AMV Romance

In this life there are very few things that really inspire me and make me breathless. One of the things that does both of these things are AMVs.

AMV - Anime Music Video.

I've decided to list my top three AMVs and say why I love them. I'm sorry that I'm not listing the creators. If anyone goes to animemusicvideos.org they will be able to do a search lickety split and be able to download the vids for their viewing pleasure within like 10 minutes. And I'm lazy, so I won't be listing creators.

Full Moon wo Sagashite - Queen 'Who wants to live Forever?' This is such a lovely video - so lovely. Full Moon wo Sagashite is about death (among other things) and the pairing of this song with this anime is perfect. I used to only think of Highlander whenever I heard this song - now I think of Full Moon wo Sagashite. The pic I've included is a manga cover I believe.

A Vision of Escaflowne - Limp Bizkit 'My Way'. I don't normally listen to music like this, but Escaflowne is a really good series to make AMVs for and so it's hard to screw it up. There are so many good scenes in it that if a person bombs it, ya gotta be like, HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE? This one focuses on Van and Dilandau beating the crap out of each other and doesn't even show Hitomi once. It's AWESOME!

Neon Genesis Evangelion - Verticle Horizon 'Everything you Want'. Anyone who's hung around here a little bit has probably heard how batty I am about this one, so I'll leave it. However, I have to say that this song is probably one of the best songs ever released - by anyone. It's so powerful and stylish and a little noisy. I love this song.

So now that I've done my list I can talk about why I love them so much. I feel like they really do a good job of highlighting one important aspect of an anime and the music chosen to help relay that message can be so perfect it pulls a person to their knees. It's like watching the ULTIMATE preview for a movie (a ten hour movie). One time I was, okay, I lied. Sometimes, I end up seeing previews for anime series' that they put at the front of whatever I've rented or bought and the preview is in English and they're obviously marketing the anime to ... ? I don't know who they're trying to market it to. I have no idea. Who would be interested in anime with such crappy previews. Seriously. It's been like six years since I first saw a preview for Biohunters and ya know what, on the recent (sort of) release of the new Vampire Hunter: D the preview is still the SAME. ARGH! Who the heck is in charge of marketing and advertising? And I have to ask them this very important question: are you stupid? Cause it seems like it. Do you even want to stay in business?

The way I see it - they need to get some of those AMV kids making their ads for them. They don't even need anyone to speak (big bonus - no voice actors). The can use sound clips from the show's soundtrack and do written text for the parts that need to be communicated to the audience, and ba da bing ba da boom - you got yourself an ad for an anime series that ... how shall I put it? DOESN'T SUCK!

Some of those AMV kids do movie previews too, and some of them are very talented. I made an AMV once and it was pretty fun, but it took a lot of time and a lot of wrist work. I don't have tha much wrist power to give to a project like that.

It just depresses me when my favourite thing is being marketed so poorly that it could only encourage ... I can't figure out who would want to watch anime with such ... ABSOLUTELY WRETCHED previews. Not I. It also depresses me when really talented people aren't making their livings doing what they are really great at. I hope all those AMV kids go to college and take graphics design and multimedia classes and throw the poor bums who are sucking at this incredible creative opportunity into retirement. And don't say that it won't happen. Lately, whenever I go shopping I'm very keenly reminded that other people in my generation are taking over, because products I've always thought would be cool are finally starting to come out.

However, I'm also feeling a little bit of the English burn lately, because I bought some Card Captor Sakura to put in my child movie savings box (for when kids come over) and when I turned it on to make sure it was okay - there was no Japanese language selection. I was so TANKED (for lack of a better word). So, now if I wanted to watch it to see if it was any good (I've never seen that particular anime), I'll have to watch it in English. I feel like stuffing my fingers down my throat. How much fun would that be? Ah, at least I'd feel better. I should stop complaining. My eleven year-old nephew complains to me that he can't follow it in Japanese and that he wants to watch anime in English. That's why I shouldn't complain. I love my nephew a lot and I want him to enjoy it. But, for myself, I'd really rather not.

Besides, sometimes when you hear English voice actors say certain things - it just sounds absolutely batty. Somehow, when you read subtitles - you hear the Japanese voice saying it and you read the exact same line in the subtitles that the crappy English voice actor had to say out loud ... and it seems totally reasonable. I don't know why, but reading the lines lets me access the world of the anime so much better. The characters and the scenerio seem better just because you didn't have to hear that loopy line in English.

So, this was supposed to be an AMV romance. Instead, maybe it was a lot of other things, but I feel the way I do and I've wanted to rant about something lately - so here was my rant. I feel cleaner. Cheers!