The Sky Crawlers is directed by Mamoru Oshii, the same person that did the Ghost in the Shell movies and Jin-Roh. He has a knack for bringing out the eeriness of sci-fi mystery, shrouded in profound, unanswered questions. The Sky Crawlers itself is based off the first in a series of novels written by Hiroshi Mori. Without giving too much away, the story on a surface level is an alternate WWII-esque world where fighter planes from two companies, Rostock and Lautern, battle interminably to entertain the peacetime people.
After I had watched the movie, I was confused and appalled. It made sense, but at the same time it didn't. It was only after I had pondered and discussed the message of the story did I begin to truly appreciate what this movie was about and really admire what Oshii had to say. Don't walk into The Sky Crawlers thinking you're going to see a WWII dogifighting epic, or even a compelling story that will keep you on the edge of your seat. If you do, you will be sorely dissapointed, for what happens above the surface is only the tip of a massive iceberg, filled with an amazing message that speaks to the people of our century.
Review (Spoilers!)
The story itself is about Kannami Yuuichi and Kusanagi Suito, a wartime pilot and captain, respectively. Their world revolves around pointless dogfights in retro-styled WWII fighter planes. The skirmish on a daily basis, speak in english, take tourists around the base, yet don't ponder why they perform such actions on a day-to-day basis. As the story progresses, Yuuichi constantly asks questions about Jinryoh, the man that Kusanagi had killed. He is always warned by his friend, that if you take an interest in her, she'd put a bullet in your head. Others would simply ignore the questions or pretend nothing ever happened. One day, a fellow pilot is shot down, and the very next day a replacement pilot came with the exact same face, and the exact same habits as the previous. At this very moment, Yuuichi realizes that he is part of an endless cycle of repeated battles and that Kusanagi had killed Jinryoh not out of spite or any morbid intent, but because she loved him and death was the only way out. The "kildren", as they are called, are children that never age and will never die unless by fatal accident or disease. All the pilots, including Kusanagi, are kildren, and destined to fight to their deaths for the peacetime people, upon which they are replaced by an identical clone. What was the reason? Kusanagi speculates in one scene that humans can never eradicate war completely in any era and that fighting can never be "faked". Death and destruction must be constantly experienced by humanity in order for them to truly appreciate the notion of "peace". At the climax, Yuuichi is about to shoot Kusanagi and set her free of her pain, but instead tells her to live on. The next day, Yuuichi breaks off from his scouting team and decides to go against fate. He was going to bring down the teacher, a male ADULT pilot that none of the clones can ever beat. Yuuichi fails in the same way that other the other pilots do, and the rest of the cast stares off into the endless sky, until too much time has passed, and they realize that he would not return.
Okay so in order to properly interpret this film, I'm going to have to break it down into two parts. The film is almost completely internal. One cannot view the two-hour feature and take it all in a literal sense, because there is nothing at surface level.
Surface Level
The Sky Crawlers is a sci-fi mystery and philisophical story about war, human nature, and the pointlessness of meandering through life. This is extremely apparent when Kusanagi comments the endless repetition of war in every era and the necessity of fighting for humans to truly value peace. The plot was written in a way to confuse the reader at first, but slowly unravel and reveal that these are genetically engineered fighter pilots for the sole purpose of war. It's a morbid view on the future of human farming. The second focus of the story is on Kusanagi. Make no mistake, Yuuichi is NOT the main character. You'll come to realize that Kusanagi had to bear the weight and pain of releasing her lover, only to have him come back and haunt her again. The other thing I wanted to comment on was the dryness of the film. This is utterly intentional, as Sevakis pointed out, to show the conundrum of the pilots' lives. The only one to break past this is Mitsuya, but it seems all the other pilots have already been engineered not to care or ask any questions. Even the battles seemed empty and pointless.
This is the point where I draw the line. This is far as most Western audiences will see. It's really sad, because this movie has much, much more to say than that, and I feel sorry for those who weren't able to grasp the unsaid depth that The Sky Crawlers has.
Internal Level - Looping
I read an interesting review on ANN that opened my eyes. While I don't quite agree with all of it, Sevakis's review states that he believes this story is Oshii's jab at otakus. Yuuichi and the rest of the pilots represent the boring, tasteless characters that we see in all of our shows and games, just with a different face and a different costume. They're all the same things we watch every season, with the exact same plot, but we fool ourselves into surprise each time. I believe Oshii's intent is wider than that though. He's speaking about our generation of kids, where we meander through the nothingness of life, and take on habits such as smoking and fighting because that's just the way things are. We don't give things a second thought, we just do them. There will be individuals that question the validity and purpose of our actions, but the majority if us choose not to ask such things. Any attempt to break away from the cyclical harmony of the current state of society will be shot down by the "teacher". The whole point of the anti-climatic ending was because it was MEANT to be anti-climatic. Instead of the ideal "hero and heroine" roles, Oshii slaps us in the face. Wake up. When Kusanagi realizes that Yuuichi had failed, she begins to take up a cigarette, but then puts it away. Slowly, but surely, she is beginning to break away from the endless loop of her life.
Internal Level - Kusanagi
This story is about Kusanagi Suito. She's one of the few to actually understand what is going on in their lives, and I believe the "heart" of the story lies in the motivation that caused her to kill the previous Yuuichi. Imagine that - knowing that the life of both you and your lover is an incessant hell that repeats itself without end. She loved him, and selfish as he was, he asked her to relieve him of such a life. Knowingly, Kusanagi shot him through the head. Knowingly that she'd be alone and that she would have to bear the weight for the both of them. When Kusanagi asked for Yuuichi to shoot her, he instead embraced her, asking her to live on in hopes for change. In this case, I believe the message is that love transcends above all this clutter and mess. What else can push a person to wade through and continue living as she has been for the past decade in absolute despair.
Internal Level - Commentary on Modern Society
I read elsewhere that Oshii's intention was to, also, deliver the message to the younger generation of the current state of the world. While the world is lathered in riches and wealth, we still have pointless battles are fought to preserve "peace" created by warring corporations. If we have been granted a world as such - no revolution, no starvation, no worries in general, why then do we still fight? To live in such a dry world and have no war, is it worth it?
As bland of a film The Sky Crawlers is, it truly speaks volumes beneath the actual plot. I actually had a lot more to write, but some random weirdo messaged me asking to have sex so I'm playing along with that. If you would like to talk more about it, message me or e-mail me. I'd rather not bore you anymore with my rants :)
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