Mamoru Oshii's Avalon.

Watched this 2001 movie last year. Reminded me of The Matrix. Typical of award winning filmmaker and writer Mamoru Oshii (押井守) movie, anime or otherwise, thus far. Deal with reality ie what's real and so forth. The story took place in this stylish but depressive feeling sepia tone world whereby the population seeks escape from reality by playing this ultra addictive illegal online game call Avalon. The gamers basically hardwired themselves directly into the game world, much like The Matrix. It started promisingly until the very end which left me confuse as *&^%, again very much like The Matrix trilogy as well as Mamoru's Ghost In The Shell anime movies.It seems to me Mamoru very much like us to question our "self" and "perception". Unfortunately, it left me feeling lobotomise. And I thought Blade Runner is deep. Visually, it is stunning with some of the battle scenes incorporating this technology called "superliveanimation". And of course the movie contain all his trademarks - stare at empty spaces shots, minimal dialog or just scenes showing the tram moving or people walking about while a depressing song is being played in the background. As well as that basset hound. Consist entirely of Polish actors and actresses, protagonist cool loner Ash (Małgorzata Foremniak) curiously reminded me of Grey Death (Grey~Yoshihisa Tagami). Like most of Mamoru movies, I would watch it again for the visual, although the storyline is best reserve for those willing to delve further into "who am I" "are you real" cyberpunk sort of philosophical babbling mess...