Product Description

The next installment in the Appleseed franchise Appleseed: Ex Machinaavailable on DVD! Produced by John Woo and Directed by Shinji Aramakiand featuring next generation CG technology Appleseed: Ex Machina isback bigger and badder!Based on the manga from reknown creator Shirow Masamune in this movieDeunan and Briareos are both partners and lovers. As members of ESWATthe elite forces serving Olympus they are deployed everywhere troublestrikes. The two fighters find their partnership tested in a new way bythe arrival of Tereus who uncannily resembles Briareos before thewartime injuries that led to his becoming a cyborg. At the same timeOlympus finds itself under a stealth attack . Cyborg terrorism deadlynanotech zealots and rioting citizens are just some of the threats thatDeunan must contend with as she fights to save Olympus.System Requirements:Running Time: 159 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: SCI-FI/FANTASY/FANTASY Rating: PG-13 UPC: 085391200673 Manufacturer No: 120067

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5221 in DVD
• Brand: Warner Brothers
• Released on: 2008-03-11
• Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Aspect ratio: 1.66:1
• Formats: Animated, Closed-captioned, Collector's Edition, Color, DVD-Video, Limited Edition, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, Japanese
• Number of discs: 2
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 104 minutes

Amazon.com
Produced by John Woo and directed by Shinji Aramaki, Appleseed Ex Machina (2007) ranks as the most elaborate, stylish, and violent of the three adaptations of Masamune Shirow's manga. When it was released in 1988, the original Appleseed felt like a summary of anime's past, while Akira pointed the way to the future. The second Appleseed (2004), also directed by Aramaki, was an unimpressive motion-capture CG feature that borrowed elements from other sci-fi anime. In this latest incarnation, Deunan, Briareos, and Tereus of the E.S.W.A.T. team are charged with preserving the peace of the city-state of Olympus, a hi-tech paradise on a largely ruined Earth. Screenwriters Kiyoto Takeuchi and Todd W. Russell have given the story a contemporary twist, adding attacks by "cyborg terrorists" and an effort by the ruler of Olympus to control a world-wide satellite surveillance system. When cyborgs and human launch coordinated attacks on the government headquarters in Olympus, Deunan, Briareos, and Tereus swing into action against a mysterious enemy. The plot has little in common with the earlier films: the Appleseed technology that was at the core of the story isn't even mentioned. The look, tone, and characters in Ex Machina recall Shirow's Ghost in the Shell, rather than the original Appleseed. Not surprisingly, the elaborately choreographed fight scenes reflect Woo's signature style, with slo-mo martial-arts combat, close-ups of falling shells, dynamic camerawork, and all-out gun battles. But the weightless movements of the motion-capture characters and the limited rendering of the skin textures gives Appleseed Ex Machina the feel of an extremely elaborate computer game. Despite the limits of the mo-cap technology, Appleseed Ex Machina is a fast-past, take-no-prisoners cinematic adventure that will delight action-movie fans as well as anime lovers. (Rated PG-13: violence, violence against women, profanity, grotesque imagery, potentially offensive religious imagery.) --Charles Solomon

On the DVD
The second disc contains two jittery documentaries: The Apple Seed Chronicles: The Definitive History of this Anime Phenomenon and East Meets West: Similarities and Variations in How Different Cultures Enjoy the Art Form. Chronicles includes printed quotes from Shirow, but no appearance by the reclusive cartoonist; East Meet West juxtaposes commentary from such knowledgeable authorities as Roland Kelts ("Japanamerica"), Giles Poitras ("The Anime Compantion"), and Carl Horn ("Japan Edge") with self-styed "Anime Addicts." Lacking appropriate visuals, the filmmakers clutter with screen with images of toys, simple graphics, crudely drawn cartoons, and amateur actors mugging for the camera. --Charles Solomon

Customer Reviews

Appleseed Rocks!
This DVD is a sequel to the movie released in 2004 [Appleseed (Widescreen) (2004)] not a remake. This is a "must see" not just for Appleseed fans but for all fans of Japanese Anime. The bonus features are entertaining and informative. Add to cart, you won't regret it. (AliasQTip is a real person, not a paid celebrity.) :D

awesome!
it amuses me that there's always a handful of people who can give a 1 star rating for just about anything. if you wanted to watch shakespeare in the park then you're to blame - not the people who created this awesome work. the animation is incredible, the action scenes are fantastic, the repeat viewability is very high. if you're looking for serious brain stimulation, do sudoku. if you want to enjoy a fun animated film - this is 5 stars for sure.

John Woo's greasy fingerprints all over
Appleseed the original movie (from the early 90's) was great. Appleseed the CG update from a few years back was also great. This sequel is awful. The creative hand-off from Shirow Masamune to John Woo could not have been worse. Woo, you'll remember, gave us such heartwarming tales as "Face/Off" and "Mission Impossible 2". His signature idiom is that violence is *beautiful*. In CGI, that becomes an even MORE flawed premise than it is for live-action film because the constraints imposed by physics are removed. Most directors of anime are content to continue modeling such normal forces as, say, gravity or anatomy. But that apparently gets in the way of Woo's violence-porn story. In the future as envisioned by Woo, EVERY man is a muscle-bound spartan god, EVERY woman is a gorgeous D-cup. Woo is also in love with Matrix-style slow-motion spinarounds, his theory being that if a little of it is good, then gobs'n'gobs of it is better. The film speed slows down so often so we can watch superhuman gymnastics or visible bullet-trails that I wanted to ask the movie if I should get out and push.

Visual problems aside, the story is nothing to write home about. There's some vague use of the idea of human/cyborg tension and the awkwardness of meeting your own clone, but it goes nowhere and is dumped in favor of a villain whose "I'll-rule-the-world!" monologues make Doctor Evil look nuanced and believable. At one point, the villain's lieutenant commits suicide and I ran the DVD back three or four scenes because I couldn't figure out why. But I still couldn't figure it out and I'm pretty convinced that either there's simply no reason for it or else they accidentally edited out whatever reason there was supposed to be for it. Even the hero's dialog jangles like a handful of loose change.

I never thought I'd watch anime that I enjoyed so little as this film.