The bigger the screen, the heavier the brain processing.
Interviewer
Did you already have a plan from the beginning to divide the story into two parts after the sixth episode?
Anno
Yes, from the time I was thinking of making the film by re-editing.
I imagined that the last 20 minutes, which would be the climax, would be Operation Yakushima, and I wanted to use all new footage.
Interviewer
The story isn't that different, is it?
Anno
The outline of the story has not changed. The end of the story is different as a drama. In a TV series, the climax would be in a 20-minute time frame, so I prefer a simple time-suspense story, with "If you don't hit it the first time, the first person to shoot it back the second time wins." So the climax is a drama with a sense of urgency as Unit-01 becomes a shield and gets beaten up.
But when I thought of it as the final climax of a 90-minute film, it seemed too simple. So I decided to add one more difficult situation until Shinji is able to shoot once more. That was the only major difference in the drama. But when I was writing the script, I still had doubts about whether it would work. I couldn't be sure until the final film was completed.
Interviewer
What were you worried about?
Anno
For us and the fans, the tempo of the sixth episode of the TV series is still in our minds. In that episode, the speed of the development was very short, which makes it comfortable. However, I think it is necessary to have a different kind of comfort and still surpass the TV series. To be honest, I was a little worried until the film was completed whether it would be better than the TV series.
Interviewer
I think the music has a lot to do with it, but in the finished film, the drama is so majestic and powerful.
Anno
The music was massive all the way through, and as a result, it was nice to have a good amount of pause. You can't tell whether the flow of time is good or bad until the whole film is finally connected. And that feeling of seeing it in a movie theater can only come out if you watch it on the biggest screen possible. This time, I was editing digitally, so I was watching it on a small Quicktime screen on my computer. So it's hard to get the flow of time on a big screen and at high volume in a movie theater.
Interviewer
That's something that's very much related to the idea of "making it into a movie" this time.
Anno
That's right. I paid a lot of attention to how it would look on the big screen. In order to get as close to that impression as possible, I replaced the monitor in the meeting room with a larger one in preparation for the second film. If you see it at this size, it will probably give you an impression similar to that of seeing it in a movie theater. This is because the flow of time looks different from when I was watching it on a pc screen, so my impression has changed. The impression of the movement changes, and the size of the information that comes into your eyes is smaller when it comes from a small pc screen. So, I guess it's easier for the brain to process.
Interviewer
Does that mean that the stress on the brain is less?
Anno
Yes, it is. I guess small images are also easier for the brain to process. So even if you put a large amount of information in a small image, your brain will be able to fully process it, and you'll think it's OK. However, when I see it on a large screen, my brain can't fully process it, and I think, "Oh no, there should be six more frames here."
Also, when my brain couldn't fully process the information on the screen, I felt like I couldn't fully process the sound information either, like I couldn't get the dialogue into my head. Again, I felt that the tempo of the TV series was still too much in my mind. Next time, I think I will be able to work more consciously on the tempo or length. However, it is also a pleasure to have your brain numbed by too much information. So, I need to control that.
» #6