Mind Game

(2004) dir Masaaki Yuasa [103 min; DCP; in Japanese with English subtitles]

Buckle in and prepare to surrender yourself to an exhilarating and wildly entertaining ride. The animation cult classic MIND GAME is an explosion of unconstrained expression – gloriously colorful mages ricochet in rapid fire associations, like Masaaki Yuasa’s demented brain splattered onto the screen in all its goopy glory. Audiences will begin to grasp what they are in for early on when loser Nishi, too wimpy to try to save his childhood sweetheart from gangsters, is shot in the butt by a soccer-playing psychopath, projecting Nishi into the afterlife. In this limbo, God – shown as a series of rapidly changing characters – tells him to walk toward the light.  But Nishi runs like hell in the other direction and returns to Earth a changed man, driven to live each moment to the fullest. Phantasmagoric does not even begin to describe this truly mind-bending work of animated mad-genius!