Yep, subtle
Official site for Utena - the Movie.
Produced by Central Park Media.
From Revolutionary Girl Utena: The Movie (same film, kids) :
A new student comes to a strange school and is caught up in a battle for the affection of a beautiful and mysterious girl. Sounds like a familiar plot, doesn’t it?But REVOLUTIONARY GIRL UTENA: THE MOVIE is not your typical high school drama. For one thing, the new student isn’t all he seems to be—and neither is the school. Duels, mystery, conspiracy, hate, love and millions of roses fill this award-winning animated movie.
In 1997, director Kunihiko Ikuhara and popular female comic artist Chiho Saito created the TV series “Revolutionary Girl Utena,” which broke new ground in portraying an intense emotional relationship between two girls, gender-bending Utena and femme Anthy. (Ikuhara was already well known in the U.S. for his work directing the animated series “Sailor Moon,” which had a lesbian couple as part of its regular cast of sailor-suited super-powered girls.) In the TV series, Ikuhara and Saito created a world in which the beautiful and powerful students of exclusive Oohtori Academy each suffer for their secrets, even as they try to win the mysterious “power to revolutionize the world.” With the movie, Ikuhara takes the relationship between Utena and Anthy to the next level.
Beautifully animated, UTENA boasts one of the finest voice acting casts in Japan and a chart-topping soundtrack. We are pleased to have award-winning director Kunihiko Ikuhara here in person for this screening—sure to be a feast for the eyes, ears and heart.
—Erica Friedman
at the site for the 26th San Francisco International Lesbian & Gay Film Festival.
Missed it back in June of last year, natch. Film's out on video & DVD, but looks like one of them things works better on the big screen.
Well, what can you?
Want to know more? There's always Utena TV, for a start, or Anime Web Turnpike is always good. . .
Comments
I want to see more of the tv shows, since the movie would've made precious little sense to anyone that watched that w/o watching at least some of the shows first. As it is, the last 1/3 of the film is still some of the most surreal anime footage I've ever seen.
& you might mention that Anthy Himamya [sp] is one of the few anime characters that seems to be coded Indian.
Posted by: neogrammarian | December 1, 2003 11:16 AM
Well, I don't have to, you just did. . .
Haven't seen any of the tv show or the movie, if I remember a'right. I did read the first few chapters of the manga back when I was buying Animerica Extra, but I dropped 'em when they dropped X/1999.
Well, guess there's adding the DVDs to my Yeah-I-Wish list and checking the local video stores. . .
Anywhere in Columbus have 'em for rent? We can do an Utena fest when I'm out there. Uh, for a week or two. . .
Posted by: Aaron | December 1, 2003 12:14 PM