giant machine that appears to be set to self-destruct, which slaughters countless soldiers. Casshern uses all his strength to stop the machine, although it still detonates, albeit away from any urban or heavily populated area. In the finale, the General's son kills Burai with a grenade after revealing he was human all along, and it is learned that Tetsuya, during his military service, slaughtered Burai's family. Casshern stops his father from resurrecting his mother, so Dr. Azuma retaliates by shooting Luna in the head. Luna is revived by the blood of Burai, only after Casshern kills his father. The souls of the dead come onto Casshern as he and Luna embrace each other. Luna rips out Tetsuya's containment suit and a pillar of light fires through space and crashing down onto another planet. The film ends with a montage of the characters in happier times. Cast Yusuke Iseya as Tetsuya Azuma/Casshern Kumiko Asō as Luna Kozuki Akira Terao as Professor Kotaro Azuma Kanako Higuchi as Midori Azuma Fumiyo Kohinata as Professor Kozuki Hiroyuki Miyasako as Akubon Jun Kaname as Barashin Hidetoshi Nishijima as Lieutenant-Colonel Kamijo Mitsuhiro Oikawa as Kaoru Naito Susumu Terajima as Sakamoto Hideji Ōtaki as President Kamijo Tatsuya Mihashi as Professor Furoi Toshiaki Karasawa as Burai Ryō as San Ikegami Mayumi Sada as Saguree Tetsuji Tamayama Gorō Naya as Narrator Production The film is loosely based on a 1973 anime television series, Shinzō Ningen Kyashān (translated as "Neo-Human Casshern" and known as just Casshan in the United States) from animation studio Tatsunoko Productions. Along with contemporary films Able Edwards, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, Immortal, and Sin City, it was among the first feature-length live action films to be shot on a digital backlot, with the actors performing in front of a greenscreen and all but the simplest stage elements added digitally after the fact. As well as being influenced by Shakespeare's Hamlet, director Kazuaki Kiriya states that he drew upon Russian Avant-Garde for visual inspiration. According to Kiriya, in an interview with Joblo, it took two months to shoot the film and a further six months of post-production work. The film's look was achieved through a combination of means, from CGI (supervised by Haruhiko Shono), matte paintings to even Kiriya's heavy involvement with the cinematography. The Japanese release contains a 6.1 channel soundtrack (Dolby Digital 5.1 on the PAL Region 2 release) and English subtitles.