Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within

Fine, first I want to specify that I watched the anime quite a long ago, a year or two ago I guess. I haven't played the games, so I can say with no mental self-accusations that this was the better part of Final Fantasy movies. For me.

Story - it wasn't something veeery special, still, at least you understood what is going on and that stuff, which in Advent Children was possible only for who has already played the game. There is no game Final Fantasy on this particular story I think and that is one of the good sides, I guess, because you watch it ... like a separate film, with a different story, different characters and etc. So I must say to the non-fans of Advent Children/people who hasn't played the games - better watch this, I don't say it is a really good movie, but the story is comprehensible and you won't get tha-a-at bored as if you watch Advent Children ;)

Art - oh, it wasn't really good, it was Amazing... You watch the characters as if they are real human beings.. :) (better than Advent Children, I have the feeling xD)

Sound - I don't remember it very precisely, but the soundtrack wasn't bad and the other sounds were a fine piece of workmanship.

Character - trite. You see, there wasn't anything interesting about them. I can't even remember them, just that woman, the main character, and her beloved.

Enjoyment - fair, I guess, because of the art, it really smashed me up(it was one of the first movies that I had watched with so realistic graphics then) and some of the action scenes weren't bad...

Overall, I recommend it as a killer of time and as a really good 3D art movie, which has nothing to do with Advent Children as story, but for people, who haven't played the game and won't be angry if they don't like the film, would be a gulp of fresh air. :)

I think that if I had seen this movie without noticing the 'Final Fantasy' attached to the beginning, I would have enjoyed it. But there was something about it, as I compared it in my mind to all the amazing and mindblowing games I had played, that could only fall short. I didn't find the characters very sympathetic or engaging. All in all, I would have been fine going my entire life without seeing this film.

The project was unsound from the beginning - even today, making a fully CGI animated film like this costs too much to be profitable and is not particularly convincing as a realistic art style besides. Final Fantasy is an outlandish sci-fi and fantasy video game series - why not make a film like this using traditional animation? Not only would it have looked better, it would have served the narrative better, as this story centers around nature versus technology. Hell, they could have made this movie live-action with the same cast for 140 million dollars and it would probably have made more money and reached ... a wider audience. But then it would not be on MAL to review, I suppose.

Anyways, despite the fact that the film is based on a video game series, this plotline is entirely original, with some trace overarching elements from the franchise included. This is because the Final Fantasy games are all self-contained narratives that take place in their own universes. This plot in particular draws from Princess Mononoke and other traditional Japanese narratives regarding the conflict between Nature and Technology (namely the belief that all life is sacred and equal versus the belief that nature exists to be used by man), misdirected idealism, and religious tenets vaguely drawn from Shintoism. There are also many elements overtly lifted from James Cameron's filmography, namely The Abyss, Aliens, and Titanic. The director of this film is notably a fan of western cinema and desired to create a synthesis of western and Japanese narrative elements here. This makes sense as the Final Fantasy games have a big following in the west and often contain Arthurian constructs such as knights, castles, and western designs of things like dragons and swords. It's a fascinating blend of ingredients.

The chief obstacle is the animation. Even for the time, these models paled in comparison to something like Blue Submarine No. 6 which was airing on Toonami. It makes scenes like the zero gravity make-out scene between the two romantic leads sillier than they would have been otherwise. It's an uphill battle from the start to expect western filmgoers to emotionally connect to these PS2 mannequins. The film often feels in stasis - the character's faces aren't facing, the plot is not moving, and there's very little action. This is more of an epic character drama in the vein of again something from James Cameron. It's really not a kid's film despite being based off of a video game. I personally feel that a few colorful side characters would have helped tremendously, but every character here is dead serious and bland. Also, considering how expensive the project was already, I don't think there was much upside in hiring celebrities like Alec Baldwin, Steve Buscemi, and Ving Rhames for the English dub rather than your usual VAs who would work for dirt cheap around this time. Admittedly these celebrities were not A-listers but there is little reason to seek them when anyone could do this voice acting. They needed to save money where they could since they were bleeding cash on the animation. I suppose companies like Pixar and Dreamworks hire celebrities for their animated features, but they have the backing of financially strong western film studios while this project was on the outs from the beginning. After all, it's not like video game movies have ever been particularly profitable. There are a few exceptions such as Mortal Kombat and the first few Pokemon movies, but those never cost anywhere near 140 million.

Anyways, this film is not horrible per se, but this is a very weak 5 bordering on a 4. There are some good ideas strictly with regards to the story - nearly everything else is ill-conceived. The execution is fine but the ideas were not great. It's an interesting experiment and a noble failure, but not something anyone needs to see, even FF fans.