Riding Bean: OVA Review

Title: Riding Bean

Author: Kenichi Sonoda

Director: Yasuo Hasegawa

Year: 1989

Back in those golden days when the Sci-Fi Channel had the presence of mind to broadcast anime goldies, there were certain factors that prohibited me from viewing them. The main factor was a bedtime. So in order to avail myself of these films, it was necessary to badger my parents, to ensure that they put a tape on to record at the end of the night, and all-importantly, that it was on the correct channel. It is in this way that I availed myself of many of the retro classics: Patlabor, Appleseed, Ghost in the Shell, Black Jack, Golgo 13, Black Magic M-66 and, slightly inappropriately, Violence Jack. I would often view the information tab on these shows, to decide whether or not they were worth recording, though in the end it likely boiled down to two variables upon which I would judge a film. These two variables were: running time and, more importanly, age certificate. It is for these reasons that Riding Bean was never taped, being quite a short film, and not having an 18 certificate. In a strange twist of fate, it is currently listed on imdb as an 18 certificate in the UK, so whether or not my memory is letting me down I may never know. I may simply have avoided it due to its title, imagining that it is a tale that centred around an anthropormorphised runner bean with equestrian tendencies.

As it turns out, I would very much have enjoyed it. So, I am glad that I have watched it now.

Riding Bean is a masterpiece of gratuitousness: gratuitous violence, gratuitous nudity and gratuitous chin.

The film (or one-shot OVA?) throws us into the midst of the action, with our hero, the daftly named Bean Bandit, waiting as a getaway driver for two goons who are committing a robbery and peppering the inside of a mall with shotgun shells. It is in this opening sequence that we also get to see pretty much all of a hostage, an inexplicably naked orange-haired lady, suspiciously too faithful in her representation with a corset-shaped tanline. Is it more suspect that they drew it, or that I found it worth commenting on?

So follows the film's first car-chase, of many, with obligatory police-car pile-ups. I like my sentences hyphenated. Using the term 'obligatory' sounds as though I am doing the car-chases down, which certainly isn't the case. As car-chases go they are very entertaining, but in reality those sort of sequences have never really been my thing. Though my mind was blown by some of the activities of Bean's wIkk3d k3wl car, such as when the wheels turn 90 degrees and send the car hurtling sideways instead of forwards. That is the sort of sequence that would've blown the mind of my 12 year old self, unfortunately only leaving my 22 year old self ruing that he hadn't watched the film a decade earlier. Since the film was released in 1989, it apalls me that this technology does not come standard with every car. The concept is at least 20 years old now! Henry Ford would be spinning in his grave! But no, the technology isn't there yet. He has to make do with doing doughnuts. It's just not the same.

Riding Bean is very much a product of the 80s. The anime of that era which made it to Western shores seems to share certain things in common: an over the top grotesque obsession with "cool" style, being set in a cityscape, nudity, and guns, specifically, a tendency to use them wantonly. Not forgetting a gloriously New Wave/Power Rock crossover of a soundtrack, to be drunk into your ears like a pint of the distilled sweat of Oingo Boingo and Stan Bush. Sound appetising? It is!

In my notes I have written that the film is, on occasion, "fucking vicious with blood", which is certainly an accurate description, and I feel omitting the coarse language of that description would be doing the film down. Its the sort of film which doesn't mind a character getting shot, and if that happens, it would be wise to expect sudden torrential hemoglobin downpour.

There is a vein of comedy running through the film, though the humour shies away from subtlety, instead favouring overblown shouting and gurning. One example is where Bean is rendered furious by an oafish gunman disrespecting his car, which prompts a hugely odd reaction. Bean throws a number of peanuts into his own mouth, straps himself into the car-seat and then chomps down so aggressively on them that his shades fall off. A strange, strange scene.

The car is a big focus of the film, named 'The Roadbuster', it is zehr fast, ludicrously armoured to the point of near-invincibility and red. It seemed to be Bean's main strong attribute, to the point where I had to wonder if he would be of any use away from the wheel of the car. Ohohohoho! I am glad you asked Mr Gilder. Bean is able to withstand bullets, punch through doors and lift a car up by its bumper. "How?" I hear you ask. Fuck knows.

This is the sort of inexplicably daft point that would usually anger me in a film, but Riding Bean somehow manages to be thoroughly endearing despite the ludicrousness of its plot. This is further strange as the dialogue is often banal, with the hilarious quips and witty badinage between characters lacking any wit. The film is probably helped by its relatively short running time, which keeps things punchy, and also by the fact that it is in some way an unofficial pilot episode for Gunsmith Cats, which the author was forced to rename it thanks to falling out with the production company. So I can at least hope that the issues of Bean's superhuman strength are explained in there.

If not, Kenichi Sonoda needs a slap. A soft one though. On the wrist. The other wrist, silly. Do I have to do everything myself?

I haven't really dealt with the film's plot, which was tactful of me as it is full of twists and duplicity which I would've ruined through explaining. So go and watch it and find out what they are.

Oh yes, and Bean Bandit has a stupid chin.