Space cowboys
for hire

Spike Spiegel	Faye Valentine
Ed and Ein	Jet Black

Four intergalactic bounty
hunters search for a terrorist

"Cowboy Bebop: The Movie" Rated R Playing at Consolidated Varsity

By Jason S. Yadao
jyadao@starbulletin.com

The 1940s were a dynamic time for the jazz scene. Several musicians, tired of playing conventional swing, came up with a more improvisational style. The style they devised, which they called "bebop," turned out to be a key point in the genre's evolution.

But perhaps the most unexpected indirect offshoot of those sessions came in the mid-'90s with a Japanese animated series about intergalactic bounty hunters, where gunbattles and chase scenes unfolded to a snappy musical soundtrack courtesy of "Escaflowne" and "Macross Plus" composer extraordinaire Yoko Kanno.

People loved it. The series, "Cowboy Bebop," originally was supposed to run 13 episodes in Japan, but viewer demand expanded the run to 26 episodes. Even after the series ended in such a way that would make it difficult for a "Cowboy Bebop 2" to ever be made, fans wanted more.

The solution: the feature-length movie "Cowboy Bebop: Knockin' on Heaven's Door." Now, after a few screenings at last November's Hawaii International Film Festival, the English-dubbed version, with the admittedly blander name "Cowboy Bebop: The Movie," is beginning its formal theatrical run in Hawaii.

And it's ... different. It's not different enough to drive fans from the theater screaming in anguish and horror, but it is necessary to issue this warning: If you're a fan and you're expecting to see a movie filled with the series' trademark one-on-one fights, space battles and wisecracks, prepare to be disappointed. But if you can stand long stretches of nothing but talking with minimal animation, along with a liberal dose of philosophy pondering the nature of life and death, then step right up.

It's not that it's a bad film -- far from it. It's more an action-adventure film that takes more thought and concentration to watch than your standard-issue chop-socky flick.

Audiences new to the "Cowboy Bebop" universe might be confused at first as to what's going on in the film, so here's a quick primer: Much of the story revolves around Spike Spiegel, a guy whose easygoing outward appearance hides his ability to kick major booty with his honed martial arts skills. Along for the ride are his partner, Jet Black, a former intergalactic police officer; Faye Valentine, a veteran scam artist with an outfit that severely tests the limits of fabric elasticity; Ein, an intelligent, tail-less Welsh corgi "data dog"; and Edward Wong Hau Pepelu Tivrusky the Fourth -- Ed for short -- a delightfully loopy girl with a penchant for hacking, general mischief and eating what little food is left aboard their spaceship, the Bebop.

Together, they hunt down criminals in the new intergalactic order of 2071, not out of a sense of justice, but because they like the money. Of course, with Spike and Jet wanting to fix the Bebop, Faye ready to blow it all on horse races and Ed and Ein wanting to eat, they never can agree on what to do with their earnings.

In the movie, the bounty hunters' mission is to track down Vincent Volaju, an intergalactic terrorist sought for unleashing a deadly viral attack on an unwitting populace. (The film was released on Sept. 1, 2001, in Japan, so any real-life parallels are purely coincidental.)

We know Vincent is the bad guy because he has shifty eyes, a beard, long scraggly hair and a trench coat, the required wardrobe for all Token Bad Guys in this genre. Plus, he's prone to hissing philosophical statements like, "I have no fear of death. It just means dreaming in silence, a dream that lasts for eternity."

That's the basic plot. What actually unfolds onscreen, though, involves tangled threads of corporate corruption, killer "nanomachines" encased in marbles and hallucinations featuring golden, glowing butterflies that would take a thick book to explain fully. This leads to drawn-out conversations between characters that might make viewers feel like they're experiencing living out Vincent's "dream" in real life.

Just when it feels like the movie is going to collapse under its own weight of self-importance, though, something happens to jolt people awake again. Sometimes it's one of the dynamically choreographed fight scenes that rival the best Hong Kong martial arts sequences. (Spike's climactic battle with Vincent had me wincing with every blow struck.) Other times, it's Yoko Kanno's score, which, in addition to more of the smooth jazz chops that made the series such a pleasure to watch, adds in elements of country and -- ugh -- pop. (Well, no one's perfect.)

Little has been mentioned about any future adventures of the Bebop crew. If this is indeed their final mission, it was a great way for them to go out.

But here's hoping for more.

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