Wings of Honneamise

Royal Space Force 王立宇宙軍 (retitled The Wings of Honneamise オネアミスの翼 by its distributor on its initial release) is a feature-length anime movie produced by Gainax and directed by Hiroyuki Yamaga. And was the first film produced by Studio Gainax. With a budget of 8 billion yen, this film was one of the most expensive works of anime ever produced, yet did not do well when initially released to theatres.

The story is set in a world similar to our own, with 1950s technology. Shirotsugh Lhadatt is an unmotivated young man who has drifted into his nation's lackadaisical space program. After the death of another astronaut and meeting a religious young woman, Shiro volunteers to be the first person launched into space. His training as an astronaut parallels his coming of age, as well as surviving unreliable technology and assassination attempts. Meanwhile, war is brewing with a neighboring nation.

This film is constructed to tickle two fancies at once: the filmgoer's desire to be the first person in space (while still maintaining Japanese identifications) and to have that event produce a change in world history, more than the commotion that Sputnik caused. Since it cannot be about a Japanese person being the first in space from this world, it is set in a world that continually references Japan. The society is a constitutional monarchy whose royal family sit on the floor with a back-support the same as a formal Japanese piece of furniture. In fact, the word "Royal" in the title is the translation of the word Oritsu, which the film's chief saw on a teabag. He was delighted that he had found a word of dignity, without being a direct reference to the Emperor of Japan. Politics within the hero's country have reference to the infighting endemic to Japan; the word "Honneamise" in the title comes partly from the crucial Japanese word "honne," meaning the understanding of what is going on that insiders do not tell outsiders, but keep amongst themselves. Specifically, the "Royal Space Force" is a half-hearted showpiece funded off-and-on by members of the royal family - and it is to be manipulated by greater political circles. This way, he is not an acclaimed test pilot with the eyes of the nation upon him, but someone whom the average cinemagoer can relate to, and he does not need to begin with confidence and dedication, but can acquire these. Even the emblem of the RSF is absolutely Japanese, based on the Zen design of the enso, a clockwise circle made with a brush, which starts with a circular blob at the top and isn't really closed. Here this is redoubled: an enso within an enso.

Everyday items were re-designed made to be distinctly different from the practices of this planet, especially those of the West, though nonetheless workable. This can be exemplified by the Chinese-like shoulder tie of the uniform being - a cotter pin. The protractor is concave and the bowls of the spoons triangular. (They missed making the bicycle look unearthly, though.) The coins used are not round; rather they are even more oblong than traditional Japanese gold pieces. The aircraft Shiro trains on is quite like one of the last experimental fighters which the Japanese built in World War II, the Mitsubishi J7W Shinden. The rocket was a combination of the Soviet "R-7" used for Sputnik, Vostok, Voskhod, and Soyuz and the S-IVB stage of NASA's Saturn. Its engines are stated as being named after mythological sea monsters of that imaginary planet, just as the first major Japanese rocket was named "Kappa," after one in Japanese mythology that also happened to be the name of a letter in the Greek alphabet. The designers took Art Nouveau structures as their models sometimes. As the Japanese like to have a wide variety of supports for fences rather than mere rectilinear ones as Western countries do, this is in evidence even in such things as window frames.

There are also interesting references in the particulars of the "bad guys." Their language is composed of phrases from various rural dialects of Japanese, while being recited by non-Japanese, to make it on the brink of difference and recognizability. And the uniforms of their troops have the collars from the Zeon forces of the first Gundam series.ja:王立宇宙軍～オネアミスの翼