I bought this DVD purely on the spur of the moment, having not heard anything about it. Having sat down to watch it, it's certainly an intriguing and surreal film, which is worth a viewing, if you fancy something out of the ordinary.
The story, is essentially a fantastical retelling of the Pinocchio fable. A boy robot is desperate to become human, but has to join a group of aliens, humans and other robots to rescue the soul of the robot boy's mother, whilst trying to outwit a second band of aliens who are prepared to do anything to stop him from his goal.
This is not your usual type of anime. In fact, it's almost pseudo-anime: the vast majority of artwork is undertaken by a Korean animation team, and is quite dissimilar to regular anime art. There are still characters with large, friendly eyes, but the backgrounds aren't as detailed as in some recent works like "Akira", "Ghost In The Shell" and "Perfect Blue". Having said that, the film is well animated, and the use of CGI is limited but credible, rather than overpowering.
But, with that all said and done, this is a movie that is aimed at people with a good attention span, and an audience willing to give the film the time it needs to breathe. The story is leisurely-paced for sure, but if you let it lead you down its path, you should grow to like it.
As you watch the film, you will notice many nods to other works and artists, including "Akira", Rin Taro, "Metropolis" (the anime), Osamu Tezuka and many, many more. Don't let this put you off, because whilst this could be seen as Nakamura being unoriginal, the combination of recognisable works actually helps the film, rather than hinders it.
The UK DVD release from ADV Films is superb, with both an English-dubbed and English-subtitled version, both in 2.00:1 Anamorphic Widescreen. Occasionally, the subtitles can go a little too fast, or get a tad confusing, but on the whole, it is a great effort. If you are willing to devote the time to this film, and don't come expecting lots of big action set-pieces, then you may be pleasurably surprised.
One word of caution though: although predominantly a film suitable for children, there are some scenes of bloody violence that may not be appropriate, or deemed a little too dark and mature in tone for them to cope with.