Pale Cocoon by Yasuhiro Yoshiura. A 23 minute philisophical science-fiction OVA. Almost every frame is a work of art but the main point of this OVA is to make the audience feel what the characters feel.
Hundreds of years have passed since humans have ruined the Earth. Forced to retreat to an artificial surface network and a moon colony, humans have forgotten their past. They have forgotten what green fields are, flowers, birds, life. Despite the advances in technology, much of the information about the past has been lost. The remaining files are stored in an archive, corrupted, binary files that can be restored. The “Archive Excavation Department” is responsible for that sole task.
Once a lively and enthusiastic department, it has become forsaken for humans no longer seek the truth. The truth that hurts. Only a few workers remain and among them are the characters of Ura and Riko. Ura seeks to know and to understand. He continues his work although those around him are slowly disappearing. The only one to remain is Riko. Riko also works in the same department but she has already had enough. She stays because Ura does but not for the same reasons. Her’s is to hold onto a collapsing relationship where Ura’s is to seek the truth.
One day, two large files are sent to Ura. Running a simple restoration program, Ura discovers that it is a video file with audio. Contained within the video is a message in the form of a song that will forever change Ura’s life.
Artist: Yoko Yamaguchi (Little Moa)
Song: Hito no Hibiki (Aoi Tamago)
The morning after the forest has slept
A tail of smoke left in the sky
Intersecting with the horizon
Forming a silver cross
The morning after the repetitive sleep
The moon stopped waiting
As the moon waxed, a cradle was formed
In the stead of a prayer, this is presents
That is the last angel
That is the last remaining cloud
The pale cocoon that will never hatch
Even if I lose my smile
The morning after the stars have slept
At least tomorrow will have a cloudy sky
During the peaceful time when God was here
The strawberry gardens glistened with dew
Promise that someday we will meet again
I won’t forget you
The second video file reveals that the singer Yoko had left for the moon colony and from there she sees a rusted Earth. In an epiphany of understanding, Ura rides an elevator to the top levels of the network. There he discovers a sky. A cloud formed from the exhaust of a rocket surrounds him as he stands atop the elevator car. The support cables suddenly snap and as Ura falls he sees something.
He sees, a blue Earth.
Many others have drawn parallels to Makoto Shinkai’s, Voices of a Distant Star. The largest common factor being a relationship slowly torn apart by some uncontrollable science fiction event. But in stark contrast, Pale Cocoon offers a much more darker outlook. Despair conveyed perfectly by both the setting and the plot; the vast emptyness of space whether it be extraterrestrial or in a society losing hope. People quitting. People wishing that the truths were actually lies. The mood can be felt almost as soon as the episode begins only to be reinforced again and again throughout the entire 23 minutes.
But in the harsh quest of truth that strays away from the wonderful world of lies, there lies hope, hope that there is more beyond the truth that one finds. Others have given up, not being able to walk a path that shows them horror and of humanity’s stupidity. Ura is a man seeking for something more than the reality that exists before him; a crumbling world following the demise of Earth. Riko is not as strong willed. She cannot bear to see the truths anymore but her dying love for Ura keeps her with him. She tries to pull Ura away from his quest only to be left behind.
An obvious message of “change before Earth dies”, the audience leaves with two things; despair and hope.
The song in this OVA was performed by Little Moa and there have been no official releases of it. In fact, rummaging through the internet, I was only able to find the only other song by Little Moa called “instead for you” on the album “VALB next”.
This is not for everyone. The sci-fi and philisophy combined with the gloomy mood makes for a very sad feel. If you’re the type of person who likes the mainstream, happy-go-lucky, fanservice animes, this isn’t for you. For those who seek for a true anime experience that explores human emotion and sadness, Pale Cocoon is a must. I walk both worlds and this was definitely a gem for me. I enjoyed it thoroughly from the visuals to the character emotion to the depressed setting.
For a bit of even later introductions Hi! I am one of the new torture victims authors at THAT. Thanks go out to Impz and Extrange for helping me get started. I’ll mainly be writing about movies and short OVAs for THAT however if there ever is a need and I have a crap load of time on my hands I might write some episodal posts. I look forward to working with all the others on my now not-so-empty YIM list.
phuzy over and out.
13 Comments
Welcome to T.H.A.T. … and what a way to start! I loved this short movie despite its bleak outlook, short running time and occasionally shaky graphics. I can kinda understand the Shinkai comparisons too – the home-grown CGI, the use of a song towards the end, the obvious influences from the likes of Arthur C Clarke and so on reminded me quite a lot of his earlier work. If Yoshiura ends up following a similar career path, mind, I’m all for it!
Considering what this movie achieves in such a short time, I think it deserves much more recognition – I went through a wide array of different feelings while watching this, and the song itself is absolutely stunning. Shame there’s no official release of it though.
By the way, trailers for Yoshiura’s next movie, Eve no Jikan (Time of Eve) are floating around online, if you haven’t stumbled on them already. It looks like it will be absolutely fantastic.
Thank you!
The song is strangely addicting. I was actually replaying the rip I have of it over and over again while I was writing this entry. Little Moa, don’t know why I can’t find her anywhere, she’s amazing.
I did stumble upon “Eve no Jikan” although the English title appears to be “Are you Enjoying the Time of Eve?”. Literally translated, “Eve no Jikan”, as you said, is “Time of Eve”. I’m looking forward to it! But it has yet to come out. Visit http://www.studio-rikka.com/eve/ for more details!
I haven’t watched this but here’s another entry on Pale Cocoon (for past authorial promotional whoring? – and I’m sorry if I’m assuming you haven’t read it yet)
Great review! I haven’t seen this yet, but the way you describe it, it sounds right up my alley. I wish the cyberpunk genre was still fashionable, the mix of despair and hope resonates so well in this medium.
@lelangir
It was actually that original entry that got me to watch that OVA in the first place. It’s alright. If a past author has written about it, that just makes it so much better doesn’t it? It adds another view to the same thing. Seeing something is knowing, sharing what you see is understanding.
@jiff
Hope you enjoy it!
Hmm… this is interesting, i havne’t seen it yet, but i think i might pick it up ^_^
Good thing I asked you here to THAT. I have always been interested of this series, but never really bothered to take a look since the science fiction is not something I will watch that much. Nonetheless, after this entry, I went on a search to watch it and found myself pleasantly surprised.
Rather than despair or hope, I felt a strange sensation of resignation and relief. Resignation is because it is something that cannot be changed by the future. The past is already over and the present is no longer able to adapt back to the past. The future, being dictated by the present, is no longer there. Relief because everyone has somehow accepted the new truth, that this is their world.
I realize one of the major themes of this story is that Ura is a normal man that wishes to run away from the fact that he cannot do anything to change this world that has finally collapsed. Despite the fact that he is perhaps more resigned to fate that the world that they call as Earth is no longer alive, he is still trying fruitlessly to understand this world as they used to know.
When the truth no longer aids in facilitating change or returning back to the same thing (bringing parallels with the world and the relationship that the two protagonists had), what is the point of truth? Is truth useful to simply know, or is it just something to look forward to in order to feel that there is something to search for.
Perhaps, Pale Cocoon is trying to give two different perspectives, but eventually merging into one common thing that all humans look for: the purpose of living.
the lyric is somewhat melancholic. will check out the song. i’m tempted to buy the anime cd because i’m attracted to its cover.
and after reading the review, i will buy the dvd the next time i see it in the shop.
Glad to see another author here! I’ll look forward to your posts on movies and short OVAs, heaven knows I have to watch more. :]
Ah, so you’ve read Itsubun’s post? Regretfully, I still haven’t watched Pale Cocoon after her post, but I shall get to it sometime soon! Now that both of you have described it well. If you want, check out Mizu no Kotoba. It’s only 9 minutes, but I kind of loved it (by the same director).
Frankly, I thought Pale Cocoon hit that point of longing for better, earlier times than Voices of a Distant Star did, but then again, I didn’t like the latter nearly as much as Shinkai’s other works, notwithstanding this piece.
Good post and great to see another writer happy and working here. :3
Just finished watching it, thank you so much for pointing this out! How did this get past my radar when it was released? Oh, well, that’s why we have blogs, for when we drop the ball like that.
I was confused at first by their references to up and down, wondering what they meant when they said her grandma lived above with others, but the sea was supposed to be below and this base built on top of it, and other stuff like that. I think though that they were trying to convey the sense of confusion felt by the people living in the base, literally not knowing up from down. Maybe I’m missing something – I only watched it once so far.
The ending was great, I got the message that it is important not to forget why we make sacrifices – the humans went to the moon base to escape the earth (presumably after destroying it themselves) but also to allow the earth to recuperate. Like the idol says in her message to earth, they have to hope the sun is able to fix itself.
As for the name Pale Cocoon, we have to wonder at what goes into a cocoon – a worm – and what comes out – a butterfly (or moth i guess). Perhaps the author is saying that we humans now are worms, and there needs to be something major that causes us to metamorphose into something able and willing to take care of the earth.
Despair and hope, I felt those too at the end. Hope, because their earth healed itself and ours can too, but despair that their race has forgotten their past. I assume that the parents of the first generation born on the moon were so ashamed of the past that they only spoke of it in hushed whispers, so it wouldn’t take long for memories of the past to fade. one needs look no further than the collective memory of any of the Axis countries that participated in WWII – or Vietnam for us Americans – to see how quickly unpleasant memories can be pushed away.
Libraries are important for that reason – we need to constantly remember what we have, what he have lost, where it came from, and how mistakes in the past can be repeated if we are not careful. I see today fewer and fewer people reading, especially history, and I got the hint from the director that this needs to change.
Thanks again for the review, I would otherwise have missed out on an awesome anime. I hope to see lots more of your recommendations in the future!
Thanks so much for reviewing this. I finally got a copy and just finished watching it. An absolutely magnificent piece of work from this independent writer/director, i’ll definitely be looking out for his future work.
awesome!