[alita01]

sorry if this has been brought up, but i was wondering what people are thinking about animes being turned into movies? the two that i'm thinking of specifically are evangelion and battle angel alita at the moment. i don't know who's helming NGE or anything. all i really know is that weta's been working on it for a while now. as for BAA, i think it's fairly common knowledge that james cameron is directing and that he plans to make alita a fully cg character in a live action environment. the year for release that's been mentioned is 2009.

i know that anime has a growing fandom in the states, but is anyone ambivalent about the U.S. taking something that's distinctly not ours and trying to make it ours? i'm curious about the transition that the shows will have to make and what changes are going to happen because they'll be marketing it to an american audience initially, not it being released in japan and then being brought over to the states.

also, the whole live action thing? the mechas, the angels, the designs. it's a tall order i think. and i'm wondering if part of the appeal of anime is that it is animation where people have/look/do things that aren't possible in real life.

thoughts?

[kyubichan]

Anime to live movie = not good. Only ones that are along the lines of GitS will probably work. But NGE? C'mon. Personally, I have qualms about East to West transitions (I think the US version of The Ring just sucked ass, not coz it's crappy, but because it was too far away from the original story). There was also a rumor about a live Sailor Moon movie with Lindsay Lohan on the lead. LOLZ

[alita01]

GitS?


anything with lindsay lohan just needs to not be done >_<

[darktruth]

Well I've seen one manga to live action type of film and that wasn't actually made by Hollywood, that was City Hunter starring Jackie Chan and it was a Hong Kong movie. I'm not sure if there's an anime for City Hunter but when I saw the live action version adapted from the manga, it was pretty average to be honest but part of the film was quite hilarious (a certain scene involving street fighter characters lol).

Also there's a Hong Kong live action film of Initial D based from the anime as well, so it's not only the US that are "taking" an anime that's distinctly not theirs, but I haven't seen it though. I think it's considerate to look into asian films as there tend to be more live action films based off manga and anime than US films, I've hardly seen a live action Hollywood film that's fully based on either an anime or manga but I do see that they do get part of their ideas from it.

While we're on this topic as well, there's also a live action film version of the Perfect Blue anime and that was made by the Japanese but from what I've read from those who've seen it, they say it's quite bad and doesn't live up to the anime version.

So overall I'd say live action film adaptations from either an anime or manga is not a wise idea regardless of which countries are making it. I'm not totally against it but I'm speculating it'd take one hell of a task to truely pull it off and make it as good as the anime/manga was.

[The Wolf]

I have seen those two movies, and my goodness, they were bad. What you've got to understand about Hong Kong cinema is that fans don't really like to watch a movie that in Western society would say is good, because to them, its all about their favourite stars. In Hong Kong, stars have to be able to do practically everything, eg, act, sing, write songs, etc. You won't believe at how obsessive the fans can get over there.
I did see another manga turned into movie by the Chinese. It was called Saviour of Souls. It stars Aaron Kwok and Andy Lau. It was probably one of the worse things that I have ever seen in my entire life. And I had never even heard of the manga before.

anything with lindsay lohan just needs to not be done >_<

I totally agree.

[alita01]

i think You're Under Arrest was also made into a live action series. i've seen torrents for it around...

i think the transition from culture to culture is something that might require too much change for fans of the original to really be satisfied. i also think there's a reason that a series is animated, y'know? there are so many things we can't do in a live action production that animation accomplishes... ah well.

personally (or maybe obviously? haha), i'm more concerned with BAA being made into a movie and James Cameron being the director. i hated titanic and him ripping off the series in order to make Dark Angel really pisses me off >_<. i'm not sure how well his plan of making alita all cg in a live action environment suits me either... i can appreciate the experimentation, i just wish he wouldn't do it with my favorite series!!! -_-

[GabeXorn]

There's a live action version of Great Teacher Onizuka thats supposed to be good but I think its a tv series

[kyubichan]

There is also a live series of Gokusen, but the actors are Korean (I think). And there's a Chinese (?) live series of Condor Heroes and A Chinese Ghost Story.

GitS = Ghost in the Shell; you know, sci-fi/ conspiracy stuff thingies, which would probably translate better to movies than magical school girls and giant mechs.

[darktruth]

The Condor Heroes anime was actually based on the original 80's live action series from the Chinese same as A Chinese Ghost Story (if you didn't already know from the title lol), also one of the recent animes Gankutsuou is loosely based on The Count Of Monte Cristo. So you can see the Japanese also use other stories that's not really theirs for anime.

To add to that, there was also some news last year or so of a fantasy book series called Deltora Quest written by Australian writer Emily Rodda being turned into a Japanese anime series and it's going to be released this year. You can read a little bit about it here and here.

[Kiai]

I think the only reason product to movie adaptations suck so much is because the creative minds involved are too interested in creating something new out of a formula that has always worked the way it was. Plot changes, character changes, and general mood changes all affect the way we watch, mostly because we're so used to the way something has worked. If it aint broke, why fix it?

[kyubichan]

One good example for Kiai's post is (though not based on anime, but rather on a console game) Resident Evil.

[Moelman]

I just don't really see any live action movies based on animes working too well. It would be so different since most animes have such a distinctive style that you can only portray with animation.

[Lynk Former]

I think the only anime/manga/comic/game/whatever to film adaption would be something that allows for an interpretation in the first place. Such as Batman. We've seen how the franchise has been reborn with Batman Begins... you just can't do that with most animes. About the only anime I can think of is Last Exile which you could really get away with making a film adaption of.

[PJ-Animation]

Personally, I don't like the idea. Most manga's and anime's were made with the cartoonish look in mind, literally. I just can't imagine them translating well. They each are unique, and making them into a live action movie gets rid of that. They don't have the... personality, I guess would be the word.

I know they did do it to the American superheroes, but I've never read any of the comic versions of them, so I can't compare the movies to the comics. I don't even think they followed the same story line, but again, I don't know.

[Moelman]

I don't even think they followed the same story line, but again, I don't know.

The Superhero movies follow what happened in the comics pretty closely actually. But that's different than manga I think. Just the distinct drawing style couldn't be reproduced with live action I don't think.

[Lynk Former]

The thing about Superman and Batman and all that is that more than one person has made their comic of these characters. Many different people have worked on it and many different styles were used to interpret these fictional worlds.

The Superman and Batman and X-Men movies do follow the story laid down in the comics very closely, but because someone allowed a varied group of interpretive styles it's a lot more accepted than your anime/manga/game to film conversions.

[The Wolf]

I heard that the guy who made the comic of "V for Vendetta" didn't like the movie. He also made teh comics for some other ones that turned into movies. Can't think of them all, but I know one of them is "The league of Extraordinary Gentlemen".

Anyway, Japanese people don't like to watch anime. Well, at least a majority of them don't. They would rather read the manga. Anime is targeted at Western Society. I personally prefer the manga myself, I'm sure many agree. So, maybe there are things that just aren't meant to be made into motion.

[alita01]

the differences in style reflect a fair amount of the difference in culture and who the different genres are marketed too as well. i recently bought something from rightstuf and in their catalogue they have a whole 'live action' section, which i supposed answered part of the question. there's an obvious market for it in japan then, but in america? that's the kicker. again, i'm wondering if the gap between audiences/expectations/cultures will be crossed without losing the uniqueness of the show, especially considering that we look to manga and anime because of how different they are to american entertainment. i'm not thinking "oh, it's japanese it must be great", but how the art and the stories and the characters draw us to them more than the standard american comic. i have to think that this is in part due to how comics/manga and cartoons/anime are regarded within each society as well. the fact that manga/anime are actually a decently respected genres would definitely have an impact.

[darktruth]

You're right, the difference between the eastern and western society regarding animated stuff is the respect they have.

In the US, most of their cartoons are purely aimed at young children and families with some exceptions like South Park, Family Guy and American Dad. Many of these contain humour which pretty much shows how they perceive cartoons as. With animes, there are series that are very dark and contain very little or no humour in it at all showing how serious they take it.

Even most Hollywood animated/cartoon films always have humour in a number of ways compared to anime movies like Perfect Blue, Ninja Scroll and RahXephon. I guess another difference between these is that anime movies (and in some cases anime series) usually try to make a point while hollywood animated films are made usually for entertainment and laughs.

[The Wolf]

I don't think that the last statement that you made is entirely true. Yes, there are people in Hollywood who would make these animation purely for entertainment. But, there are some really good ones out there.

Anyway, if anyone is to blame for this whole anime to movie thing are those frigging fan boys/girls who watch anytype of anime (especially some of those awful ones that MADMAN release) and say that its good.

[darktruth]

Name those "good" ones that doesn't resort to using humour to make it interesting or really enjoyable. There's rarely any Hollywood animated films that go above the G or PG rating these days, the last I could think of was South Park: The Movie and even that used (crude) humour.

When I think about it more, it seems like cartoon movies in the western society weren't taken for granted as much as it is now during the era where Disney revolutionised animation. If you look at it, the first ever animated film in Hollywood (which is Snow White & The 7 Dwarves) had a somewhat dark and sinister plot but was branded as a family film. Think of how many scared children there would've been after seeing the transformation scene of the queen turning into the old hag lol. It was even labelled as unsuitable for young children when it originally came out.

Since the decades have passed, cartoon movies in the western society have toned down much more on the level of storyplots containing violence. Now some people here might be surprised with my comment here but I don't think anime would've really existed had it not been for Disney changing the way people saw animation. So as much as I...how can I put it? Dislike the majority of American cartoons these days with a few exceptions like The Simpsons and American Dad, I do acknowledge anime pretty much owes itself to Disney.

Having said that, I do see there are also animes that are also taken for granted (Crash Gears, Yu-Gi-Oh etc) made purely to sell toys, but there are also animes that were originally aimed for mature teens and adults being butchered down for the sake of selling merchandise to young kids when they're brought over to the US (Dragon Ball Z, GT etc is a prime example and the latest is One Piece). That pretty much shows how much animation is respected in the US.

When you compare the two different forms of animation between the eastern and western societies (in this case Japan and the US), Japan appears to take their animation more seriously. The US had taken it very seriously in the early 20th century but up to this day, many of these are made out of humour or political jokes making fun of their society or to simply sell children's toys. Now I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that but it's kind of sad to see that it costs the respect of animation for these things to happen.

[Scar da Kookee]

how about Noir? seems simple enough to do, it dont need any flashy special effects to do, so a lower budget shouldnt be a problem