Pale Cocoon is the work of a single person, Yoshiura Yasuhiro; in just 22 minutes this short anime surprises for its graphical beauty, the intelligent story and the way it's told. A real jewel comparable to Hoshi no Koe.

Pale Cocoon is a sci-fi short tale about a colony of humans buried deep underground, the people unable to go back to the surface because it's extremely polluted.

Animation

Fully 3D except for the characters, the animation creates a beautiful frame within which the story unfolds. The dark atmosphere of a decaying artificial structure is expressed in every single shot thanks to the choice of colors: the pale light of the monitors reflected weakly by opaque metal surfaces and a mildly unpleasant yellowish light pervading the whole environment contrast against a few touches of lively colors added to the scene by photographs of a world long gone.

Sound

Except for a good piano piece and a certain song that is important for the plot, there isn't much worth noting. The few tracks are suited to the atmosphere and a few moments of silence in the right places have an even stronger effect. The one song there is has a huge importance in this anime and is, unsurprisingly, central to the soundtrack as well. It's just your average J-pop piece -- hardly worth listening to -- but such a song was needed because of its connection to the story; a classic music piece or a heavy metal song couldn't take its place. You'll understand if you watch this anime.

Story

Ladies and gentlemen, here's some genuine, honest to God science fiction. This isn't a billion dollars movie straight from Hollywood with tons of special effects where the most intelligent thing they say is "Launch the protonic missiles!". This is authentic sci-fi, the one Ray Bradbury and Asimov are famous for.

I'm sorry I can't say much about Pale Cocoon's' story, it's so short any hint would be a spoiler.

I can say that it keeps the spectator in a continuous state of mind that goes from confusion to uncertainty. The director keeps screwing with the chronological order of some events but leaves the order of all the others untouched. By the end of the anime, everything snaps back in its proper place and one has to mentally bow to the ability of Yoshiura-san -- I hope that's the surname, I can't really tell :) -- because putting all the pieces back together takes no effort at all. It just happens.

The setting is a futuristic labyrinth of pipes, metal, monitors, light signals, stairs, lifts; in this almost completely abandoned labyrinth a few people move about with a dwindling sense of purpose. Their job is to find and restore documents like photos and movies.

People who like the short stories by Bradbury and similar artists should really give this anime a go.

Characters

A length of 22 minutes means no character development at all. There's an attempt to do some of that, but it's only an inkling. There wasn't time for it and, honestly, it's all right.

Personal judgement

Even though it's short, Pale Cocoon grew on me even as I was watching it. I love it.

Overall

This one is a must watch.