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Metropolis (Metoroporisu) - Yuka Imoto, Junpei Takeguchi, Kei Kobayashi, Tarô Rin

Threat advisory: High - High risk of entertaining activities

Movie propaganda

Set in the future, Metropolis is a grand city-state populated by humans and robots, the cohabitants of a strictly segmented society. Amidst the chaos created by anti-robot factions, detective Shunsaku Ban and his sidekick Kenichi (Kei Kobayashi) are searching for rebel scientist Doctor Laughton (Junpei Takeguchi), to arrest him and seize his latest creation, Tima (Yuka Imoto), a beautiful young girl. When they locate them, Shunsaku quickly comes to realise that the eccentric scientist is beyond their reach, protected by a powerful man and his fierce desire to reclaim a tragic figure from his past.

Persons of interest

  • Yuka Imoto .... Tima
  • Junpei Takeguchi .... Doctor Laughton
  • Kei Kobayashi .... Kenichi
  • Kouki Okada .... Rock
  • Toshio Furukawa .... the General
  • Osamu Tezuka .... Comic book writer
  • Katsuhiro Ôtomo .... Screenwriter
  • Tarô Rin .... Director

Cinematic intelligence sources

Intelligence analyst

Special Agent Matti

Theatrical report

Cool!

Metropolis is a most cool animation, having a huge story but showing it at the most intimate of levels. Like Blade Runner, the world is divided into layers that are physical as well as social. The rich and powerful live up in the light while the poor and powerless scrape by down in the dirt. Through these levels travel the outsiders: foreigners sent on a strange and mysterious mission...

The animation is excellent, recalling both Saturday morning cartoons and hints of Alien; it's the two-dimensional art form taken into a whole new realm, filtered through the world of contradictions that is the Japanese culture. You have to see it to believe it.

Media intelligence (DVD)

  • Audio: Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS
  • Disc: Single side, single layer
  • Features:
    • Disc 1:
      • Feature
      • Trailers: Theatrical, bonus
      • Picture disc
    • Disc 2:
      • Behind-the-scenes: Animax special: The making of "Metropolis" (30 minutes)
      • Biographies: Talent profiles
      • Gallery: Conceptual art including character design
      • Interviews: Tarô Rin, Katsuhiro Ôtomo
      • Multi-angle: 2 scenes
      • Picture disc
      • Text file: History of translating Osamu Tezuka's comic book to film
  • Languages: English, Japanese
  • Picture: Widescreen (1.85:1/16:9 enhanced)
  • Subtitles: English (original Japanese translation), English (USA theatrical version), English Captions, Hindi, Dutch

Security censorship classification

PG (Medium level violence, adult themes)

Surveillance time

108 minutes (1:48 hours)

Not for public release in Australia before date

Film: 27 June 2002
DVD rental: 16 October 2002
VHS rental: 16 October 2002

Cinema surveillance images

Metropolis image

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