On the weekend of 8th to 9th October the 6th "BD Expo" (BD for 'Bandes Dessinees' in French, comics in good English) took place in Paris, featuring for the third year a special section on Japanese mangas and anime. Well, as you can imagine, I went and enjoyed it! The Japanese section featured a few stands and a screening area.
Animarte: Association which edits the main French anime magazine Anime Land, and which is strongly linked to a couple of labels that sell French- subtitled anime. The label Anime Virtual released The Legend of Lemnear a few months ago and their counterpart Kaze Animation released Record of Lodoss War 1-3 on the 19th of September (available in both SECAM and PAL, by the way). Planned releases for KA: in the near future, Ranma 1/2 OAVs, Macross: Do You Remember Love?, and later, Black Magic M66, Iria Zeiram The Animation. Things are starting to move in France, and in the right direction! (I mean with subtitles).
Tsunami, Effet Ripobe,...: Associations editing fanzines.
Madoka, Katsumi,...: Shops selling mainly mangas.
Tonkam: They had the biggest selling area, and were the organisers of the screenings. Had a lot of the usual manga and anime-related range of goods. Video Girl Ai 1-2 has been already released in French by them. Anyhow, the printing quality is not that good in my opinion, I prefer to stick with the Japanese version and the English translations (but they made the effort to move each drawing to put them in the right order instead of mirroring the whole page). Tonkam also plans to enter the video market with subtitled titles from Western Connection: in November, Ushio To Tora and Mamono Hunter Yokho should hit the streets (source: AnimeLand 15).
That was the small part of the convention, the main one being the screenings of many anime titles, all of them in Japanese with no subtitles. From what I gathered from the credits, they were mainly 1994 titles, and this explains the good quality of the anime. Bear in mind that a fair amount of the spectators are Dragon Ball Z fans (it is really popular in France, the DBZ movies 1-4 just came out dubbed and uncut, but their reaction to non-action packed anime is ...ehem.. extreme from what I read in reports by AnimeLand, and listening to real DBZ fans while queuing is rather interesting... let's put this on their young age) and thus wouldn't enjoy slow paced anime: all those presented are action-oriented. We will have to wait till the next convention in November to see a wider range of styles.
Attendance was between 1000 and 1500, and that means a lot of people in a not so big area. Screenings were nearly non-stop between 10:00 and 19:00 with always live video clips from X as interludes (kind of noisy for anyone you wouldn't like it).
Well, now the program:
Plastic Little: Arrggghhh! I missed this 'much talked about' anime, I was stuck in the queue all morning. I also missed the next one, and spent most of the day standing. I did better the next day.
Iria Zeiram 1: I can't really tell about the plot, but the animation is good and the world and technology depicted are really interesting, with many original ideas. But, I couldn't help being annoyed by the stupid 'voice' of the Zeiram monster. Big letdown, but the only one, really.
Shin Kujaku vol 1: Even Iria paled after this one! State of the art animation, impressive fighting scenes. Featured Kujaku (a monk?) who fights Nazis for a golden skull, which can unleash terrible powers. If someone can come up with the complete synopsis of this one, he's welcome, a script would even be better. And who did this anime? Pretty violent, but really good.
Goku: Again, terrific animation, people with extra-normal powers, and an interesting plot (well, what I guessed of it). A style not unlike Shin Kujaku except set in a city.
Dominion: Starts with the policewoman (don't remember her name) chasing someone with her tank right down into an underground bar. When she comes out, the whole building collapses! That's only the beginning, but I'd like to know if it belongs to the old or new series (New series - J.).
Campus: Maximum weirdness in a Japanese campus! Really funny anime, with lots of fighting scenes, and mainly female characters. Enough to send the audience to the roof when there was a glimpse of a breast. Needless to say, there is not much left of the campus at the end. Didn't really follow the plot, but good animation.
Mamono Hunter Yohko 5: As you might guess, loud reaction in the audience at the transformation scenes, and this episode is not short of them. The plot? Girls vs baddies to put it short.
Angel Cop: That was supposed to be the 'special violence' time (no one under 13). Well, they chose something with more dialogues than violence. As I finally got a chair, I kind of dozed. Good animation, but I really didn't catch what was going on...
Sunday:
Violence Jack: Hell's Wind: Things started at 9:00, one hour earlier than expected so this one wasn't scheduled. In a 'Hokuto no Ken' type world, a village is attacked by bikers. A female archer with scars all over her body comes to their rescue, as well as a giant, which receives enough bullets to be left for dead. Even so he survives and they go to the rescue of the sister of a village boy. Poor animation, weak plot.
Natsuki Crisis: Girls, fights (judo).... Not bad, but not my favourite style either.
Iria 4: Really good, but jumping from the first episode to this one didn't help the understanding...
Clip: Legend of Casshman: Several music videos in fact, a pretty American-like hero, and nice animation.
Gatchaman OAV 1: This one came as a surprise, it wasn't scheduled at all, but was really appreciated by everyone (i.e. big applause at the end). Really slick animation.
Shin Kujaku vol 2: Conclusion of the story, REALLY great animation, I want one... Tomkam is sure to sell a whole bunch of LDs of those OAVs.
Final Fantasy 1: Didn't look good after Shin Kujaku...
Macross Plus 1: State of the art animation, detailed drawings, lots of colours, a real visual pleasure. I wonder if four OAVs will be long enough to have an interesting story.
Fatal Fury 2: For NEO-GEO fans only. Not a bad anime, in fact.
Next convention in France, 11-13 November, again in Paris. Screenings organized by Animarte, it should be much better (more styles, more subtitles, and perhaps even on the fly translation). See you then.