Product Details

• Actors: Ryôka Yuzuki, Hikaru Hanada, Yuka Imai, Kazuhiro Yamaji, Jôji Nakata
• Format: Animated, Color, DVD, Full Screen, Subtitled, NTSC
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround), English (Dolby Digital 5.1), Japanese (Dolby Digital 5.1)
• Subtitles: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: R (Restricted)
• Studio: Geneon [Pioneer]
• DVD Release Date: June 25, 2002
• Run Time: 90 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (36 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00006674S
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #129,429 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "Armitage - Dual Matrix" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not as good...but growing on me., April 28, 2003

By 

Ilker Yucel "Kryptych" (Annapolis, MD United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Armitage - Dual Matrix (Special Edition) (DVD)

The first time I saw this DVD sequel to one of the best animes of the '90's on the shelves, I was skeptical. When I saw that Juliette Lewis was doing the voice for super-sexy robot ...Naomi Armitage, my feelings were mixed, knowing her to be a competent actress with a sexier voice than Elizabeth Berkeley (and certainly sexier on screen). When I finally watched it...I was disappointed. And yet...I watched it again, and I liked it a little more, despite the flaws.

As a sequel, it's pretty standard. It acknowledges the events of the first movie (except of course for the funny plot hole of why nobody on Mars recognizes Ross or Armitage when they figured to be such prominent characters in a government conspiracy in the original). The sequel expands (not answers, but expands) on certain questions from the first, like how does a robot have the ability to conceive human children? The action is pretty good, almost as good as the original, and it wrap things up nicely in the end.

The major flaws with this sequel are inherent in the animation. It's just not nearly as good. The animators went a little overboard with the use of CGI for some of the vehicular chase scenes (which were pretty cool, but obviously out of place with the rest of the animation). The panning is far less smooth than in the original, probably another result of CGI...it just doesn't look the same. The character design is updated slightly to give a sense that the characters have matured slightly. The backgrounds and setting aren't all that great either, but...it is mostly on Earth, not Mars. Maybe they just didn't want to go too far with it. There's also a problem in the plot, which is almost a direct rehash of the original, only instead of the government being behind it, it's the big robot-producing corporations that have a lot to lose if robots are allowed to be treated as human. Politics come into play a little more this time around, but that hardly helps the case the plot is pretty much the same. Also, the cliched plot devices of taking the child hostage and of a mother protecting her child is played out in perfect form here. Armitage could take out an entire army to protect her child...and she pretty much does (well...two ultra violent clones of herself, which is pretty much the equivalent of an army...and those clones laugh way too much, you just wanna bash their heads in).

The pros of this movie are that in spite of these little details, it's still a far better sequel than most Hollywood sequels attempt to be. As I said, the action is really good. The extended fight between Armitage and Ross and her two clones is pretty good, especially considering that the clones are more than just programmed soldiers...they seem to have a sadistic side, laughing almost every time they think they're about to kill someone...which was annoying, but it does helping you to hate them. The additional characters like the daughter Yoko and Mouse the Repairman are pretty enjoyable too. Yoko plays out like a typical kid in anime movies, but she's far less annoying than you'd expect. The little twist near the end when we see what makes her more than just an ordinary human is well integrated, especially after the villian made a big deal about not finding anything special about her. Mouse is just funny. The music by Julian Mack is different...still electronic-based, but more orchestral elements are introduced, and the presence of a female voice in the theme is rather interesting.

All-in-all, the sequel did what it sought out to do, and while it's certainly not as good as the original, it does at least hold a candle. I hated it at first, but the more I watch it, the more I enjoy it, and the more I feel it's actually a pretty good sequel. This is just my opinion, so feel free to disagree, but I think "Armitage: Dual-Matrix" is pretty good.

15 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Oh dear...what a shame, October 2, 2002

By 

J. Armstrong "jarm" (UK, Cambridgeshire) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Armitage - Dual Matrix (DVD)

The original Armitage series (not the hacked to pieces Poly Matrix movie version) was a work of art. A gritty cyberpunk thriller raising serious questions about the future of our society when technoloy loves, hates and fears. This sequel is almost unconnected. The characters of Ross and Armitage have become all but manequins, Ross stumbles around with nothing much to do, his police background is all but forgotten and there even seems to be no mention that he has an artifitical arm and leg, as his same hand gets injured.

Armitage, a very strong and quite deep character has been rendered one dimensional, running around avoiding robots of different shapes and sizes, her motivation in the whole plot is shallow and unintersting.

A weak plot and script can sometimes be saved by good animation and design, but Armitage Dual-Matrix just looks uninspired, CGI is used throughout and sticks out like a sore thumb, looking out of place and [inexpensive]. The characters themselves don't look quite right, Armitage seems to have bizarre lip growth most of the time and she's just lost her charm and grace.

The dubbing is OK, though Juliette Lewis gives a wooden performance as Armitage (and you thought Elizabeth Berkley [was bad]?The original OVA voice was better than both movie versions. Japanese vocal is far superior.

If you want cyberpunk anime, pick up the original series (now available on DVD) and avoid this cliche.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Spoken like a true Armitage fan!, June 24, 2002

By 

"cutemarco" (Hutch, MN, wishing I had a vespa!!!) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Armitage - Dual Matrix (Special Edition) (DVD)

I am going to try to calmly write a review with ideas in neatly arranged in some sort of order.
1st- acting... I feel very sorry for the voice actors in this movie. Not that they were bad or anything, but pioneer didn't keep one voice actor the same, despite several characters that appear in the same movie. That means that the actors not only had to live up to the japanese for subbies, but also to the old english ones for dubbies. Juliete Lewis does quite the job. Her voice is lower and rougher than Elizabeth Berkley's and her acting was quite good. She give as much heart and soul as Elizabeth Berkley and she obviously had fun doing it. Skip Stellrecht tried his best with Ross, and had a very hard time keeping his voice low. He tried to match Kiefer Sutherlands, and he almost had me fooled sometimes. Being a dubbie, I thought he was a little too...act-y for Ross, because I was used to Kiefer Sutherland's crude and flat Ross. Yoko... oh boy, when I found out that rebecca fordstadt (mihoshi, tenchi muyo) was doing her voice, I was scared, then, upon seeing her performance, was quite pleased. Her crying was a touch odd, but was her voice, not her acting. Demitrio, michael mcconnohie was mediocre at best, sometime underacted, sometimes over acted, and sometimes right on, but nothing too special for a bad guy voice. Mouse was played by the guy who does the voice for jar jar binks, ahmed best, and that scared me worse than the mihoshi thing, but again, I was pleasantly surprised. Very good, very wacky! Strings... nothing too much here, just a flat military character. As for Julian... Mona Marshall, all I can say to you is nice job not sounding like Izzy from DIgimon. Music was GREAT!!! LOVE LOVE LOVED IT! Kudo's to Julian Mack. Visuals... nice animation, very smooth, a little much on the computer, but still blended quite nicely. Character designs were very true to the original. Now the story of coursr, is the ultimate test. You can't expect another Armitage III: Poly Matrix, you ahve to accept that it's a different kind of story, and I think the director is different too. The action was very apparent, but hey if you're an armitage fan, you love that kick bum stuff! ^.^ The story didn't lose heart though, and explained some more of the politics that were left to crumble in the first movie. It had a different feel to it, but it was still a good story. I'm not very picky about DVD set ups or special features, I was just kind of like oo, fancy interviews and trailer... the most I can is that it was a very spiffy user friendly set up. Besides a few random ... shots, the language and violence were no worse than the first, so maybe a PG-13. Not too much comedy, except the random please (?) don't touch on the second's but and the kick in the balls that the bad guy deserves... I enjoyed this movie, and I hope you will find this review helpful and enjoy the movie youreself!!