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Forum - View topicBuried Treasure - Ringing Bell
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halo
Posts: 356 |
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I like Arashi no Yoru ni but the review hit the nail on the head. I really would like to check this one out. I'll see what I can do about the fansub situation
Edit: I think Arashi no Yoru ni came out in 2005 not last year. |
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Anton Chigurh
 Posts: 257 Location: Guam |
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Anime that resembles No Country for Old Men in its thematic? I am there. The series itself sounds as if it had been made exclusively to fuel children's nightmares everywhere - come for the cutesy animal designs, stay for the story of death and unfairness in life.
That people would use stationery of the main character doesn't surprise me. After seeing children's books of movies like The Dark Knight, little surprises me, even if it happens in another country. |
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JohnathanEnder
 Posts: 89 |
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They had this at Otakon a few years ago. One of the video rooms was playing it on Saturday night. One of the most depressing things I have ever seen.
Apparently, someone has put up the English dub on Youtube. The first part is here: [no linking to elongated segments or sequences, please -TK] |
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Ryusui
 Posts: 463 |
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Guh? The Mouse and his Child? I watched that after it was mentioned several times on TVTropes.org. Good movie, but I had no idea it was by Sanrio.
(It was good enough that I bought the book off of Amazon.com. And yes, before you ask, the book is better, but the movie stands on its own merits.) Anyways, thanks for the YouTube link...I've heard of Ringing Bell before (thank you, Anime Encyclopedia and your shining gems mixed in with tons of misinformation), but I've never had cause or opportunity to watch it. :3 |
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CloverKuroba
 Posts: 506 |
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Oh, wow...I remember Ringing Bell. I saw it when I was pretty young, around 4 or 5, but I remember it being so heartbreaking. It leaves you feeling very empty and sad, and I definitely wasn't used to having animated films produce that kind of feeling out of me.
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Anime World Order
 Posts: 390 Location: Florida |
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Since the time when I put up my review of Ringing Bell about two years ago, I've received a lot of correspondence from people who remember seeing it in their childhood perhaps not via the RCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video release, but because this thing apparently aired on TV. Exactly where is uncertain: people have claimed it was on Nick Jr, but I grew up with the creation of Nickelodeon back when they used to show tons of anime, and since I never saw this during my childhood I can only assume it aired somewhere else. I hear similar stories regarding Unico as well as Sea Prince and the Fire Child, so there must be something to the tales. That said, I'm not the resident expert; for matters relating to this (as well as Unico), I defer to whatever Rob Fenelon--one of the original "pushers" of Ringing Bell--and StudioToledo say.
I do wish Sanrio had continued making films of the caliber of this, Unico, and Legend of Sirius. It's my opinion that children's entertainment is far too sanitized and overprotective to the point of being detrimental. |
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rti9
 Posts: 1241 |
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Ringing Bell is an extremely interesting movie because it makes us inquire if this should be seen by children or not. Consequently it raises the question: are today's parents spoiling their children too much? Is it really the best idea of today's safe and colorful films directed to children to constantly emphasize that all their dreams will come true? |
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Chrno2
 Posts: 6172 Location: USA |
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Great review. I immediately went and searched for it and of course it's posted online for anyone curious. I have to say for it's time it's very deep in it's message. I saw 'Arashi no yoru ni' awhile back, and I kept wonder about what they were leading up to. I can see what you mean about chickening out. I guess they wanted to resolve it a different way that wouldn't scar the kiddies. Still a good movie but for some reason it didn't grab me. Maybe one day I'll take another look. But 'Ringing Bell' doesn't hold back.
The film almost looks familiar to me but I can't say. But I know I've seen 'Mouse and His Child' somewhere. And that's also up online. In a way some of the work in 'Ringing Bell' reminds me of some 'Max Fleischer' or 'Harvey Toons'. Continue reviewing more buried classics like these. |
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prime_pm
 Posts: 2376 Location: Your Mother's Bedroom |
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This feels like my interpretation of the ending: *Spoiler Alert*
Because he's the ram we deserve, but not the ram we need now. So we'll hunt him because he can take it. Because he's not our ram. He's a silent wolf, a watchful protector. A Dark Sheep ...I have a movie trailer idea now Last edited by prime_pm on Thu Oct 29, 2009 8:49 am; edited 1 time in total |
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zawa113
 Posts: 7359 |
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This pretty much sums up my general problem I seem to be having with all kids movies lately. Just name it, Bolt, Insert Disney movie, Spiderwick Chronicles, they're all playing it safe. None of the main characters or their parents/best friends ever die (or if they do it was way before the movie ever started), they all have happy endings, and they don't try anything objectionable. It's like someone took the term "family" and grossly misinterpreted it to mean "politically correct-safe-predictable-bore fest". Then made at least 5 films using this new term and wrote a book on how to do so for others to rip off. I suppose Wall*E actually tried to bring some things into question in regards to the American life style (with clear disregards to skinny vegetarians), so it gets some credit there I suppose for not playing it entirely safe, but pretty much everything else has been annoying me for this very reason. I just finished watching this on youtube (hooray for youtube) and enjoyed it. I'd call it family viewing and viewing for little kids no problem, it's not like bazookas are involved with enough blood to fill several olympic sized swimming pools on the screen at any given time. But it still deals with more mature themes than "finding you pet" or "protecting a book from evil using tomato sauce", both of which were uber predictable happy endings. I don't remember being sheltered this much when I was a kid (and this was just back in the 90's). And I played with Fisher Price toys that had small parts young kids might choke on, but clearly, everything worked out. |
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Zin5ki
 Posts: 6680 Location: London, UK |
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It certainly makes plot predictions easier: To identify the characters to whom things will turn out for the best by the end of one of these films, one needs only to identify the main protagonists. Since this is often possible simply from glancing at a promotional poster, one doesn't actually have to see such a film to do so. Thus one saves a lot of time. Huzzah! Does this film really lack any positive message at all though? As much as I'm clearly against sugary endings, for there to be nothing remotely uplifting to find (regardless of who survives and who does not) would not make this the sort of work I'd wish to see. Somebody once told me The Dog of Flanders is much like this. |
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Charred Knight
 Posts: 3085 |
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"There is almost nothing uplifting about Ringing Bell, and yet it maintains its sense of adorable while simultaneously destroying our concepts of the beauty of nature. Which, in my book, ranks slightly below Santa Claus on the list of horrible lies parents tell their kids. "
Are you telling me that the reviewer is telling his audience to exterminate wolves? What the hell did Wolves ever do to you that you would tell us to kill them? The Mexican Gray Wolf is a critically endangered wolf and your telling us that we need to finish the job? Hey I think bears might be a danger lets kill all of them and screw the ecosystem. Seriously Justin, I think you need to go outside, and I don't know get some fresh air. Your world view is kind of well screwed up if you think that humanity and nature are at war. The squirrels are not trying to kill you |
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caporushes
Posts: 16 |
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I absolutely ADORED this movie when I was very small, and then once when I was a little older I took it out to watch again and I was just depressed for days. I couldn't believe I would watch it over and over again. It's a great movie though, for all that nothing in it is in any way uplifting. It's a very brutal movie and I can't imagine what the message of it is but it's certainly stuck with me my entire life so that's something. And it vaguely reminds me of old Disney films where if the young protagonist was happy, inevitably his mother (or father, whoever was more important a figure) was going to die. Only in the end the protagonist doesn't rise above the tragedy, he just sort of gets bogged down with how cruel and unfair the world is. Perhaps you can take a message away from Chirin's sort of tragic nobility spoiler[because even when the sheep he rescued --by killing his surrogate father figure!-- all shun him he keeps watch over them anyway]? I'm not sure what it would be though, again, except that life is unfair and then you die.
They played it at Otakon a few years ago (two, I want to say?) and the weirdest part about watching it in a crowd is that everyone was laughing, like there was some sort of compulsion on them to laugh at an old dubbed anime. I couldn't figure it out, because while the dub isn't brilliant the film is still really just not funny at all, not even in a "how hilariously bad things were back then!" way. |
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Craeyst Raygal
 Posts: 1383 Location: In the garage, beneath a 1970 MGB GT. |
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Umm, Charred Knight, ever think that he's talking about the popularized "Innocent Natural Harmony" bullcrap that we put in our kids' faces with movies where lions nobly explain that the only reason they eat antelope is because it's part of an Elton John song?
No one's saying kill wolves. What he's saying is let's look at the real nature where wolves do eat livestock because they're hungry and livestock are easy prey provided Farmer Frank doesn't have his twice-barreled shootgun on hand. |
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REDOG
Posts: 37 |
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While far from being the most depressing movie i ever saw. This movie can bring a lot of moral to it. Like how people don't care about the suffering of other only to concentrate on their own life.
Anybody think the wolf is pretty philosophic? |
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