Animax's LaMB animated movie - blog feature and review

To celebrate the premiere of LaMB in Animax tonight at 8pm (Manila Time), I'm publishing a short feature about the 1st animated movie project by Animax Asia and script written by a Filipino, Carmelo Juinio. It was a great timing that I received an invitation to watch the press screening of LaMB in Greenbelt MyCinema few weeks ago, and I was right that Carmelo will be there and will watch the animated movie for the first time. Carmelo wrote the story of LaMB and it was his winning entry in the Animax animation script writing contest, and in all entries in the world, they picked up and granted an animated movie using Carmelo's story about people being laminated and preserving its beauty.


Here's my video interview with Carmelo Juinio, he reveals to me that he is a freelancer or a professional bum, a college drop out in FEU and a freelance computer programmer, and in this video he shares to us his vision about laminating people, the big influence of music in making this story, the strength of writing it and funny times during the days of working on the script after 5 years storing it in his vault.

Also I just met Greg Ho, VP and General Manager of Animax, and it was great to meet him again, and he just shared that he did convince his boss to materialize this idea and he even volunteer to monitor everything during the production. And he just love the story of Carmelo, and with that story they created it more darker and fitted for the culture of SE Asians. He said that they are not sure if there will be a follow up of this project in producing animated movies, but Greg's final note was, If this is a success, then expect more Animax produced anime show in the future. And oh wait, Greg told me that this movie is made of FLASH based animation. And produced paper less, means all digital.

(Read more below)

The Review





screen caps from the movie

After some intermission and watching the behind the scene, they just showed the LaMB animation starting from an accident occured in the lamination laboratory, they just cut it and then the intro video of the animated movie shows up. Featuring some clips and also fast introduction of each characters. Then I saw the characters moving and talking and because of that I'm very familiar with the quality and style for FLASH animation, I just can't help my eyes remove it and vision turn out to be very technical, visually. But I just removed that concept after seeing some 3D and CGI on the screen. So I said to myself, ahhhhhhhh. Me and Inquirer.net's Alex Villafania, my cinema seat mate, exchanges short review during the screening. Then I noticed that the 2D flash design is showing up, then over laps of 3D and CGI stuff covering and also being used in the background. The filtering of the movie is can be seen, but I'm not sure if it is visible in the small tv screen. I'm turning very technical already, and because it is made digitally, we just can't avoid sharing on what we see. They blended the flash animation with 3D and CGI and I think they used the 2D of Flash for the characters and the 3D and CG for the background and other components of the movie. To think of it that way, the makers of this animation is a genius!


Josie Ho, Vanness Wu, and Tanaka Chie

The dubbing for Vanness Wu and Josie Ho are matched for their character, I'm kinda feel weird everytime I hear Josie Ho talk, looks like that she's reading something, and maybe its the script. Vaness Wu's english language for the movie is perfect also, but I just can't stop noticing some delay in the lips and mouth movement of the character when speaking in the animation. But I hope they saw that too and re-edit it, but I'm not sure if theres a slight delay of audio duirng our screening. Vanness Wu (Dr. Jack Griswold) and Josie Ho ( Keiko Suzuki) provides the english and mandarin/cantonese language, while Tanaka Chie dubs the character Keiko Suzuki in Mandarin



The great thing for this movie is the main storyline and how the story goes, the story started from everything and it will never confuse a viewer, because the introduction of each character is done well, character development occurs in every scene, were you learn more of the character's personality and history, and also discover their main role in the LaMB storyline.

The use of branded entertainment can be seen mostly in the entire film. From music, props, wardrobe and even personalities. The greatest branded entertainment ( a form of advertisement placement in a film using existing products) are the music of Click Five and Simple Plan, the band Simple Plan is in the movie and they are fully in CGI as a band. The wardrobe of the character Eve of LaMB is designed by Vivienne Tam.

· LaMB to feature two exclusive dresses designed by Vivienne Tam in the animation TV feature
· LaMB protagonist Eve dons the Vivienne Tam designs in the animation which will be made into actual dresses for an exclusive showcase at LaMB launch events in March 2009 across Asia
· Ready-to-wear versions of the dresses are in the Fall/Winter 2008 Collection from Vivienne Tam, the fashion house responsible for gowns worn by Hollywood stars Halle Berry, Ashley Judd, Hayden Panettiere, Heather Graham and Ashanti

The only flaw of this movie is the non-sync of the mouth of the character while talking, and the fast pace of some scenes, I'm not just sure if it will be much better to watch it on TV, because I saw the movie in a big screen in Greenbelt MyCinema, sometimes syncing the audio and video to a projected big screen is sometimes be delayed. The animated movie is one awesome piece of animated movie that merges different kinds of media.

But my over all review will be, this animation feature has a ground breaking success in stitching different kinds of media and the big collaboration of people in the industry makes the job more easier. LaMB is the first and I know many will follow on its foot step. I'm supporting this because our Pinoy friend, Carmelo Juinio created the story and I know it will inspire a lot of young audience if they watch the movie.

here are some facts about the LaMB

MUSIC
· Simple Plan’s ‘I Can Wait Forever’ as title track, along with The Click Five’s ‘Summertime’ feature within LaMB
· Simple Plan band members animated into TV feature to perform as an animated band
· Animax and Singapore-based animation studio Peach Blossom Media produced animated music video for ‘I Can Wait Forever’ premiered 19 December 2008 on Animax Asia
· Animax and Singapore based production house VividThree Productions produced animation-live-action mix music video for ‘Summertime’, premiered 21 November 2008 on Animax Asia
· Both music videos are airing on Animax and are available at the LaMB website www.animax-lamb.com

PRODUCTION
· Animation and production of LaMB TV feature by Singapore-based animation studio Peach Blossom Media and Animax Asia
· Directed by Thomas Chou, co-founder and director of Hong Kong production house Da Joint, with project consultant Ryosuke Tei, former founder and creative director of Japanese creative agency Furi Furi
· Storyboard artist is Yasufumi Soejima, formerly from Japanese anime studio Gonzo who has contributed animation and 3D work to anime including The Second Renaissance of the Animatrix series, Zaion: I Wish You Were Here, Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo, and Final Fantasy: Unlimited as well as music video for Linkin’ Park’s hit single ‘Breaking the Habit’
· Singapore-based comics and concept art studio Imaginary Friends Studios provides concept art and design as well as produces web manga and mobile graphic novel

VOICE-OVERS
· Van Ness Wu, Taiwan-based actor, star of Ken Yip’s Kung Fu Chefs (2009), and singer of Mando-pop group JVKV (known previously as F4) to voice the English and Mandarin dubs for LaMB’s male protagonist Dr. Jack Griswold
· Hong Kong-based actress, star of Kenneth Bi’s The Drummer (2007), and rock star Josie Ho to provide the English and Cantonese voice-over for LaMB’s villain Keiko Suzuki
· Taiwan-based Japanese starlet and actress Tanaka Chie, star of Wei Te Sheng’s Cape No. 7 (2008) voices Keiko Suzuki in Mandarin
COSTUMES
· LaMB to feature two exclusive dresses designed by Vivienne Tam in the animation TV feature
· LaMB protagonist Eve dons the Vivienne Tam designs in the animation which will be made into actual dresses for an exclusive showcase at LaMB launch events in March 2009 across Asia
· Ready-to-wear versions of the dresses are in the Fall/Winter 2008 Collection from Vivienne Tam, the fashion house responsible for gowns worn by Hollywood stars Halle Berry, Ashley Judd, Hayden Panettiere, Heather Graham and Ashanti

Schedules and Show times
LaMB (Part 1): Tue, 24 Mar 2009, 8pm (SIN) / 7pm (WIB)
LaMB (Part 2) Tue, 31 Mar 2009, 8pm (SIN) / 7pm (WIB)
LaMB (1-Hour Special): Tue, 7 Apr 2009, 8pm (SIN) / 7pm (WIB)


Here are some photos from the press screening

more photos in my album at Animax's press screening of LaMB animation @ Greenbelt 3 MyCinema