The very best Lupin III movie.
Excellent from beginning to end, the characters are spot on, the art is superior, the story is great. It's funny, it's poignant, it is set to some of the best music Yuji Ohno composed, the ending montage is perfect Lupin III.
This movie presents one of many versions of the beginning of the Lupin gang (See also TV episodes and Monkey Punch comic). Not only how they met, but what their relationships are to each other throughout the stories. Lupin and Jigen's brotherhood; Jigen and Goeman friendship of mutual respect; Jigen and Fujiko's antagonistic dislike of each other; and Fujiko and Lupin's relationship of betrayal. This movie even supplies an origin for the classic yellow roadster Lupin's gang drives on and off through all the TV shows and movies (sometimes as a Mercedes, sometimes other things, sometimes two seat, sometimes not).
Also, the story sets up the various likes and dislikes of the characters. For example, Zenigata's devotion to his obsessive version of police work, and cup-of-noodle. Jigen's condescension to people who have bad relationships, and hate of the dentist (a joke in other Lupin III movies). Lupin's mercurial disguises. Especially funny when Lupin and Jigen are captured and the camera pans past a table where their pockets have been emptied. Jigen's pile is a gun, some bullets, and some cigarettes. Lupin's pile is his P-38, and rope, and extend-o arms, and masks, and makeup, and a parachute, etc, etc.
Lupin Tradition: The big boss, Galvez, looks the same way big bosses always do, fat with the triangular bald head. The evil sidekick of the big boss, Shade, also is drawn to tradition. Same hair, same clothes, same tacky sunglasses, same preference for dual guns. Jigen getting shot, any time it happens it is always in the left bicep. Always.
