Mind and Body

So, I figure we’ve had enough of idle speculation with regards to the role of color psychology in depression, and I’m going to do a post about a movie I just watched last night.

It was called Casshern, apparently it was released in 2004, but was based on a 1970’s anime series, Casshan (known in Japan as Neo-Human Casshern). It was recommended to me by my mother. This is somewhat surprising, because the film is Japanese, and while I enjoy any sort of Asian film most of the time, my mother doesn’t. Particularly not Asian sci-fi, which is what I would classify Casshern.

The movie is essentially about a race of super-humans derived from special cells taken from “original humans,” or humans with the purest DNA, the first humans to ever be created. Using the cells from these people, the scientist Dr. Azuma runs an experiment which inadvertantly creates the super-humans. They are filled with rage and hatred for “lesser humanity,” which is ironic, considering their origins. Dr. Azuma’s son, Tetsuya, is also given these cells, granting him an invincible body. Thus, he stands as humanity’s only defense against the new race.
The movie takes place after a very large-scale war between the vaguely-established powers ‘Europa’ and ‘Asia.’ It is a somewhat complicated movie, and probably needs a couple of viewings in able to absorb the entire scope of the movie.

Casshern , being a sci-fi movie, is quite reminiscent of certain video games, namely JRPGs. The Final Fantasy series, and Final Fantasy VII in particular, bear some resemblance to the themes expressed in the movie. As the anime series has been around since 1973, it is highly likely that the FF series was inspired by it, and perhaps the movie was inspired by that series in turn.
I would recommend the movie to any fan of JRPGs, as they bear the same general mood, atmosphere, story, and themes, and also to anyone who is a fan of ‘puzzle movies,’ ones that require your full concentration.

There’s a lot of action, quite a bit of violence, but no sexual content, which is quite a plus in my book.

The movie was directed and written by Kazuaki Kiriya.

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