Subject: Review: Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001)

From: Evelyn C. Leeper <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 17 Jul 2001 03:46:59 -0000

FINAL FANTASY: THE SPIRITS WITHIN
               (a film review by Mark R. Leeper)

    CAPSULE: This very dark sci-fi fantasy is magnificent visually 
    but it has a nearly incoherent plot.  FINAL FANTASY is a 
    Japanese-American co-production entirely animated but with a 
    very real three-dimensional look and with very real-looking 
    characters.  In the year 2065 aliens that appear to us as 
    translucent images, but still very deadly creatures, have 
    invaded Earth.  Saving the Earth requires resorting to 
    semi-mystical means to understand and halt the enemy.  If this 
    film had been done in live-action the scenes more spectacular 
    than those of BLADERUNNER would have been hailed as a triumph.
    Rating: 6 (0 to 10), high +1 (-4 to +4)

The art of the animated film continues to evolve before our eyes 
at an incredible rate.  It seems that one animated film after 
another is released and advances the art of animation.  I 
personally was very impressed with the visual images created in 
TITAN A.E.  But there are images in FINAL FANTASY that go well 
beyond the power of that film's animation.  The one problem is 
that if I applaud this film it will have to be mostly on the 
imagination of the concepts and on the visuals.  I don't think the 
story was a very good one.  And the uncertain terms in which I say 
that are intentional.  The telling of the story and the 
explanation of what is going on lies somewhere in the range 
between terse and incoherent.  I frequently had no idea what was 
happening in the plot, thought FINAL FANTASY was never failed to 
be an enjoyable film to watch.

The greatest part of what was remarkable about the film was the 
animation work.  The entire film is done in a three-dimensional 
technique.  Every single image is as three-dimensional as a live 
action film.  Of course, I am afraid one could always distinguish 
the images from real live action.  And that is (intentionally) 
praising the animation with faint criticism.  The computer-
generated images were almost photographic.  And what images they 
were!  There were planet-scapes and futuristic battlefields.  
There were alien monsters of towering height.  There were things 
that cannot be described; they have to be seen.

The story opens in 2065, with the Earth already mostly destroyed 
and conquered by a diaphanous life form from space.  Well, not 
just one diaphanous life form, but a whole class of gossamer life 
forms.  There are things that are insect-like and things that look 
like floating dragons.  It is like a whole planet of creatures are 
cooperating and taking part in the invasion.  Why?  Dr. Sid 
(voiced by Donald Sutherland) and his protege Dr. Aki Ross (Ming-
Na) want to find out.  The creatures seem to burrow into the 
ground then attack with deadly potency.  Humans have reacted by 
retreating to force-field protected cities.  A guard of power-
suited soldiers protects these cities and what is left of the 
human race.  Dr. Sid believes in the Gaia theory that planets are 
like a living organism with self-protection mechanisms.  Perhaps 
they can be triggered to protect the planet.  But Sid and Aki have 
to act fast.  Aki's body has been invaded by one form of the 
aliens' essence.  AIDS-like it will prove deadly if the nature of 
the aliens is not better understood soon.  Hironobu Sakaguchi, who 
is connected with the Final Fantasy video games wrote the story 
for this film as well as directed and acted as executive producer.  
Jeff Vintar and Al Reinert wrote the screenplay.
Generally in an animated film of this sort, I complain that any 
starving actor could have gotten a good job doing the voice of an 
animated character.  It usually seems wasteful and useless to give 
these voice roles to established and successful actors.  In this 
film it really did serve a purpose.  The animation technique makes 
the characters realistic and even gives them some marvelous facial 
expression, but it leaves them seeming cold and without much 
personality.  That makes it hard to keep straight who is who.  One 
thing that helped was that I found it easy to track four of the 
characters because they spoke with voices I immediately 
recognized.  Those were Alec Baldwin, Steve Buscemi, Donald 
Sutherland, and James Woods.  I probably should have recognized 
the voice of Ving Rhames, but did not.  The main character is 
played by Ming-Na best known for her roles in THE JOY LUCK CLUB 
and in the various Disney productions in which she plays the 
Chinese historic figure Mulan.  What is a little disconcerting is 
not that the voices are familiar, but that the faces do not 
resemble those of the actors.  Dr. Sid may have unmistakably 
sounded like Donald Sutherland, but he looked very different.  I 
kept expecting to see Dr. Sid with the Sutherland face.

This film from Square Pictures (whose logo is a rectangle) is 
animated to be just one step from live action.  The viewer may 
come away not understanding the story or the future Earth on which 
is it set, but he will have seen some marvelous images set to the 
tune of some really terrible music.  I rate the film a 6 on the 0 
to 10 scale and a high +1 on the -4 to +4 scale.

					Mark R. Leeper
					[email-masked]
					Copyright 2001 Mark R. Leeper

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X-RAMR-ID: 28836
X-Language: en
X-RT-ReviewID: 236432
X-RT-TitleID: 1108683
X-RT-AuthorID: 1426
X-RT-RatingText: 6/10