Lupin III: The Mystery of Mamo

Beginning with the gentleman thief's execution, Lupin III: The Mystery of Mamo (also known as Secret of Mamo, Lupin III: Lupin vs The Clone or, simply, Lupin III) quickly locks itself into a pattern of episodic action. The film is a series of vignettes, loosely arranged around a plot that slowly inches its way towards secret histories and supernatural intrigue. Mystery of Mamo operates like a riff then, with director Soji Yashikawa and co-writer Atsushi Yamatoya feeding Monkey Punch's elasticated bandits into ceaseless, wonderfully arranged spectacle. Motorbikes snake around inside the Giza Necropolis; a liquid lunch in Paris is gatecrashed by an attack helicopter that machine guns dozens of innocent bystanders to pieces.

Mamo's many chases blur together, immediately overwhelming the central story to the point where frantic pursuits and death-defying feats become the film's primary method of communication. The best of these processions plays out like Chuck Jones' interpretation of Steven Spielberg's Duel - Lupin and the gang crammed into a red BMC Mini while an enormous, frowning, 18-Wheeler smashes everything else off the road. Police patrol cars and metal crash barriers included. Yashikawa and his animations are dizzy with big screen possibilities, the TMS crew quite apparently using their theatrical-sized budget to speed through every interlude or set-piece denied to them while working on the less extravagantly budgeted Lupin the Third Part I and Lupin the Third Part II television series. The result? Beautifully animated incoherence that works tremendously hard to be constantly, breathlessly, entertaining.