Angel's Egg
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| Angel's Egg | |
|---|---|
| 天使のたまご (Tenshi no Tamago) |
|
| Genre | Drama, Fantasy, Surrealism |
| Animated film | |
| Director | Mamoru Oshii |
| Studio | Tokuma Shoten |
| Released | 22 December 1985 |
| Runtime | 71 minutes |
Angel's Egg (天使のたまご Tenshi no Tamago?) is a Japanese anime feature film produced by Tokuma Shoten in 1985. A collaboration between popular artist Yoshitaka Amano and director Mamoru Oshii, it incorporates surrealistic and existentialist qualities but very little dialogue, making it a commonly cited example of progressive anime.[1]
Contents |
[edit] Plot
Angel's Egg follows the daily life of a young girl in a surreal world of darkness and shadows.
The girl, whose name we do not learn, is the keeper of a mysterious egg. She spends her time collecting bottles and artifacts in a gothic, dead city. A man, whose name also remains a mystery, arrives in the dark town one day riding a machine and wearing a cross on his back. The two meet and talk, though their dialogue consists mostly of the single, repeated question "Who are you?".
Meanwhile, shadow fish appear within the town, and then the many statues which line it come alive and begin hunting the fish with spears.
Inside the girl's vast cavernous 'refuge,' which contains many strange fossils and her collection, the man tells the girl a tale similar to Noah's Ark. He waits for the girl to fall asleep and breaks the egg.
The girl reacts in anguish and follows the departing man, only to fall into a ravine of water and die. Her dying exhalation under the water blossoms into bubbles of 'eggs' on the surface. A symbolic ending of apocalypse and rebirth is mixed with a gradual reveal of the story's world which is highly abstract and ambiguous.
[edit] Cast & Characters
Girl
The young girl portrays innocence in a world of darkness. She lives in an abandoned planetarium and guards the mysterious egg, a focal point of the movie. The girl, who lives alone, collects water in bottles, watching it as bubbles rise to the top. Voiced by: Mako Hyoudou
Man
The man is portrayed as a Christ-like figure, carrying a cross on his back and wearing bandages on his hands. He tries to protect the young girl once he meets her but ultimately steals the egg that she keeps. Voiced by: Jinpachi Nezu
Narrator
Voiced by: Keiichi Noda
[edit] Symbolism
There are no official or published explanations of the symbolism present in the film, but some individuals have made non-authoritative attempts, such as here.
[edit] Music
The music in Angel's Egg was composed by Yoshihiro Kanno who seldom composed film scores.
[edit] References
- ^ Angel's Egg (anime) at Anime News Network's Encyclopedia. Retrieved 2006-07-09.
