Casshern

Blurb: "In a world with an alternate history, a great war finally comes to an end leaving the earth diseased and polluted.  The geneticist Dr. Azuma vies for support from the government for his neo-cell treatment that he claims can rejuvenate the body and regenerate humankind.  The government leaders, guarding their own deeply entrenched powers, turn down the professor.  Driven to complete his work, Dr. Azuma accepts a secret offer from a sinister faction of the powerful military.  After an incident occurs in Dr. Azuma's lab, a race of mutant humans known as the Shinzo Ningen are unleashed upon the world.  Now only the warrior known as Casshern, reincarnated with an invincible body, stands between the Shinzo Ningen and a world on the brink of annihilation." (imdb.com)

Notables: No awards are mentioned on imdb.com.  Unfortunately, the "official" movie page won't load on my computer.  To be honest, if it didn't receive anything, I'm not surprised.

My thoughts: 3/5

Calling all scifi-action fans!  Really, this is a movie for you... and pretty much only you.  I love scifi, and even though I'm not much of an action fan, the movie at least kept me interested.  However, if you're not very good at reading and interpreting subtitles, or even know much about the 1973 anime (or really, Japanese myth in general), you will spend most of this movie confused.  Being an everything-Japanese fanatic, I was mostly okay... but even I had moments of "wtf mate?"  The costuming is good, and the art direction you can tell was a huge focus.  With scenes shot in both black & white and color (with some in that nifty black & white with bits of color, like a character's eyes or a thing of flowers), there's definitely a lot of visual variety to be had.  But truthfully, the story is complicated and often times depressing.  However, there is a wonderful twist in the climax that harkens to the greatest of traditional scifi literature, raising social questions that will leave your jaw open and your mind churning for at least an hour afterward.

I give it 3/5 because I know everyone's first reaction will be "...huh?"  But if you can stand to watch it through again, you'll find a lot of cultural relevant nuggets among the power-packed scifi ride.