Short Peace - Opening (Koji Morimoto)
Well there isn't much to say about this other than it's a typical classic Morimoto style opening. The girl in the piece is well animated and captures the tone of an Alice led through a rabbit hole which leads to many different worlds with different possibilities. It's a colorful and expressive music video of sorts which summarizes the purpose of the Short Peace anthology project.
Short Peace - Combustible (Katsuhiro Otomo)
The first short in the anthology is by Otomo himself, and it's a pretty artistic attempt to tell a rather simple but tragic story set during the great Edo fire. Otomo puts a lot of effort here in trying something unique, with the story unfolding as if it were animated on a historical parchment, letterboxed by the parchment itself. The narrative shows artistic ambition as well, as it tries to use a short story to contrast the emotions and lives of the two characters with the elemental and destructive nature of the fire itself. Unfortunately that's about as much credit as I can give it, since I don't think it really comes together very well.
The heavy reliance on CG animation to handle subtle character motion is a poor choice because it gives the short a very unnatural look, which even if intended as part of the tone, simply looks jarring and ugly. The art direction also seems a bit of a miss to me, but I think I'm just not a fan of the sort of Japanese period art that it seeks to imitate. I found the execution of the story to be rather weak because of the limited runtime, and the direction and visuals never really came together to create any sort of emotional impact.
Short Peace - Tsukumo (Shuhei Morita)
The second short is a full CG piece about a lost traveller seeking shelter in a haunted temple during a thunderstorm. Since there is no hybrid animation work here, the visuals were consistent and there is some pretty creative use of effects and camera work which would have been difficult to achieve traditionally. The story is not complex, but it was fun and whimsical enough to keep my attention. Not a particularly ambitious short, but it handled the material well and was definitely enjoyable and cute.
Short Peace - Gambo (Hiroaki Ando)
This is the stand out of the anthology for me. A total surprise and something which I felt validated the entire existence of this collection of stories. The best thing about anthologies is that you never really know what you'll get, and having a mix means there's a chance that there'll be something really good in the lot even if they're not all ground breaking.
At it's heart, Gambo is a traditional Japanese horror story. Not scary in the way modern horror is, but rather a very strange and somewhat macabre tale in a setting where the contents of the odd incident clashes with the time and place it is set in. The visuals are creepy and grotesque, but also filled with an uncompromising vision which is executed so well by some of the best hybrid animation I've seen.
While there's nothing inherently original about a story of a friendly monster fighting another monster to protect an innocent child, but I've certainly never seen it depicted in this way before. It's rare enough to see animation tackle monsters battles, so seeing that theme used in a really well thought out Japanese horror tale with fantastic visuals is a huge bonus.
Short Peace - Farewell to Arms (Hajime Katoki)
This is the longest of the shorts, and runs for twice as any of the other ones, clocking at over 20 minutes. It's not a particularly complex or deep story either. It's Katoki being totally indulgent after being given the chance to direct something of this nature. While it does drag a bit, it's hard to really be negative about it because the short is very good at what it wants to do.
This is a classic man versus machine tale pitting a squad of relatively well equipped and well trained men in a post-apocalyptic setting against a defensive mech weapon which simply refuses to give up or die. The action is pretty exciting, the battle is well staged, there are really nice explosions and effects, and the ending contains a stinger which makes the narrative feel smarter than it would otherwise.
There's also some great use of music and the entire short feels really cinematic. The opening moments set the tone well, the battle itself has good moments of suspense and a lot of money shots, and the ending leaves just enough for the viewer to reflect and have a laugh. I think out of all of the shorts, this one definitely wants to feel like a mini-film the most, and it mostly succeeds.
In terms of weaknesses, aside from the length I would say that this also feels the most traditionally "anime" out of all the shorts in the anthology. There's a very modern feel to the CG/2D hybrid animation, which is to say it is pretty obvious and doesn't mesh perfectly. There's also a very hyperactive camera which uses more jitter than I would like.
Overall it would be my pick for the second best short in the collection though. Gambo is way better, but Farewell is probably easier to go on and on about because it's a much more familiar sort of work.
