Metamorphoses

I saw "Winds Of Change" when it was first called "Metamorphosis". The biggest difference was the total lack of dialogue. This original version did not feature the Peter Ustinov narration, standing alone on the musical score and the imagery.

Comparing the two, the earlier version fares better. I enjoy Ustinov's wit, but it wasn't necessary here (except in the minds of some narrow minded distributors, perhaps, who forced the narration on Takashi).It's like "The Thief And the Cobbler". I love Johnathan Winters, but there was no need for his ad-libbing.

Unfortunately, it is another great work of animation sentenced to moritorium hell, like many of Takashi's fellow pioneers of Anime. Just try to find "Gulliver's Travels Beyond The Moon" ("Gariba no uchu ryoko"), "Alakazam the Great" ("Saiyu-ki") or even Nelvana's "Rock & Rule".

I've seen this movie in 1980 and knew that the original title was "Metamorphoses". It is a favorite of mine. I love the look of the design and just the whole take by the Japanese. I especially love the way Pegasus was designed! Reptillian like. I really, really, love this animated movie!!!! I favor this over Disney's style 'Hercules'! What the Japanese do as far as the visual look, it always seems to have a futuristic look about them! That's not even really what I meant. But, anyway, I just love there design sense. Very exciting and refreshing!! I am so glad that this is available for purchase. Although, it is 25 years ago, even now it holds up and inspires me. I have looked for this film for a long time, now.

This film/feature length music video before the days of music videos is a defiant gem! The music and lyrics, written & performed by disco producer/artist Alec R. Costandinos (Of "Romeo & Juliet", "Thank God It's Friday" & "I Found Love Now That I Found You" fame) fit every image in this great film. They are several short stories in great Japanese animation told about Greek myths..all with a point behind them to make you think. I would say this is a great film for the wide minded ages 13 - Adult. The narration helps along the story with the music. To give a good comparing, it's kinda like how Pink Floyd's "The Wall" tells its story through the music and video. This is a must have for any Alec R Costandinos fan or any Japanese animation collector. Unfortunately, like every other decent piece of film or music, the film and its album that went with it are long out of print. Used VHS copies can be found around the net sometimes as well as vinyl copies of the album.

In the mid 1970s, Japanese gift company Sanrio decided to enter the animated feature market with their own rock musical epic inspired by Fantasia. The result was a massive collaboration between American and Japanese animation artists called Metamorphoses. Despite a lot of promise, the film was a critical disaster on its original 1978 release and was soon reissued a year later under the title Winds of Change and has since fallen into obscurity. Looking at the feature today decades after its original outing, it proves to be a modest effort in bringing Romet poet Ovid's stories into the world of animation.

Structured as an anthology film chronicling Ovid's tales of humans and gods, mainly Actaeon, Orpheus and Eurydice, The House of Envy, Perseus and Phaethon, they are all presented with an allegorical boy and girl in differing albeit similar roles. With all of this in mind, what does either make or break the feature is how all these stories are presented through these children and not different characters, making it somewhat difficult to suspend one's disbelief. It doesn't help that their designs look like parodies of 40s Disney characters, complete with stock cute faces and overly simplified broad body proportions. That being said, the art direction is gorgeously crafted and utilizes the dangers of each individual world through creepy shadows and frightening looking monsters. The casual cruelty from all the gods presented throughout each tale is reflected through themes such as the evil that lies within beauty and the consequences of being too trustworthy. While some could see the film as a parody of elitist intellectualism, others could find some value in having these tales being reintroduced to a modern public.

Now of course the soundtrack must be talked about, although it may depend if you watch the original 89 minute cut or the Winds of Change cut. Compared to the original intention to bring on music legends like the Pointer Sisters, Mick Jagger and Joan Baez, the alternate cut features a contemporary Euro disco score composed by Alec R. Costandinos, which is said to have accompanied the feature a lot better than the original cut where the music was written before the animation and was too deemed lengthy to work with. The feature is elevated not only by Costandinos' intense score, but also new disco songs performed by Arthur Simms and Pattie Brooks that make their sequences feel like the film might have been successful if it was cut down to experimental music videos. In addition, the flow of the feature is explained through narration by Peter Ustinov, which benefits the narrative while also being used a bit too much when it doesn't need to be there. It's hard to say if the original cut was worse than the Winds of Change cut, so all we can osi take it for what it is.

Metamorphoses is a fascinating mixed bag where its ambitious efforts are also muddled by some questionable artistic choices. I think this film can be viewed in the same lens as cult classic music odysseys like Rock & Rule and Across the Universe where the unconventional experience can at least be taken into admiration more than any form of narrative structure. If you're into bizarrely obscure rock opera fantasies of the past, this film might be up your alley in spite of its shortcomings. It might not work on all levels, but it's still worth your time for reasons beyond what it set out to do.

The film was first released and exhibited theatrically in the USA in 1976 under the METAMORPHOSIS title.

Although the animation was impressive (especially a scene obviously inspired by animator Bill Tytla's work of the huge demon in the "Night on Bald Mountain" sequence of Disney's FANTASIA), there originally was no narration or dialog to explain any of the film's story, nor was Ovid mentioned in any of the advertising for the film, and so bewildered audiences had no idea what was going on in the film plot-wise.

The original soundtrack was also odd in that it had a pop-rock score compiled from unreleased throw-away tracks from such artists as the Pointer Sisters and even The Rolling Stones, which made no sense to the film's story, either, and was merely trying to capitalize on the musical artist's names to hype the film.

After the film failed to find its audience from its first American release, a whole new soundtrack was created with new music, Peter Ustinov's narration, an explanatory opening credit about Ovid, and the WINDS OF CHANGE title change to try and save the film, which still did not do well in its second American theatrical release in 1978.

Even now, the film is sometimes hard to follow, and seeing the film is still helped if you're made familiar with the details of the original Ovid stories ahead of time.

Sold to American cable TV in 1979, and randomly cable-cast for the next few years, the film started to find its cult audience, which grew when the film was released to VHS video a few years later, but has yet to see any official release on non-bootleg DVD or Blu-Ray.