psyches from the inside. Atsuko also does double duty as Paprika, a high-tech detective who uses this new innovation to find out the truth about what the people she's trailing really think. However, Atsuko falls victim to a thief who steals the one-of-a-kind machine, and Paprika sets out to find it as a wave of psychological instability tears through the city. Paprika received its world premiere at the 2006 Venice Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Megumi Hayashibara, Toru Emori, (more)
This three-episode anime series follows Natsumi, a ten-year-old girl whose father gave her what turned out to be a very special necklace. Before long, Natsumi's sleep is disturbed by strange dreams; in one, an ancient jungle god teaches her a sensual dance of power and warns her of the existence of a recently awakened forest demon. After being forced to deal with impish jungle spirits, gargantuan whales, and elite fighter pilots, Natsumi has no choice but to perform the dance and transform into a buxom fertility goddess. ~ Tracie Cooper, All Movie Guide
The popular animé series Cowboy Bebop gets its own feature-length film with the aptly named Cowboy Bebop: The Movie. Set in the late 21st century, it jumps into the series' story line just prior to its conclusion, with the bounty hunting crew of the interstellar craft Bebop chasing a hacker aboard a tanker into a major city on Mars. As crew member Faye Valentine closes in on the tanker, she witnesses its catastrophic explosion, which soon appears to be a viral terrorist attack as the death toll continues to mount in the days following. Furthermore, Faye caught a glimpse of the person responsible for the blast and is thus the only surviving witness of the crime. After the government puts out a large bounty for the perpetrator's capture, the Bebop gang -- slacker Spike Spiegel, former policeman Jet Black, and hacker girl genius Edward -- begin their own hunt for the mass murderer, who is eventually revealed to be one Vincent Volaju. Vincent, it turns out, was the lone survivor of a governmental medical test and now seeks revenge by unleashing the same microscopic robotic virus used in the tanker explosion on the unsuspecting city. The Bebop crew must scramble to prevent Vincent from carrying out his plan, as well as try to locate an anti-virus to counterattack the effects of Vincent's virus. Released in both dubbed and subtitled cuts in the United States in 2003, Cowboy Bebop - The Movie premiered in Japan in 2001. ~ Ryan Shriver, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- David Lucas, Beau Billingslea, (more)
- 2000
This Japanese anime series tells the story of Pai, the sole survivor of a race of immortal three-eyed beings known as the Sanjiyan Unkara who temporarily assumes the form of a human girl in a quest to recover an ancient artifact which will make her human attributes permanent. She eventually befriends young Yakumo Fuji, the son of an archaeologist who has become an expert on Sanjiyan lore. Together they set out to recover the mystical object, embarking on an adventure beyond the boundaries of life and death. The journey takes on a whole new meaning for Yakumo when he is killed in a supernatural battle and resurrected as Pai's spiritual sidekick. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide
- 1998
Jet gets a mysterious email from his old friend, Pao, a feng-shui master. This leads him to Pao's gravestone, where he meets Meifa, Pao's daughter, who has developed her father's skill with feng-shui. Meifa and Jet team up against the Blue Snake Mobsters and search for the sun stone, which may give them some answers. Like other Jet-centered episodes, "Boogie Woogie Feng-Shui" is influenced by the detective genre and features voice-over narration. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1998
While flipping through channels on TV, Spike, Ed, and Jet see the missing Faye on an advertisement for Scratch, a religious cult that believes the soul should reside out of the body. It seems Faye has enlisted herself in hopes of capturing the huge bounty on leader Dr. Londes. Spike goes after her, while Ed hacks into the Scratch website and Jet purchases a Brain Dream. After finding the site's location in a hospice, Jet and Ed sneak in to find out who the real Dr. Londes is. The Scratch cult is seemingly based on the real-life Heaven's Gate religious cult. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
Following up on his wildly successful 1997 feature-length anime Neo Genesis Evangelion, Hideaki Anno takes digital camcorder in hand and makes his live-action directorial debut with this day-in-the-life drama about a quartet of enjo kosai (school girls) who make big bucks selling their services to middle-aged perverts with money to burn. Though frequently weird and exotic, their dates rarely request anything close to plain old vanilla sex. One geezer takes the four to sing karaoke. After belting out a few, he reaches into his bag and pulls out a bag of grapes. He asks that each lass bite into the fruit just enough to break the skin. Once that's done, he puts each grape in its own individual baggie and labels it. Other patrons are just as pitiful if less bizarre. The film focuses particularly on Hiromi (Asumi Miwa), who is trying to make enough money to buy a topaz ring and hide her right hand, which she thinks is ugly. Hiromi comes from a normal -- if blithely obtuse -- family and is not your typical portrait of an enjo kosai. Yet she hustles with her more street-smart friends and learns about her newfound profession's dangers and degradations the hard way. This film was based on a book by Ryu Murakami. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
- 1998
Titled after a Herbie Hancock album, "Speak Like a Child" opens with Jet beginning a story which is actually a Japanese folktale. A package arrives for Faye and she takes off, thinking it is from one of her enemies. Out of curiosity, Jet and Spike open it to discover a video in the obsolete Beta format. They then travel all the way to a crumbling Earth in order to view the tape, only to return with a VCR in the incompatible VHS format. Another package in the mail arrives and the crew gets a fleeting glimpse into Faye's mysterious past. This episode features references to Beverly Hills 90210. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1998
In the first part of the final two episodes of the Cowboy Bebop series, "The Real Folk Blues, Part 1," Vicious, the dangerous loner from Spike's past, tries to take over the Red Dragon crime syndicate, but is caught by the elders. Soon, Spike and Jet are shot at by syndicate gangsters, but Shin helps them escape. Meanwhile, Faye accidentally meets Julia, who relays a message for Spike just before Red Dragon fighter planes attack the Bebop. This episode reveals many of the dangerous secrets that have haunted Spike about his past connection to Vicious and Julia. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1998
One of the funnier episodes, "Mushroom Samba" features the antics of Ed, followed by her companion, the data dog Ein. Out of food as usual, the crew is stranded in a desert which bears a landscape straight out of an old Western movie. Searching for food, Ed and Ein encounter the bounty villain Domino and manage to get Spike, Jet, and Faye to hallucinate on magic mushrooms. This episode features characters influenced by blaxploitation films like Shaft and Coffy, as well as the spaghetti Western Django. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1998
Titled after the Jean-Luc Godard film, "Pierrot Le Fou" is one of the more visually striking episodes. Spike is badly injured from a killing machine named Pierrot Le Fou. Jet's ISSP friend Bob lets the Bebop crew in on some of Pierrot's past, and Spike gets an invitation to a "party." In a fantastical theme park called Spaceland, Spike battles the bizarre villain. This episode features an homage to Pink Floyd's "On the Run" from Dark Side of the Moon, as well as various influences from Batman. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1998
In this episode, "Cowboy Funk," the crew is in search of the bounty for a terrorist called the Teddy Bomber, a serial bomber with a stuffed animal shtick. Just as he is about to blow up another building, Spike arrives and beats him up with his signature style. Suddenly, a self-styled outlaw named Cowboy Andy appears and messes everything up for Spike. On the Bebop, Jet and Faye don't believe the story, and Spike develops a growing animosity for Andy. Ed discovers his true identity as Andy Von de Oniyate, a bored rich kid who is heir to a ranch estate and indulges in his longing to be a bounty hunter with silly gimmicks. In a continued effort to find the Teddy Bomber, the Bebop crew goes to a masquerade party, only to meet up with Cowboy Andy once again. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1998
In part two of the two-part episode "Jupiter Jazz," Gren tells Faye about what happened to him during and after the war, and she unsuccessfully tries to apprehend him. Spike is still searching for Julia, leading him straight into the conflict between Vicious and Gren. Jet finally finds Faye and takes her back to the Bebop. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1998
Titled after the Kiss ballad, "Hard Luck Woman" opens with Faye watching a video, looking for clues about her past. Faye drags Ed along with her to Earth, in search of some locations from the video. Instead, the girls run into Ed's old caretaker, Sister Clara, and Faye has a run-in of her own. Meanwhile, Jet and Spike are after the bounty of Appledehli, who is attempting to make a map of the ever-changing Earth while it is consistently pummeled with meteors. Drawing to the close of the series, this episode contains some dramatic turning points as well as an ending scene reference to the Paul Newman film Cool Hand Luke. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1998
The story line for the final episode of the Cowboy Bebop series, "The Real Folk Blues, Part 2," offers a poignant realization that all things come to an end. Just as Spike has united with Julia after three years, Vicious takes over the Red Dragon crime syndicate. Spike and Julia run to Annie's store to rescue her, only to be attacked by syndicate gangsters. One of the saddest, most beautiful entries in the series, the episode ends with Spike finally confronting his past to the tune of the Beatles' "Carry That Weight." See you space cowboy... ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1998
With no bounty to hunt this time, Spike, Jet, Ed, and Faye are stuck on the ship with nothing to do. Gambling and trying to cook with a blow torch occupy them until a mysterious creature seems to wreck havoc on the ship. The monster bites each member of the crew leaving a purple mark and making them get sick. Ed is missing and even Ein gets bitten, leaving Spike to deal with the ominous presence alone. A particularly funny episode, this one makes references to Alien and 2001: A Space Odyssey. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1998
In this episode, "Wild Horses," Spike takes his ship, the Swordfish II, to Earth to get fixed by Doohan, the ship's original owner. Jet and Faye are after some Starship Pirates, who release a computer virus with harpoons. Jet shuts down the computer systems on the Bebop and resorts to an archaic radio communication system. Spike battles the Starship Pirates, while Doohan and his assistant overhear the communications on the radio. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1998
Titled after the song by Queen, "Bohemian Rhapsody" begins with Jet, Spike, and Faye each capturing a bounty. Each bounty hunter has the same clue to the main criminal of toll gate theft. Jet does some detective work and figures out that the mastermind is former Gate insider Chessmaster Hex. One of the funnier episodes, the crew searches a wayward scrap yard filled with stoned vagrants while Ed obsessively plays a chess game with the Chessmaster. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
