Poupelle of Chimney Town - Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Poupelle of Chimney Town



Movie:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score:


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Movie
I really didn’t know what to expect from Poupelle of Chimney Town. It was from a first time director (Yusuku Hirota), and looked more like a French animation work rather than Japanese, but the story seemed intriguing from the trailer so I decided to give it a go. The story starts out simplistically and very childish, with a narrators voice cluing us into the fantastical world world of Chimney Town. A town that spat black smoke into the sky in an effort to run the economic world of the town, while telling everyone that there is nothing outside of the smokey sky. A whirlwind of magic forms a man made of trash into existence, and dumps him right into the middle of Chimney Town during a Halloween festival (the perfect cover), only to get found out and chased away by the scared town folks.

Running away into the mist, our magical trash man runs into Lubicchi, a young chimney sweet who works among the highest peaks of the city due to his father Bruno’s stories as a young boy. Bruno had claimed to have been outside of the smoke and trash that is the city and seen these mystical things called “stars” and “sky”. As his father had recently passed away, Lubicchi yearned to see the things his father told him of, even if he was pretty sure they were nothing but fantasy. However, his trip to the stars may very well become a reality when the trash man (whom he dubs “Poupelle”) runs into him and changes his life forever.

Poupelle of Chimney Town starts out a simplistic child's story at first. Lubicchi and Poupelle bond over being outcasts in society, while running from the Inquisitors (the personal guard of the city’s mayor, who does everything he can to squelch the idea that there is something outside of the smoke of Chimney Town), but as it moves along, the story starts developing depth and layers that you really didn’t expect. Lubicchi becomes the protector of the innocent and warm Poupelle when the town wants to destroy him, and Poupelle inspires the longing chimney sweep to fulfill he’s dad’s story of actually reaching the stars one day. Together the two begin to heal each other from their wounds, culminating in a battle between the downtrodden people of Chimney Town and a leadership that desperately wants to keep the status quo.

While the idea of fearing the unknown, and people in power trying to keep a populace ignorant is nothing new. We’ve see this base narrative a million times. However, it’s the way that Poupelle of Chimney Town goes about it’s narrative is what makes it truly special. The entire story focuses on looking into the unknown with gusto. Overcoming fears and searching to expand not only your knowledge, but yourself on the way to that goal. It’s what makes it change from a simple child’s story that you’d see on the Disney Channel, to something truly amazing by the time the credits rolls. There’s also a couple of twists near the end that will be certain to draw a tear, and a sense of warmth and genuine heart that is intoxicating. I won’t say the movie is as strong as last month’s Belle, but it is still one of the best animated films I’ve seen in ages.




Rating:

Not Rated by the MPAA




Video:

Once again, the encode from Shout Factory is a CBR (Constant Bit Rate) encode that is right at the 30 mbps line. Luckily it doesn’t fall into the same over compression issues that frustrated me with Belle, but the constraints of the CBR do bring in some artifacts. There’s some wavering at the edge of the hand drawn animation lines, and the night sky gets some blocking and banding. OTHERWISE, this is a vibrant and VERY right looking picture that thrives off the unique animation style as well as vivid colors. The film is mixture of CGI and hand drawn animation, with almost watercolor rotoscoped animation style that makes it much more unique than most other Anime films. Blacks are deep and inky, although the smokey sky is the murky looking areas that show the blocking and banding. Not perfect, but still a very good encode with great detail.







Audio:

Using both a 5.1 DTS-HD MA track in both English and Japanese, it’s really going to be a matter of which dub does it for you. I’m almost always a traditional audio dub person, but the English dub for Poupelle is actually quite good. Both sets of actors do an impressive job with their own take on the characters, and each is impressively detailed. Outside of that, the mixes are quite impressive, with lots of bass when needed, and the score from Youki Kojima and Yuta Bandoh is just incredible. The opening “Halloween” song is amazing, and the lilting and melancholy song during Lubicchi and Poupelle’s climb to the night sky is haunting to listen to. Surrounds are wildly active during the various chases and hijinks, and overall this is one impressive (and aggressive) mix.












Extras:

• The World of Chimney Town — A Discussion with Director Yusuke Hirota and Creator Akihiro Nishino.
• What's Next For Chimney Town — An Exclusive Interview with Creator Akihiro Nishino.
• Creator Akihiro Nishino Special Q&A — Malibu Film Society Screening

Final Score: ​

Poupelle of Chimney Town starts out whimsical and goofy, a pure kids move to the core, but then gets progressively more layered and deep as it goes along. I honestly didn’t know what to expect from the trailer, but this ended up being a fantastic must see film by the end. It’s sweet, heartwarming, sad, and incredibly powerful despite the simplistic basis for the story. The Blu-ray from shout Factory is great, with good video, great audio, and moderate extras. Well worth checking out.


Technical Specifications:

Starring: Masataka Kubota, Mana Ashida, Shingo Fujimori, Rina Honizumi, Kazuki Lio, Jun Kunimura
Directed by: Yusuke Hirota
Written by: Akihiro Nishino (book)
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 AVC
Audio: English: DTS-HD MA 5.1, Japanese DTS-HD MA 5.1, English, Japanese DD 2.0
Subtitles: English, English SDH
Studio: Shout Factory
Rated: NR
Runtime: 100 minutes
Blu-Ray Release Date: May 31st, 2022

Recommendation: Great Watch

 

[tripplej]

Thanks for the review. Never heard of this but after reading the review, I am interested. Will check it out.

 

[Michael Scott]

aplogies, there was a slight snafu with the audio/video portions. It has been fixed.