Cossette no Shouzou

Title:Cossette no Shouzou
Le Portrait de Petite Cossette
Petite Cossette
コゼットの肖像
Overall:Rent
Keywords: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Notables: CHIBA Susumu
EBARA Masashi
FUJIWARA Ikumi
FURUMOTO Shinnosuke
IGARASHI Rei
INOUE Marina
MORITA Junpei
Music - KAJIURA Yuki
NOTO Mamiko
R1 Distributor - Section23 Films (ADV)
R1 License - Pioneer (Defunct)
R1 License - Sentai Filmworks (ADV)
R1 License - Subtitled Only
SAIGA Mitsuki
TAMURA Yukari
TOYOGUCHI Megumi
YAMAGISHI Isao
YOKOTE Kumiko (Hyousei)
"Who loves me so much that he would forsake his own dear life... could it be you?"

Eiri, a talented art student, works part-time in an antique shop in a quiet part of town. One afternoon, he uncovers a delicate Venetian glass that holds a startling secret. When Eiri peers into the glass, he can see a young blond girl, her life playing out like a movie solely for him to see. Curious, he stares into the glass, hoping to learn more about the enchanting girl inside. She is Cossette, a mysterious beauty who haunts the glass, waiting 250 years for someone to finally see her, and set her free. Eiri is soon obsessed with Cossette, determined to do anything he can to help her. Will Eiri see past all the illusions and discover the tragic truth about Cossette, or will he be consumed by anguish and obsession?


[OVA, 2004, 3 episodes, 38+36+34 min]
2:20min OVA Opening - YouTube Video
OverallArtAnimationCharacter Design MusicSeries StoryEpisode StoryReviewer
Buy 10 10 9 9 8 8 Ggultra2764 [series:1313#1552]
Petite Cossette delivers on its gothic thriller theme, but lacks in the secondary character development department. Take a young, isolated painter, pair him with an antique glass, and he winds up going through hell for the sake of a young girl whom his ancestor killed centuries ago. In terms of the thriller theme, Petite Cossette delivers. The hellish world Eiri goes through is filled with enough violence and disturbing content to make the most sensitive of viewers flinch, especially with the twisted relationship of Cossette and Eiri. You get to see Eiri's mentality break down as the viewer is left to comprehend whether he is hallucinating or suffering the wrath of Cossette's vengeful spirit. Tiny details are scattered throughout the series giving you hints of what the world of Cossette is like and how others feel in regards to Eiri's activity and fascination with the glass that contains Cossette's world. The visuals are a treat filled with plenty of vibrant color and detail that come bursting out in front of your eyes. Animation was smooth and shown off very well in the nightmarish world of Cossette's glass. Character designs are just as lush and detailed. This was a very good-looking animated thriller.

A major issue that I have with this OAV though is the lack of secondary character development. Outside of Eiri and Cossette, there isn't much expanded upon of the characters concerned over Eiri's safety and the man who loved and killed Cossette.

Otherwise, Petite Cossette makes for a thrilling animated title. If gothic thrillers are your thing, then you will love the twisted world of Petite Cossette.

Last updated Friday, November 07 2008. Created Friday, November 07 2008.
Rent 10 10 9 9 7 Kari [series:1313#798]
Immediately after this OVA starts, it's obvious Le Portrait de Petite Cossette was directed by Akiyuki Shinbo, who also directed The Soul Taker. The many scenes of bright colors flashing to black are irritating.



The plot is about Eiri Kurahashi, who falls in love with Cossette d'Auvergne, a young girl he can see in a Venetian glass. Eiri becomes obsessed with Cossette, practically goes insane, and screams a lot. That pretty much sums up the three episodes to this OVA.



At least the art, animation, and music's good. The music was composed by Yuki Kajiura. The ending song Houseki (Gem), performed by Marina Inoue, is a nice song.



As for the English dub, Kevin Hatcher is truly a wonderful actor. There are scenes in which Eiri is repeatedly being mentally and physically tormented, and Hatcher was able to portray Eiri's emotions, such as pain and anguish realistically.



I paid $35.00 for this DVD, and I'm not really sure why. I would advise against spending $35.00 on this though, just rent it.


Last updated Sunday, September 24 2006. Created Sunday, September 24 2006.
Rent 8 10 5 10 8 9 Devil Doll [series:1313#752]
[Score: 78% = Rent. Recommended Fantasy/Horror animes: sola, Interlude]
  • Drama: High (creepy horror drama, can it get any higher?)
  • Comedy: None (dark tragedy, how could there be any fun?)
  • Action: Med (violent horror, says enough)
  • SciFi: Med/High (strange people and a surreal fantasy show)
  • Ecchi: None (not that I remember any scene)
A shy and isolated male lead, a mysterious but cute non-human girl as his counterpart, a scenario filled with gore and violence, "DEATH" written in big letters all over it (floating skulls in use over and over again), and a storyline that doesn't seem to make a lot of sense for quite a while. Yet this is a chilling ride with nice Art and lots of 3D CGI Animation in use (just look at the moving butterflies), and as such strong in all aspects that normally are of minor importance to me.

My highest praise goes to the outstanding Music (by KAJIURA Yuki, lead vocals by INOUE Marina), with haunting vocals for morbid tunes and minimalistic yet chilling glockenspiel & piano & violin suspense themes (the Mai-HiME OP instantly comes to my mind), and most of these even harmonious. That's exactly what a horror story needs! Both the OP song Main Theme and the ED song Houseki have found their place in my "Best of Anime" music collection; unfortunately most of the wonderful instrumental themes (such as Moonflower, Sadness) aren't a part of the OST so I'll have to cut them out of the video tracks.
I watched the German dub (which I consider quite decent) so no comment on the original seiyuu.

It takes full concentration to follow the Series Story - not only because information is revealed incrementally but because of the artsy narration style. For example, it's quite hard to get acquainted to all the characters - no character relations are explicitly mentioned, you have to learn them from the context (as if the story alone weren't confusing enough).
The ending leaves a number of minor questions unresolved (except for the apparent Dorian Gray reference) but I was positively surprised by the development in the final episode, and thus upgraded my rating after finishing the OVA. The suspense elements and the art of direction with many sudden switches between different locations, thus telling a parallel development of a story playing on different levels in a convincing way, were another significant part of the enjoyment for me, resulting in a high Episode Story mark.

Which leaves the Characters are the one weak element of this anime - and unfortunately they're very weak. Most of them remain one-dimensional and without any development, so they don't really add to the story (the surprise in episode 3 will come from a different element of the drama). Do we really learn a lot more about them than Eiri being surrounded by a number of women who all care for him in one way or another?
It's difficult to rate Cossette as a character without spoiling the story. Eiri could have changed his mind a number of times with his growing understanding about the situation - but he just keeps on walking despite all the dreadful things happening to him...
So these characters made me deprive this anime of the "Buy" rating it would surely have deserved otherwise.

In the end this anime offers an audio-visual feast with a suspense story and several surprising elements while its weak sides are storyline transparency and cardboard characters.
Strangely enough this OVA reminded me of Rahxephon with its similar visual designs and its many undeveloped side characters, both featuring a painter as lead character, and both telling a complex non-linear love story beyond the boundaries of time.

Last updated Monday, June 20 2011. Created Monday, March 06 2006.
Watch 8 8 8 7 0 0 KBanger1 [series:1313#1694]
I'm finished watching this long and highly boring anime. I had to watch the dvd twice in order to understand it. I fell asleep after the first episode. Now that I understand it, I can't really give it an avoid rank. If you like horror or can tolerate long yet simple plots, then give this title a go. What got to me was the fact that I didn't really see anything that horrific. I mean, sure it's a dark anime, but it seemed to forced upon as a horror title. It's more of a dark fantasy/supernatural type than horror. I did like the animation and especially the are. However, since the story dragged along, it made everything seem so repetitive. It's like watching a scene over and over, but the story continues. At least the story was simple enough to understand, but due to the length it made the story so dull. Like I said, I won't put an avoid rank because it doesn't deserve it. I would say that this is more to fans of artistic anime. If you can understand the plot the first time, I commend you. If you can actually stay awake the first time, I applaud you.

Last updated Sunday, February 26 2006. Created Sunday, February 26 2006.

Other Sites
NameURL
Le Portrait de Petite Cossette http://www.cossettedvd.com/
Official Geneon site to Le Portrait de Petite Cossette
The Picture of Dorian Gray. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorian_Gray
A Wikipedia article about Oscar Wilde's famous novel

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