Karas: The Prophecy (2005)

It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.

It isn't all that great, actually. Really cheesy and very predicable of how certain scenes are gonna turn play out. However, I guess that's the charm of it all, because I would consider this one of my guilty pleasures.

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.

This explanation is my culmination based on my 3 viewings of "Karas: the Prophecy", and four website explanations: Netflix, IMDb.com, and a quoted DVD text, and the official (English) website. Please note that this explanation is based on the English texts I have read and the English translation of the movie. It may not be 100% accurate, which if I have done this correctly, a more accurate explanation would really require knowing Japanese. E.g. "Eko" is actually Eku, and Yurine, is really "Yuri" and from the little Japanese I know, a single letter can drastically change the entire meaning of a word. OK, enough said.= THE PROPHECY = It was once foretold, that the battle for the future world will start and end - with Karas.= THE PLOT = The worlds of humans and demons have overlapped since time immemorial, and a spirit named Yurine (who represents the will of the people in the city) and her servant, Karas, have long maintained order and balance between the worlds. But humans have finally lost their beliefs of the demons and spirits. Disgusted by human arrogance, Karas turns his back on his role as guardian of the city, taking the name Eko, and plans an attack against the humans in the city. His goal is to have the humans once again believe in, and fear, demons.Eko and his followers live in the material realm in human form, but to continue doing so they must feed on the fluids of human bodies. Their periodic feasts result in massacres that leave only a single traumatized survivor. (There is no explanation given for this - it might be part of Eko's plan to re-instill fear into the hearts of humans.)Opposing Eko is the once demon Nue, who also lives in the material world in human form but refuses to drink blood. He wants to kill Eko b/c Eko trapped Nue's younger brother to help complete his evil plan. Also opposing Eko is Otoha, a human, who called out from his heart to Yurine - while he lies in a hospital bed in a coma. They make a contract and he becomes the new Karas.= THE KARAS = The "Karas", which means "crow" in Japanese, is their nom de plume as well as their title. There are others called Karas as well, Eko and Otoha are just the two most current and powerful. They can transform into any of various heavily armed vehicles. (There is much about "crows" but a lesson in ancient Japanese culture may explain that thread.)= The Humans = These "inexplicable" tragedies are the obsession of a marginalized police inspector whose daughter was the survivor of one such massacre. A young Leutenant is assigned to this "department". Beyond this simple role, they hardly have anything to do with the plot.Final comment: the first one is: "Karas: the Prohpecy" which has phenomenal CGI and action. 5/5* the second one is: "Karas: the Revelation" which has a cheaper version of the first CGI and typical anime action. 3/5*-LD______________________my faith: http://www.angelfire.com/ny5/jbc33/

First of all I think that this title "The Prophecy" is not complete without "The Revelation". The two movies together make what I think to be the best animation I have ever seen. The CG animation is flawlessly integrated with the traditional animation. The plot is deep and the characters are awesome. I love the idea of a city as being an entity alone and the people make up that entity. There is no other way to describe this anime. Go and get it and watch both in the Karas series. I seriously wish another one would come out. I have talked to many people here in Utah (Anime fans) that after watching the movie they say it is their favorite. MUST SEE and MUST BUY.

I'm giving this an 8 ONLY because it is only part one of a series.The opening sequence will slowly pull you in, and then once the battle begins you want to turn down the lights and turn up the sound. Then you want to back up and do some of the sequences in Slo-Mo-- and you will be gratified to see that the details are there frame by frame by frame. Then you back up again and let the speed go back to normal and just hiss out the word: COOOOL!Then you get to the Title!Now to be fair-- even though this is a movie-- you will begin to see that it has the structure of an anime set episode-- just way longer. Yet the storyline hovers up in the adult level of appreciation as well as appealing to teens-- WITHOUT the usual anime non-stop attempts at creepy soft-kiddie-porn thank you so very much! It will take you a while to figure out exactly WHO is WHO, especially with the not-quite-linear cuts from one scene to another. But once you get the hang of it-- you will get the hang of the scene "sidesteps" and accept the fact that during the battles-- Human Time freezes, and Demon Time beginsIf anything, I'll bet that when this whole series is complete, it will give you the familiar ring of "Doomed Megalopolis" Ohh-- and last but not least-- the English Dubbing is VERY GOOD. For fun-- leave the English Subtitles on-- the differences between the spoken English and the subtitles can be intriguing.

Lovely looking Animation. Similar in style to that of either Blood or Ergo Proxy. Storyline represents that of more classic Ainme demons against each other. Soundtrack is quite good, very "Computer game" feel to it. The fight scenes are all very flash and high in 3D quality. The reason I didn't rate it a 10 would mainly be due to it having slow parts that seem overly slow and sometimes, although the fight scenes are real nice, do get a bit mish mash and lose you on what is actually happening. nice addition to any collection of ainme films. Possibly one of the best demon related Ainme's out there. The dubbing is done extremely well and not too Anericanised either