Animation:
7 or so years after the fact, The Spirits Within still boasts visuals competitive with a newer Final Fantasy: Advent Children, . The character animations don`t seem quite as smooth and effortless, but the gritty, post-apocalyptic setting and the striking realism in the skin tones and hair of The Spirits Within remains matchless. The characters don`t look like digitized images of real people; they retain a little bit of a cartoony feel, only with eons more detail than nearly every piece of animation in existence. The clunky character animations and the lack of long, and truly gratifying action scenes leave me with a slight, very very slight, feeling of disappointment in the visuals; I feel like it was but 2 steps from blowing my socks off. As it is though, it is still brilliant, and a beauty to behold each and every second.
Music:
The sound track is always perfectly matched, never committing the cardinal sin of overpowering the inherent mood of a scene. It also just sounds good. The full on orchestral score compliments the epic grandeur that the story goes for. The soundtrack is not better than that of Star Wars or Lord of the Rings, but it is certainly comparable.
Story:
Even though a couple of characters feel like they belong right at home in any Final Fantasy game, the story bears no similarities to that of the games aside from a couple of nominal references and Sakaguchi`s strange obsession with anthropomorphing planets, . It is however, effective and interesting as a supernatural sci-fi story, at least up until the end. At the start of the movie, the planet has already been plagued by ethereal alien invaders for quite some time. These creatures, dubbed phantoms, can pass through matter and kill anything alive with a simple touch. The ravishing doctor Aki and her superiors are working on a special weapon that will destroy all of the aliens without harming anything else. Her opposition is a general who is insistent on using a large space cannon to wipe out the invaders by brute force. The government grants Aki some time to collect the "spirits" necessary to complete their project, and she enlists the help of a lower ranking military officer, Gray, who happens to be her old flame.
The post-apocalyptic America setting is beautifully fleshed out, and genuinely disconcerting; the alien invaders are at once sci-fi alien monsters and creepy, supernatural beings; plenty ominous, the obligatory romance is not half bad, and the general creates some political elements that complicate things nicely. In other words, the build up in the story is effective for a sci-fi film. The problem is the climax. The world turns on itself, and becomes inconsistent with its own logic. Conventional weapons can kill the phantoms (we see it happen), as can the space cannon, but it paradoxically also makes them stronger? That`s a head scratcher. There is also a gigantic contrivance in how Aki obtains the last spirit needed to utilize her special weapon, forcing an unspectacular ending that`s basically ripped right out of FF7. Yet another contrivance is an unnecessary death that occurs towards the end, but at least this one brings about a somewhat touching and emotional scene. The lackluster ending really brings down an otherwise well crafted story, but if asked the simple question of "like or dislike?" my fondness of the first 3/4 trumps my disdain of the last 1/4.
Characters:
Putting aside the solid characters in the villain and Aki, and a mediocre one in her lover, the rest of the cast feels like they`re still warm off a Matrix photocopier. Gray`s little platoon is a gallery of token characters. A fast talking little snark provides the much unneeded comic relief, which clunks up otherwise functional scenes with been there, heard that jokes. Somewhere in there is a noble and stoic black man, and an equally stoic, quiet woman. Dr. Cid is less of a cliche, but also lacks any personality beyond anything that is absolutely necessary for a generic scientist.
The villain, one of the two effective characters, would fit right into the cast of a Final Fantasy. He seems modeled after the FF7 villain, Sephiroth, only a little less crazy. The general looks terribly menacing from the get go, but his intentions, initially, are good. Eventually, ambition gets the best of him, and his actions become more and more unsavory. The movie highlights his just motives, humanizes him with conscience and regret, and yet manages to give him, throughout the whole film, an intimidating and menacing presence perfect for a good, love-to-hate villain.
Luckily, the other strong character is the main character, Aki. Might I first mention that she is beautiful, not only because of her fetching appearance, but also because of a certain quiet dignity she possesses. Despite her usual bland tone (voiced by Ming Na), she`s not stoic. A better description would be "mellow". She manages to express herself in her own muted and understated way, which is especially effective in her relationship with Gray. The few outright dramatic scenes she has are all the more explosive for their contrast to her usual, calm demeanor.
Aki`s romance with Gray seems to have much more baggage than a typical boy meets girl setup. They are past lovers after all. None of that baggage is explicitly revealed, nor does it need to be since the nuances that resulted from it are present in their interactions. The intimacy between these two characters is quietly warm, familiar but awkward. The romantic element generates the intended fuzziness overall, but the placement of the most affectionate scene is questionable. It`s right next to a tragic turn in the plot, and as lovely as that scene might have been anywhere else, it completely goes against the mood at that point in the story.
Closing Comments:
I first saw this film when it opened in theaters years ago. I kept waiting for the melee combat, the summoning of deities and of course, the limit breaks. I expected all of that, and received none, so despite the awe it left me in from its visuals, I left the theater disappointed. Upon watching it again, now 7 years after my first viewing, I saw it not as a movie version of the FF games, but simply as a computer animated sci-fi movie, and from this perspective, The Spirits Within is a decent watch. A couple of hiccups at the end murk up an otherwise memorable film. It`s a shame that this movie lost money for Square. A second effort that smooths out the story and keeps everything that was charming about the first would be truly spectacular.
