Best Kon Satoshi Animation

One of the greatest creative minds in animation over the past two decades, Satoshi Kon's work has been a cause for celebration for those desperately trying to make animation a serious art form, and many of his films are among the best. Categorized as . Best, side by side with the same people Sen and Chihiro's Spiriting Away and Akira.

Although he passed away at a young age from complications of pancreatic cancer, his legacy is hard to ignore and his impact on the world of animation as a writer and director will be felt for years to come. His work has influenced major Hollywood films. But how do they compare to each other? These are all rankings of Satoshi Kon's animated movies and series.

Updated by David Heath on December 3, 2024: People who are annoyed by praise for metaphorical sacred cows often counter that if they hadn't created something big, won a big game, or made a new discovery, someone else would have. The early death of Satoshi Kon at 46 did not put an end to the dreamy, philosophical animation projects that impressed film lovers and otakus. But few of them rival Kon's best work.

This is partly why Kon's last project, the Dreaming Machine, was not continued after his death. Madhouse and MAPPA tried, but production slowly came to a halt without Kon pushing his vision forward. However, his completed works remain and are still admired to this day, sparking debate among aspiring directors and future cinephiles such as Darren Aronofsky and Guillermo Del Toro. Inspiring people. Therefore, this list has been revised and rearranged to rank Satoshi Kon's works against one another to see which works best exemplify his style.

8 good morning

Your early morning routine all summed up in one minute.

• studio: Mad House.
• run-time: 1 minute.
• Available on YouTube.

Unless dreaming machine The last work Gon worked on before his death was barely completed. good morning. Narratively, there is not much content as it only shows a woman waking up in the morning. On the animation side, translucent stills are used to show the woman taking a while to fully awaken. She may be watching TV, but the rest of us are still getting out of bed and grabbing something from the fridge. Only after taking a shower in the morning does she feel fully alert and ready to start the day.

In just one minute, it really captured that dizzying early morning feeling. Not to mention the impressive animation, it has more frames in its runtime than most 30-minute animated episodes. But this is just one of 15 segments. Annie*Kuri15NHK commissioned various famous animation studios and directors to create shorts to fill the time between each segment of the show. Others include: gathering of cats Shinkai Makoto, project omega by Macross Creator Shoji Kawamori, project mermaid by ghost in the shell Directed by Mamoru Oshii.

7 jojo's bizarre adventure

How Stardust Crusaders Helped Kon Take Over Directing

• studio: APPP
• run-time: 35 minutes per session.
• Episode: 13.
• DVD only.

Everyone has to start somewhere. before perfect blue Satoshi Kon, who made him a recognizable name, worked with Katsuhiro Otomo on some of his projects. he is Akira Before providing comics, main animation and background art. Lujin Z. But the spark that led him to become an animation director himself came from an unexpected source. jojo's bizarre adventure. Before the 2012 anime, fans only had APPP's OVA series. Part 3It wasn't easy to find, and it's even harder to secure now.

Kon's greatest contribution came in episode 12, where he provided the script and storyboard for Joseph Joestar's first meeting with Dio of Kakyoin. The OVA is more condensed overall and isn't as good as the 2013 sequel, but it has a better direction, thanks in part to Kon and others. Dio's time-stopping abilities are more subtle and eerie compared to the massive time-farting effects of later series. They impressed producer Masao Maruyama so much that he offered him the opportunity to direct smaller projects such as: perfect blue.

6 memory

Three short stories, Gon wrote the best short stories.

Kon took over as director. perfect blueAlthough it was not completed until 1997. During that time, he worked on an anthology film with Katsuhiro Otomo. memory. Otomo's Name received the best reviews because he came up with the short stories that formed the basis of the three parts. cannon fodder short. But the best short in the film, and the only one that's really about memory, was written by Kon.

magnetic rose We see space salvage engineers Heintz and Miguel investigating an abandoned space station with a surprisingly intact, classic European-style interior. They learn that it belonged to Eva Friedel, an opera singer who disappeared decades ago. By the time Heintz and Miguel board the ship, she would have been very old, if not dead. But they soon come face to face with the young singer, or use her image to manipulate them into staying. Although not a director or producer, Kon's tragic story is a good example of his feature films.

5 paranoid agent

Kon's only TV series shows how powerful the idea can be.

for example, paranoid agent It was the only TV series that Kon directed directly, and he works in a similar field. magnetic rose and paprika. At first, it's the story of character designer Tsukiko Sagi trying to uncover the identity of 'Lil Slugger', a boy in a hat and roller skates who attacked her with a baseball bat. Subsequent episodes follow the Slugger's other victims, the plight they find themselves in, and the paranoia inflicted on Tokyo's Musashino district by his sudden attacks.

It sounds simple enough, but as the craze surrounding Li'l Slugger grows, the smaller details don't add up and the more things go wrong. likewise magnetic rose We've seen characters controlled by memories. paranoid agent It shows how people are controlled by fear, whether Li'l Slugger is a real threat or a social phenomenon like Mattoon's Mad Gasser. It's an effective psychological thriller that will twist viewers' minds and make them think over 13 episodes.

4 paprika

A dreamy detective story shows that reality and fantasy are not that different

• studio: Mad House.
• run-time: 90 minutes.
• Available on Tubi and AppleTV+.

Cohn's last full-length project, paprikaIt was also a psychological thriller based on a novel, so it really showcased his slender body of work. This wasn't planned because Kon wanted to tweak it. paprika The topic of how illusions and memories can influence reality, and vice versa, made a deep impression on him. He covered similar topics. millennium actress and paranoid agent Mainly because he wanted animation. paprika One day. He finally got his chance in the early 2000s when he received permission from author Yasutaka Tsutsui.

On the surface, research psychologist Dr. Atsuko Chiba becomes Paprika, a dream detective, and dives into patients' dreams to help them. But when the technology to do so is stolen by a 'dream terrorist', she enlists the help of Konakawa, a detective and patient in the program, to track him down. Below that, the film shows how fiction and reality are not that different, and how people shape both at will. The surreal images inspired a dream-based thriller. firstBut even Christopher Nolan couldn't match Cohn's dynamic visuals.

3 perfect blue

Kon addresses how the internet amplifies obsession and dissociation.

Darren Aronofsky expressed his appreciation for Cohn's work but denied it for his own films. Black Swan Inspired by perfect blue. They deal with similar situations (the female protagonist is under pressure until she no longer knows what's real), but they go through different situations. One is, P.B.Mima is forced to transition from an idol to a TV actress, and is torn apart by an obsessive stalker who watches her every move, and a website where someone pretending to be her spreads false information.

It's also technically an adaptation of Yoshikazu Takeuchi's novel. However, Kon was less faithful to the novel. paprika. The subplot about how the internet can help stalkers attack their targets directly or indirectly, and Mima's increasing psychosis as she loses track of who she really is, are all Kon's work. Other internet-based thrillers tend to age quite a bit (hacker It's pure '90s cheese). However, while Internet stalking is still a serious problem today, perfect blue It's still as relevant and unsettling today as it was in 1997.

2 Tokyo Godfathers

How Kon uses social issues in Japan to tell feel-good stories

• studio: Mad House.
• run-time: 92 minutes.
• Available on Amazon Prime, Hoopla, Tubi, PlutoTV, and Freevee.

Tokyo Godfathers Kon's other films, which deal with the theme of the encounter between the real and the unreal, are gentle because many of their predicaments are based on realism. There are homeless people in Japan. They become homeless for a variety of complex reasons and suffer horrific abuse.

But homeless hunters, criminal gangs and a twisty Christmas play are just some of the many obstacles alcoholic Jin, trans woman Hana and teenage runaway Miyuki face when they discover an abandoned baby on Christmas Eve. It also doesn't shy away from how crude and ugly things can get, especially when trying to find your baby's parents. But they show how hope can help people move toward a happy ending. It's the perfect picture for those who want a drop of seasonal joy rather than the saccharine overdose that other holiday TV specials provide.

1 millennium actress

Break hearts instead of bending hearts.

• studio: Mad House.
• run-time: 87 minutes.
• Available on Amazon Prime, Peacock, Retro Crush, Asian Crush, Shout, and Freevee.

Most fans are familiar with Kon's heavy workload. He delves into people's minds to make them more paranoid, more anxious, and more thoughtful about big ideas, like the thin line between fiction and nonfiction. but they millennium actress It stands out because it uses thin lines to tell a romance story. The goal is to make viewers shed tears rather than shock them. Filmmaker Kenya Tachikawa interviews renowned actress Chiyoko Fujiwara about her career and recounts key events in her life through scenes from her most famous films.

Genya and his camera operator Ida are literally entranced by her scenes, including her real-life flashbacks, as we learn why she got into acting in the first place. These scenes unfolding in occupied Manchuria are heartbreaking enough, but they only make the twist even more heartbreaking. It's a powerful, bittersweet film that shows just how powerful Ghosn's storytelling is, and how sad it is that he didn't make more romances like this.