SKY BLUE
Directed by: Kim Moon-Sang & Sunmin Park.
Screenplay by: Park Jun-yong, Kim Mun-saeng, Sunmin Park , Howard Rabinowitz & Jeffrey Winter.
Produced by: Lee Gyeong-hak, Kay Hwang, Stephen Kim, Kyeong Hag Lee & Sunmin Park.
Director of Photography: Sun Kwan Lee.
Edited by: Michael McCusker.
Music by: Sam Spiegel, Weon Il & Il Won.
Released by: Maxmedia/Endgame.
Language: English.
Country of origin: South Korea. 86 minutes. Not Rated.
With: Catherine Cavadini, Marc Worden & Kirk Thornton.

In the year 2140, humankind's exploitation of the environment has finally taken its toll - the earth is a wasteland enveloped in layers of polluted clouds and deprived of sunlight. Only a small number of elites have continued to prosper, building an organic metropolis called Ecoban. However, it is a tenuous city of corrupt politics with an unstable power source. All of the non-elites of the world are called "Diggers," shut out from Ecoban and forced to mine the wasteland for carbonite needed to fuel the city.

Jay, a 19-year-old Ecoban female trooper, questions her allegiance after seeing her superiors' cruelty against the Diggers. When she discovers that a mysterious intruder is Shua, a former member of Ecoban and her long-lost childhood love, she stumbles upon a secret rebellion of Digger freedom fighters. Jay is caught in a turmoil that will change the course of the planet, as well as a yawn-inducing love triangle among her, Shua and her current lover and security commander of Ecoban, Cade.

Seven years in the making and praised as the hallmark of a maturing Korean animation industry, Sky Blue offers ambitious duel sequences and speedy aerial flights that may delight anime fans. It features a unique superimposition of live action, miniatures, 3-D CGI backgrounds and traditional 2-D animation. The result varies from shot to shot - the mid-air views of Ecoban and the surrounding landscapes can be breathtaking, but the 2-D animated characters often seem strangely outdated.

The setting evokes moments from other animation milestones such as Mamoru Oshi's Ghost in the Shell and Osamu Tezuka's Metropolis, but the characters in Sky Blue are more Saturday morning cartoon that recite stoic, carelessly dubbed lines. Just as the 2-D characters have a hard time blending into the ultramodern 3-D Ecoban, viewers too are unable to connect to the world and characters of Sky Blue. Marie Iida
February 18, 2005