Escaflowne the Movie: A Girl in Gaea
Reviewer: Hanako
English Release: Subbed for conventions, rumored theatrical dub release in the US
Production: Bandai and Sunrise
Year of Release: 1999
Genre: Fantasy Mecha Drama
Audience: PG-13 because of the cool violence

I love Escaflowne. A lot. To the point where it is probably my favorite anime series. And being the huge Escaflowne fan I am, I was extremely excited to find out that Otakon was featuring the Escaflowne movie, which has been the talk of the Esca community since last summer. Rumors and speculations had formed about it, but here I have the facts and my humble opinion about it all. I will give away no major spoilers since I know the world would hate me if I did.

Basically, the story is a more meloncholy version of the original: Hitomi is your typical high school girl who happens to be particularly bummed at this time in her life. Wanting to fade away after considering suicide and hurting her best friend, she has a vision of Folken persuading her to help him in Gaea. After hearing a beautiful song, Hitomi is swept away to Gaea, the mysterious dark planet behind the moon. There she meets a boy who she had visions of as a small child. The boy, Van, is a young Prince without a country. Having had his homeland destroyed by the ruthless Black Dragon Clan, he seeks revenge for his family and for his people. He goes about this with the aid of Allen Schezar, Millerna Aston, and their gang of, uh, pirate-like guys in their floating airship. What makes this all tangled up is Van's rather cruel older brother, Folken, who leads the Black Dragon Clan. Among all of his many charming personality quirks, Folken has the twisted wish to see all of Gaea destroyed. In order to do that, he must gain control of the legendary armor Escaflowne, or at least control over whomever ends up piloting it. Hitomi is thrown into the middle of all of this because she alone is the key to the preservation or ultimate destruction of Gaea.

There is one comment about the character design that I have: It's freaking awesome. The characters all have the same basic design, but seem to have 'matured'- the females have more developed bodies, the males have muscles, and everybody has lips. The obscenely long noses have been replaced by shorter, more realistic ones, outfits have been changed drastically, and there seems to be a lot more attention to detail. The simplicity of the television series has been thrown out the window- the visual job done will leave you dizzy. Every wrinkle, every shadow, every strand of hair has its own life. The outfits are detailed and the changes are very noticeable. Van has been morphed into a little barbarian powehouse. Allen reminds me of Laguna from Final Fantasy VIII. Folken looks more David Bowie-like than he did in the original series and has a COOL OUTFIT. Millerna probably has been changed the most, and looks like a punk biker girl. It's kinda... err, gross. But that's okay. She's still cool.

It wasn't until I listened to the music from the movie again I remembered how much I liked it. As is typical with Yoko Kanno, the music totally sets the mood. Sora's song is very beautiful and, heck, if I heard it I would probably want to get swept away to a weird world, too. I think it's in French, but I can't really tell because sometimes it sounds French, then English, then Japanese. It confuses me. But it's still awesome. The slow techno ballad version of it is totally awesome. If I remember coreectly, two popular characters that make a cameo *I won't tell you who* sing it. And don't worry- your favorite monks that chant 'Ehhhhhh-Scahhh-Flooooow-Naaaaaay' are in there, too, as is 'Dance of Curse'. Both are kicked up a notch and are noticeably faster, but they're the same songs. The rest of the score is very good, including all of the new music. I was impressed by it all.

There were some things that did annoy me. Mainly, it was the fact that they tried to cram an entire 26-episode series into a 90-minute movie. Even though it was a stand-alone movie, they tried their hardest to introduce all of the characters from the series and have them play a part in the plot somehow. That was a bit on the not-good side. The beginning was rather slow because of the introductions of characters. Because of that, in the end things went by way too fast and story, which could have been resolved in a graceful and meaningful way came to an abrupt end.

Overall, I just loved it. The character design and music kept me totally glued to my seat, so whatever stupid thing the plot did didn't phase me all too much. I also got to see it in a movie theater, so that might have completely enhanced my Esca-experience. In addition to that, it's just amusing to watch Dilandau run around in his underwear. Watch the movie- you'll see.