Otaku no Video (1991)

The Worst Film Ever

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

This grab bag video features a fictional (and animated) story line of how some college anime fans came together, lost their other friends, flunked out, started an animation studio, got rich and eventually got to live out their futuristic sci-fi dreams. Actually this part was a thinly fictionalized and slightly idealized re-telling of how the real life GAINAX company came about. What makes it special, though, are its hilarious (live) 'documentary' interviews with anime fans which play like outtakes from some Japanese version of Slackers. Strictly for fans of the genre, - non-fans of anime will be confused and likely bored by all of the inside jokes and cryptic references, and even devoted anime fans might need to glance at liner notes from time to time - but this is a clever and entertaining exercise intended for insiders. Recommended if you are already an 'otaku'(obsessed fan).

I had Otaku No Video out of the library for a full three weeks before getting around to watching it. I had been put off by its reputation as a film with in jokes only truly understood by hard core anime fans.When I finally watched it, I found I had been mistaken. Although it has many in jokes, they do not spoil the fun of the movie. The true appeal of Otaku no Video is its loving yet still hilarious depiction of otaku. It explores virtually aspect of fandom, making it look fun even as it mocks it. It's enough to make you go on eBay or JBox and try to find a garage kit!Also, the film actually makes you care about its characters. Kubo and Tanaka are genuinely sympathetic, even to a non-otaku. Yes, they are socially awkward and obsessive, but the movie deals with this issue pretty well. For example, Kobu is shown to have been an obsessive tennis player before he was an otaku. As he asks at one point, why is playing tennis constantly fine while watching anime obsessively is bad?This is definitely a must for any anime fan, or any rabid genre fan for that matter.

Gainax poked fun at the fans of anime, (really the fans of anything) in their OTAKU NO VIDEO, which was I just picked up on DVD I watched the disc, subtitled and captioned to provided explanation of the anime/manga jokes and I am pleasantly surprised to find it very funny for all the right reasons. If you are into anything (from dolls to widgets to cars to trains to salt shakers) with any sort of passion, you'll know these people. And the deeper you're into the thing you love the odds are the more people like this you'll know. I know all of them and see myself in there too. Gainax is in there too, since they are the ones in the live action segments If you're a fan of anything and can be made fun of with out crying then get the video and watch it. Better if you watch it with several of you friends who are fans as well....

Although there are four pages of extensive liner notes that explain every inside joke, reference, and parody, I feel that you have to have lived in Japan, with all these things going on around you, to truly appreciate this video. I didn't, so a lot of the jokes fell flat for me. The faux interviews were great--up there with Spinal Tap and Zelig--but the animated sequences weren't even up to par with Gainax' TV animation, and Otaku No Video is supposed to be an OAV (which usually garner a larger budget). Until the end, there really wasn't any animation that was striking--just reference, joke, look-alike, joke, joke, reference, and mainly to old television shows that I've never seen or didn't particularly care for.Beyond that, I have absolutely no idea how much has been fictionalized in this dramatization of the creation of Studio Gainax, so I don't know what's ridiculous or what's real (i.e. (spoilers) did they really can him while he was on an extended business trip to China/did his ex-girlfriend really saddle up with his conniving boss to oust him?)