* Hair Length *
Anime hair defies explanation.
You've got handsome guys with long flowy hair that blows in the breeze just so. Girls with hair in nearly impossible buns and pigtails. Hair of every color. Bangs that mock the effects of gravity. Hair in anime often defines a character. Nuriko's purple braid, Trowa's huge bangs, Usagi's pigtails, Saitou's two trails of bangs... they are trademarks of a person.
Why is everyone's hair color every color but black, when anime is created in the Asian country of Japan? It's said that hair color is often used to help people identify certain characters. In manga, hair is three colors: black, white, or grey, due to limitations of the media, and only gain color for those few pages drawn in color. In anime, the imagination is the limit, and thus you get strange combinations like pink and purple.
Why, then, did they change Utena and Anthy's hair length for the movie?
Why, because they changed their entire character design and personality, of course.
Utena from the television series had straight, shoulder-length pink hair (orignally blonde from the manga) while Anthy had short purple hair that was usually tied up. In the movie, Utena has a short hair style that makes other characters mistake her for a boy, while Anthy's hair is long and flowy. When Utena transforms into her dueling form, her full hair length falls down and takes on a bouncy set of curls.
Strange? Maybe not. Hair length can mean different things.
LEFT: Let's start with Utena's short hair style. In the photograph of her with Touga, her hair is shoulder-length just like the Utena from the television series. Yet when she arrives at Ohtori, her hair is the length of a boy's - cropped close to the neck. It looks as if she cut off her hair because she was in mourning. She was deeply hurt when Touga left her, and cutting one's hair is making a sacrifice, and showing one's sorrow.
Maybe this isn't the case. Maybe it's because she wants to be a prince. After all, with her hair short, Saionji mistakes her for a guy, and is quite annoyed to discover she is a woman. By being a prince in appearance (not only by having short hair but in by wearing a guy's uniform) she may be hoping to become a true prince.
Whatever the case, her short hair style shows her to be a no-nonsense sort of person. She seems to stay by herself until someone else pokes their way into her life (Wakaba and Anthy, for example.) An Utena with long hair would not fit this role as well - not even an Utena with shoulder-length hair.
RIGHT: Himemiya Anthy is on the wildly opposite side of the spectrum. Where Utena is an introvert and closed to others, Anthy is an outgoing, charismatic individual. She's the one to begin the introductions when the two first meet on the dueling platform. Unlike the Anthy in the television series, she's willing to defy authority - she tries to stop the duel between Utena and Saionji, and she's willing to face down her brother at the end. Always smiling, her longer, flowing hair matches her new personality to a 'T'. This moving tangle refuses to stay put and gives her a slightly unruly appearance, unlike television Anthy, whose hair is tied up and hidden under her crown.
LEFT: Utena also has long hair - but it's only shown when she transforms into her dueling persona. Actually, her hair is always long, but she ties it back in such a manner that it appears to be short. (Thanks to Yapi for the explanation and the scan from the Movie artbook!) Her long hair also shows a bit of wildness, demonstrated by her power when fighting Saionji and Juri. But she's not always dueling when she's in her dueling outfit. In a climactic moment of revelation, Utena finally remembers the truth between her and Touga - how he never left her, but died while saving a drowning girl in the style of a prince. She comes to grips with the past and accepts it, and with tears in her eyes, says goodbye to her boyfriend. When she heads back up to the dueling platform, her hair glides in a light breeze. Perhaps it shows her pain has finally been healed, and her period of mourning is over. Perhaps it shows that she's changed, and ready to become a true Prince. Perhaps the animators just like drawing long hair (I know I do!)
No matter the reason, one thing remains: hair length is an important, but not always noticed, indicator of character.
