The Soul of the New MACHINE: Oshii Mamoru's Ghost in the Shell

Author(s): David Chute

Source: Film Comment, Vol. 32, No. 3 (MAY-JUNE 1996), pp. 84-85, 87-88
Published by: Film Society of Lincoln Center
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/43455186
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 The Soul of the New

MACHINE
Oshii Mamorus Ghost in the Shell
By David Chute

a cyborg cop of the near future with a

nated the notion that technol- crucial kernel of actual brain tissue in
Who ogy, nated was ifogy,
the the sufficiently notion wise man that advanced, who
if sufficiently technol- origi-
advanced, her metal cranium.
would be indistinguishable from magic? On a purely technical level, GitS is
Arthur C. Clarke, perhaps? In any case,dazzling. Only die-hard Western Anima-
the master Japanese manga creator tion chauvinists, clutching their stop
Shirow Masamune shares this view: watches and fixating upon the number
"Science, the new black magic,"
of frames-per-second that flicker by
declares a character in Shirow's early (which is a function of money, anyway,
cyberpunk graphic novel Appleseed rather. In than technique) - only these per-
Ghost in the Shell , the animated film ceptually impaired souls could fault the
version of a later Shirow work, a giftedmovie's craftsmanship. Director Oshii is
director, Oshii Mamoru, works harda to master of mobile spatial effects. His
invest the futurism with a quality of blasted
the cityscapes feel three-dimen-
uncanny, as if our awe before technolog-sional because he moves through them
ical advancement has gone full circle without inhibition, gazing at them from
and become indistinguishable from every possible angle. (Supposedly, in his
superstition. off hours he prowls Tokyo with a
Ghost in the Shell (Kokaku Kidotai , videocamera collecting novel vantage
'95), which has been playing around points.)
the country and will be out on Manga The characters, too, wear their fabri-
Entertainment home video this summer, cated status lightly. Some of the most
is a breakthrough work - an anime impressive "effects" in the movie are
spine-chiller more fully alive than most
closely observed incidental glimpses of
live-action movies. It should be
people changing clothes or climbing out
required viewing for critics who
of bedfear
in the morning. As always, when
that snowballing new film technologies
human truth is captured by hand, in a
will inexorably make movies even more
drawing or painting, rather than by pho-
mechanical and soulless than they are
tography, it's the quality of perception
already-as if mechanical thinking,
that's impressive, not the technical
achievement. This is one account of the
especially about plot and character,
hasn't been the real hazard all along.
encroachments of robots and cybernet-
ics onto
Even more dramatically than such human turf that doesn't seem to
heartfelt techno-romps as Babe have
andfallen
Toyin love with the enemy.
This is a futureworld in which the
Story , Ghost in the Shell is an artfully
fabricated mechanism with discernible
replacement of frail human body parts
life signs, a factory product by sturdier
with a mechanical ones has
human soul. Its traditional cel-anima-
reached a logical conclusion. Our hero-
ine,with
tion techniques are augmented Section Six special operative
Kusanagi, has been battered about so
swatches of glittery computer graphics,
but what matters most is that its much and fitted with so many prosthetic
compli-
cated story and sophisticated replacement
themes parts that she barely exists
are consistently interesting. In in her the
this original form. Only a portion of
her God-given organic gray matter
picture resembles its central character,

85

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remains inside her titanium alloy
"shell." In this augmented incarnation,
Kusanagi makes a stellar operative. She
can plug listening devices directly into
her nervous system, and "dive" men-
tally into computer circuits and monkey
around with the programs. Of course,
there are other people around who can
do this, including some government
"ghost hackers" who are perfectly will-
ing to implant false memories - "syn-
thetic experiences" - into innocent
citizens and manipulate them like pup-
pets when it suits their purposes.
Kusanagi remains confident, how-
ever, that her "ghost," or soul, has
remained intact deep inside her walnut-
sized lump of surviving brain tissue -
until some strange encounters in the
line of duty force her to reexamine the
entire concept. A superpowerful pirate
ghost hacker, The PuppetM aster, has
been sabotaging sensitive government
initiatives. But when the PuppetMaster
appears, as a ghost in the shell of a
female cyborg, he/she/it turns out to be
something new under the sun, an intelli-
gence that has never been human. A
fragment of computer virus that repli-
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cated itself and acquired sentience, the least, Shirow is practically a Luddite.
PuppetMaster has commandeered a Most of his work contains certain sig-
body in order to demand "political asy- nature elements: these are, in his own
lum," the rights that any other "life words, "females, mecha, computer
form" would be entitled to. brains, and Special Forces units." His
Superstar writer-artist Shirow Masa- lissome heroines (there isn't a single
mune, who created Ghost in the Shell in male protagonist in the Shirow canon)
the pages of Young Jump magazine in tend to be soldiers or SWAT cops in
1993, is a rare one-man band in the form-fitting battle armor that bristles
manga field- the norm involves squads with machine enhancements. Shirow
of assistants working in near factory himself contends, with justice, that his
conditions to crank out hundreds of reputation for turning out minutely
pages a month. Shirow, a former high detailed art is exaggerated; the com-
school art teacher, lives near Kobe, well
plexity is in the content, he says, not in
away from the high-pressure Tokyo its depiction. His stories, crawling with
manga scene, and lovingly writes, spidery marginal notes that supply fans-
draws, and Zip-a-Tones every page. He satisfying facts about every vehicle and
has been one of the chief exponents weapon,
of have their "technical manuals"
the "mecha" school since the mid- built right in.
Eighties, when his second professional Ghost in the Shell didn't emerge in a
cultural vacuum, didn't spring full-
effort, the 1,000-page-plus epic Apple-
blown from Shirow's solitary forehead.
seed , was published by a small indepen-
dent company and became a Rather, it's an evolutionary advance in
the mecha subgenre of Japanese manga
word-of-mouth hit. It is a pleasing irony
and anime, a welter of giant robots,
that these almost fanatically detailed
"mobile suits," cyborgs, and more
celebrations of the mechanical are pro-
duced in conditions befitting hand- recently, computer hacking and artifi-
thrown pots or boutique jewelry. Incial
hisintelligence. Everything from
attitudes toward manga production,Tezuka
at Osamu's boy-robot hero of the
1, Box 169 ^
CLASSES I
^ H
87
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Fifties, Tetzuan Atomu (aka Astroboy)- befuddlement of an android comrade- olis is now called Newport City, and it
often cited as the founding icon of the in-arms. The central issue here is the
resembles Hong Kong a great deal more
entire Japanese comics and animation one that engaged Philip K. Dick in Do
than Tokyo. The beehive tenement apart-
industry - to later variations like Giant ment blocks and signboards stretched
Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, the
Robo , Mobile Suit Gundam , Macross 1968 source novel of Blade Runner. across the neon canyons are distinctly
(aka Robotech), and Akira fall into the "What if a cyber-brain could generateHK-like, and unless I missed something
same broad category of tales about its own ghost?" wonders the mostly all the signs are written in Chinese char-
humans who interact, or intersect, or cybernetic Kusanagi - with the "ghost"
acters only, without fiirìgana.
meld with their mechanical append- of the title understood as not just theShirow seems to be a basically down-
ages. (The kidcult TV show Power Rang- sum total of a persons memories to-earth
but individual, a responsible citizen
ers is an adaptation of a Japanese concerned about the future. He finally
program from the subgenre's hentai or emphasizes the strategies people will
live-action wing.) have to come up with to function in a
terminally disorienting world. To that
extent, at least, he's an optimist; he
already a leading light of the thinks that our sense of day-to-day
Director already anime
anime branch a Oshii
branchleading of Mamoru
of light
the the mecha
mechaof was the responsibility will keep us from going
movement when he came to Ghost in the under. Oshii, however, seems to
Shell , as distinctive in his way as embrace disorientation. He sees it as a
Shirow, but with impeccable industry- steppingstone to a higher form of con-
insider credentials. His reputation was sciousness. His use of a trance-indus-
built, in films like Patlabor and Patla- trial music score and gliding camera
bor 2, upon the sheer sensuous splen- moves that caress the façades of loom-

SB 55
dor of his futuristic battle scenes. He is ing buildings- especially on a couple of
also credited with making some of the extended montage interludes - invest
first mecha films that are truly adult in the hi-tech vistas with an ominous
their approach to character. undercurrent, a whiff of the uncanny.
In interviews Oshii claims to get He makes the implications of metasta-
many of his best ideas in dreams, and sizing technology seem awe inspiring,
he works in more conspicuous Christian sublime, like the poisonous beauty of a
references per film than any Asian mov- smog-filtered sunset.
iemaker this side of John Woo. He also Ghost in the Shell is a carefully
had enough clout to demand and get a worked-out set of variations on the
free hand on GitS, and in picking and theme of what's human and what isn't.
choosing episodes from this episodic The movie, in its startling soulfulness,
epic he shifted the emphasis in interest- finds a way to resolve the apparent con-
ing ways. The surprising resonance of tradictions. In the manga, Shirow Masa-
the final product results partly from the mune's images of one mind "diving"
tension between Shirow's broader spec-the bedrock of her self- awareness. If
into another are frankly sexual. In the
ulative approach to the implications that
of essence can take up residence as
film, Oshii takes us a step further, hint-
easily in a mechanical as in an organic
the story and Oshii's introspective bent. ing, 2001 -style, at the birth of a higher
system, "then what's the value of being
In general, Oshii's approach to GitS form of consciousness from the inter-
human?"
differs from Shirow's in emphasizing mingling of human and machine intelli-
human and philosophical concerns overOshii condenses the novelistic rich- gence. The ghost of the PuppetMaster,
ness
political and technological ones. A lot of of Ghost in the Shell , of necessity,"spontaneously generated in a sea of
but he also generalizes it. He seems todata," and the ghostly remnants of
Shirow's lavishly depicted weaponry has
been omitted, and Kusanagi's sensewant of to ascend as efficiently as possibleKusanagi's ghost that have survived the
personal implication in the PuppetMas-to the level of abstraction and metaphor.obliteration of her body, produces a
ter case has moved to the foreground. He deliberately elides specificity. new creature, inhabiting the body of an
Shirow is energized by social issues likeIn the manga, the city setting is sim-eerie cyborg adolescent with a reedy,
the potential for eavesdropping and ply Tokyo, right down to the streetoddly inorganic soprano voice. Looking
names. Shirow peppers his pages without over the city, in a shot that mirrors
mind control that would arise with ghost
sly satirical digs at Japanese politicalthe movie's very first, this Neo-Kusanagi
hacking. Oshii is more interested in the
challenge the technology presentsinstitutions,
to and bases some plotlines on quotes the Bible again- "When I was a
one individual's sense of her own recent political scandals, notably thechild, I spake as a child" - and wonders
humanity. covert involvement of the supposedlyaloud, "Where does the newborn go
It was Oshii who added a couple of neutral Japanese government in the U.S.from here?"
quotations from the Bible to the discus- Cold War weapons buildup in the Ghost in the Shell makes supertech-
sion of th birth of ghost consciousness Pacific. In Oshii's version, even the nology feel magical. ®
in either an artificial or an organic shell: locale is indeterminate. Are we even in
"Now I see through a glass, darkly," Japan, any longer, or are we somewhereDavid Chute wrote on New Indian Cinema
mutters a reflective Kusanagi, to the else entirely? Or nowhere? The metrop-in our Jan-Feb '95 issue.

88

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