Incannerax What a waste of my time!!!

Phonearl Good start, but then it gets ruined

Afouotos Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Robert Joyner The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

Bits Pieces Being new to anime, I watched this with no expectations and no background knowledge. This is one amazing, intelligent movie.The early scenes have a persistent, eerie, dislocated feel to them. Soon it's obvious that this is deliberate. What the characters do not say, and do not do, is more important than what the viewer sees and hears. The stillness and emptiness on screen hint at something very menacing off-screen.The hints gradually give way to answers. This is a horrific, predatory world where humans exploit perpetual adolescents - "kildren" - to keep the peace. By fighting and dying in stage-managed battles, the kildren help maintain a comfortable stable social order for the adults to enjoy. The adults also get to enjoy, vicariously, the thrills of warfare.The kildren do what they have been trained, engineered, and ordered to do - kill their own kind. But as they slowly, one by one, become aware, of the nature of their lives, the kildren suffer. Some turn suicidal. Some try to blot out the awareness with continual distractions, of chain-smoking, alcohol, sex.How do you live, when you realize you have been bred like cattle, for butchering, and your last day could well be this day? There are some thought-provoking themes here, and it's a nice touch, somehow very fitting, that the sex scenes are as sad as they are modest.Predation of the young, abuse of power, the pain that comes with awareness. These are difficult high-level concepts, skilfully handled in this artful piece of work.

Samiam3 Just occasionally, you'll find a film where thew execution of drama over powers your awareness that the film is animated. The Japanese style is arguable the most exploitative of animation, which is why Mamoru Oshii's rather minimal and refined approach which he brings to The Sky Crawlers is extraordinary in it way. The film is rather static with little physical movement, elongated cutting, wide open Kurosawa type shots, psychological use of color, light and shadow, and a haunting and mystic score. The film is kind of cold, but with a scene of mystery which makes it seductive. Even when we are up in the air with dozens of aircraft, gunfire, and spectacular balls of fire, the film maintains it's sense of calm. Oshiii handles it almost like a ballet. This is not a kids movie, and it's not for those with a short attention span. It it a deep slow psychological piece. The ending is one that may divide an audience. Some will see it as giving The Sky Crawlers a sense of moral function, while others will argue that it makes the whole thing seem useless. I won't take either side. All I'll say is that I enjoyed the flight.

Lars Gottlieb Take a couple planes and combat scenes from Crimson Skies, mix them up with the most empty, uninteresting, bland scenes ever, and the most void, stagnant story possible, and this is the whole movie. For example: At one time our main character is driving somewhere, and the movie renders every single second of the drive, we watch him park, turn the key, use the door handle, open the door, get out of the car, close the door .. All rendered painstakingly slow. If you haven't fallen asleep during this unnecessary waste of time, you're rewarded with watching him take every single step toward the building he was driving to... The combat scenes made me want to go back and play the game, but for this movie to claim to be any kind of good is preposterous. If this is art, it's the art of the void.

julian kennedy The Sky Crawlers: (Sukai Kurora):7 out of 10: This is an adult anime...In fact this is a very adult anime. No there isn’t copious amounts of fan service or blood. (In fact the film is rated PG-13 primarily for smoking.) Instead Sky Crawlers has a very quiet, reserved pacing. It’s a two hour anime that feels like it clocks in at over three hours. Not boring per se but very deliberately paced with adult conversations, adult music and an overall adult tone that reminds one of Before Sunrise with occasional airborne dogfight to break up the relationship introspection.The plot is both light (I will reveal that here) and quite heavy (I will let the movie itself surprise you with its philosophical underpinnings). On the light side is there is a special group of teenagers who are pilots that never grow old. The movie refers to them as Kildren and much is made of how they are just kids; but if you drive, fly, have sex, drink, and smoke a pack every 10 minutes of screen time your are at best a teen and in reality a young adult.These Kildren fight in retro WW2 style aircraft against each other in an air war with no winners and no other casualties all to apparently satiate the public’s need for conflict. (Think Star Trek’s “A Taste of Armageddon”). There is a new pilot, a wingman and a couple of androgynous love interests with deep secret pasts. There is even a Red Baron character rumored to be an adult and a constant source of tension and conversation in both the dogfights and on the ground.The Animation is simply awe inspiring. The CGI work is better than many a Hollywood blockbuster and the 2 dimensional cell shaded characters fit both the pacing and the mood of the film. The attention to detail is quite amazing overall.Overall the film is recommended for fans of adult drama and serious anime. I do confess I did wish for longer sky battles, more realistic violence and even some fan service. It is ironic that one of the most adult anime I have ever seen suffers from a lack of adult thrills with its PG-13 rating.