Phoenix 2772: Love's Cosmozone

ひのとり にーななーなーに あいのこすもぞーん

Aired: 1980

A theatrical anime produced by Tezuka Productions and distributed by Toho, with Osamu Tezuka himself credited as story originator, structural author and general director. While drawing on his lifelong manga series 'Phoenix,' the film unfolds an entirely original screenplay set in a dystopian twenty-sixth-century future. Godo, a boy born from a laboratory test tube and raised as a World Federation Army space pilot in the company of his all-purpose robot partner Olga, is condemned for falling in love with the aristocratic Lena and is exiled to the far reaches of space. His mission is to capture the legendary immortal Phoenix, whose 'cosmozone' life-energy is said to be the only thing that can save a dying Earth - sending Godo and Olga on a sweeping odyssey to the edge of the galaxy. Yasuo Higuchi's score (featuring violinist Mariko Senju) and the film's signature themes of cosmic love and life-force make it one of the defining Tezuka theatrical animations.