Jin-Roh: The Wolf Brigade

Length: 01:41:59
Format/Subtitles: .MP4 / English .srt subtitles
Audio: Japanese
Director: Hiroyuki Okiura
Writer: Mamoru Oshii
Year of release: 1999
Wikipedia

Despite the mp4 format the video quality is great, the size is after all 1.6 gb so don't worry about quality.

In order to recuperate from my Valkyria adventure I decided to revisit another anime movie that I dearly liked. The movie itself is essentially a military thriller and a nice insight into the mind of a soldier (unlike some animes that I might mention, oh - ho - ho, pretension etc.) but there's very little actual combat (something of a Mamorus trademark).

The story is set in a dystopian alternate timeline where Japan didn't do very well after singing the defeat with the Americans. So in the turmoil and chaos of rebuilding the nation a wide migration to the cities occurred and so a lot slums appeared. Naturally a lot people started breaking the law along with forming various anti-government guerrilla factions etc. Shit hit the fan. Cops on the other hand didn't know what it's like so they did the only natural thing to do which was - more cops. But these were a special breed of police force on par with the military called Panzer Cops (according to wikipedia, but translations vary).

So these guys basically didn't fuck around, carried heavy weapons and arrested everyone with machine gun bullets. In the middle of all this comes our protagonist who's in one of those brigades doing his job like everybody else. As with all jobs unexpected yet expected things (I don't want to spoil it too much so I won't say what) happen and yeah, he needs to deal with it.

Since the story is written by Mamoru Oshii (Ghost In The Shell etc.) you can expect it to be much more than just what I wrote. As usual with his way of storytelling there are a lot of things happening at the same time and not much is being said - they are being showed through subtle actions and reactions of characters. But there is much more plot exposition here through words compared to the rest of his work so it's not that hard to follow what's going on unlike some other of his works. This is probably because of the director who carried the whole movie out.

The movie deals with a lot of problems of morality and the line where we just stop and rethink why are we serving whatever system we are serving and why the hell are we doing this. There's a very noticeable feel of depression and nihilism between the two main protagonists throughout the whole movie. On the surface they just don't really give a shit anymore about who's right or wrong. It wears people down and they portray it really well. It's an internal struggle whether you'll plunge completely into the beast or resurface as a human and live a more normal life.

The movie has a lot of great ideas and messages and it portrays them very well thanks to the combined job of the director and the writer. Both aren't new in this so they know what they are doing and they do it marvelously in all aspects. This is also very apparent in the art style which is somewhere between Akira and later Mamoru Oshiis work. Since the plot is set in post-war Japan there really is not much space to be imaginative but they manage to make all the backgrounds compelling and believable as locations. Lots of short alleys, mass built buildings and blue collar outfits that everyone seems to wear. It all looks very believable and it's enjoyable to look but also depressing as well.

I would love to go into much more detail with this movie but I don't want to spoil the plot for those who didn't watch it so all I can do is share the links and hopefully you'll find this movie as great as I did.

Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 and 11.