Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to "Lupin the Marathon" here on Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering the next film in this marathon that came out in 1996. That movie is "Lupin the 3rd: Dead or Alive".
Now, I would love to tell you anything that I know about this movie, but sadly, I don't know very much about it, aside from it being another Lupin movie. The only thing that I've noticed, just judging from the cover art, is that the art-style looks vastly different, compared to the other Lupin movies that I've seen before. Which is interesting, even though it was still made by TMS. Now mind you, I'm not saying that it's a bad thing or anything, it's just something that I happened to notice is all.
So, setting aside that, I know nothing about the plot to this movie, nor have I seen any trailers or clips from it either. So, in other words, I'm going into this one 100% blind here. I'm hoping it's gonna be just as good as the other two Lupin films that I've seen prior to this one. But the only way I'm gonna find out for sure is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Lupin the 3rd: Dead or Alive".
5 minutes later
OK, so...this warden, well, fake warden I should say, just did a prison break releasing four other guys. And the reason why I say the warden was fake was because it was actually Lupin in disguise. Mind you, there's no context as to why Lupin released these guys at all, but it does leave me rather curious. So, I'm hoping the movie will provide that context.
17 minutes later
So, that buoy that Jigen managed to pull off turned out to be a hidden plane...interesting. Not totally sure how capable that actually is, but I will say that it is creative.
8 minutes later
OK, this shot here that I'm seeing, for whatever reasoning, has Jigen's hair completely white, as if he grew really old. I don't know, *maybe* it was trying to reflect the lighting of the fire going on in the background, but still, it just seemed a little bit weird to me, you know?
6 minutes later
Guys, I know that this is probably a moot point to bring up, but the music in this movie is really good. I'm really digging the score here. But then again, it's "Lupin the 3rd", and it would be sort of a crime if the music in this series turned out to be horrible. Which, thankfully, it still hasn't.
11 minutes later
OK, so we finally got some sort of explanation as to why Lupin, at the beginning, busted those guys out of prison. The main reason being is he wanted information about "Drifting Island", the island that Lupin and the gang were on to look for some treasure. At *least* they explained that much. Granted, I don't know why they are talking to only *one* of the former prisoners, and not the whole lot that they busted out. But still, at least they explained why Lupin busted them out of prison. So, I'll take what I can get out of this.
20 minutes later
You know, guys, I am gonna say that while Zenigata seems to be a lot less over-the-top in this movie than the previous ones, I'm still kinda surprised, and not, by the fact that he didn't pick up on Lupin's strange silence earlier from when he apprehended him. I guess, maybe, perhaps that Zenigata is still one step behind Lupin's 4-D chess, you know what I mean?
1 minute later
O...K, well that got...surprisingly dark rather quickly. Never thought I'd see a beheading like that before, but, well, I got to see it. And yeah, that totally caught me off guard.
The Review
Well, guys, that was "Lupin the 3rd: Dead or Alive". Let me go ahead and shut the film off here...OK. So...where to start with this one? Well, I am gonna say that, so far anyway, this is the best Lupin film I've covered this marathon. Now again, it's not gonna compare to something like "The Castle of Cagliostro". But then again, that movie's on a whole different level of awesome. That aside, it is a really great movie on it's own standards. So, I'm not gonna complain on whether or not it's better than certain others, because all that matters to me is whether or not the film was entertaining. And it most certainly is.
So, let me go ahead and start this review off proper by first talking about the writing. More specifically, I actually want to talk about the movie's tone, first and foremost. Now, way back when I reviewed "The Secret of Harimao's Treasure", I mentioned my experience with "Lupin the 3rd" at the time. In which, I had only seen "The Castle of Cagliostro" and "Lupin the 3rd": Part's IV and V. And on the latter, I said that I enjoyed both series very much. However, the one thing that stopped both those series from being great was that, at least for me, the final arc's for both Part's IV and V tried way too hard on being dark in tone. Not that the series was ever dark beforehand, but I didn't really like how those arcs approached the way it set it's tone during those final arcs. Which is what kinda sullied it a little bit from two really enjoyable series. Now mind you, it's been quite a number of years since I last watched both those series when they last aired on Toonami, so perhaps maybe if I ever viewed those series again on DVD at some point, my opinion on those could ultimately change. But, as it stands, I still didn't like the tonal shift on when and how the series went dark on their last arcs.
Which now brings me to talking about this movie again. And the reason why I brought up all that to you guys is that this movie has, quite possibly, one of the better examples on how to properly balance it's tone. You see, while this movie has a somewhat darker approach to it's tone here, it doesn't completely overshadow the insane, goofy, over-the-top action that this series is mostly known for. It knows when to be serious and when it wants to have fun with itself. And mind you, the story here is kinda complex, but it really is easy to follow, as long as you're able to connect the dots in your head. And if you're somehow not able to, then another viewing of it doesn't hurt either, because while it was simple for me to follow the entire story, it is possible that others may not. So I'm not gonna insult anyone for not grasping the whole story of this movie on their first go around. That said, I will say that there is a twist near the end that, while I won't spoil what it is, it could leave you asking a bunch of questions about it until the movie answers it itself. So, you just have to take that for what it's worth. It really is something you're either gonna like or not. Myself, personally speaking, I'm kinda split on it. But it didn't really stop me from enjoying this movie as a whole. So, again, it's just something that you're gonna have to interpret for yourself, really.
All of our characters have tons of depth. The best one has to go to Ole, who is a new character in this movie that has a really strong arc. Where she starts off working for the enemy, to being rescued by Lupin, to her discovering about her missing boyfriend being discovered alive after 2 years. It's a really good arc, and it easily makes her the best character in the entire movie. And as for our establishing characters, most of them are very likable and have tons of personality. The only one of the bunch that has the least amount of screen time is Fujiko, who, when in comparison with the previous movie that I covered for this series, doesn't have a whole lot of screen time here. The same could also be said for Detective Zenigata. However, I will say that, when compared to the previous two movies that I covered in this marathon, he actually does manage to get the 1-Up on Lupin a couple of times here. Where in the previous movies, he was essentially just there for the sake of being a foil in catching Lupin. Here, it's the same shtick, but at least he's not just a worthless comic relief character like he was in "The Secret of Twilight Gemini" and "The Columbus Files". So, at least it's something of an improvement here.
But overall, guys, the writing here is really strong. It's probably some of the strongest I've seen since watching "The Castle of Cagliostro". Again, it's not as good writing as that film had it, but it's still really good as a standalone movie. And as for the acting, well, once again, I am watching the English dub here. And for the 3rd straight time in a row, it was dubbed by Funimation. So naturally, you have the talent pool of actors from that studio reprising the roles for our established characters. Sonny Strait, once again, nails it as Lupin and I'm starting to grow more used to him voicing the character. The only bit of acting that I thought was a bit weak was any time characters had to put on some rather goofy accents. And, of course, when I mean characters, I mean like background characters and such that have to put on accents, which is suppose to be whatever country the movie's taking place in. Now admittedly, I don't really know what country this movie is suppose to take place in, but I will say that the accents are kinda silly and somewhat stupid at the same time. Mind you, now, it's not even all that bad, it's just something that I felt like I needed to mention, just in case there's someone out there who's somehow real picky with accents. Don't really know who that would be, honestly, but there is that *slight*, slight chance. But anyway, the acting here is perfectly fine for the cast here.
Animation, I do want to talk about a bit. Now, first of all, I will say that the animation here is really good, but I do want to comment on something that I brought up at the start of this thing, which was the art-style. The art-style in this movie is very different compared to the other two movies I covered in this marathon. It seems to be, well...not so much realistic per se, but more so down to Earth. Meaning that this movie's animation doesn't seem to be going for as many over-the-top action scenes, though they still do exist in this movie. Especially the beginning of the film, where most of that was definitely there with the prison break scene. But for the most part, it seems to play itself out as a standard action movie. Which there's nothing wrong with that. At least, to me, there isn't. So, while the art-style may be different, just about all of the tropes involving "Lupin the 3rd" are still here. Which is great to see. So yeah, the art-style is great, as is the color palettes and the overall animation as a whole.
Sound-mix here is mixed fine. The music here is fantastic. In fact, honestly, listening to the score in this movie sorta reminds me of another anime series that had awesome music, which is "Cowboy Bebop". The score in this movie reminds me of that, and it works tremendously. It has the perfect vibe to it, and it never really goes away. It's gonna stick with you from the opening title screen, all the way to the end credits. But again, we are talking about "Lupin the 3rd" here, and it would be considered a crime if the music ended up sucking at all. But otherwise, guys, the music here is great.
And with all that said, can I recommend "Lupin the 3rd: Dead or Alive"? Oh yes, certainly, guys. This movie is really good. While the art-style has changed a bit here and the story is a little more complex than previous entries, it's still really entertaining. And once more, if you are a fan of the "Lupin the 3rd" series, and you haven't had a chance to see this one yet, by all means, check it out. It is definitely worth your time. And as for myself, I was pleasantly surprised by it. I wanted it to be really good, and part of me was thinking that it was gonna be just OK. But thankfully, it surpassed that level to a point where I really enjoyed it immensely. I, of course, will be adding it to the ever growing collection of "Lupin the 3rd" movies that I already own. I'm hoping the rest of the marathon is gonna be like that, but we'll just have to wait and see for now. In the meantime, I think I'm gonna go and watch another action movie. Perhaps maybe I'll pop in my copy of "Rambo III", since I rewatched the first two movies already. So, why not go for number 3? I might as well, seeing as how this movie got me in the mood to watch another action film.
And with that, guys, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.
No comments:
Post a Comment