The Castle of Cagliostro

How does one adapt a television show to film? The Mystery of Mamo exemplified one approach of making everything bigger, bolder, and global in scope (Lupin literally saves the planet) and including things (expressive linework, extravagant nudity) they could not manage on television.

Cagliostro takes nearly the opposite approach. The treasure of the story is, as Lupin says, truly “bigger than his pocket,” but overall the story is told on fundamentally the same scale as an episode from the first series of Lupin III, only longer and with more sophisticated setpieces. That sophistication’s essential—The Castle of Cagliostro isn’t pieced together like Mamo was but tells one coherent story. And it manages to do it with better pacing, too—it’s amazing how quickly the action arrives in Cagliostro, and how well it’s balanced with quieter scenes that allow one to catch their breath.

Despite the scope being smaller, the story still manages to be bigger. Lupin still does save the world in a sense by removing a source of economic volatility (the “Goat Bills” he goes after) but that’s not why anyone remembers the movie. It’s truly a film about Arsène Lupin III himself, and while The Mystery of Mamo served as a sort of capstone to the original comics The Castle of Cagliostro is an effectively a finale to the original show—how odd that it was my gateway to the rest of the show.

On the most basic level it’s a continuation in that Lupin’s jacket is green here, like in the first series, not red like in the original thematic short and the second series. The similarities go deeper than that, though. The character designs go back to more realistic proportions of the series. In fact Lupin sometimes verges on neotenic here, with his head almost too large for his body in some shots, in contrast to the broad-shouldered, small-headed, bow-legged figure from The Mystery of Mamo. Although the physics are still a bit fantastic (more on that later), Cagliostro takes the opposite approach of Mamo in rendering the world—rather than making Lupin more comic-like than television allow (think expressive linework and two-dimensional abstraction), Miyazaki uses the big screen to make it more naturalistic. There’s even a sense that Cagliostro exists somewhere in our world (probably nestled up against Alpes-Maritimes). My reaction after watching Cagliostro on a Dutch winter’s afternoon was that I couldn’t wait until spring.



The colors are, if anything, more muted than in the series—not limited to television broadcasts, Miyazaki can paint with somewhat paler or subtler shades (this is a film for fans of green, blue, and grey) and still maintain a bright-and-clean look. But what really stands out that there’s a real sense of depth in the scenes. And since it’s animation, there’s three-dimensionality beyond what we could record in the real world, and makes scenes like the one above seem natural. It also allows for a means of expression—while Cagliostro eschews the expressiveness of Mamo’s animation, it makes up for it via the perfect placement of characters in space. It’s what makes that vertiginous Miyazaki feeling possible. It’s like the transition from the plastic and two-dimensional, Gothic painting to the Renaissance, with more natural figures arranged in space, gaining its power from the clarity of its composition and subtlety of its meaning. If it weren’t for all the action I’d call this movie bucolic—I last watched it last winter (before I’d seen the original Lupin III series, I should add) and my immediate response after watching was that I couldn’t wait for spring.

The Castle of Cagliostro, like Mamo and “Keep an Eye on the Beauty Contest,” wears its love of painting on its sleeve, again returning to the device of directly employing a reproduction of the artwork. We get Le Serment des Horaces in the background when the Count is plotting with his henchman, and Fujiko peers through Doge Leonardo Loredan’s eyes (and Giovanni Bellini really exemplifies the sort of clear atmosphere and strong-yet-natural use of color the film uses).

During a historical narration we also get a return to sketchy the aesthetic used in “Everyone Meets Again: The Trump Plan.” In fact, there are lots of little bits from the show that I felt were building up to Cagliostro. There’s the counterfeiters and clock in “Target the Counterfeit Money Maker,” the rescue of an attractive young captive and Old World European setting of “When the Seventh Bridge Falls,” and Lupin’s honorable rescue operation from “Rescue the Tomboy!” Of course, it’s the other way around—Miyazaki did not direct those episodes with a future film in mind, but one of the things that makes Cagliostro so effective is the way it builds on previous Lupin tropes and plot elements, creating something truly synergetic from them.

This is especially true of the characterization, where no one’s shortchanged. Jigen and Goemon play only supporting roles, though they get strong moments with their weapons of choice and Clarisse actually manages to melt their tough façades a bit. Although she’s demoted from co-lead to supporting character and we don’t get a return to baaad Fujiko here as we did in the The Mystery of Mamo, she nonetheless remains a woman of action and cunning as ever (describing herself as a “lady spy” but absconding with counterfeiting plates making her precise allegiance here uncertain).



The biggest beneficiary from the film, though, would be Inspector Zenigata. While he can be played as a bit of a joke, Cagliostro pulls off the near-impossible by making Zenigata super-competent and by meshing that with a sort of understated humor around him. He’s also working on the same side as Lupin, too, being brought in to, in Goemon’s words, “Use poison to fight poison.” The Castle of Cagliostro’s sense of humor a whole is impressive—it’s remarkably understated for a Lupin film, seldom going for broad laughs and eschewing cartoony wackiness altogether. It’s more like a silent film, where a lot of clever little touches add up to humor.



Cagliostro’s action is clever and inventive (note how Lupin and Jigen plough through the foliage—figure at the top of the page—in the greatest instance of passing on the right in cinematic history), as are the inventions themselves. There’s no Mercedes here and fewer explosions. Here Lupin goes for the small (Lupin’s driving his FIAT, and a 2CV—Miyazaki’s own car—gets destroyed again), the seemingly commonplace, the clever, and for the not-nearly-as-flashy-as-it-seems. The high-tech defenses of the castle are also clever and well done. The mooks’ uniforms are highlights—their large, gauntlets extend weigh down their wearers arms, making them seem gorilla-like and vaguely inhuman. They’re so elegantly simply you wonder why you haven’t seen them in film before.

There’s also real darkness under Cagliostro’s surface. For all the acrobatics, this is the first time we see Lupin seriously hurt, and it’s a real shock.

There’s also real darkness under Cagliostro’s surface. In common with Mamo, one of the driving forces for the film’s story is the villain’s lust for the leading lady. It’s much subtler here, though—unlike Mamo’s somewhat tragic position in a skewed love triangle, the Count’s desire to have Clarisse is wrapped up with his desire for power, both to consolidate his control over the state and to physically dominate over another person (and he is certainly a would-be rapist: drugging Clarisse for their wedding, having vows that include “silence implies consent”). The Count’s look is impressive—he’s tall and well dressed and has proportions that, if slightly altered, could make him a handsome Disney prince. But they’re just off enough to make him appear dangerous and a bit grotesque. The association of the goat—low, inhibited and sexual—with Cagliostro is appropriate.



The count’s death is also one of my favorites in cinema, and similarly manages to be dark without explicit, as well as quite economical—a simple, brief sound effect does a surprisingly amount of work.

Lupin occupies the emotional high ground here, though. Mamo put empty intellect against embodied cleverness, but Cagliostro is motivated by Lupin’s more sentimental side. This, I gather, has made the film’s high reputation slightly controversial among some dedicated Lupin fans—who’s this nice guy? Lupin’s had an altruistic streak for a while, usually undergirded by attraction (“Farewell, My Beloved Witch,” which was only the third episode of the original series) or a sense of obligation (“Rescue the Tomboy!,” which is a far more direct antecedent to The Castle of Cagliostro). Lupin definitely feels an internal sense of obligation to Clarisse, but there’s some attraction as well (despite taunting the count by calling him a pedophile). He keeps himself from fully embracing Clarisse at the end, but it’s definitely an effort. Fujiko tells Clarisse to watch out for Lupin, but Lupin also watches out for her on is own.



It’s striking how old Lupin looks here. This is the first film where he really seems vulnerable—he’s even shot (near-fatally!), and it’s a shocking, important moment. Although it’s certainly not the last Lupin adventure (not by a long shot), nor even Miyazaki’s final work with Lupin (by release date, at least—I’m not sure about production schedules) Cagliostro, in many ways, feels like final episode to the original series. There are thematic callbacks, everyone gets their due, we get something special with Zenigata and Lupin working together, but what really gives The Castle of Cagliostro a sense of finality is that Lupin’s growth over the series—more a product of behind-the-scenes dynamics than anything plot-related—is acknowledged. Stunningly, we get callbacks to the original opening sequence—spotlights flashing and Lupin running in his tactileneck to escape in his Mercedes—as Lupin recalls his initial heists. We even get Lupin’s threatening smirk from the first episode, so different from the kinder countenance he has in this film.

Time passes and things change—early on Lupin walks through the ruins of the duke’s castle, and it ends with the rediscovery of an ancient city. As in many episodes Lupin’s initial spur to action is to revenge a wrong, but while the story starts with a less-than-noble casino heights it has wide-ranging benefits for the world as a whole— The loot from Lupin’s heist is in a public treasure. And while he wins the heart of the girl, he refuses to take it. Lupin’s grown into something different from the original pilot film, and this is the culmination of his evolution. It isn’t the last Lupin, but it is the final word.



Recommended?

Yes—everything about this film, from the overarching mood, to the turns of the story, to the tiny details in the animation—is damn close to perfect. Although it was my (and many others) entry point to Lupin III, it’s extra-fun if watched after the original series, too (I got very excited when I noticed the homage to the original opening above).

Stray Observations

It’s remarkable the degree to which this film is a dry run for Castle in the Sky, which shares a similar skepticism of hereditary monarchy as an institution.

While Lupin in The Mystery of Mamo is obsessed with pop rocks, the Italo-French food featured in The Castle of Cagliostro looks really sumptuous.

Jigen seems to be having the most fun of his characters in the climax—it’s great seeing him swing around with his anti-tank gun bedecked in looted crown jewels.

Although I couldn’t figure out a place to organically slip it into the review, Ono Yuji’s score is excellent. It’s also surprisingly wistful—although it’s recognizably Ono’s own (and thus very much a jazzy Lupin score), in mood it really anticipates Joe Hisaishi’s later work for Miyazaki. If you can find it, the full Castle of Cagliostro Music File is very worth having—listening to it while writing this review, I honestly I got a bit emotional.

Next week we will continue with Miyazaki’s final two contributions (or at least final two contributions to air—as noted above I’m not sure about the production schedule) to the Lupin franchise, two episodes of the second “Red Jacket” series: “Albatross: Wings of Death” and “Farewell My Beloved Lupin.”