Metropia

Saw Metropia, an animated dystopian film. The animation style is a sort of photoshop-distortion layered over photographs. It's like South Park, but with photos. The animator is also bad at action, so the effect is sort of like dolls bouncing around, nervily talking about mind-control. The plot is that Europe is connected by a gigantic metro network. Somehow (it's really not clear) this metro network is also producing mind-controlling shampoo. The protagonist is contacted by la resistance and is quickly won over to their side when he finds out about this blatant, ham-fisted manipulation. There is a bit of irony that the film makes, that he is being emotionally manipulated by the resistance members who are promising to free him (but are, of course, not all they seem.)

The film is a bit empty. It feels like an animated short that was stretched out to an hour and a half. It's very unusual and I liked it better than some of the films I've seen recently (Beneath the Planet of the Apes springs to mind as an example.) It's fairly hermetically sealed, not touching on any modern angst or topical issues. It also lacks any more poignant, universal messages. It's mood of nervousness is very well constructed and illustrated. It has an excellent sense of place and tone. The characters are cyphers and the action is relatively meaningless but, like I say, it's unusual and worth a look. An odd, nervous little film.