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Crying Freeman - Portrait of a Killer

ADV Films // Unrated // March 11, 2003
List Price: $29.99 [Buy now and save at Amazon]

Review by Don Houston | posted March 30, 2003 | E-mail the Author
Movie: Anime is often the source of non-traditional stories with anti-hero's as the focal point. Such is the case with Crying Freeman. The dvd is comprised of two episodes of a story that centered around a hired killer, Yo Hinomura, who is the best assassin in the gang known as the 108 Dragons. Torn from a life as an acclaimed artist, he was brainwashed and forced to become something totally opposite, a merciless killer who follows orders and sheds silent tears for his victims. The show was originally from 1988 and had a fair amount of nudity and a lot of bloody violence when Yo took on the opponents of his gang. Seeing heads blown apart, throats cut and other means by which the various gangsters attempt to send each other to an early grave is half the fun here. If you aren't into violent anime, don't bother with this one.

The two episodes on the disc were:
Portrait of a Killer: This episode introduces us to Yo, his organization and the dilemma he faced when confronted with a quandary about love versus duty. How he handled it was certainly non-traditional.
Shades of Death: This episode centered on an internal conflict between the 108 Dragons as well as a rival assassin's attempt to kill Yo. To say any more would be to spoil it for you.

Picture: The limitations of the source material were evident but not as bad as previously released VHS tapes have been. The show was presented in 1.33:1 full frame ratio and looked it's age with a limited style of anime that really wasn't great even when this was originally released.

Sound: The standard choices of English, English with song subtitles, or Japanese with English subtitles was present with 2.0 stereo. Each track was pretty good with few problems associated with older releases.

Extras: 6 trailers

Final Thoughts: This was the best I've ever seen this show by far and the biggest problem it has with the Manga original would be that the show looks almost as if it were taken straight from the pages of the comics. The comic lasted a long time and trying to cram so much history into the 6 episodes this series runs was simply too much to properly convey all the subtleties of this anti-hero saga. I enjoyed it as a look to my own anime watching roots but others may not find it as nostalgic as I do. In all, a good rental for casual anime fans who'd like something with an edge and a keeper for hardcore fans.

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