Origin: Spirits of the Past (aka Gin-iro no Kami no Agito) — anime — dvd review
Director: Keiichi Sugiyama
Genre: Anime, Action
In Origin: Spirits of the Past, the forest reclaims earth in catastrophic fashion and leaves human civilization devastated when an experiment in growing plants on the moon goes awry and the plants destroy the moon and extend to earth, tearing through everything in their path. In this post-apocalyptic world, two cities are left, Neutral City, a city built on metropolitan ruins at the edge of a sprawling forest, and Ragna, an industrial city in the middle of the desert that surrounds Neutral City on the opposite side. The people of Neutral City are struggling to co-exist with the beings of the forest, who have them at their mercy and control the only source of water in the town. The people of Ragna seek to destroy the forest as they see it as a threat to civilization. The story follows Agito, the son of one of the founders of Neutral City who by chance happens upon Toola, a young girl from the past who is awakened after forced hibernation and she becomes central in a plot to destroy the forest once and for all by Colonel Shunack of Ragna, a powerful man with a dark secret who aims to rid the world of the forest and return the world to its past.
The visuals in Origin are really spectacular. The computer graphics for the most part blend in very well with the more traditional animation, sometimes to breathtaking effect. I love how the world is fully realized with a great attention to detail in the environments and how each location has its own character. It is obvious that a lot of though was put into this aspect and what validates all of that time is the sense of adventure within this new world that you feel from the characters in the movie. There is danger everywhere as Neutral City is filled with precipitous ledges and the forest is equally dangerous and unpredictable due to the less than friendly inhabitants. The story is a good length and manages to be exciting the whole way through and it tackles the theme of humanity’s harmony with nature in a new way as well as the big question of how people should face the future. I’d certainly recommend this to anyone interested in a good, fun anime feature as it ranks up there with the best I’ve seen and is probably my favorite Funimation release thus far.
The special features contain an extensive 50-minute documentary which covers the 7-year production of the film with interviews with everybody from the Director to the Animation-Checker. You also get to see all of the main voice actors, which is cool, but for the most part this is something that is ok to miss unless you are really interested in these sorts of things. There are also theatrical trailers, some of which that contain characters and scenes not found in the movie, which is pretty interesting. There are also the TV spots which are of less interest.
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