Until 2025, Mamoru Oshii was best known — at least outside of Japan — as the director of Ghost in the Shell. But while the movie that introduced the world to Major Motoko Kusanagi is undoubtedly a genre-defining cyberpunk classic and a majorly influential work of science fiction, it isn’t the movie that’s closest to its co-creator’s heart. That film is Angel’s Egg, a hand-drawn passion project that Oshii once described as the “poor daughter” who never moved out of the house.
An original work of OVA (direct to video) animation, Angel’s Egg marked a major turning point in the future anime legend’s style. While he wrote some episodes of the accompanying anime, Oshii’s first two films were both adapted from a manga, Urusei Yatsura, created by Inuyasha and Ranma ½ artist Rumiko Takahashi. Angel’s Egg, meanwhile, sprung from Oshii’s subconscious, seemingly fully formed. Combining elements from Oshii’s unrealized dream project — a film adaptation of Lupin III — with his lifelong fascination with Christianity and Christian imagery, the result is a film that’s dense with meaning, even if that meaning can be elusive.
