Write a short summary of what happens in the film

SK-II reacted to a landmark moment in Japanese sporting history – the retirement of their only gold medal-winning badminton duo, Ayaka Takahashi and Misaki Matsutomo – with an early release of “VS MACHINES” as a tribute to the pair; the first of six animated films. VS Machines focuses on the pressure to be a constantly performing machine; a mindset that eventually makes you more robot than human. With a well documented-struggle and slump in form after the 2016 Olympics, the film explores a futuristic dystopia, set in a training facility where competition is the main reason for existence, where humans become machines in their quest for perfection. In this world, cyborg-versions of Takahashi and Matsutomo are programmed with machine-like mindsets and are pitted against each other to achieve cold, joyless perfection. Together, they learn to resist and break free of The Machine by rediscovering the the human connection they share.

Cultural / Context information for the jury

For SK-II's sponsorship of the 2020 Olympic Games, we developed a provocative platform, Beauty Is #NoCompetition, in which SK-II’s partnership with six female Olympic athletes could be leveraged. We told the stories of these athletes through animation, in homage to the anime of SK-II’s native country, Japan. Each episode has a different enemy within beauty that stops our protagonists from feeling beautiful in some way. The ‘enemy’ takes the form of a kaiju, a Japanese monster. Ayaka Takahashi and Misaki Matsutomo’s struggle to find purpose after clinching a gold medal played into a pressure to constantly obtain perfection that felt familiar for women in Japan. When they retired as a duo, against the backdrop of Covid-19 and the postponement of the Games, we reacted to this moment with the early release of VS Machines. The film felt appropriate to reframe and dedicate as a tribute to the gold medalists.