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Information

• Member: Second Element
• Studio: Second Element Video
• Title: Requiem for a Family ( Bring me to Life )
• Premiered: 2005-08-26
• Categories:
  • Drama
  • Character Profile
  • Serious
  • Sentimental
• Song:
  • Evanescence Bring Me To Life
• Anime:
  • Violinist of Hameln (TV Series)
• Comments: Oh no!! Not ANOTHER stinking "Bring me to Life" video!!!!
  
  I've taken a major risk in posting this video, seeing as the musical content is one of the most over-used and abused songs of all time when it comes to AMVs. However, I have been working on this video for years ( the planning alone goes back to 2003 ), long before the "Bring me to Life" crime-wave hit AMV.org, and I guarantee this is the *only* "Hameln" video to this song in existence, and that is also probably the only one to address family relationships in this AMV as opposed to the usual romance themes that seem to accompany this song.
  
  This video is by far one of our most complicated and involved projects, which I'm sure some will scoff at given the small amount of special effects work and syncing. However, the amount of planning and time involved on the project spanned a couple of years. One of the main reasons for this was the fact that "Hameln" is a very intense, very complicated series, and it's hard to make any kind of AMV for the series without just glossing over it. Even in this video, so much stuff relevant to the story is left out, but it is pretty much impossible to touch on all of "Hameln"'s themes in a short music video. I can't even begin to tell you how many times we sat through the entire series, notebooks in hand, accurately logging by episode footage and moments that we thought might be useful in the video. We were so desperate to keep as much footage handy as we changed and re-arranged writing elements in the video that the project took up more than 24 Gigs of space on our hard drive.
  
  There is an awful lot more that can be said about the creative process, but an awful lot needs to be said about what is going on in this video, as it is necessary for people who are in no way, shape, or form familiar with the series. The following detailing will be spoiler heavy- but the video itself is full of spoilers as it is, so if you are going to watch the video anyway, no further harm will come from reading the following.
  
  "The Violinist of Hameln" is one of the most over-looked, under-appreciated anime of all time. It is also one of the most brilliant, endearing, and numbing anime of all time. Words can not measure the depths that this anime reaches, nor the magnitude of it's powerful story and themes. It is a completely involving form of entertainment, and n this video, I have only been able to touch on the most bare-faced of it's many underlining themes. One just can not simply compass all that is "The Violinist of Hameln" into any kind of music video- no matter how long they make it- no matter how well they do it. The series is just something one has to experience for themselves. Perhaps then, they'll understand what the "Hameln" fans have been saying all along.
  
  Basically we have the story of a woman ( Pandora ) who fell in love with the very Devil himself ( Kestra ). A long time ago, the God of the Heavens sealed all of the Devil's demons and royal court in a box, freeing the world of evil, and completely robbing Kestra of the knowledge of who he really is. It isn't until the happy couple one day finds the box in the fields of their home does Kestra begin to realize just who he really is. Only a woman who truly loves the King of Demons can ever open the box, and with Kestra's prompting, Pandora opens the box, setting all the demons free, and Kestra establishes his Royal Court of Hell in Hameln.
  
  Shortly after, Pandora gives birth to twins, one is an angel and the other a demon. The 4 Hell Kings under Kestra decide that an angel child is no good heir to the future throne, so it must be discovered which of the two it is and murdered. Fearful for the life of her children, Pandora takes the children and flees in the middle of the night, but Kestra catches up with her. Succumbing more and more to his fate of being the King of all Demons, he realizes it has all gone too far, and tells Pandora that if she really loves him, she'll seal him away in the box until the time is safe once again for him to rejoin his family. Pandora does just that, and takes the box and her children on the road. Along the way, she hides the box in one kingdom, and the key in another.
  
  The demons are infuriated that their King has been sealed away in the box, and furthermore, the whereabouts of the box are unknown. The 4 Kings plot to have the female twin, the angel ( Sizer ) kindnapped, in hopes that when they find the box, she will open it and release her father, for the Demon King can only be set free by either the woman who loves him or an angel.
  
  As time goes by, the demons decide it is time to collect the proper heir, the demon boy ( Hamel ), and capture him and Pandora. When they take his mother away from him, he becomes so distraught that he realizes his nearly full powers of being the future King of Demons. He levels entire villages and kills thousands, and to wreak such havoc as such a small child, the demons themselves become afraid of him, and instead spirit away his mother, leaving the demon child alone, with no recollection of his past or what has just happened.
  
  Young Hamel is adopted by a small village in one of the kingdoms, and grows up to become a young adult alongside the young girl, Flute. Hamel, even as a young man, still has no recollection of who he is or where he comes from, and can only slowly begin to piece things together as he and Flute journey to her palace, as even Flute has spent all these years not knowing she is a princess, and has her own destiny to fulfill.
  
  Meanwhile, Sizer has been turned into a fallen angel by the Demons- used from a very young age to kill and destroy. They raised her to resent her mother- after all- why would a mother love and cherish and raise a demon child instead of an angel? Sizer's ultimate plan is to find the box and set her father free- surely if her mother doesn't love her; her father does.
  
  It isn't until the final showdown over Pandora's box does Hamel finally learn that Sizer is his long lost sister, whom he has been feuding with during his and Flute's journey. Regardless, Sizer, despite protests from all that the Demon King should not be released - for the world would be lost to evil for good - opens the box, only to find that all that remains of her father are tiny skeletal remains. The reason being is that the Demon King is no more- Hamel, now matured, is the new King of Hell. Hamel, who wanted nothing more than to live as a human and be among humans, succumbs to his fate. And Flute, since she has come to love Hamel deeply, realizes she is the only person who can save both the world and Hamel, from his own fate. Bravely, she opens the box- and Sizer, realizing that all she has left of her family is her brother, charges and tries to stop Flute, but it is too late. Hamel is sealed away in the box, to suffer the same fate as his father. As the Demon King is the source of life for all of a demonic existence, the world is instantly cleansed as all the demons and evil spirits drop dead. And Sizer, who wanted nothing more than to be loved by her family, but was instead raised by demons, now has absolutely nothing and no one at all.
  
  And that's only the half of it. "The Violinist of Hameln" is one of the most tragic anime of all time. We hoped to capture even the smallest amount of the loss and pain in this video. While we would never dare boast that this is one of the "best" of the "Bring me to Life" genre ( as it is far from that ), we certainly hope one can agree it's one of the better ones, and unique in it's own way.
  
  ***You will need an XVID codec to properly view this video.