Ghost in the Shell: Solid State Society.
December 21st 2007 22:06
Category: Videos
Creator: Masamune Shirow (Appleseed & Dominion Tank Police).
Director: Kenji Kamiyama.
Screenplay by: Kenji Kamiyama, Shotaro Suga & Yoshiki Sakurai.
Producers: Tomohisa Nishimura, Hisanori Kunizaki & Norihisa Oki.
Starring: Mary E.McGlynn (Motoko Kusanagi), Richard Epcar (Bataou), William Knight (Aramaki), Crispin Freeman (Togusa), Michael McCarty (Ishikawa), David Wittenberg (Saito), Bob Buchholz (Paz), Dean Wein (Boma), Michelle Ruff (Tachikoma), Rebecca Forstadt (Tachikoma) and Sherry Lynn (Tachikoma).
Produced by: 2006 – 2007 Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex Committee.
English Adaptation by: Bandai Entertainment in association with ZRO Limit & Animaze Inc.
Released by: Madman Entertainment.
Running Time: 100 minutes. Rating: M.
The latest of Ghost in the Shell features, Solid State Society is a movie that is based more on the television series GITS: Stand Alone Complex than on the two Ghost movies. Confused? Well don’t be, it’s essentially a case of a shared universe being used to tell individual stories by different people, there really isn’t any connection between the first two movies and the television series and its spin off film other than this shared universe. So effectively Solid State Society has linkages with the Stand Alone Complex series but not with the original movie and its sequel GITS: Innocence. The other interesting feature about Solid State Society (or SSS for short) is that is effectively a stand alone film in spite of its connections to GITS: Stand Alone Complex, if you’ve never seen the television show or any of the other films you can quite easily sit and watch this film without any problems.
The interesting thing about this movie is that there are a lot of parallels with the original movie, the one that lead to this profusion of Ghosts upon people’s televisions and computer monitors. It is the year 2034 and a situation has developed in a major Japanese airport involving a former foreign military operative. Aircraft are being asked to remain in a holding pattern whilst those low on fuel are being diverted to another airport, various police elements are being deployed and Section 9 of Public Security is moving in to handle things. All of this is heard by Major Motoko Kusanagi, a former Section 9 operative, via her data link as she stands atop some kind of tower overlooking the airport in question. She rests their on this tower in the pouring rain poised like a raptor ready to pounce, monitoring the situation, keeping abreast of events yet not moving in to participate.
From this scene the action then moves to the arrival of Section 9 on the scene and their eventual deployment into the airport terminal. It seems that a Colonel Kogaio is the centre of events, taking a hostage and grabbing a 9mm automatic pistol from a security guard. When Togusa and one of his operatives close in on Kogaio they discover first the fact that he is armed then that he is high on a military grade reflex booster, still there seems to be very little actually happening as they manoeuvre closer to the erratic colonel. Eventually they confront him and back up swiftly rendezvous with them in the form of both armed police and fellow Section 9 operatives. An attempt is made to get Kogaio to surrender his weapon but he mentions something about the Puppeteer, the fact that they won’t make a public spectacle out of him and he then blows out his brains before anyone can stop him. Case closed. Or is it?
It seems that Kogaio is the son of General Karam, the exiled military dictator of the Siak Republic; Karam was granted exile by the current Japanese regime in return for not perpetuating a series of terrorist attacks throughout the world. Unfortunately it seems that Karam was not sincere in his agenda and was instead planning to engage in a terrorist action through his True Believers organisation, of which his son Colonel Kogaio was a member, along with various other individuals. Strangely it seems as if all the other members of the True Believers have also engaged in acts of spontaneous suicide, prompting Section 9 to believe that the suicides are all part of the plan to activate the terrorist action ordered by Karam. Opting to deal with things immediately Section 9’s chief; Aramaki, decides to move against Karam. He swiftly makes his way to the island abode of the exiled general with a team consisting of Togusa, Boma, Ishikawa and various back up elements only to discover that the general is very much dead and the government is completely unaware of his demise. It’s a real conundrum especially considering that a check of Karam’s nursing computer reveals that he and his operative’s were up to something but it is unknown whether or not the plan had been given the go ahead.
As with anything involving the GITS universe nothing is quite as it seems until the final credits role, and even then there is always some kind of unresolved issues. Even though SSS does not require prior knowledge of the various other GITS incarnations it was interesting to see parallels between this movie and the original, namely in the initial scenes of the Major standing atop a high place perched like a hunting falcon and in the names of the main protagonist – the puppeteer in this film, the puppet master in the original. In this film the main protagonist doesn’t so much seem to be any particular individual but Section 9 itself. Unlike the original film SSS is more of an ensemble piece with all the various characters who comprise Section 9 getting their place in the sun, including the Major, who though she resigned from the section two year ago still seems to be more in tune with them than one would expect for an independent operative.
When via their various diverging efforts the mystery of the Puppeteer and the Solid State Society are unravelled it is an interesting take on what has been going on and makes you question precisely who were the antagonists within the film from the outset. When you get a hold of a copy of this DVD ignore the blurb on the back, especially the line that goes: “The Year is 2034 and the face of terrorism has changed”, Solid State Society is not solely about terrorism and in fact no Ghost story is ever about a single issue, they are all multi faceted from the original film right through to the various efforts of the television series; Stand Alone Complex (SAC) and SAC 2nd Gig.
Anyone who watches Solid State Society will be an audience to a complex story which like a good club sandwich has multiple layers filled with nutritious goodness. The SAC Committee who were responsible for this films production have certainly lived up to the standards of the original Ghost film and perhaps in some ways have surpassed that original film through their efforts. Certainly as I said initially it doesn’t require prior knowledge of the GITS universe to be able to watch and enjoy this film which is always a positive, secondly the film is set within Japan rather than a fictional city as the original film had been. This might seem a bit of a tenuous point but having Section 9 as part of a bona fide national regime gives it just that little bit more believability, it also makes the various political intrigues between various regimes as well as various government arms have a more pronounced edge than they would have.
Animation wise things cannot get any better, the standard certainly matches that in the previous films and is better than that within the various television series. I recently saw a 2nd Gig episode that was aired on SBS TV here in Australia at an ungodly hour of the morning and I have to say that in that particular episode the characters looked a little bit stilted animation wise in comparison with the other facets of the show. In Solid State Society the characters have a depth and expressiveness that you’d expect from a major anime franchise. Then there is the input from Nissan in regards to the depiction of certain Section 9 vehicles show in the film, the producers of the film cooperate with the Nissan corporation in depicting this two cars which are real life vehicles given life within an anime film. It seems that a lot of Nissan designers had drawn inspiration from anime in doing their design work and it seems that the world of industrial design and anime are involved in a vibrant cross fertilization process that has been going on for some time.
The DVD edition I watched was a special 2 disc edition which as well as having the feature also has a disc revealing the Nissan connection and the design of anime cars as well as various other interesting features including the actual making of a Tachikoma robot, an interview with the English audio recording director and the English actors behind the Major and Bataou amongst other things. In fact I was surprised to see that the guy who did the voice of Batou had a faint resemblance to the actual character. Truly as the Major is wont to say at the end of the original Ghost in the Shell; the net is vast and infinite and this film has a similar appeal. Its definitely one to watch, ponder and most importantly of all; enjoy.
Director: Kenji Kamiyama.
Screenplay by: Kenji Kamiyama, Shotaro Suga & Yoshiki Sakurai.
Producers: Tomohisa Nishimura, Hisanori Kunizaki & Norihisa Oki.
Starring: Mary E.McGlynn (Motoko Kusanagi), Richard Epcar (Bataou), William Knight (Aramaki), Crispin Freeman (Togusa), Michael McCarty (Ishikawa), David Wittenberg (Saito), Bob Buchholz (Paz), Dean Wein (Boma), Michelle Ruff (Tachikoma), Rebecca Forstadt (Tachikoma) and Sherry Lynn (Tachikoma).
Produced by: 2006 – 2007 Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex Committee.
Released by: Madman Entertainment.
Running Time: 100 minutes. Rating: M.
The latest of Ghost in the Shell features, Solid State Society is a movie that is based more on the television series GITS: Stand Alone Complex than on the two Ghost movies. Confused? Well don’t be, it’s essentially a case of a shared universe being used to tell individual stories by different people, there really isn’t any connection between the first two movies and the television series and its spin off film other than this shared universe. So effectively Solid State Society has linkages with the Stand Alone Complex series but not with the original movie and its sequel GITS: Innocence. The other interesting feature about Solid State Society (or SSS for short) is that is effectively a stand alone film in spite of its connections to GITS: Stand Alone Complex, if you’ve never seen the television show or any of the other films you can quite easily sit and watch this film without any problems.
The interesting thing about this movie is that there are a lot of parallels with the original movie, the one that lead to this profusion of Ghosts upon people’s televisions and computer monitors. It is the year 2034 and a situation has developed in a major Japanese airport involving a former foreign military operative. Aircraft are being asked to remain in a holding pattern whilst those low on fuel are being diverted to another airport, various police elements are being deployed and Section 9 of Public Security is moving in to handle things. All of this is heard by Major Motoko Kusanagi, a former Section 9 operative, via her data link as she stands atop some kind of tower overlooking the airport in question. She rests their on this tower in the pouring rain poised like a raptor ready to pounce, monitoring the situation, keeping abreast of events yet not moving in to participate.
It seems that Kogaio is the son of General Karam, the exiled military dictator of the Siak Republic; Karam was granted exile by the current Japanese regime in return for not perpetuating a series of terrorist attacks throughout the world. Unfortunately it seems that Karam was not sincere in his agenda and was instead planning to engage in a terrorist action through his True Believers organisation, of which his son Colonel Kogaio was a member, along with various other individuals. Strangely it seems as if all the other members of the True Believers have also engaged in acts of spontaneous suicide, prompting Section 9 to believe that the suicides are all part of the plan to activate the terrorist action ordered by Karam. Opting to deal with things immediately Section 9’s chief; Aramaki, decides to move against Karam. He swiftly makes his way to the island abode of the exiled general with a team consisting of Togusa, Boma, Ishikawa and various back up elements only to discover that the general is very much dead and the government is completely unaware of his demise. It’s a real conundrum especially considering that a check of Karam’s nursing computer reveals that he and his operative’s were up to something but it is unknown whether or not the plan had been given the go ahead.
As with anything involving the GITS universe nothing is quite as it seems until the final credits role, and even then there is always some kind of unresolved issues. Even though SSS does not require prior knowledge of the various other GITS incarnations it was interesting to see parallels between this movie and the original, namely in the initial scenes of the Major standing atop a high place perched like a hunting falcon and in the names of the main protagonist – the puppeteer in this film, the puppet master in the original. In this film the main protagonist doesn’t so much seem to be any particular individual but Section 9 itself. Unlike the original film SSS is more of an ensemble piece with all the various characters who comprise Section 9 getting their place in the sun, including the Major, who though she resigned from the section two year ago still seems to be more in tune with them than one would expect for an independent operative.
When via their various diverging efforts the mystery of the Puppeteer and the Solid State Society are unravelled it is an interesting take on what has been going on and makes you question precisely who were the antagonists within the film from the outset. When you get a hold of a copy of this DVD ignore the blurb on the back, especially the line that goes: “The Year is 2034 and the face of terrorism has changed”, Solid State Society is not solely about terrorism and in fact no Ghost story is ever about a single issue, they are all multi faceted from the original film right through to the various efforts of the television series; Stand Alone Complex (SAC) and SAC 2nd Gig.
Anyone who watches Solid State Society will be an audience to a complex story which like a good club sandwich has multiple layers filled with nutritious goodness. The SAC Committee who were responsible for this films production have certainly lived up to the standards of the original Ghost film and perhaps in some ways have surpassed that original film through their efforts. Certainly as I said initially it doesn’t require prior knowledge of the GITS universe to be able to watch and enjoy this film which is always a positive, secondly the film is set within Japan rather than a fictional city as the original film had been. This might seem a bit of a tenuous point but having Section 9 as part of a bona fide national regime gives it just that little bit more believability, it also makes the various political intrigues between various regimes as well as various government arms have a more pronounced edge than they would have.
Animation wise things cannot get any better, the standard certainly matches that in the previous films and is better than that within the various television series. I recently saw a 2nd Gig episode that was aired on SBS TV here in Australia at an ungodly hour of the morning and I have to say that in that particular episode the characters looked a little bit stilted animation wise in comparison with the other facets of the show. In Solid State Society the characters have a depth and expressiveness that you’d expect from a major anime franchise. Then there is the input from Nissan in regards to the depiction of certain Section 9 vehicles show in the film, the producers of the film cooperate with the Nissan corporation in depicting this two cars which are real life vehicles given life within an anime film. It seems that a lot of Nissan designers had drawn inspiration from anime in doing their design work and it seems that the world of industrial design and anime are involved in a vibrant cross fertilization process that has been going on for some time.
The DVD edition I watched was a special 2 disc edition which as well as having the feature also has a disc revealing the Nissan connection and the design of anime cars as well as various other interesting features including the actual making of a Tachikoma robot, an interview with the English audio recording director and the English actors behind the Major and Bataou amongst other things. In fact I was surprised to see that the guy who did the voice of Batou had a faint resemblance to the actual character. Truly as the Major is wont to say at the end of the original Ghost in the Shell; the net is vast and infinite and this film has a similar appeal. Its definitely one to watch, ponder and most importantly of all; enjoy.
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