Dream On - The work of Satoshi Kon

Written by A. H. on 30 Aug 2010

Whenever any prominent cultural figure dies, it's easy to get caught up in the emotion of the moment and the inevitable hyperbole that follows - "genius", "greatest", "legendary"... all words that too easily trip off the tongue as the sadness caused by the death of somebody whose work was appreciated by many sinks in.

In the case of Satoshi Kon, who died tragically on August 24th 2010 from pancreatic cancer at the age of just 46, things are a little different however - all of the aforementioned words had already been used in gushing and quite legitimate terms long before his death, making the sadness expressed at his passing all the more marked.  Viewed as part of the wider anime industry, Kon was undoubtedly a unique individual, a true one in a billion talent who has no equal considering his very individual style and story-telling themes which were always delivered in a stylish, memorable and thought-provoking fashion.

Rather than simply wax lyrical about the man himself however, what better way to pay tribute to Satoshi Kon than by discussing and remembering his work as an anime director, writer and animator - a career cut tragically short, yet still one which created a body of work that will be hard for anybody to surpass, and one that will surely never be forgotten.

Early life and career

Satoshi Kon was born on October 12th 1963, in the city of Kushiro within the north of Japan's Hokkaidou prefecture.  A big Astro Boy fan, Kon's original passion was to become an illustrator of some description, and he studied at the Musashino College of the Arts in Toyko in order to pursue that dream.

After leaving college, Kon's first job was working on Young Magazine alongside Katsuhiro Otomo, a man best known for creating Akira in its manga, and later anime, forms at a time when the former was being serialised in said magazine.  With Kon also doing some editing work for the publication, he also ended up helping out Otomo, and eventually worked with him on a manga named World Apartment Horror, an adaptation of a live-action movie directed by Otomo himself.

The working relationship between the two men led to Satoshi Kon dipping his toe into the world of anime in 1991 as a set designer and background artist for the critically acclaimed Roujin-Z, a science fiction Original Video Animation written by Otomo and directed by Hiroyuki Kitakubo, who went on to direct Blood: The Last Vampire having previously worked as an animator on titles such as Gunbuster and Macross: Do You Remember Love, as well as Akira where he took up a key animation role.

The relationships formed during his work on this production would pay dividends as his career progressed, while 1995 would see Kon make his debut as a screenwriter with Magnetic Rose, one element of the Memories anime which was based upon a trio of manga short stories.  Once again, this project reunited Kon with Katsuhiro Otomo, who was both the creator of the original short stories and the screenwriter for the other two tales told within the film, while Kon's segment was directed by Kōji Morimoto, who later directed one of the short films within The Animatrix and also worked on the concert scenes within Macross Plus.

While creating the story of Magnetic Rose was second nature for Kon given his history at this point as a manga artist, the challenge of weaving the narrative in words rather than pictures alone was a challenge for him.  It is, however, a challenge he rose to admirably, creating a 45 minutes piece of science fiction that is as ambitious as it is inventive.

Magnetic Rose introduces us to a crew aboard a small salvage shuttle whose normal operations are interrupted by a rather strange SOS call, coming from a so-called "space graveyard" whilst playing Madame Butterfly.  Obliged to investigate, two member of the ship enter the craft giving out the signal to find what initially appears to be a lavish home, but slowly reveals its nightmarish secret.  Despite their best efforts the two astronauts become embroiled in the memories of the craft's occupant which are being recreated by the ship's computer until even their own memories are thrown into the heady mix which threatens to entrap them forever.

Needless to say, this overlaying of reality with fantasy and memory is a topic which Kon returns to again and again throughout his career, and there are clear indications even from this first script writing effort of the direction his future works would take.  Even shorn of its prescience, Magnetic Rose is still a fantastic short film in its own right in terms of both script and animation, making it a must-watch for any fan of quality anime.