If you’ve been following ccpopculture for a while, you might have noticed that kids’ films are rarely reviewed here. That’s not an accident; I’m simply aware of my strengths and weaknesses as a critic, and writing about children’s entertainment is most definitely a weakness. When it comes to Shaun the Sheep, for instance, I can…
This cumbersomely titled anime – called Noucome for short – has perhaps the largest gulf between potential and quality of anything I’ve seen. Its premise is absurd but laden with promise: the show’s protagonist, Kanade Amakusa, a high school boy, finds himself regularly faced with “Absolute Choice” – a set of options that he’s required…
I watched Grave of the Fireflies expecting a masterpiece. I’d never seen the film before, but its reputation preceded it – as Studio Ghibli’s second film (released simultaneously with the magnificent My Neighbour Totoro) and as a tear-jerking war drama. Based on the non-fiction novel by Nosaka Akiyuki, it tells the tale of teenage boy…
Hal uses intricate futurism to examine universal themes of bereavement and obligation. Running at a slim sixty minutes, it’s simplistic in its narrative and themes, but finds a gentle profundity and quiet beauty nonetheless. Ryôtarô Makihara’s anime feature begins with a robot idling in a peaceful stream; the tranquillity is shortly interrupted by the explosion…
Adventure Time’s third season represented an evolutionary leap forward for the show, taking Pendleton Ward’s template – a preschool mix of Dadaism and Dungeons & Dragons portioned out in eleven minute episodes – and directing towards experimentation and serialisation alike. The third season featured a range of episodes that deviated from the established formula of…
On a purely visual basis, The Boxtrolls is one of the most inventive animated films in some time. Like Laika predecessors Paranorman and Coraline, it’s animated in tremendously tactile stop-motion. Its troglodytic characters are cast amongst the cobblestone streets of a 18th century minor metropolis which brings to mind, variously: the spindly grotesquery of the…
Princess Mononoke’s recent release on Blu-Ray provided me an opportunity to truly appreciate the gorgeous animation of Miyazaki’s seventh feature-length film. My previous viewings of the film had been low-quality (pirated) versions – in fact, I can distinctly recall watching the film at a friend’s place on a burnt DVD when, halfway through, the disc…
The first How to Train Your Dragon was a special kind of miracle. A simple tale of a father and his son, of a boy and his dragon, it soared beyond its modest ambitions. HTTYD succeeded thanks to gorgeously composed and edited animation and a spectacular Oscar-nominated score, yes, but mostly because of the simplicity…
Some films are just impossible to evaluate with any kind of objectivity. For me, Toy Story is one of those movies; when that Randy Newman theme kicks in I’m transported back to my youth in a nostalgic rush. Even when trying to view the film with a critical eye, it holds up pretty damn well.…
It’s surprising that it took five live action films before Wes Anderson tried his hand at animation; the hand-made, stop motion animation that enables this Roald Dahl adaptation is a perfect match for the gentle, whimsical nature of the director’s films. Fantastic Mr. Fox is a Wes Anderson film through-and-through, whether it’s the wistful, pastoral…
ccpopculture 