Twentieth Century Boys: Chapter One - The Beginning of the End
(aka 20th Century Boys 1: Beginning of the End)
2008; directed by Yukihiko Tsutsumi

With a cast of 300 people and a budget of over six billion yen (that's about sixty-five million US dollars), the Twentieth Century Boys trilogy is one of the most ambitious live-action adaptations of a Japanese manga to date. Since your friendly neighborhood reviewer hasn't read the source material, I can't say how the movie version of approximately the manga's first five volumes stacks up. But, taken on its' own merits, this first chapter of Twentieth Century Boys is a fun mix of science fiction, social commentary, comedy, drama, action, and suspense, all twinged with an element of hard-rock braggadocio.

Seeing as this is the first installment of a trilogy that ends up running over seven hours, a plot breakdown would probably be an exercise in futility. Basically, a group of children in 1969 Japan come up with a fantastic story about the world coming to an end on December 31 2000. As that time draws near, the kids are now adults, and have forgotten about the story. However, as a wave of mysterious deaths goes around the world, and growing numbers of Japanese begin to join a strange cult, the friends realize that their childhood tale is coming to fruition.

For a movie that runs well over two hours and has dozens of characters, Twentieth Century Boys is surprisingly lean. Yes, there are small scenes here and there which could probably have been cut. Overall, though, the film never feels bloated or self-indulgent, which goes a long way to making the audience more receptive and sympathetic seeing how the story flows. This ends up being a good thing, because some of the acting is suspect, and the big CGI "money shots" frankly don't look all that great, especially in a post-Avatar world.

Those are fairly minor quibbles when you're looking at the movie as a whole, though. Really, the only major sticking point of Twentieth Century Boys is that it's the first part of a trilogy, and so the end of the picture brings no plot resolution. Opening more questions than it answers, the cliff-hanger will likely frustrate many, especially if they don't know that there's two more installments to follow. Again, this is coming from someone that has zero knowledge of the original manga, but I was still entertained by this film, and I'm definitely looking forward to how everything comes together.

RATING: 7.5

This movie is available from both the US and UK Amazon stores. For US readers that have region-free DVD players, the UK version is definitely the better buy, as it has much more in the way of extras.