Metropolis,
based on a 1949 Japanese comicbook novel by Osamu Tezuka,
is animated with voiceovers in Japanese and subtitles in English.
Directed by Tarô Rin, the visual images are far more
impressive than the story, and oddly the futuristic city has
no computers. When the film begins, an aging autocrat named
Duke Red (voiced by Jamieson Price) is trying to install a
robot that will bring order and peace; the robot’s developer,
Dr. Laughton (voiced by Junpei Takiguchi), has not quite finished.
The military serving under Duke Red, meanwhile, is preparing
for a coup. Duke Red’s unofficially adopted son, Rock
(voiced by Kohki Okada), meanwhile, is trying to eliminate
all lawbreakers and opponents of his father’s rule, especially
the General (voiced by Toshio Furukawa), presumably so that
he can become the successor ruler. Kenichi (voiced by Kei
Kobayashi) and his Okinawan uncle Shunsaku Ban (voiced by
Kousei Tomita) have left Japan for Metropolis to stop Dr.
Laughton, but he is hard to find in such a big city. Accordingly,
Ban hires a robot, which they name Perro (voiced by David
Mallow), to find Dr. Laughton. While pursuing the assignment,
the two Japanese men tour Metropolis’s many nooks and
crannies as well as levels, with music to accompany each different
venue and mood. At one point they run into Tima (voiced by
Yuka Imoto), the Duke Red's handpicked robot successor. Kenichi
becomes amorously attached to Tima, who does not realize at
first that she is merely a robot. Meanwhile, Rock suspects
Ban, Kenichi, Laughton, Tima, and the military of scheming
against him, and he tries to liquidate them, vigilante style.
Throughout the film, the rigid status hierarchy and sexism
of Japan is mirrored in the behavior of the various characters.
Humans are in rebellion against robots, which are putting
them out of work. A very old theme justifies the pro-human
bias, namely, that robots behave more rationally than humans
but humans have such emotions such as love. The Japanese visitors
are viewed as good people, but the denizens of Metropolis
are corrupt, a theme that doubtless resonated with the way
Japanese viewed their military occupation by the United States
in 1949. Although Rock is incredibly handsome and robust in
the film, Kenichi is an ordinary guy, suggesting that Japanese
are very suspicious of narcissists who think that they can
do whatever they want to promote their own interests. In short,
the animation reveals much about how Japanese view themselves
and the world. MH
I
want to comment on this film
