So I just watched The Last Unicorn, a movie I had seen a portion of as a child, but at least to my memory, never saw in its entirety. I kind of always knew its name (at least I think I did), but hadn't heard anything about it until about a year or two ago when I spotted it on a shelf in a store in a mall. I think it was one of those stores that sells antique collector's items and such, including classic films, but I could be wrong. I recognized one or two of the images on the case to be from my memories of the movie, and I recently heard about it again somewhere, claiming that it was possibly one of the greatest animated stories ever made, despite it being a sort of anti-disney in that it tells a story in a style that is the complete opposite of the style of Disney films. Finally, I had some extra time tonight, so I cracked down and watched it online. This is what I have to say about it (be warned, there are hints at the ending in the following review, so I guess I should say SPOILERS!!):
Beautiful movie. Granted, there have been other films and stories that have held a MUCH greater emotional impact to me, but this one wasn't really emotional as much as it was thoughtful. I realize now that it could be due to what I had seen of this film as a child that I ended up dreaming of meeting animal friends and such, only to have them leave me for unknown reasons and never return. Such dreams would leave me with a sense of longing and loneliness when I woke up in the morning, and that caused me to become a very emotional child. Although I'm not so emotional now, I still remember those times, and those emotions always affected me much more than any other whenever I felt them, and thus they caused me to become a guy who tries to be as nice as he can be while still trying to achieve his ultimate goals. Goals that just might be impossible for one who was not born in a very wealthy family and who also happens to be as lazy as I am.
However, from what I had seen beforehand, I thought this movie would end in the last unicorn's death. I did not remember the unicorns actually surviving, as I remembered it being that they were released, but passed on in life, like spirits that had been caged up in hell and awaited release to heaven, their true destination. I had also remembered the unicorn as always being timid and confused. I was not aware that her human form was not her doing.
What made that idea even more solid in my mind was the song. It talks about how everything is ending, the last great things of the earth are dying, and yet the last unicorn on the earth, the most beautiful thing left, is not crying over its eventual death, but rejoicing that it is even alive in the first place. This made me assume the movie was about the final unicorn teaching others to see the positive side of things, even if there isn't much, and obviously wanting to remain alive, but eventually sacrificing itself to do the right thing, even if it meant causing the unicorns to go extinct.
To this extent, I can honestly say I think the song actually tells a more touching story than the movie itself, but the movie is much deeper and more realistic in the way it portrays things, and thus teaches a larger variety of messages, though none are the same message as the one taught by the song. You could say the song teaches an extra message the movie itself could not teach without it.
Perhaps the most interesting thing about the movie regarding my childhood is that, when I was so young (I was like five), I saw the unicorn as a human and thought she was the prettiest thing I had ever seen. Yes, I was one of those kids. Her voice matched her pretty, innocent looks, and I basically found myself infatuated with her. Of course, that was back before animation was as clean as it is now, and thus I have seen much prettier individuals in fiction and heard much more touching stories since then, but at the time, I had never seen an animated being so beautiful and pure. At some point afterward, I'd say within a year if not a month, I had a particular dream that remains in my memory to this day. I think I had also just discovered the Green Lantern because of the nature of this dream. She was a princess. I was a boy with a powerful ring. This ring held a large rectangular diamond in it (no really, the thing was like as wide as my finger and about 1.5 times as long), and right in the center was a very slim emerald jewel, so thin you could call it a green slit in the diamond's center. I actually managed to draw a picture of this ring once, although I think I have yet to scan it and post it online. From what I can remember, the ring could do anything I wanted it to, although I think I had yet to fully master it (now that I think about it, that sounds a LOT like the wizard from the movie). Even so, I eventually found myself trying to guard this princess from others that would try to harm or capture her, and I was doing this in a modern-day city, I believe somewhere coastal, most likely somewhere like New York (although I've never been there and the place in my dream looked very different, merely sharing a similar landscape). I forget everything else regarding that dream, but for a while now, I have hoped that I can perhaps turn that dream into a real story about a princess who must travel either for some sort of "coming of royalty ritual" or to claim the throne of her own branch of her father's kingdom, and to the astonishment of all, out of all the guardian escorts she could have chosen from, she chooses a young timid boy who is only just old enough and only just trained enough for the task. This boy turns out to be very noble and protective of her, but at the same time, very trusting and wise, as despite not being so sure of himself a lot of the time, he manages to defend her quite well simply due to his dedication to his task as well as the princess herself. The ring was given to him as a means of defending her on the journey, and should the journey be successful, he would be allowed to keep the ring for the rest of his life. During his time wielding it, he would be known as the Emerald Guardian. There would be other rings of power in the world, such as one that grants the ability to materialize just about any real object out of thin air, one that lets its wielder read minds, etc. All of them are their own unique shape, and all of them are made of a large diamond with a specific colored gem in the center. The emerald one in particular could grant its wielder the ability to manipulate force. For example, he can create forces to push things away, pull them, send them spinning, etc., or he could create barriers that work by automatically countering any opposing force with an equal amount of its own. Of course, these barriers would only be able to sustain so much pressure, but over time, his control would become stronger, allowing him to stop even bullets to a certain extent (although bullets would be some of the toughest things to stop with such a method, and thus would be used as a suspenseful moment when he must put up a barrier as a last resort). Since this would take place in a world with modern-day technology (to a certain extent), things like guns and other modern weaponry would still be quite rare and expensive, but not unheard of. The country's government would be that of a monarchy of sorts. You could say it combines medieval times with modern times.
