THE MYSTERY OF MAMO (1978)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *good*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *cosmological, psychological, sociological*

The first LUPIN III animated movie barely has the lovable criminals indulging in crime at all, as they get caught up in the business of thwarting a mad world-conqueror. That said, MYSTERY OF MAMO is still predominantly a comedy, always on the lookout to inject slapstick and wild chases into the business of madman-foiling.

Fittingly for the first cartoon-movie, the script also stresses the "eternal triangle" between Lupin III, his two allies-in-thievery Jigen and Goemon, and temptress Fujiko Mine. Lupin, Jigen and Goemon are like a three-man Beatles of Crime, and Fujiko is Yoko Ono, constantly playing on Lupin's desire for her and messing up the well-planned plots of the master thieves. I'm not a Lupin expert, but by the time of this movie I would imagine that this trope had become well-established in the comics and TV shows. Unlike Yoko Ono, Fujiko never quite manages to sunder the bonds of guy-loyalty, and since the main characters never age, Lupin never really has to make a final choice between adventure with his buddies and commitment to the love of his life.

Mamo, the aforementioned madman, attempts to expand the triangle into a quadrangle, at least temporarily. The tangled plot is hard to unravel-- it begins with an exact duplicate of Lupin being executed for his crimes, and only much later is it revealed that this was a clone produced by Mamo's super-science. Mamo also contracts with Fujiko to use her wiles on the real Lupin to get him to steal the Philosopher's Stone for its power to give immortality. Fujiko goes along with the scheme not just for her usual motive of crossing up Lupin, but because Mamo has promised her an immortal existence and she apparently hopes to get Lupin to "commit" to her for all time. (Certainly neither Jigen nor Goemon is invited to join their leader in this artificial paradise.) Mamo allows Fujiko to think this is a possibility, but his true plan is to eradicate the population of Earth with nuclear warfare and then to repopulate the world with the spawn of Fujiko and himself.

Mamo is, like a lot of world-beaters, an ugly little shrimp (visually based in part on singer-actor Paul Williams). Thus he's the opposite of the Man Who Can't Be Tied Down; he's the Man Who Wants the Woman Tied Down-- though at least he's faithful in his fashion, not alluding to any other paramours. Mamo's backstory is very confusing in that he claims to have lived for thousands of years, collecting real celebrities as different as Lao-Tse and Hitler for his private menagerie-- though, given his mastery of cloning, the prizes in Mamo's collection could be clones of the originals. He controls such fantastic super-science that a clever thief and his gang shouldn't be able to oppose him. But Lupin, called an "idiot savant" in one English translation, has the advantage of not knowing any better.

In contrast to some of the later "neutered" Lupin projects, the master thief's lubricity is on full display here, and he has many funny moments pursuing Fujiko, who knows how to push his buttons and then leave him hanging. The relentless cop Zenigata has a lot of strong moments here as well. At one point, he's told to lay off chasing Lupin and to take early retirement, at least partly because the police aren't sure whether or not the original Lupin may have been executed. But Zenigata replies that as long as one Lupin exists, it remains the driving force of the cop's life to bring him to justice someday. His obsession for the law is just as meaningful, and just as funny, as the "will-they-won't-they" dance between Lupin and Fujiko. Jigen and Goemon have less to do as the hero's boon companions disgusted by his unprofessionalism, but they have their dedicated moments.

The only real debit of MYSTERY OF MAMO is the design for Fujiko. I don't know how she'd been depicted in the TV animation up until 1978, but come on, guys-- that's not the face of a really sexy woman!

ADDENDA: I should note that the translation I saw is also very unflattering to the Americans involved in fighting Mamo, though they're represented by just one obnoxious FBI guy.