Mamoru Oshii's legendary OVA (original video animation), "Angel's Egg," released in 1985, will celebrate its 40th anniversary in 2025 with a 4K remaster. Under Oshii's supervision, the original 35mm film was scanned and remastered in 4K using the latest technology. This is Oshii's first original work, with Yoshitaka Amano handling the original concept and art direction. It was produced in an ascetic style, featuring near-monotone colors, minimal dialogue, unusually long takes, and approximately 400 cuts, roughly one-third the number of cuts in a typical anime. Released as an OVA in 1985, it was screened in theaters for a limited time to commemorate its release. To commemorate the 40th anniversary, we asked Oshii and Amano to look back on the time of its production.
◇An eternal girl separated from reproduction
-Do you ever rewatch "Angel's Egg"?
I had a chance to see Amano-san last year. I may have seen it somewhere else, but I remember it being last year. Watching the 4K remaster this time was refreshing. The sound was also really good. I thought it was great once again.
Director Oshii basically doesn't rewatch films once he's finished working. I may have seen it overseas, but it was over 10 years ago. They don't show the whole thing in panel discussions or anything like that, so I probably almost never watched it all the way through. It's not even shown in cinemas. I do watch "Patlabor" and "Ghost in the Shell" on TV, but I hardly ever watch "Angel's Egg." I've seen it so many times while working, and I remember the retakes, so it's a pain. It's been a while since I've seen it in such close to perfection, and I was quite moved. The sound was good too.
I felt that Amano-san was different from when I saw him last year. I don't know what the difference is, but I discovered something new.
Although I think I've seen Director Oshii's films, I actually haven't seen most of them. When I talk to people who have seen them, I find that they've seen something completely different.
Each scene looks different to me . I find myself drawn to something different every time.
-How did Amano end up participating in the first place?
Director Oshii: I don't remember it clearly, but "Lupin the Third" was a failure and ended halfway through, so I wanted to work with him properly once more. Amano-chan has done a lot of things, but it was characters. Characters are good, but I wanted him to do art direction. I wanted him to draw boards.
Amano: I was working on anime characters and I wanted to draw pictures too. I brought my work to "SF Magazine" and did an original serialization. Until then I didn't know what my originality was, but I started to think maybe I liked this kind of world, and it was a time when things started to get interesting. It was a time when I had been away from anime, and I thought I could create something close to my own originality, so I agreed to the offer.
Director Oshii asked me to draw this world. By drawing the buildings, costumes, and so on, I discovered many things. I used a photo book of a town in the French countryside as a reference. The same goes for stained glass windows. By piling up these elements, I created a fictional town.
Mr. Amano, you also went to the dinosaur exhibition.
There's something I want Director Oshii to see. It's a fossil of Archaeopteryx, and I've always loved it. It's the most beautiful of all fossils.
Amano: The texture doesn't come across in print, but it's really beautiful when you see it in person.
Director Oshii: You can't tell from a photograph. When you see something that actually exists, all sorts of images come to mind.
There are times when it's better not to look at Amano . It's also good to work with less information, so it's difficult to find the right balance.
With Director Oshii's animation, it's important to see things. You have to see as much as possible. It's best to watch it with the staff and experience it for yourself. Animation is about recreating feelings and sensations. Original animation, in particular, can't be made without a starting point. Everything, including the girl's costume and the layout of her room, has to be created with the same worldview. Of course, you don't know where she sleeps or what she eats, but you have to be able to feel it. That room is the center of the world, but it needs a shape. So someone has to draw it. Why are there so many bottles lined up? Each one is an expression. You can imagine it in words, but what shape is it? Each one is different. That's a uterus. Only one contains red liquid. It's an eternal girl, separated from reproduction. There are almost no specific explanations, but Amano draws it from my words.
Amano: By using visuals, a different world emerges, because visuals create space.
Director Oshii: Amano's designs are unique. I like decorative designs. An accessory designer might be able to draw accessories, but it's rare to find someone who can draw characters as well. The more fictional the world, the more someone has to draw them. It's not always required, but it's absolutely necessary for certain types of work. It's definitely necessary, especially in fantasy genres.
◇It became the prototype of something that is repeated
--It's an art-oriented work, and wasn't a commercial success when it was released. Did you consciously create it as a commercial work?
Director Oshii: It was the dawn of OVAs, so no one knew what to do with them. It was different from TV and movies. No one knew what the demand would be. Everyone started off by coming up with an original idea. At the time, I had left Pierrot and was freelance, so I quickly wrote up a proposal. It was called "Aquatic City," but Toshi-chan (producer Toshio Suzuki) said, "No!" He always starts with the title. When I explained that it was a story about a girl and an ark, Toshi-chan wrote up a proposal on his own. It was a proposal like an extension of "Urusei Yatsura," with its mysterious girls and mecha. It's true that there are girls and mecha in it.
-Did you have an image in your mind from the beginning, Director Oshii?
Director Oshii : Quite often. But originally, it was a story about a late-night convenience store.
It does seem that way to you, Amano-san (laughs).
This is a typical example of how Director Oshii changes as he works. It completely changed when he started working with Amano. I don't think anyone expected something like this to come out. But it was actually something that was deeply rooted in me. We did something similar with Urusei Yatsura, so I thought people who noticed would notice. I think Bin-chan had a vague idea of it too. There was talk of a theme song, but then we asked, "Where should we put that in?" Bin-chan yelled at us in a meeting, and it was dropped. What did we need to do to make it work as an OVA? No one knew. It wouldn't have been possible if it had been a few years later, when OVAs had already been established.
-What does the work "Angel's Egg" mean to you two?
Amano-san wanted to express his own world, so he went independent as an illustrator and created a worldview that wasn't based on characters for "SF Magazine." That was interesting. That flow led to "Angel's Egg," and creating a worldview was appealing to me. I felt that Oshii-san had talent, and I thought it would be interesting to work together on an original piece.
After Director Oshii made "Angel's Egg," I was out of work for about three years, but I was writing various proposals during that time. I couldn't make the same mistake twice. It's difficult to put all your effort into it. I needed a story after all. One day, I realized that "Angel's Egg" is a story that keeps repeating itself within me. In the end, I always end up returning to it. A story set at night, with a girl wandering around. Time flows through ruins, wandering a world where time has stopped. In fact, it has made occasional appearances in other works. It appears in "Patlabor" and "Ghost in the Shell." The final museum scene in "Ghost in the Shell" is, to put it simply, the same. "Ghost in the Shell" has some flashy action scenes, but it's still the same. It became the prototype for something that is repeated. Because anime starts from a single image, the image tends to become fixed. It is the basis of my work. A motif becomes a motif because it is repeated.
It's filled with the essence of Amano and Oshii .
The 4K remastered version of "Angel's Egg" will be released exclusively at Dolby Cinemas from November 14th, and will be released nationwide from November 21st.
