| The Castle of Cagliostro | |
|---|---|
Special Edition DVD cover |
|
| Kanji | ルパン三世 カリオストロの城 |
| Rōmaji | Rupan Sansei: Kariosutoro no Shiro |
| Directed by | Hayao Miyazaki |
| Produced by | Tetsuo Katayama |
| Screenplay by | Haruya Yamazaki Hayao Miyazaki |
| Based on | Lupin III by Monkey Punch |
| Starring | Yasuo Yamada Kiyoshi Kobayashi Makio Inoue Eiko Masuyama Goro Naya Sumi Shimamoto Tarō Ishida |
| Music by | Yuji Ohno |
| Cinematography | Hirokata Takahashi |
| Editing by | Mitsutoshi Tsurubuchi |
| Studio | Tokyo Movie Shinsha Topcraft |
| Distributed by | Toho |
| Release date(s) | December 15, 1979 |
| Running time | 100 minutes |
| Country | Japan |
| Language | Japanese |
The Castle of Cagliostro (ルパン三世 カリオストロの城 Rupan Sansei: Kariosutoro no Shiro, Lupin the Third: Castle of Cagliostro) is a 1979 Japanese animated film co-written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki. It is one of the films featuring master thief Arsène Lupin III. [1]
The second animated Lupin III movie and arguably the best known, Castle of Cagliostro was written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki, who also co-directed the first Lupin III TV series and directed two episodes of the second, before he formed Studio Ghibli. Cagliostro features gentleman thief Arsène Lupin III, grandson to French author Maurice Leblanc's master thief Arsène Lupin.
It was originally subtitled by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and then dubbed and released in 1991 by Streamline Pictures. A redubbed version was recorded by Manga Entertainment in 2000.
The title alludes to La Comtesse de Cagliostro (The Countess of Cagliostro), the title of an original Lupin adventure by Leblanc.
Contents |
The movie opens with Arsène Lupin III and Daisuke Jigen escaping in a Fiat 500 after robbing a casino in Monaco, only to discover that their entire haul is counterfeit. Lupin recognizes the distinctively high quality counterfeit bills from his early days as a thief when he was almost killed while searching for their source. He decides seek out the source again, and the two head off to the rumored source of the bills, the Grand Duchy of Cagliostro.
Shortly after arriving, they rescue a young girl from a car driven by criminals, with her and Lupin falling off a cliff while escaping. Lupin is knocked unconscious, and the girl captured, but she leaves him a distinctive signet ring. Lupin later discovers that the girl, Clarisse, is the princess of Cagliostro and is to be married to the Count, the country's regent. The Count wants to cement his power and recover the fabled ancient treasure of Cagliostro, for which he needs both his ancestral ring and the princess's.
After narrowly escaping a group of the Count's elite assassins, Lupin calls on Goemon Ishikawa XIII to help him and Jigen in their new quest to rescue the princess. He also tips off his longtime pursuer, Inspector Koichi Zenigata, to his whereabouts to provide a distraction. Zenigata's presence and a party give Lupin enough cover to sneak into the castle. There he finds his former lover, Fujiko Mine, posing as Clarisse's lady-in-waiting and she tells him where the princess is being held. Lupin makes his way to Clarisse, returns her ring, and promises to help her to escape. Before he can act, the Count ambushes them with his assassins and Lupin is dropped down a trapdoor into the bowels of the castle.
The returned ring turns out to be a fake, left by Lupin as a practical joke. Infuriated, the Count flushes him deeper into the cellars, which are full of the bodies of spies killed while trying to learn the secrets of Cagliostro and the counterfeit bills. While down there, Lupin bumps into Inspector Zenigata, who was accidentally dropped down earlier. The two reluctantly form a pact to help each other escape, which they accomplish by overpowering the assassins sent to recover the ring.
Their escape leads them to a room full of printing presses---the source of the counterfeits. Zenigata wants to collect evidence, but Lupin points out they must escape the castle first. They start a fire as a distraction and steal the Count's autogyro (a uniquely stylized helicopter). However, as they attempt to rescue Clarisse, Lupin is shot and seriously wounded. Clarisse offers the ring to the Count in exchange for Lupin's life. After securing the ring, the Count's attempt at betrayal is foiled when Fujiko's quick actions allow her, Lupin, and Zenigata to escape. While Lupin is convalescing, Zenigata tries to convince his superiors at INTERPOL to prosecute the Count for counterfeiting, but fearing political repercussions, they halt the investigation and remove him from the case. Meanwhile, despite his wounds, Lupin vows to stop the wedding and rescue the princess. Fujiko tips off Lupin on a way to sneak into the castle, and makes a plan with Zenigata to publicly reveal the counterfeiting operation under cover of pursuing Lupin.
The wedding appears to go as planned with a drugged Clarisse until Lupin's "ghost" disrupts the ceremony. The Count calls his guards, but Lupin makes off with Clarisse and both her and the Count's rings. Meanwhile, Zenigata and his squad arrive in the chaos and the detective leads Fujiko, posing as a television reporter, to the Count's counterfeiting facility to expose the operation to the world. Lupin and Clarisse flee the Count, the chase ending on the face of the castle's clock tower. Lupin is forced to surrender the rings to save Clarisse, and they are both knocked into the lake surrounding the tower. The Count then uses the rings to reveal the secret of Cagliostro, only to be crushed by the mechanism as it moves to unveil the treasure.
Lupin and Clarisse watch as the lake around the castle drains to reveal exquisite ancient Roman ruins—the true treasure of Cagliostro. Lupin and his friends leave Clarisse as Zenigata chases after them again and Fujiko makes off with the plates from the counterfeit printing presses.
The film was the best selling anime DVD in May 2001, and the third best selling in June.[2][3]
Both of Manga Entertainment's releases of The Castle of Cagliostro received DVD Talk Collector Series recommendation status, the highest status given by the review website DVDtalk.com.[4][5] Chris Beveridge of AnimeOnDVD.com gave the film a grade of "A+", although he disliked Manga Entertainment's use of PG-13 level language in the English dub.[6] The Castle of Cagliostro placed in 5th place on Japan's Agency for Cultural Affairs's list of best anime.[7]
In 1979, Toho released the original theatrical version. In 1991, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer created a subtitled version for American theatres. MGM/UA Home Video released the film on VHS in 1992 (dubbed by Carl Macek's Streamline Pictures), and Best Film and Video Corportion released it on VHS in 1993, again using the Streamline dub. Manga Entertainment in Australia and the UK purchased the license for the movie, using the Streamline dub. Then Manga Entertainment purchased the license for the movie from MGM in 1995 and has been in Manga's North American, Australian and English catalogues since then. Manga Entertainment lost the license in Australia to Manga's Distributor in 2007 to Madman Entertainment, whose DVD release featured the Streamline dub with anamorphic widescreen video and artwork exclusive to both the Australian and UK releases. Manga's previous version of Castle of Cagliostro in Australia was eventually pulled from Manga's and Madman's catalogues. In 2000, Manga Entertainment created an all-new dub.
Streamline's dub, while lauded for the overall acting talent of the voice cast, has been widely criticized for its retiming of the opening credits to remove all traces of Japanese writings, as well as for liberties taken with the translation of its dialogue.
Manga's new dub of Cagliostro has been praised for its overall faithfulness to the original Japanese dialogue, but criticized for its addition of profanity in some scenes. In addition, Manga's original DVD release has been criticized for lacking an anamorphic transfer (unlike the 1992 MGM/UA release of the Streamline dub) or any extras apart from previews for other Manga Video releases, and in the way its English titles are hard-matted onto the film's video image, obscuring parts of the screen behind them.
Optimum Releasing re-released Cagliostro in the UK after Manga Entertainment lost its license in the UK. The new DVD features an anamorphic widescreen print with the original Japanese audio track as well as the Streamline dub, both in stereo.
Manga released a new special edition DVD of Cagliostro in 2006.[8][9] The disc is double-sided with the movie on side A and the extras on side B. It includes a new digital transfer; Manga's English dub in 2.0 and 5.1 surround plus Japanese, Spanish, and French language tracks in mono; the complete movie in storyboard format, accompanied by Japanese audio with English subtitles; an original Japanese trailer; a sketch and still gallery; a 26-minute interview with animation director Yasuo Ōtsuka, and animated menus. The movie is presented in 16:9 anamorphic widescreen; however, the opening credits, which feature Lupin and Jigen slowly making their way across Europe to the song "Fire Treasure", have been heavily re-edited to remove the Japanese credits, instead using selected still-frames of scenes that appear without Japanese writing. The English-translated names are superimposed over these stills. (This modified credits sequence is also present on the 2007 Australian DVD release by Madman Entertainment.) The DVD packaging of this special edition is strongly reminiscent of that of Disney's Studio Ghibli film releases.
In December 2008, a Blu-ray Disc package was released in Japan. Its video format is MPEG-4 AVC and its digitally-remastered audio is improved over that of the DVD.[1]
Castle of Cagliostro, along with its title, includes elements that were seen in other Arsène Lupin works. One such tale, La Justice d'Arsène Lupin by Boileau-Narcejac, involves the discovery of a tremendous stash of forged franc notes with which World War I–era Germany had planned to destabilize the French economy.[10] Maurice Leblanc's The Green-eyed Lady also featured a secret treasure hidden at the bottom of a lake.[11] The castle is visually influenced by that of The King and the Bird (Le Roi et l'oiseau).
Gary Trousdale, co-director of Disney's Atlantis: The Lost Empire, admitted that a scene at the end of Atlantis, where the waters recede from the sunken city, was directly inspired by a similar scene from Cagliostro.[12] One of the sequence directors of The Simpsons Movie also mentioned Cagliostro as an influence; the scene where Bart rolls down the roof was inspired by Lupin running down the castle roof during his rescue attempt.[13]
Footage from this movie, along with the previous Lupin movie Secret of Mamo, appear in the 1983 LaserDisc video game Cliff Hanger.
| Character | Japanese | English (Streamline) | English (Manga) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lupin III | Yasuo Yamada | Bob Bergen | David Hayter |
| Daisuke Jigen | Kiyoshi Kobayashi | Steve Bulen | John Snyder |
| Goemon Ishikawa XIII | Makio Inoue | Steve Kramer | Richard Epcar |
| Fujiko Mine | Eiko Masuyama | Edie Mirman | Dorothy Elias-Fahn |
| Inspector Koichi Zenigata | Goro Naya | David Povall | Dougary Grant |
| Count Cagliostro | Tarō Ishida | Michael McConnohie | Kirk Thornton |
| Lady Clarisse d'Cagliostro | Sumi Shimamoto | Barbara Goodson | Bridget Hoffman |
| The groundskeeper | Kōhei Miyauchi | Mike Reynolds | Barry Stigler |
| Jodo | Ichirō Nagai | Jeff Winkless | Milton James |
| Gustav | Tadamichi Tsuneizumi | Kirk Thornton | Joe Romersa |
| Waitress | Yoko Yamaoka | Juliana Donald | Bambi Darro |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||