Shônen Sarutobi Sasuke

I too saw ''Magic Boy'' on it's first release back in 1960. Being a fan of fantasy films, I was enchanted by the story and characters, though it was over 40 years before i saw it again. Alas, it lacks much of the magic I remembered. The story is just an excuse for the beautiful animation, and the characters are undeveloped. The motives of the witch, for instance, are left unexplained (yes, she's wicked, but why?) Many will think that my revised opinion is the result of seeing the film again not as a child, but as an adult. However, this is not true. Many films I enjoyed as a child still hold up wonderfully. ''Alakazam The Great'' for instance, is a superior Japanese animated feature.

The movie is pure magic, just like Sasuke. The SFX are great, the plot is coherent and the fights! oh boy! It's a pleasure looking Sasuke materialize and de-materialize at will, or his flight scenes. The really humorous scene is when he gets to the prince's castle and gets sticked into the guard's sword until they let him pass and then he gets flying! With so much power who can put a parental figure on this boy? I ask. When I looked at this movie in my teens I loved it. I just would kill to see it edited and distributed in DVD and get it into my hands...(*sob*) However "Magic Boy" was a preview of the great potential of Asian cinema and anime production that there was yet to come.

I ,like Jerri from K.C., saw this movie in 1961 as a Saturday matinée in the small Midwest town I grew up in. I was fascinated by the story and the animation. Up to them it had been Woody Woodpecker and Tom and Jerry for me. The animation was very artistic and the story something very different from cartoons produces in the USA. Like Jerri cried at the end of the movie. I have been searching for the movie for several years now, but, to no avail. I hope the whom ever currently own the rights will consider sharing it with the rest of us animation addicts. It really qualifies as some of the early Anime and would be a great addition to the collectors of this genre.

In medieval Japan, Sasuke and his sister live in the forest with their animal friends. He battles a water monster which turns into a witch. His sister tells him that the monster's name is Yakusha. Years earlier, the witch had corrupted the happiness of the people. A powerful wizard was able to transform her into a tiny salamander. Since then, she has grown big and powerful, on the verge of returning to her former self. Sasuke sets off to see the wizard.

This is an early colored animated movie from Japan. They are obviously trying to marry a traditional story with the Disney formula of cute animals and an underdog hero's journey. It's fascinating. The animation has a bit of ugliness which does add to the charm of the visual look. The traditional story is interesting. It's straight forward. If it needs improvement, Sasuke needs to slow roll his powers. It's a quick training montage transition between an eager young fighter and a supernatural superhero. It would be nice to have a smaller build. I don't get the sense that he's the underdog after his training and the tension for the final battle is not that high.

Just saw this on TCM and it still has the magic. This is recognizably a Taiji Yabushita film, in that he takes much of his style from classic Disney--fluid (maybe not as fluid as Disney) movement, use of music and imagery, animal sidekicks. It's not as emotionally powerful as his The Orphan Son (his masterpiece, I think), or as all-around well done as Alakazam (his collaboration with Ozamu Tezuka), or as historically important as The White Snake (which influenced Miyazaki) but it has its virtues--the inventive way the hero appears and disappears, the 'transformation battle' that occurs at the climax, the lifelike sword fights of the prince...not Yabushita's best, but still up there, somewhere.