Review of Redline

Perfect animation - not so perfect story Firstly, I’ll start with the animation. It’s stunning. The colours are vibrant, the lines are solid, it’s superbly animated. Also, throughout this fantastic animation it manages to hold on to a sense of intensity and excitement that the concept of high octane anime racer should have. A fine example of Madhouse animation in which they so often prove to be one of the best animation studios. This however is where the positivity ends. Next, the characters. I found i didn’t really get enough of them. It’s like they are just there for the purpose of tellingthe story rather than them being there to get you drawn in to their own individual stories. Setting the main character to one side, the secondary characters honestly added nothing to the story. The main character also didn’t really have much to offer either. The only thing that made him the main character was screen time and look. That’s really it. Even his back story which was very briefly touched on was lacking.

Now to the story which I think is it’s biggest downfall and I won’t talk about it’s conclusion for now. From the beginning, you are welcomed by what seems to be the beginning of an adrenaline pupping, thoroughly enjoyable journey through a very interesting environment. However, everything seemed rushed. As soon as the first chapter of the story, or the end of the Yellow Line race, finished, pieces of the story just started getting thrown together. The climax of important parts of the story were just given to you on a plate without the build or anticipation of getting it given before hand, very disappointing

Now the conclusion. Based on the reviews of this I imagine mine has not aligned to the majority, nevertheless, this ending is so half done I can’t even describe. I was left with no feeling of loss, magnificent gain, acceptance, despair, joy or sadness, feelings I would get from a well written conclusion. Rather, I just found myself saying ‘is that it?’ Then when the credits rolled ‘you must be joking’. It’s like the writer just got bored, or the director got screwed by the producers. Either way, it was abrupt and simply poor.

Coming into this film I thought I would love it, throughout the film I found myself trying to, and putting the stunning animation to one side, in the end, found myself trying to understand why I should.

Disappointing sadly. Lesson learned is set your expectations lower, your disappointment will be less and the 1 and a bit hours of your time won’t seem wasted.