There
had to be some honest and conflicted cops in Orwell’s 1984. If so, Akane Tsunemori could relate to them. She is an
inspector in a dystopian Japan, tightly regulated by the Sibyl System. She
tries to only enforce legitimate, threat-to-the-general-populace crimes, but
she clearly has her doubts. Nevertheless, she will somewhat knowingly become a
pawn in a scheme to export the Sibyl System into Southeast Asian during the
course of Katsuyuki Motohiro & Naoyoshi Shiotani’s mostly stand-alone-ish
anime feature Psycho-Pass: the Movie (trailer here), which screens
nationwide for two days only this Tuesday and Wednesday.
The
Philip K. Dick echoes in the Psycho-Pass
universe are obvious and intentional. The world is in anarchy, except Japan.
There, the Sibyl System closely monitors each citizen’s mental state,
calculating the probability each might develop criminal tendencies. When their
Psycho-Pass reaches unacceptably high levels, the Public Safety Bureau
quarantines them. The system is not fool-proof. Those who are “criminally asymptomatic”
record artificially low “crime coefficients.” Some of them have even penetrated
the Bureau.
In
the two seasons of the regular anime, Tsunemori has seen enough of the inner
workings of Sibyl to make her skeptical of its ultimate intentions. However, she
remains within the system, unlike her former colleague, Shinya Kogami, who has
gone rogue. In the opening action sequence, Tsunemori’s unit takes down a
terrorist cell, only to have them ominously whisked away by her superiors.
Based on information extracted the hard way, they learn the terrorists had
contact with Kogami in SEAUn, the Southeast Asian Union. Tsunemori is sent to
investigate and hopefully capture him, presumably because she is both competent
and expendable. However, once in-country, she finds the oppressive government
has somehow perverted the newly installed Sibyl system, allowing the criminals
to exploit the innocent with impunity.
There
are a heck of a lot of challenging themes in Psycho-Pass, starting with the fundamental and increasingly timely
question: how much liberty can free people afford to relinquish for the sake of
security? Although Tsunemori’s place in this world is ambiguous, Acton’s maxim is
stamped all over it.
Tsunemori
is also a well-developed character, who really grapples with her reservations
(and provides a brief interlude of fan service). Boldly, screenwriters Makoto
Fukami and Gen Urobuchi further challenge viewer preconceptions with the
thuggish mercenary who frequently quotes anti-colonial Marxist critical
theorist Frantz Fanon. There is also quite a bit of action and sophisticated
intrigue, but the film clearly presupposes viewers will be familiar with the
anime, especially when a significant character makes an eleventh hour
appearance, with little or no explanation for who he might be.
