Review submitted.

Hopefully it will be published.

It's the first I review a movie on the IMDB, if you have any comments post here.

Like almost all the Italian kids of my generation I grew up watching
Matsumoto's series like Battleship Yamato, Galaxy 999 and of course
Captain Harlock.

I was surprised to see that a movie had been developed and I had
nothing about it, I saw the trailer on TV and even if I'm not a CGI fan
at all I decided to give it a chance...well I wasn't disappointed.

The plot is simple, doesn't have anything to deal with the previous TV
series of the 70s, the 80s or Arcadia of you Youth, the Endless Odyssey
or any other OAV, it seems that the Japanese have never been interested
in developing a consistent continuity or mythology of any kind while
they are more focused in re-creating the same..."atmosphere" perhaps is
the right word. Here we have the same basic ingredients of Harlock's
history: he's a pirate, an ex captain of a military ship in a previous
war that he lost, he fights for freedom and for Earth, a place from
where he is banned (this time everybody is banned, for the matter), his
dear friend Toshio is dead, his crew consist in outcasts and among them
his right hand is Key and left hand Yattaran. I don;t know why in the
FAQ it is written that his love interest in the previous movie was
Esmeralda because as far as I remember she was Toshio's girlfriend and
the alien Mime is again the woman who dedicated her life to him, the
last of her race that here we are informed were the Nebelung,who
possessed an esoteric technology that is the center of the story. The
main antagonists are the gerontocrats of the Gaia Coalition who banned
Humanity from Earth, some real life references to aging population and
the decline of Civilisation are new and interesting elements that
reflects some themes of our actual times especially in Japan (I guess)
but also in Western Europe.

Without giving too many spoilers the story makes relative sense until
the end when something unclear happens: on one side it seems there is a
cosmic regeneration ongoing and the baton is given to Yama (that here
like in the original series always looked a "young" Harlock) but in
reality it doesn't seem that Herlock's original plan was carried
on...perhaps the movie has been cut for the European release or there
has been something lost in translation ( for instance certain dialogs
of Z Gundan in Italian or English don't make any sense at all,it seems
the characters are discussing about Philosophy during a duel), I don't
know but however the romantic atmosphere of the movie has not been
disturbed, at least for me.

Talking about CGI: this incarnation of the Arcadia is cool but from the
outside I preferred the original blue version or the green one of
Arcadia of my youth, the turrets and the interiors have a real
mechanical feel that rarely CGI can give (I think about the "fakeness"
of Transformers first), the ship of the Coalition have a beautiful
retro' style that seems taken from Alien and Aliens, the 3D works great
too, without feeling too intrusive.

CGI as usual fails portraying realistically humans: Harlock and Yama
look a little like Big Jim dolls, Key on the other side being a woman
and "smooth" is more similar to a real actress covered with make as it
is fashion today, of course the "best" looking character is the Alien
Mime, much better than anything we have seen in Cameron's Avatar. All
the character and costume design are faithful to Matsumoto's original
design, so men and women are slender and ethereal, the hairstyles are
pleasantly 70s (Kay looks like a Norwegian model of that era) as well
as the costumes (I want Yama's leather jacket! Or at least, it looks
like leather), it is surprising what the Japanese can do with a budget
of just 30 million dollars, the American directors and Hollywood
managers should watch this movie, they can learn one thing or two.

In conclusion, I liked the movie, in comparison to the Hollywood's
crap-fest we are watching on screen in the last years it is a
masterpiece, the weak points are the traditional "Matsumoto" flaws: a
certain lack of consistency, no real relation with the other media,
evanescent plot, but if you are familiar with him and generally
speaking the world of Japanese Anime you have to deal with that.

Juliet Parrish: You can't win a war if you're extinct!