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Post by xpistissopheiax on Dec 31, 2013 0:23:48 GMT -5
I thought I'd pass this along for anyone who might be interested in "anime." This movie is basically a Gnostic passion play. Humanity's only hope for survival is the "knowledge" hidden in the physical world and a young girl lives in an illusory dream where she is forced to wake up by "the true prince" who has a tattoo of a cross on his face, who saves her by sacrificing himself for her. Pretty interesting  I'm not sure why the Japanese use Gnosticism so much in their movies, but I'm not complaining. (btw if you were to watch it make sure to watch with subtitles, the English dubbing is horrid and confusing) |
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Post by Soulgazer on Dec 31, 2013 9:16:51 GMT -5
Pastor Wood will LOVE this  |
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Post by xpistissopheiax on Dec 31, 2013 14:55:05 GMT -5
Awesome! you'll have to let me know what he thinks I wonder how well known the idea of the "spirit twin" is, b/c in this movie the main character is split into two people or twins. One is sleeping, and the other is a waking version that is a projection of her sleeping half. With an movie that has this much symbolism it is hard to tell where the symbolism ends and what is just a convention of the story. I barely know anything about the idea of the "spirit twin" so I'd be pretty impressed if that was in a Japanese movie lol. |
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Post by rmcdra on Jan 2, 2014 11:54:47 GMT -5
I'll have to check this series out.
My theory of why Gnosticism is in so much of anime is for the same reason we use Buddhism symbolism. They like using western concepts and Christianity is heavily associated with the west. Like how we will use a "Buddhist" or "Shinto" to create a mysterious stranger troupe, they will use Christianity in this way because it's exotic to them. Since they don't have the same filters about what is Christianity like what we do over here, they are easily able to pick up on Gnostic themes that get over looked. A season of a series that uses a lot of Christian symbolism is Magirangers. It draws heavily from Christian and Greek mythos and Christian/Gnostic concepts for how the characters grow and develop and are eventually able to overcome and even redeem some of the villains in the series. The source of magic in this series is "courage" which from the context of how they use the word is very close to the original meaning of the word "faith".
Another good series to check out and more adult oriented is Magica Madoka. I'll give a little bit of a spoiler but the wish granter is pretty much a demiurge/archon.
But yeah I'm going to want to check out King of Thorn.
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Post by xpistissopheiax on Jan 5, 2014 2:09:46 GMT -5
I can't find those on Netflix unfortunately, but maybe I can stream them on Hulu or something (although I still need to catch up on Full Metal Alchemist ) King of Thorn is just a movie, and not an entire series, so even if you have to buy it the cost isn't too terrible. When I got my copy it was $15 plus shipping and it came with a blu-ray and dvd copy (I'm new to blu-ray but the animation does look pretty amazing in hi definition). You'll have to let me know what you think. I posted a review of the movie for the horror movie site I write for and spent most of it just explaining all the symbolism. I didn't give it much thought at the time, but I'm guessing my editor won't publish it. Maybe he will, but for whatever reason religious topics are seem to be the most incredibly uncomfortable for the rest of the guys at the site, even considering how taboo a lot of the rest of the stuff we cover is. I'd think horror movie people would be interested in this kind of stuff considering how religious based a lot of our genre is, but I guess once you go beyond scratching the surface of the topic it isn't "polite" any more. |
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I'm not sure why the Japanese use Gnosticism so much in their movies, but I'm not complaining. 
