One of the best kept secrets in the music industry is revealed in this anime-music video from Daft Punk and Leiji Matsumoto called Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem. What’s the secret? If I told you, Earl de Darkwood would probably have me (and you) killed. He is the master super villain behind every revolutionary musician throughout history. Oops, I’ve said too much! Daft Punk grew up watching anime and are big fans of Leiji Matusmoto. When the Discovery album was nearing completion, Daft Punk contacted Matsumoto and he warmly agreed to help with their ambitious project. (from left to right: Octave, Baryl, Stella and Arpegius)
This 65 minute movie is the result of their collaboration and is the first of its kind. The movie begins with a monologue performed by Matsumoto and these are the only words spoken in the entire film: “Musicians are magicians. That’s what I always say. I’ve had this dream or hope since my childhood, and…the dream itself came towards me. How should I explain this? I have all these lights flashing in my head.” Then lights and colors begin to flash across the screen and we are transported into the Secret Star System. One more Time begins to play as we see a band of aliens playing a concert. Everyone on the planet digs their music and apparently de Darkwood does too, because moments later they are abducted and sent to Earth and are dubbed the Crescent Dolls.
The heroic Shep (Stella and Shep above) gets a distress call and soars into action to rescue the band in his space ship –it’s shaped like a guitar! Many secrets are revealed as he struggles to rescue the band from the evil Earl and his minions. The story is simple and the music is stellar. Matsumoto creates a magical story of love, courage and mystery using only the power of his images and Daft Punk’s dance music. By the way, the members of Daft Punk have to be otakus! They show the fans some extra love by packing the DVD with extras! Storyboards, character art – sketches, interactive backgrounds, a commercial, and L. Matsumoto’s signature, are among the countless extras on this disc.
Sensei no Otaku says: “I wouldn’t have insomnia if I had dreams like this each night and I wouldn’t want to wake up.”
Interstella 5555 is not rated. I would rate it PG for some scary scenes. It is available for purchase at deepdiscount.com and amazon.com. You can also purchase a limited edition set of figures (if they’re not sold out).
Sensei no Otaku: rating scale 0 (rotten)-10(sweet) 
Overall… 10 Extras… 10 Story… 9
Animation… 9 Art… 10 Music… 10
Positive: I have watched this hundreds of times and it never gets old, it only gets better.
Negative: If you don’t like Daft Punk’s music or Leiji Matsumoto’s art you might not like it- or you might just be deaf and blind.
