Promare Revisit: Did This Bizarre Anime Film Age as Well as Fire?
Copyright © Toho Animation, Trigger, XFLAG, 3DCG
Title: Promare
Director: Hiroyuki Imaishi
Release Date: May 24, 2019
Something funny about reviewing this movie is that it is two months after its Tokyo release. However, The Lion King did the same recently, as it did release in theaters about a month after its actual 30th anniversary date. So, this would still work in some way. Plus, the movie's USA anniversary lands on September. Today's revisit will focus on Promare, an anime film by the anime studio Trigger, which has turned five years old this year! Back in May 2019, it released in Tokyo on the 15th. Nine days later, it got released generally on the 24th. In Japan, it grossed 1.5 billion yen, marking it on #23 out of the highest-grossing Japanese films in 2019. With its international grosses added in, the movie made a total of $17 million worldwide, which makes this movie a box office success. Along with its box office gross, the reception is very positive with both critics and audiences. Rotten Tomatoes gave it scores of 97% (critic score) and 93% (audience score). According to the other movie review sites, its IMDb score is 7.0/10, as well as its Metacritic scores of 76 (critic score) and 8.8 (user score). Even though there are some smokes here and there, Trigger's colorful anime film, Promare, did age well as fire for its vibrant animation and action-packed nature.
Summary
Thirty years ago, the Mad Burnish, mutants who can wield fire, destroyed half of the world. This caused them to be in a war against humanity until all fails. In the current state, a firefighting mecha force is founded for another flame-filled battle.
Reasons
To first start off with, Promare's top shining fires are the colorful animation, earworm-worthy soundtrack, and most of its great characters. In particular, Trigger animated this film so well in many ways, especially the color palette. The film has a lot of neon colors and bright shades, making this highly look like a Spider-Verse inspired movie. Additionally, there is a lot of movement, despite using the average number of frames per second for an anime film. However, it can be concerning for some people to watch because they might have epilepsy, seizures, or anything similar. Aside the impressive animation, the film excels with its jazzy and catchy soundtrack. The vocal songs were the best part of the soundtrack, with cameos of unknown Japanese artists, yet they turn out to be bops anyway. Even the score by Hiroyuki Sawano (who also composed for Bubble and the Mobile Suit Gundam franchise) is also a plus. What is surprising is that he also composed the vocal songs' instrumentals which shows how he produces good music. Before moving on to the next pack of strengths, most of the characters were fun and likable. Galo Thymos (Kenichi Matsuyama/Billy Kametz) is a well-written protagonist but he can go off annoying at times with his dialogue. His personality is a Maverick-inspired type which was something fun for anime character writing. However, Lio Fotia (Taichi Saotome/Johnny Yong Bosch) was a far more interesting character. Sure, he is supposed to be the stoic one but his backstory and motives take him to be worth more sympathizing with. All of the others were also great but some of them were rather underdeveloped and predictable in their writing.
Putting these qualities aside, Promare also shines fires of its exciting action, talented voice-acting, and decent story concept. Even from judging it from the poster alone, this film has a lot of action, really. Sure, it is well animation and thrilling but the movie did not have to cram in too much of it. Next up, the voice-acting is dramatic and fitting for each character role. Thanks to hiring experienced anime voice actors, they are good at directing the character's personality. Both sub and dub have known actors from the anime category, so either one will not be any bad. Finally, the story may not be the best idea but this is not anything boring or cliché. In fact, the movie pokes fun at both the human vs. creature plot and the exhausting "save the environment" plot. Although it does have a hard time trying to put all of the planned plotlines into once, the story is still entertaining and not really that hard to follow.
Even if this is a great film overall, Promare does have its rather smoky problems, which are the fast pacing, exaggeration, and underdeveloped character writing. Judging by the runtime, it is a pretty long movie. Despite that though, the story goes too fast making viewers not have enough time to savor the moments from the whole movie. Additionally, the movie also announces twists early, which is enough to ruin the experience sometimes. As explained from earlier, the movie is mostly exaggerated, especially for how it is stuffed with a lot more action than needed. If the movie has way too many action, then it would get tiring and even boring at times afterwards. To top it all off, there are some characters who were not developed well enough, even though they are not really that horrible or bland. Lio's henchmen, Gueira (Nobuyuki Hiyama/Matthew Mercer) and Meis (Katsuyuki Konishi/Yuri Lowenthal), barely have that much writing to show that they are changing their character. The notable cause for this would be how very little their screentime is, meaning that they were not shown most of the time or at least sometimes, baking their development as rather unfinished.
Conclusion
The anime film, Promare, aged well as fire for its impressive animation and action, despite how it can get exaggerated. Even if it can cause one to have seizures or the like, Trigger can be credited for the effort they put into the bright animation and intense action. Most of the characters, even the undeveloped ones, are likable and have dramatic voice-acting thanks to its talented choices for the cast. Speaking of that, the story is actually decent, for how it pokes fun at two overused plots used in many other movies. To finish off, the soundtrack is catchy enough to listen to thanks to the composer, Hiroyuki Sawano. Though this movie may have some problems here and there, this is not a bad pick for an anime movie night!
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