Ninja Scroll (10th Anniversary Special Edition)
November 2003 Reviewed by: Josh Barber Format: DVD	(all ratings out of 5): Overall Enjoyment Picture Quality Packaged Extras Sound Quality

When most people think about animé, they have a few specific ideas in mind: big eyes and speed lines, to be sure, but also angular faces, extreme violence, and sexuality. If that is the case, then Ninja Scroll isn't going to help dispel any stereotypes.

Jubei is a ninja-for-hire who has been roped into being a hero through less-than-honorable means. When a mysterious plague wipes out a remote mountain village, Jubei is drawn into a vast political conspiracy that will carry him all over the countryside, introducing him to enemies and allies -- both old and new.

Ninja Scroll is often cited as one of the most dynamic and influential animés of the past decade, as well as writer/director Yoshiaki Kawajiri's masterpiece. The storyline is simple: boy ninja meets girl ninja and they don't get along; boy ninja and girl ninja team up to fight bad guys; boy ninja and girl ninja fall in love. Anyone who has seen any action movies will be readily familiar with this plot -- if Jubei was a real person, he would be part owner of Planet Hollywood.

The enemies in Ninja Scroll are dispatched in video-game style: our hero progresses through the levels, faces a "boss," delivers a Mortal Kombat-style fatality, and moves on. Since there is no real innovation in story structure, the details are what make the episodic story work. These include unique villains, creative fights, and inventive solutions, all of which inject a bit of variety to a repetitious genre.

As mentioned before, Kawajiri's animation style closely fits the stereotypical view of animé. There's more to the genre than just "big eyes and speed lines," however, and Ninja Scroll also provides the more esoteric elements, such as pauses before moments of extreme violence and the fluidity of time. The animation is consistently good, though the few scenes of nudity and sexuality seem gratuitous and out of place.

Though Ninja Scroll found its way to the US in 1996, it had debuted three years earlier in Japan. For the film's tenth anniversary release, Manga Entertainment has reworked the film into a fine DVD presentation.

Available on a double-sided disc, Ninja Scroll looks and sounds beautiful. For a ten-year-old cartoon (remember, kids, that means that everything was done before computers got in on the act), the colors are crisp and vibrant, with good contrast and no bleeding. The soundtrack, in its various languages, is rich, with some impressive foley work.

One side of the disc is widescreen, while the other is full. Admittedly, as informed viewers, we become caught up in the desire for widescreen presentations, especially when compared to their lesser pan-and-scan brothers. Ninja Scroll, however, was shot at 4:3, so its "widescreen" is actually a matte process: black bars were added at the top and bottom, obscuring a bit of the picture.

For an anniversary disc, extras are light, and mostly text-based: an examination of the historical Jubei and how his legend influenced this character; a character synopsis of the 11 main players; an interview with the English voices of Jubei and Kagero; and a subtitled interview with Yoshiaki Kawajiri. The interviews are each about 20 minutes long and do cover a variety of material.

The DVD slipcase set includes a postcard of Kagero and a double-sided poster featuring the cover group shot and another image of Kagero. The poster is somewhat blurry, as if the images have been blown up from a low-resolution file, but it is still better than a plain chapter-list insert.

Bathed in sex and violence, Ninja Scroll is certainly not for children or those easily offended. As an animated action flick, though, it is quite good.

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