Final Rating: 2/5
One day, while walking through the subway, Koyomi Araragi (Hiroshi Kamiya) encounters a vampire at the end of her life. Despite being immortal, the vampire, Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion Heart-Under-Blade (Maaya Sakamoto), has been mutilated beyond her ability to regenerate, and lost an inordinate amount of blood. Willing to do whatever it takes to save a damsel in distress, Araragi gives her all his blood, sacrificing his own humanity to revive Heart-Under-Blade.
In return, she turns him into a vampire, vowing to turn him back, but unable to do so until she’s regained her full strength. As he adapts to his new abilities as an immortal vampire, Araragi begins serving Heart-Under-Blade. His first task? Finding and defeating the vampire hunters who initially left her on her deathbed.
Kizumonogatari – Koyomi Vamp, directed by Tatsuya Oishi, is a compilation film telling the entire story of the Kizumonogatari film trilogy. Originally released between 2016 and 2017, the three Kizumonogatari films each clocked in at just over an hour and tell a sweeping story examining the price of immortality, what it means to be human, and what it means to be a monster. Koyomi Vamp condenses the saga to about two and a half hours, retaining the bones of the story, but abandoning the connective tissue that makes it work.
Koyomi Vamp is a harsh watch. The animation crudely blends varying styles of 2D and 3D animation to achieve a look that often resembles mixed-media more than any modern anime style. The playback itself often seems rough, with title cards inserted repeatedly, seemingly almost at random, announcing “ROUGE”, “NOIR”, or “BLANC” with little rhyme or reason.
Characters are rarely given time to develop on screen, so much is left to the viewer to fill in for themselves. Early on, Araragi learns the identities of Heart-Under-Blade’s assailants, but this is communicated to the audience via a momentary screen announcing each one’s name and appearance with no additional context. The designs of characters and occasional dialogue hints at deeper ideas represented by each, but no one is on screen long enough to make much of an impact.
In attempting to condense three films into one, the filmmakers often skip straight to the action, but can’t make a convincing case for why that action matters. The failure to include meaningful character moments results in a large supporting cast who seem to exist in vibe only. There are several interesting character designs, unsupported by any kind of internality. A curious side-effect is that the film is highly impressionistic: left without much to process in terms of traditional narrative, Koyomi Vamp draws attention to its unique style and striking visuals.
In terms of creating a feeling in the viewer, the filmmakers do an admirable job, at least early on. The very first sequence of the film is entirely wordless, following Araragi in his first moments as a vampire. Terrified and confused, Araragi runs through an abandoned building, emerging into direct sunlight, causing him to immediately combust and throw himself off the side of the building. It’s an extremely powerful way to start a film, but nothing else in Koyomi Vamp lives up to the high bar set in those first minutes.
Thank you to Fantasia Festival for the screener.
