Thursday, 17 January 2013

Completed in the Past: Voices of a Distant Star

Considering what i'm watching now I wanted to talk about one of the Sci-fi stories i has seen that didn't turn me into a sobbing mess for days.

Now I have mentioned before that i am not a fan of shows that have anything to do with space, for some reason it sends my mind to dark scary places that are just not fun for me.

So why would i pick up an anime that deals with some deep and sad issues of live, death, war and time dilation?

Well first off it was actually a gift. See my father is a writer and ever since i was small he encouraged me to make things.... even if no one was around to help me... Hell on my tenth birthday i forced my birthday guests to be actors and directed a 10 min short film in essentially an afternoon.
Needless to say it's terrible.... i mean.... i was ten.... i wrote it when i was nine.... i spent a weekend editing it.... theres no fade in (there is a fade out though lol) and i was relying on the shitty on board mike.... so yeah..... it's bad... but at least i tried right?

well ever since i've made little things here and there (nothing that will ever be shown.... cause no...) and my father will occasionally by me things and say "this was pretty much done by one person" And this was either the first or the second thing that was like that.

So what is voices of a distant star?
It's a single 25 minute movie that packs in quite a story, i may get some of it wrong cause it's been ages since i've watched it...
Essentially Mikako and Noboru either have crushes on each other or love each other, she joins the army/space program and continues to get sent further away from earth, due to the speed they are traveling and the fact that she's communicating to Noboru via Text message the time between the twos messages continue to grow.... it goes from having no delay to having years delay.... and it's really sad, i rewatched the end to remember it and now i'm tearing up... it's not episode 16 of clannad after story sad.... but it definitely tugs on the heartstrings.
All in 25 minutes.... all created by Makoto Shinkai with 2d and 3d animation... the only other people who worked on it were the two voice actors and the composer.

And he didn't stop there, Places promised on our early days and 5cm per second (which i do own but have yet to watch.... i really should) two titles that i know a lot of anime fans cherish were also done by him.... only those times he had money behind him.
while he has only been making titles for 10 years so far i have yet to see a flop.

So....
why bring this up now?
What does this have to do with Macross?

Well aside from Macross it's the only other show that gives me no panic attaks... at all... i don't even mind the time difference or the concept of light speed or any of that, you could argue that the other things that scare me have more time to freak me out but no... the last 13 episodes of gurren lagaan doesn't break me nearly as much as the last two episodes of gunbuster.... so time had nothing to do with it.
maybe because this story doesn't need to be a mech story in space at all... if could just be a story of a girl going to war across the world and the letters taking longer and longer to get to him. thats neither a negative or a positive but thats the similarity it shares with macross.... i'll talk about it more when i finish that show but theres very little in space in any of the macross seasons i have seen.... it's pretty much just a romance story with some aliens and music thrown in for fun.

ah but none of that matters. Voices of a distant star is an amazing short film, one of my all time favs and thats not because it's only done by one person.... it's just amazing in it's own right.
It was licensed by ADV........
...
..
.
*sighs*
anyways maybe sentai or section 24 holds the license now? if not you can probably still find it online or at cons... it's worth a watch.  

anyways just wanted to say all this to reiterate i don't hate sci-fi.... just finding titles i can sit through is tricky.
but seriosuly try and find this one.... it's worth it.

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