Genius Party

The cell is the smallest unit of life. Its mechanisms are complex, and only after many years of observation and exploration have we begun to understand their functions. Certainly, the examination of multicellular organisms warrants a much more exhausting amount of research. Even more sophisticated is the existence of life so varied and so involved that it involves taxonomical classification schemes and entire bodies of research. Plants have different organs which serve specific purposes, are able to reproduce sexually, and perhaps most interestingly, transform sunlight into energy for life. Animals consume other creatures and have a conscience, exhibiting specific social and survival patterns and areable to learn from their experiences and transform their sensory input into wisdom. Humans go as far as to have sentience and grammar. Where does the extent of our ability to understand life lie, and what is the attainable extent of life? These questions may not be answered in our lifetimes, or ever. There may be no answers. Genius Party is a brilliant anthology of mind-stimulating shorts which attempt to shatter modern animation paradigms. Driving the stories is the idea that the human mind is filled with unknowns, and that our universe is clearly incomprehensible. With such obvious observations, it follows that anime as an art need not have its content presented in a segmented and understandable way, for that would fail to emulate the very world we live in. Rather, life is too complex to be understood, and it is through its confusion and novelty that we must wade in order to find the answers. As human nature would have it, we can find meaning in anything as long as we believe in its significance, although whether or not anything truly has significance may be indiscernible. Commenting on Genius Party as a whole is difficult. It is, after all, a collection of disparate stories from a diverse cast of directors. They all succeed in providing a snapshot of current anime trends and capabilities, but their goals are as varied as their plots. It is without question that all the shorts have the asset of awesome animation, motivating soundtracks and captivating stories. Even if they fail to resonate with the audience, boredom seems distant due to the sheer novelty and excitement of the works. Genius Party comes highly recommended not only for the anime enthusiast, but for anyone who has even the slightest interest in cinema and entertainment. The audience is certain to pick favorites among the stories - which stories you find interesting may depend on your life experience and perspective. It may serve as an interesting exercise to contemplate why those stories click with you; you just might learn something about yourself.

Since Genius Party is a compilation anime with no overarching connection, I'll post what I thought about each one in the order of my favorites. 7. Limit Cycle This one was really bizarre. This is the longest short at about 18 minutes, but struck me as the worst of the whole thing. Basically a man made out of static and moving motifs goes on a very long, fast paced speech about.... literally nothing. Usually if I see someone say something attempted to sound complicated but falls under its own weight I don't believe them, but I see this as one of those cases. The man talks abouta variety of philosophical, religious, sexual, and biblical topics with absolutely no context, all in one stream. This must have been a nightmare to sub, it was almost a nightmare to watch as well. Maybe the point of this short went completely over my head, I wouldn't put it past me, but if you are expecting any kind of explanation of what is going on or any kind of basic premise on which your interpretation can be based on, you will not find it in this short. If I had to guess optimistically, the point was to be as chaotic and nonsensical as possible, in order to make some sort of "sentence-art" phenomenon to go on. This would work out well with the visuals, which are extremely spectacular, both technically and creatively speaking. A variety of colorful motifs and symbols take up the screen most of the time, and it is cool to see. Not enough to make the short itself fun though, unlike in the Genius Party opening short. 6. Doorbell This short also struck me as weaker than the rest. The premise revolves around college student looking man, who finds himself unable to walk into places or houses because a specter of himself is already in the house, and no one can see him. This sounds strange on paper, its also strange on screen. Although this short is about 13 minutes, it still felt a bit too long. At least half of the short revolved around the nameless main character walking around town, which isn't exactly a technical marvel or art style or animation I might add. In the end it was rather boring because of this, as well a premise that didn't interest me. The climax obviously carries some deeper meaning, and I won't reveal exactly what it is just in case some are reading the review without seeing it. My interpretation is that the young man is either bipolar, or it has something to do with how people put on different faces and sub-personalities based on their environment. Definitely not strong on that though, as it was an ambiguous climax. I wouldn't watch this one a second time. 5. Shanghai Dragon The theme of this short is the imagination of children, and the premise is a young chinese boy acquires a futuristic device that allows him to create basically anything using it like chalk, that is he makes a drawing out of something with it on the ground and it comes into reality. Overall I was mixed with this one. Unlike Doorbell or Limit Cycle, I never got bored while watching it, but I wasn't stunned by anything either. The theme of children's imagination conquering the evil robot overlords was cool but, when you think about it, all of these Genius Party shorts already have a theme on imagination to begin with. The visuals definitely had a style to them, but it wasn't a very unique style like the one used in Deathtic 4. The action and chase sequences were both very fun to watch, as well as the finishing scene were the boy powers up into his imaginative toku suit of armor to fight evil. Again, didn't blow me away but its just another addition to the compilation, and is good variety in retrospect. Cool crayon art stuff on some scenes. Salute to Sai and his cuban cigars. 4. Baby Blue This short is directed by Shinichiro Watanabe, the well known director of Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Champloo. A high school student asks a girl to skip class with him and go somewhere. The girl agree and they head off, all the while small talking and reminiscing a little bit. It turns out they don't really know where they are going, but eventually decide they want to make a turn for the beach, and off they go. Baby Blue features very hushed voice acting, which gives off a subtle feel compared to the rest of the compilation, and the banter between the two really complimented the atmosphere well. This isn't one of those shorts that tries to hit you over the head with symbolism, its just kind of a simple story that I can't really describe much further without spoiling, but it works well. There were some funny scenes too, most notably the part where they were intercepted by the bike cop. Bike cop had a cool voice too, good audio experience indeed. I liked the ending too. Another good short and a nice quiet anime to compliment with the crazy action of some of the other shorts. Besides that, not much else to say about this one. 3. Genius Party (short) This is the titular short of the compilation, the first of the pack in order, and also the shortest at around 5 minutes. It is similar to Limit Cycle in where, you really don't know what the hell is going on. That is to say the events that transpire are without any form of context are background information. Big difference though, it isn't 18 minutes long and full of monotonous nonsense. Instead, its an explosive piece of animation, with awesome art style and spectacular choreography to boot. Everything is colorful and complimentary, it is a huge visual and audio presentation and a great way to start off the short. An animation explosion is what it is. It's so short you could watch it on youtube in a few minutes so I won't say whats going on in the short besides theres these really happy rocks and they love to dance. Great anime. 2. Deathtic 4 CGI oh no! The CGI is really cool though because it has something many CGI anime lack, and that is detail to the art. Usually because CGI isn't meant to look like art i.e drawings in the first place, thats for the modern traditionally animated anime. This short features a bunch of zombie dudes trying to send a frog who fell into zombie land through a tornado in the sky or something (Uzu Uzu.) They get embroiled in some shit on the way. Plot is straightforward. Fantastic art though seriously, its like some kind of woodcut style thing. I usually hate CGI but I really loved the style of the background and the art. The style was particularly cool, everything is dead and zombieish, character designs fit the bill and they are all very unique. Props to the zombie police and Posse. This was one of the most entertaining shorts for me, mostly due to the reasons above, I really like when the shorts feature experimental animation or art or cool design, this one has all three. Details on the CGI, its basically like the characters themselves are computer generated, but they have a caricature style that you usually don't see in CGI anime, although you see it in western CGI alot. The backgrounds were mostly drawn in though. Anyways its a short with a simple premise but its unique because of some really funny scenes and cool style. Also all of the characters speak in some kind of bizarre, incomprehensible Scandinavian/Russian which only adds to the out of worldness of the environment. 1. Happy Machine This was my favorite short in the compilation, and is directed by one of my favorite directors, Yuasa Masaaki who directed Kaiba, Kemonozume, and The Tatami Galaxy. If you had to relate this short to anything complete he has worked on, it would be Kaiba. In a sense, Happy Machine is a visual prototype for the style and the atmosphere featured in full on Kaiba. The visuals and the design of characters, creatures etc. are very unique, in fact they are my favorite of the entire short, even more so than in Deathtic 4. I love how chaotic and enjoyable the director can make a short with such a simple premise that it goes without words, but will go with words for the sake of the review: A baby is taken care of in a bizarre machination of a day care center, only to leave it on a combination of impulse and accident, and ends up venturing out in a world that really doesn't have any laws of physics to speak of. The short is made up of several main scenes, like parts where the baby encounters a flame who burns his crackers, and riding a gigantic horse plant thing. It is not reliant on detail to add to the experience, instead more so on really cool atmosphere, music, and funny scenes. This is a kind of anime that you can just turn your brain off too and go wide with wonder, kind of like the baby. I wonder if this was the intention. Happy Machine has a theme about the cycle of life that only really makes sense at the end of it. It is really entertaining, an animation and style experiment that eventually matured into Kaiba, which was also one of my favorite anime. A great one to watch with friends.

Genius Party [Opening]: groovy music, I like it Shanghai Dragon : it's cute I guess Deathtic 4 : you ugly, not much to say Doorbell: Saramago called, he said he did it better; some interesting ideas by the end though Limit Cycle: Oh my god, shut up, this was so pedantic and dull. 20mins in length but felt like an hourHappy Machine : might feel a bit draught out but Yuasa always manages to compel you to stick around Baby Blue : Shinkai in shambles. The most "short and sweet" out of all of them. Would love to see another anthology film or OVA by Watanabe.

Genius party brings a group of directors, each of which assigned an 5 to 20 minutes episode. The result? 7 unique pieces of anime from across the board. When I think anime, this is the kind of thing I imagine - the huge variety and depth only animation can achieve. Genius Party. First is a 5 minute ride through the surreal. It is lively and compelling and appears to take you through the unknown in this bizzare world. Fantastic. 8/10 Shanghai Dragon. Second shows that even a simple kid can save the world. It glimpses the somewhat "genius" of children, and their huge imagination which haveadults have lost with time. Great animation and an interesting action packed storyline. 7/10 Deathtic 4 boosts brilliant 3D animation, but not much else. The storyline and characters all lack depth and perception, though the idea itself of a zombie world is fairly interesting. 6/10 Doorbell at first appears to be boring, but don't be fooled, the conclusion clears up the confusion and leaves you with a strange feeling and a particular concept. The animation personally I didn't like. 6.5/10 Limit Cycle. A monologue that explores the philosophy of life, God, the Man. The animation compliments the text, a compilation of flashing moving pictures which give an overall feel of thought and dreams. It gives life through an entirely different perspective than daily life and addresses life's questions in what feels like a different dimension. What is God? What is nature? Watch with an open mind and let it take you through thoughts and feelings on a whole different level. Truly a "genius party" in a sense. 8/10 Happy Machine contains the rare quality of surreal reality, similar to that of Kaiba. With quirky animation you are landed with a baby and its adventures through the peculiar world and its dazzling creations. 7.5/10 Baby Blue. Shinichiro Watanabe, who brought us Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Champloo this time strikes with a short glimpse of life. The story catches an evening of love and departure of a young boy. The fantastic animation brings to life this bittersweet conclusion, similar to that of 5cm per Second. 7.5/10 Genius Party is recommended to all anime watchers, just for the celebration of what the vast world of animation can bring us. [Overall: 7/10]