anime review

Princess Mononoke is a mildly violent with some especially violent, yet second-blip visuals. The overall theme of peace and harmony with nature, after the 2.25 hours of film is generally lost on the viewer. The action scenes are well placed, but the long-winded artistic scenes are too frequent. In general, I would not let a child under 11 watch this with me. I would not let a child 11-13 watch this without me. I think, while visually stunning and designed for theater viewing, older kids would not be very entertained by it. As an adult, the temp needed to be picked up also. I think, overall, I would rank it 5.3 with scene re-watchability only.

Castle in the Sky was packed with more slapstick and more humor, though lacked kindness in many respects. The comic relief and would-be sidekicks of the protagonists are pirates; a dubious choice at best. "What is Milton trying to say; that being evil is more fun?"+ The visuals are stunning with early 80s feel mixed with 90s Poke'mon antics and highflying (also Love Hina). The message of compassion is more fluid and the evil is truly evil, with evil men dying -- bloodlessly. I guess ... if a person were to let their child watch Poke'mon, this wouldn't be too far a cry from there, with the notable exception that people die in this cartoon. The sound is so-so and the tempo is better than Princess Mononoke, but still slow. Since this was the second time I watched it (first time in bits), I would say that it has limited re-watchability with an overall ranking of 6.1 (the Japanese sound and sync much better than English).

+ Animal House