Angel’s Egg is a Japanese art film written and directed by Mamoru Oshii and staring Jinpachi Nezu and Mako Hyodo. The film centres around a mysterious young girl who wonders a desolate otherworldly postapocalyptic landscape carrying a large egg who is joined by a young man as they travel together. Angels Egg is a metaphor for director Mamoru Oshii’s loss of faith and the fractured dread that comes with a result of his reaction of his religion.
The film starts with a girl’s hand going into a boy’s hand as the film then shows sleeping birds inside of the eggs weighting to be born. The film then transitions to showcase a man wondering a postapocalyptic wasteland coming from what seems to be an overturned ship, then descending from the sky ass is coming from heaven a giant robot looking eye comes down seemly symbolic of God or at least the eye of God, statues adorn the eye praying showcasing the followers of God as they have been taken away and ascending into heaven. The eye of God descends on a chess board to show a Jesus looking figure looking at God. His is to some existent a metaphor for Jesus’ hair is like that of Jesus, his hands are bandaged were Jesus had nails in his hands and his gun is in the shape of a cross, in being Jesus he shown to be soldier for the lord however, with the use of the phrase “who are you?” it shows that he is a pawn in gods game a person who is controlled. A girl then awakens who carriers an egg around symbolic of her faith, she lives inside of Noah’s ark as it seems the film takes place after the great flood were the people who stopped believing in God were destroyed and God and Noah and his family for being believes as Noah ah dot build an ark to save two of every animal.
The world is shown to be that of a post-apocalyptic wasteland reminiscent of the earth as shown with the stone henge figure. The film then shows a girl wandering a post-apocalyptic wasteland holding onto an egg which is symbolic of her faith as she fills jars with water, this is used in religious rituals as ritualistic purification as when she drinks the water, she purifies herself. Water is symbolically used throughout the film showing the girls religious purity as in one scene she is covered in it like a baptism as she is surrounded by water holding her egg showing her faith. The town that the girl walks through is dead and post-apocalyptic showing how God has claimed people with religion, within the film the girl collects water, water is used in baptism to purify the soul which is what she’s doing. There seems to be an omniscient presence like God watching the girl as she hears a noise and runs into a line of tanks driving down the road indicating how religion can lead to war. The man who. Steps out of the tank has long hair, his hands are wrapped, and he has a cross shaped gun, witch clearly shows that he is a metaphor for Jesus as he is there to test the girl’s faith. As well as this he is symbolic of Oshii’s other side of him being the side that isn’t religious as Jesus’ imagery is used in the film in a mocking way showing the side of him that rejects Christianity as shown with the man’s gun being in the shape of a cross. The girl guards her egg and metaphorically guards her faith against something that would threaten it and runs away, the girl fills up jars of water which is symbolically used in baptisms in Christianity and by drinking the water she is purifying herself.
She guards her egg which is symbolic of her father, her hopes, and her dreams, as again water symbolism is used to show purification of the girl’s spiritual believe as she investigates the water. When the girl confronts the man, it symbolically shows two sides of Oshii’s believes clashing. The man then gives the girl her egg back saying to keep precious things inside otherwise you will lose them, this is to show that you should guard you believes as they can easily be destroyed. The girl snatches and hides the egg from the main character as she wants to guard far faith as it makes her feel better, he then questions the girl about what she thinks is inside the egg however, she can’t say as her region is precious to her, the man says she should break the egg symbolically freeing her form faith however, she doesn’t like the idea as she needs her faith hand runs away. She asks who he is, but she doesn’t even know herself as they are both parts of Oshii’s subconscious, the girl doesn’t like the man and wants him to go away as she wants to be in her religious fantasy without the looming fear of doubt as represented by the man. As they walk the girl seems to go though the water like a portal showing the spiritual and ritualistic cleaning of herself as further shown by her drinking water, the man refuses the girls water which makes her upset the man is the atheistic side of Oshii that doesn’t want to be baptised.
The man then offers the girl shelter under his coat witch she refuses as he didn’t accept her water as they are at apposing ends which is a subtle hint of the internal conflict going on in Oshii. Soldiers the pass by with spears hunting fish that don’t exist, they chose them because they are despite throwing spears at shadows of the fish, they are shown to be like a spirit invisible and imaginary as these fish showcasing the dangers of blind faith, this links to the idea of Jesus disciples being fishers of men and the desperation people have from meaning and a reason to live. The fish in the stained-glass window is shown to be their symbolic god who showcases blind worship through there faith as they have created a perverted version as the idea of being fishers of men. The man and the girl look at each other as the fish and soldiers pass, they are not blind people flowing faith they are the internal existentialism of a fractured find as the soldiers try and catch the shadow fish with spears but to no avail showing the dangers of blind faith. They pass stone hedge again showing the power of belief, as the girl asks the guy not to hurt her egg showing that faith is a very important thing to people. They then walk through a graveyard of animal bones where they find a drawing of the tree of life. The man says that he has seen the tree before, but he has forgotten were. He goes on to describe black swelling from the tree that sucks everyone up from it and that at the top was a giant bird sleeping in an egg, he wonders if the bird is still there dreaming as he wants to know what in the egg, showing that the bird is like god laying the egg of faith as he sore the dream of life wants to smash the egg to see if faith is real.
The girl has been respectively collecting water for dead animal a pointless repetitive task that accomplishes nothing symbolically linking to religion. They have both been there so long that they don’t know where they are going or what they are doing as they are just symbolically going around in cycles. The man tells the Noah’s ark story however in his story most of the animals died and when they sent out a dove it didn’t come back and then when they sent out another it also didn’t come back, this showcases the abandonment from God as the animals died and fossilised as everything is now just a memory so distant that they don’t know if anything is real. The girl leads the man to see a fossil of either a bird or an angel, this shows that there is no hope and that the bird died before reaching land or the angel died trying to save humanity, the girl shows her naïve blind faith about the bird hatching with the man criticising this saying she knows this as if she omniscient. They then take shelter in Noah’s ark; the girl says that the bird is alive and that the egg will hatch, as the man says that the bird is dead and she’s just hearing external noise. These two characters are symbolic the two parts of Ishii’s fractured mind between the religious and non-religious as he is trusting her like Jesus. The girl asks the man who he is, and he asks her who she is as identity is a big theme in the film. the man then destroys the egg with a cross shaped gun. The contents of the egg represent dreams and hopes something that may or may not exist, and while the girl believed in what was in it by breaking the egg the man showed her what she believed in doesn’t exist. This could be seen as Jesus’ testing her or the destruction of Oshii’s religion as a lot of contemplation goes into stepping away from religion hence the long scene.
The water rises due to the lack of faith as she again asks who you are. In the response to the shattered egg the girl lets out a blood curding scream as her faith has been shattered. She then runs in distress to the man but ends up falling of the cliff, from this she kisses a reflection of herself in the water. This shows the two sides of her faith from this either she keeps her faith and is rewarded, or the faith uses her, physically using her body as it gives off eggs which shows either faith could be entail or faith could bel like a virus. As the birds in the eggs are symbolic of people’s faith waiting to be released. As the man stands on the cliff as the eye of God rises again, water drips form the eye making the sea purified, this shows that either the girl kept her faith and is rewarded as shown by the statues praying and the girl’s statue of her holding the egg of symbolic of that part of Oshii’s faith being taken away the girl has salvation or that the girl was tricked and is now dead. The film ends with the two symbolic part of Oshii’s faith and lack of faith being the man and the girl separating, as the man stands alone on a cliff nest to stone hedge witch is revealed to be a ark floating in space linking back into the Noah’s ark story in that in this new world he has created for himself from the aftermath of gods exist both physically and symbolically from his life he must deicide what to do for himself.
Angels Egg is about the personal existentialism that comes about with the loss of faith. The film examines the fractured mind of a person struggling with their own believes and trying to forge some sense out of the scrambled mess that is their mind during a horrifyingly personal situation.
