Don't Do Drugs, Kids

WHAT. THE. FUCK.

I have never uttered that phrase more than I did during the two hours of my life I gave over to watching 'Casshern' on DVD. Honestly, I go into the videostore, I see a movie about a super-powered dude fighting giant robots based on a '70s Japanese cartoon, and what can I say? I'm a sucker for that stuff. But this was... not what I was expecting.

It didn't help matters that Rialto has apparently mass-produced a faulty DVD that unintentionally loops a fight scene so that it plays twice (exactly the same way, shot for shot) in the middle of the movie, totally fucking up any semblance of sense the story had been making up to that point. In fact, I'm not even convinced the loop was unintentional... given how coherent the rest of the story was, it was probably a deliberate nod to the repetitive nature of violence, or something.

This is easily one of the best-looking movies I've ever seen. Shot using the same sort of technology that made 'Sin City' and 'Sky Captain' so gorgeous, with a guy with a rocket pack fighting armies of giant robots thrown in for good measure, it's probably best to just watch this movie with the sound off.

The problem is that there isn't really enough robot-fighting. I mean, once I get a taste for that sort of thing, I must have more; but instead 'Casshern' goes off on incomprehensible philosophical tangents that the Wachowski Brothers would be proud of. I was totally down with all the 'trippy' elements of this one at first, even as I realised it must have fuck all to do with the anime it's based on (a quick perusal of the net just then confirmed this), but eventually, one slightly confusing moment led to another until it reached the point where I had no fucking idea what was going on. Which, in a way, is actually pretty cool, but not when it distracts from the guy with the rocket pack.

Seriously, my head still hurts now. A lot. But my god, did it look cool. A part of me wants to give this the worst recommendation possible, another part of me wants to watch it again right now. Not sure which part wins yet.