Ghost in the Shell 2 : Innocence Highly recommended

Director
Mamoru Oshii
Production
Production IG
Country of origin
Japan
Format
Film
Year
2004

Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence - Music Video Anthology

By Joseph (Joe) Wood
10th Mar 06

It’s rare to see an official music video anthology DVD in Japan, and rarer still to see them make it abroad. You could search the web and find a near unlimited supply of fan made anime music videos set to the music from the show itself or musical charts. Apparently, this is where the idea came from. According to Kenji Kawai (in the interview featured on the DVD), Mamoru Oshii saw a fan made music video using footage and music from the first Ghost in the Shell film while in a café in France. While it would seem other filmmakers might be suddenly, ringing up their lawyers in order to sue this was the origin of this particular DVD.

The DVD itself is more like a party bag. As well as the DVD music video anthology also included is a copy of the Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence Original Soundtrack CD (already reviewed on this site here…), a booklet with lyrics for the songs (with both a Romanization of the Japanese song lyrics and an English translation) and five special postcards.

The main part of the DVD contains seven different tracks, which last about thirty-five minutes in total. Rather than have the tracks simply set to various clips from the movie, the music is set mainly to the backgrounds! GitS2:I used a mixture of CGI technology and 2d drawing, using the CGI for backgrounds and the 2d drawing for its characters. Getting to see these backgrounds again without the plot of the film or characters in the foreground distracting the viewer it’s easy to see the massive amount of detail that went into them, most of them are spectacular. There is some use of the sequences from the film that used only CGI and the shots are occasionally broken up by screens containing a line or two of Japanese text (which come up translated in subtitles).

The DVD suffers from problems though. Like the OST CD for GitS2 which had several tracks named “The Ballade of the Puppets:…” which was repeated three times on the CD with little variation. All three slightly different versions are on the DVD, though set to different clips. The extras include two other tracks, which for some reason were separated and an interview with Kenji Kawai (that for some unknown reason takes a full minute before Kenji appears and starts talking), which is interesting but some of the stuff is just a repeat of what he said in other making of features for GitS2. The DVD isn’t one you can really sit down and watch for thirty-five minutes, but one you might put on while you’re doing something else, for atmosphere.

This DVD seems more aimed towards the same people who purchased the GitS:SAC Official Log Book, or for people who want to buy the soundtrack and don’t mind paying a few more quid (the DVD retails at around £20) in order to get the DVD and postcards etc. Which really seems to be the only reason to go out and buy this music video anthology. There is a reason why they are hardly ever done!

R2 DVD Notes

Features: English/French/German/Dutch Menus and Subtitles, Interview with Kenji Kawai and trailers.

Release information: Publisher: Beez Released: March 6th 2006 Classification: U Running Time: 96mins (?)

Notes: Other than the interview with Kenji Kawai the extras don't really offer much.

-- Joseph (Joe) Wood 10th Mar 06

Ghost in the Shell 2 : Innocence Images