Springtime in Japan in 2000, with Cherry Blossoms
in full bloom and a lot of free time for a college kid with nothing to
do. I walked over to my school’s bookstore to pick up the latest Kansai
Walker, a travel and entertainment guide, to see what was playing at the
movies. Scanning past the usual American movies, I could see them much cheaper
back home, I saw an ad for a Case Closed movie. One thing I hadn’t done
in Japan was to go see an Anime movie. I had seen Godzilla 2000 because I
am a life long kaiju fan ever since seeing Ultraman as a child back in the 70’s
and I also saw Owl’s Castle, a ninja movie. Those were the two main
genres to see in Japan, kaiju and ninja. My fascination with ninja movies
began when HBO and Cinemax aired Enter the Ninja, Revenge of the Ninja, Ninja
III: The Domination and countless others all with ninja in the
title. My favorites were the one with Sho Kosugi and I also liked the
American Ninja series. There was one remaining genre and that was anime.
So I spent most of the day trying to convince my
friends to go see it. No one was interested. I found my old
roommate, Justin, and he agreed immediately. It is nice to have friends
you don’t always have to sell an idea to.
On opening day, which was a Wednesday, we
both skipped class to catch the cheaper matinee. Looking around we were
surrounded by babies and children, accompanied by their parents. I felt
really dumb. I’m sure the five-year old sitting next to me will
understand this movie in Japanese better than I can.
Standing in the lobby after buying a ticket,
I saw a program guide. I hadn’t seen movie programs in the US for a long
time so I decided to buy one for Case Closed. The movie program had a lot of detailed information
about the director, animators, and crew, plus nice glossy pictures.
Before start time, Justin and I nervously discussed
just how hard this movie would be to follow with no subtitles and only 3-years
of Japanese language study.
Finally the lights went out and Case Closed
began. At first it was difficult to follow. Case Closed has a lot
of information that the viewer needs to comprehend to have any chance at all in
solving the mystery. I would probably have had a better job at
understanding by picking an easier to follow movie like Doraemon. I had
already read the Doraemon Japanese manga and it was the perfect place to start
with a basic Japanese reading ability. Case Closed was so much harder to
follow. So I did what I always did when watching a foreign movie, I
discarded the dialogue and concentrated on the images, the sounds, and the
action.
As the ending credits rolled, I was so
confused about the actual plot. Hopefully the movie will be released on
DVD with English subtitles. (that took 10-years to come to light. See my review
of Case Closed: Captured in Her Eyes.)
Exiting the theater, Justin and I walked over
to a nearby McDonald’s to try to piece together what we had just seen. We
both agreed that the umbrella was the key to solving the murder. After
recently watching the DVD version so many years later, we were on the right
track. Plot aside; it was definitely worth watching with a nice loud
booming audio system, a big screen to catch all the beautiful colors and
details.
For anyone planning a trip to see an anime
movie in Japan, I say go for it. Depending on your listening ability I would
start with Doraemon for the beginner and move on to One Piece and Case Closed
after you have the basics mastered. Kaiju movies are much easier because you can skip a lot of the
dialogue and just watch the crazy monster battles.
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