A very old crocodile, so old that he had witnessed the
building of the pyramids, was suffering from rheumatism, and
no longer able to catch his food. In desperation, he decided
to eat his great grand son. Although his thousands of years
of longevity entitled him to much respect, the family
decided he would have to be put down.
Unable to bear the disrespect of his family, the old
crocodile said goodbye to the Nile. One day the old
crocodile met an octopus. The octopus treated her new friend
to a variety of fish that she caught just for him. When the
night fell, he couldn’t restrain himself from eating
one of the octopus’s legs. Since then, the old
crocodile began to help himself to the octopus’ leg
every night…
(Source: AniDB)
#~~~Toshi wo Totta Wani / The Old Crocodile~~~#
#~~~年をとった鰐~~~# ~~~
~~~
#~~~Synopsis~~~#
~~~The Old Crocodile is an underrated fairy tale about a
greedy crocodile and his friend, a caring octopus. This
story tells you about how desperate one crocodile (or
person) can be to get food. ~~~
#~~~Story and Characters~~~#
~~~ There are two characters; The Octopus who is a caring
soul who wants to help the crocodile to find food, while
sacrificing her own food at the same time. The Crocodile
however finds himself in a situation he can't control, since
being an crocodile he finds the urge to eat whatever is in
front of him, regardless of what it is, and isn't aware of
the octopus's generosity. I should say here that both
characters are metaphors for human kindness and human
greed.. One of them goes out of her way to provide food for
another being, completely ignoring her own hunger. The other
one only cares for food, and doesn't care about anything
else. The story is very simple and as stated above, the
crocodile wants food and the octopus has food to give. But
the crocodile gets too hungry, and tries to eat the
octopus's legs. The octopus does not realize why she is
giving food to such a selfish creature until it is too
late... But I really don't want to ruin the story for you,
so I will say no more.
~~~ ~~~
~~~
#~~~Art and Animation~~~#
~~~ The artwork is hand-drawn in an ink-blotch style, and
the backgrounds are always in sepia tone - this brown, white
and black colour scheme does work though, since the story
makes you forget about those colours as the anime goes on. I
find the animation to be cute, since it's hand-drawn so you
can say it's almost personal? I like that about this anime.
I am certain the artist had to draw lots of frames just for
this anime, please remember that when you watch this. ~~~
#~~~Sound, Music and Voice Acting~~~#
~~~The sounds effects are little to note, except the sound
of the waves. The music is based off Sudanese traditional
music, appearing more towards the end of the anime. The
voices are original in English, and the narration by Peter
Narakan is perfect with his calming voice. He manages to put
such much emotion into a short monologue. His voice reminds
me a little bit of Arthur Lowe from the 'Mr. Men' animated
series from my childhood (or at least, what I remember of
it). I believe you can also find a French dub and a German
dub if you look in the right places, but I haven't watched
those versions so I can't judge on their quality. As far as
I know, there is no Japanese voice option despite being a
Japanese anime. I can't find a Japanese dub, just a version
with Japanese subtitles with English voices. ~~~
~~~
~~~
#~~~Final Thoughts~~~#
~~~ A short story you do not want to miss if you like to
think about philosophical things in nature. The only thing
is that a lot of people assume this is a children's anime
because it's a fairy tale and the anime is rated 'G for all
ages'. I personally don't think this is a problem. If you
want a nice short story to watch, then please watch this.
It's only 13 minutes long and it's not a bad animation. ~~~
~~~Thank you for reading my review! If you see any mistakes
then please let me know. I would greatly appreciate any
advice you can give me.~~~