Why anime is an inferior medium

[Zhavric]

Imagine for a moment that you're a master sculpter. You can produce works on par with the Statue of David. You can turn clay & mortar into near-exact representations of the human form down to the last eyelash, blemish, vein and muscle crease.

You're ready to create a masterpiece of art... a statue that looks completely human out of clay... but you're not given clay to work with.

Someone hands you a bucket of legos and tells you to "get to work". You lament briefly and then get to work. You produce something that looks really cool, but it can never be as detailed as the Statue of David. The medium you've been given to work with simply cannot express the depth of human emotion.

I've realized that this is my gripe with anime. The characters can laugh, smile, frown and express a range of human emotions, but they're still limited. They're just drawings. They don't have the thousands of facial gestures that we use to communicate with one another. A lot of how we communicate is unspoken.

Consider the film Capote. There is a scene towards the end where the main character begins to cry. It's not a quick burst into tears. It takes a good twenty seconds where he looks around, begins to grimace, becomes flushed, etc. It was a stellar performance that convincingly portrayed the emotion of that character.

Anime can try to do the same thing, but it (to date) isn't as effective as flesh & blood human being.

The lack of detailed human body language / facial expressions has relegated anime to a medium inferior to regular film.

Anime really wants to be as emotional as cinema, but it never can be.

Discuss.

[phoenix_fire]

:rolleyes: Anime is awesome. Would go into further detail but I have to go to work now.

[bishop]

yeah... there's that other thing called a plot too...

once i've gotten into the plot, it's never been a problem for me to figure out the character's emotions. the good animators DO draw these little subtleties in. but yeah, much easier to act out emotions than draw them.. otoh, movies using human actors/actresses are severely limited in the types of scenes they can show - particularly in sci-fi, action and fantasy.. the only way they can satisfy the crowd is to use cgi, which is a part of the broad spectrum of anime.

[Zhavric]

Quote by: bishop yeah... there's that other thing called a plot too...

Which films have... and which are usually better than anime.

once i've gotten into the plot, it's never been a problem for me to figure out the character's emotions. the good animators DO draw these little subtleties in. but yeah, much easier to act out emotions than draw them..

And that's what holds anime back from being a true artform. It wants to be film. It uses film as its compass... but it can never be as good. It's (thus far) been drawings that look like people and not actual people.

otoh, movies using human actors/actresses are severely limited in the types of scenes they can show - particularly in sci-fi, action and fantasy.. the only way they can satisfy the crowd is to use cgi, which is a part of the broad spectrum of anime.

CGI has no such limitations. Consider Sin City which is nearly COMPLETLY CGI save for the human actors. There is no flip side of the coin for anime. Consider Final Fantasy Advent Children. The characters' movements are all incredibly life-like... except for their faces. Each of them look like dolls only able to express a small set of emotions.

CGI may be able to get to a point where it is sophisticated enough to portray all the body language I've referred to. Pen & ink anime hasn't yet and likely never will.

[bishop]

hey man... don't watch anime then, it's obviously not your thing.

and the b.s. about plots... i would think that someone who hates anime, such as yourself, could never really get into any anime movie to the point where you could actually appreciate the story.

...that's what holds anime back from being a true artform.

heh.. yup, it definitely isn't "true" art.. whatever that means...

[bugsbunny04]

Ive seen anime before. Ive seen characters that were fairly deep. Obviously, to get any deeper would have required human actors, but if you push the envelope of details and body language, and the voice actors are good, you can you can create better facsimiles than some human acting jobs. Hell, I dont think Ive EVER seen an anime that wasnt a better facisimilie of human behavior than the retarded daytime television my mom still watches to this day when she isnt working...Of course, I havent seen very many anime's...

[Kite]

Another victim of early to late 90's anime. Poor guy. Go watch Ghost in the Shell, and then tell me that the people drawn in there have no emotions or any subtle body language. That series is about as close to live acting as you can get.

[Zhavric]

Quote by: bishop hey man... don't watch anime then, it's obviously not your thing. and the b.s. about plots... i would think that someone who hates anime, such as yourself, could never really get into any anime movie to the point where you could actually appreciate the story.

Oh, don't get me wrong. There is some anime that I enjoy. I think Akira was absolutely ground-breaking and set the tone for nearly everything that came after it. Princess Mononoke presented a morally ambiguous story that was compelling. Spirited Away was creative and enchanting... and I get a kick out of Full Metal Alchemist and Samurai 7.

But I only watch them when I want to veg out and not have to think about what I'm seeing.

heh.. yup, it definitely isn't "true" art.. whatever that means...

What I mean is that anime doesn't have a Mona Lisa. It doesn't have a Statue of David. There's no Citizen Kane or Ode to Joy. It doesn't have a masterpiece to point to and I fear it never will. The closest its come so far has been Akira.

[Zhavric]

Quote by: Kite Another victim of early to late 90's anime. Poor guy. Go watch Ghost in the Shell, and then tell me that the people drawn in there have no emotions or any subtle body language. That series is about as close to live acting as you can get.

Actually, Ghost in the Shell is one of the best examples I could point to for my argument.



The only thing that made it stand out is that the characters were actually supposed to have blank emotionless faces.

Ghost in the Shell II was visually amazing, but still suffered from the same problem: you're watching drawings of people that aren't people... and the sequal actually, literally, put me to sleep. I dozed off during more than one section.

[Kite]

I'm not talking about the movies. The movies werre horrible. The television series, however, far surpasses the movies in every way, shape and form.
Also, this is really about personal preference rather which medium is superior. I find most action/sci-fi/fantasy movies that use live action seem to be lacking in certain areas. I feel that anime makes up for that lack. There are many terrible animes that can turn you off from the genre, but there are far more good quality animes that have not yet made it to america yet, or at least to a more prime time television slot. The reason for this is that most of the good animes aren't really kid-friendly.
Edit: Here's an example of the Ghost in the Shell TV series. It is both exeplary of why certain action/sci-fi sequences are best left to animation, and also the reason why its not aired at the same time as say, Pokemon or anotehr similar series.
http://www.ghostintheshell.tv/video/vid8.html

[Zhavric]

You're not getting it.

Anime doesn't have a masterpiece.

Anime cannot have masterpieces because it's film, but without the quality of true human mannerisms and body language that makes film so special.

That's the argument.

To prove me wrong, find me the masterpiece. Find me an anime "performance" that conveys emotion the way an acadamy award winning performance conveys emotion.

[bishop]

Quote by: zhavric What I mean is that anime doesn't have a Mona Lisa. It doesn't have a Statue of David. There's no Citizen Kane or Ode to Joy. It doesn't have a masterpiece to point to and I fear it never will. The closest its come so far has been Akira.

for most anime fans, we tend to hold akira and princess mononoke as being masterpieces.. with art, it's all in the eye of the beholder. i can't think of any movie that i'd call a masterpiece, but i can think of a lot that i really like. same with anime. art like da vinci's work, is a different story - and the application of "masterpiece" has a very different connotation as opposed to applying that label to movies (anime or not). you also don't hear much music created in this century as being a masterpiece - that term is reserved for classical greats and newer people like gershwin (sp?).

i personally, appreciate all forms of media and see the good and bad in each of them. movies with live actors would be extremely boring, or outdated, if they didn't include cgi (for example).. neither form is superior to the other imo.

while i've never seen it, everything i've ever read about the grave of fireflies tells me that it expertly conveys emotion.. in fact, the reviews usually state that it's exceedingly difficult to watch because it's "too" emotional - i.e. it doesn't hold anything back. even movies like schindler's list seemed to water down the horrors of the holocaust imo - and that movie seems like it would qualify as a masterpiece in your opinion.

read these user reviews and tell me if it sounds like the movie failed to convey emotions..

[url]http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00006HAWP/104-7923945-0447112?v=glance&n=130[url]

[Scribbler1]

Quote by: Zhavric Ghost in the Shell II was visually amazing, but still suffered from the same problem: you're watching drawings of people that aren't people... and the sequal actually, literally, put me to sleep. I dozed off during more than one section.

Clearly you aren't a fan of Anime, but that simply means you don't like it. That doesn't make it bad. As I like to say "that's why there's more than one button on the radio."

However, I don't understand your "drawings of people that aren't people" comparison. In the movies, precious little is "real" to begin with. In films, the PEOPLE aren't who they represent and sometimes they aren't even "people". Sean Connery isn't really a British secret agent, R2-D2 had a dwarf inside it and the guy who plays Will on Will and Grace isn't gay.

Anime, as well as ANYTHING thatrical requires the suspension of disbelief to enjoy. It also has great, as well as horrid examples of the genre. It's all a matter of taste.

[bishop]

no, his beef doesn't go deeper than comparing facial expressions of human actors vs. animated characters..

because you can't get exact facial expressions in anime on the level of those in traditional movies, he's saying that anime can't convey emotion, and therefore, is an inferior medium.

[phoenix_fire]

Dude, Zhav. You hate God and anime. Those are cardinal sins with me.

[Sonart]

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Quote by: bishop his beef doesn't go deeper than comparing facial expressions of human actors vs. animated characters... because you can't get exact facial expressions in anime on the level of those in traditional movies, he's saying that anime can't convey emotion, and therefore, is an inferior medium.

And non-representational art doesn't show anything recognizable, therefore that's obviously worthless too. And popular music... not nearly the depth and color of the sound you get with a full symphony... completely inferior.

{{SIGH}} These peons with their pedestrian tastes. :rolleyes:


.

[bishop]

amen brutha.

[Autolykos]

I think we would all do well here to remember the ancient Roman dictum:

De gustibus non disputandus est.

It means, "Matters of taste are not to be disputed."

- Rob

[Kite]

Quote by: Autolykos I think we would all do well here to remember the ancient Roman dictum: De gustibus non disputandus est. It means, "Matters of taste are not to be disputed." - Rob

I concur. However, the points zhavric brought up about conveying emotion through facial expressions have some flaws in them. The way anime compensates most times for lacking this ability is through large symbols that convey the emotion, IE, the big scary angry eyes, the huge sweat drop, ectetera.

[phoenix_fire]

It is also able to convey the characters' thoughts without seeming cheesy. That is something that live action really can't do.