Anime: 1001 Nights 15e2x

NOTE: This is the very first review I wrote three years ago and as such it's basically just an excuse for practicing or a starting point. Nowadays I'm not happy with it but there's no review about on the site so...

1001 Nights is a movie that came out in 1999 and should not be confused with the first hentai film ever that came out thirty years before it. It is loosely based on the famous collection composed of different tales of the same name.

It is necessary to clarify that this movie is essentially a musical film in the likes of Disney’s Fantasia, so its main focus is to present great visuals and music instead of a good story. In fact this movie was thought as an interpretation of an orchestration and nothing more so the visuals and music flows together spectacularly. Speaking of those elements, they consists of classical music and a mix between 2-D and 3-D art, more specifically, colored pencil drawings and early CGI; they somehow managed to make it right, it looks gorgeous. Isn’t it funny how a movie that came out almost two decades ago did it right while the recent attempts at doing the same thing look horrendous? The recent Berserk anime(the movie trilogy too if you want), Asura and Arve Rezzle are a few examples of what I’m talking about.

As for the story…well, it barely has one (if even). If you’ve read the original tales you can find references to some of them thrown in it but if you haven’t all you will see is erotic sequences with a most trippy art style that equals(or even tops) the sex scene from Mind Game. You could think of it as a couple dealing with the internal demons of their relationship…or just them wanted to make love but all of a sudden are being chased by an angry demon in a really intense adventure, what is this, Ghosts n’ Ghoblins?

Anyway, this movie is a great example of art in its pure form both visually and musically and one of the most unique pieces in the medium and that alone makes it worth watching despite not having much of a plot, or any.

2/7/23 update: After watching the likes of Pale Cocoon, Angel's Egg, Cat Soup, Junk Head and Mad God, I decided to stop giving a to movies like these that are just visuals, sound, and a setting, if your movie has nothing to say, its plot is very loose, and there are no characters in it, then it doesn't get a base score from me. Bye

RECOMMENDATIONS

Disney's Fantasia (basically the same thing but for everyone).
Interstella5555 (also a musical film, but it has way more conventional art style and music, and a much more comprehensible plot).