WANTED: Reviews for the frontsite.

[Loony BoB]

I'm recoding the TSW section for EoFF at the moment and would like to revamp it altogether, including some fresh reviews rather than the existing pre-release "impressions" page. If anyone could write out a full review for this movie that they would let us put up on the frontsite, that would be much appreciated.

[UWAOOOOU]

I volunteer Necronopticious. Im allowed do that right?

[raskerino]

I might but it'd probably take more then a week to have the time to get it done, so probably someone else will get it done first. However, if there hasn't been a review posted by then I'd be willing to.

[edczxcvbnm]

Here is my full review. MISTAKE!

[raskerino]

Sorry this took me so long, I just watched the movie again and this is a quick unedited review that can be changed or discarded if you want. Please reply though...

Story
The plot is based around fighting an alien presence that has forced mankind in the year 2065 to live in defended cities. The main character Aki Ross is a scientist who is trying to create a opposite entity to the alien presence in order to stop it with the Sid of this FF (though admittedly the spelling is wrong).The story to FFTSW is a highly simplistic one. Throughout the plot 'good' people will consistently have a good effect while 'bad' people necassarily have a bad effect. This led to a plot in which almost everything is very easy to define and nothing takes thought to understand. The story was also quite basic, many scenes are given to fights and the story ones come infrequently. The only scene that I liked for it's storyline value was the first one. It was the only scene where the argument had reasons to agree with both sides and wasn't overlaid with romantic tones. The story was weak but I was fine watching it, it is in effect a weak attempt at being epic and a lead up to battle scenes.
4/10 (poor)
Characters
Many people seem to find the characters very annoying, I found them slightly annoying. Again I will mention the simplicity of people's effects, and add to that that motives were either practically non-existent or a single idea behind all a characters actions. There were some interchanges that were decently done, but they were rare throughout. As characters are part of the story I have little to add here.
4/10 (poor)
Graphics
The graphics to this movie were very good quality. The environmental scenes were absolutely beautiful, mountains (at the end) and dusty deserts were a joy to watch. However most of the backgrounds were well done graphics of machines, which is not something I find interesting to look at. The people had strong facial expressions, but they came at slightly odd moments, though this may be more due to slight problems with movement that I noticed frequently. The characters were done nicely, they didn't have perfectly even faces and had a realistic feel in most of the design. I loved some views but this was marred by not being interested in most of the backgrounds.
8/10 (very good)
Music, Sound Effects and Voice Acting
The sound effects are mostly metallic sounds or guns. Music only occurs at the end which I found pleasant. The major part of this category is voice acting which ranged from bland and slightly annoying to well done if a bit emotionless (not that they didn't try, it just didn't always come off).
5.5/10 (OK)
Feel
The movie had an inconsistent feel to it. It attempted at multiple feels at single moments which didn't really work it these attempts. Combinations of somewhat dark realistic scenes with the alien spectral creatures didn't quite work for me. A character named "Neel" (I think) frequently tossed in the attmepts at humor in the movie. He seemed to make generic jokes in the type of someone whiny trying to get attention. Usually he would hurt the feel of scenes he was in, though I did like one of his later ones. Like the story and characters the feel just didn't hold together.
N/A (but it was poor)
Overall (not an average)
The graphics were the strong part of this movie and they were very well done. The rest is weak but I'd consider this movie worth seeing, it's not special but it's a perfectly reasonable way to spend 106 minutes. And there are some really beautiful graphics if you value that.
5/10 (okay)

Hope this review is okay, if you want me to do different categories, change anything or edit this that's fine.

Edit: And if it's wanted and you think I review decently (it's harder for me to review movies) then I'd love to do more for games I've played.

Edit2: I just read Ookami's review and absolutely disagree, but I thought this was supposed to give some sense of the movie, not spoil a lot of what occurs?

[YTDN]

My Review- Just So Rubbish

[Soul of Tarsis]

Allow my closing argument to be thus; that in keeping the themes, and only the themes of Final Fantasy in this film, Hironobu Sakaguchi overestimated the intelligence of his fanbase. Note how final fantasy attained its popularity with the release of Final Fantasy VII, a game that was built upon the backbone of cinematic elements, rather then storytelling like its predecessors. The Majority of FF fans at the time, were indeed drawn to the cinematic flash, rather then the storytelling depth. and unfortunately, it was this majority that files most of the above charges. It is a sad thing to say that the majority of the gaming public would not be interested in "storytelling concepts" but rather then direct reference and recycling of familiar material, as is evidenced in the media attention of my clients successor, Advent Children.

I don’t see why a review for The Spirits Within should include POV comments about a game that is practically unrelated to the movie. I see this as nothing more than a continuation of Ookami’s vendetta against a movie that he disliked, and a game he thinks is overrated. There are plenty of other reasons as to why TSW did as badly as it did at the box office; to pin it down on FFVII fans is utterly ridiculous. I suggest that if you plan on using this review(and I use that word loosely, as the entire thing is more of a rebuttal against everyone who didn’t like the movie) as THE TSW review, you should at the very least remove this comment in its entirety.

[Ishin Ookami]

I don’t see why a review for The Spirits Within should include POV comments about a game that is practically unrelated to the movie. I see this as nothing more than a continuation of Ookami’s vendetta against a movie that he disliked, and a game he thinks is overrated. There are plenty of other reasons as to why TSW did as badly as it did at the box office; to pin it down on FFVII fans is utterly ridiculous. I suggest that if you plan on using this review(and I use that word loosely, as the entire thing is more of a rebuttal against everyone who didn’t like the movie) as THE TSW review, you should at the very least remove this comment in its entirety.

Actually tarsis, that review was taken from a review I did on a separate website roughly within the time frame of a year too a year and a half ago. And though I did some slight editing, that paragraph I left entirely intact and unaltered.

And if you think that comment to be based only on my POV, go check out the reader reviews of spirits within on amazon, especially the reviews that were written prior to the announcement of AC. most of the critiques aren't dedicated towards animation values, storytelling, direction, character development, or anything else. Its just that there wasn't anything in there related to final fantasy as most of the reviewers on that website saw it.

If you doubt FFVII was more flash than substance, than I suggest you at least rent the GBA version of FFIV. There are some moments in that game that are as equally cinematic and epic as any FMV in Final Fantasy VII such as the assault on the giant of babel or the destruction of Mist. though most would call FFVII superior because of its production values, to which I'd say no. Just more accessible. There is a difference, and if you paid attention to my posts, I have no problem pointing out FFVII's and Advent Childrens good qualities, just as I have no problem criticizing their faults, in the same way I did criticize sakaguchi for trying to tell too much story in just over two hours. This I felt was Spirits Within's chief weakness, too much was attempted and there was just too little time to do it in. But overall I felt Spirits Within had far more strengths than weaknesses, and I hope that Mist Walker is successful enough that sakaguchi will be able to deliver more films and take what he learned on spirits within and apply it there, while I hope that Nomura actually bothers to watch spirits within and takes notes on how to direct with some coherence

[Soul of Tarsis]

I wouldn’t say most of the people who were criticising the film did so because it wasn't a ‘Final Fantasy' movie. Indeed, out of the 100 that I read a good deal of them had never played a Final Fantasy game. I must admit though, there were some truly terrible reviews there. I want to kill the guy who tried to say that the phantoms were based off pyrflies with a rusty hook. Many of the reviews hit the problem with The Spirits Within right on the head: It’s boring. I’m not going to debate whether or not this movie was good or not in this thread though; I see you’ve made another thread on this particular topic that I might add to later.

My main problem with that particular paragraph is that is changes the tone of the entire review. You’re no longer saying that the movie was ‘misunderstood’; you’re saying that the people who saw it lacked the intellect to understand it. You then go on to comment on FFVII’s style of storytelling, basically stating that it lacked substance. Finally, you say that it is mainly FFVII fans which criticise TSW, which at the very least is stretching the truth. Combine this with your statement that ‘Hironobu Sakaguchi overestimated the intelligence of his fan base’, and you have a rather clear criticism against both FFVII fans and the game itself. What I am saying is this has no place in a review about The Spirits Within. If you had then gone on to comment on the various other groups that would have disliked this movie (eg those unaccustomed to the 'Anime-ish' style of storytelling), this comment may have been more acceptable. As it is however, it needs to be either added to, or removed entirely.

If you doubt FFVII was more flash than substance, than I suggest you at least rent the GBA version of FFIV. There are some moments in that game that are as equally cinematic and epic as any FMV in Final Fantasy VII such as the assault on the giant of babel or the destruction of Mist. though most would call FFVII superior because of its production values, to which I'd say no. Just more accessible.

Believe it or not, I’ve completed FFIV: Advanced, in addition to the chronicles version as well. I can honestly say that while I thought FFIV was an epic and compelling game, it couldn’t even begin to match the complexity and depth of FFVII-X inclusive, or indeed FFV. Hell, even the ‘2000 year time loop’ in FFI made you think a little; the only aspect of FFIV that I could say fascinated me was Zeromus.

There is a difference, and if you paid attention to my posts, I have no problem pointing out FFVII's and Advent Childrens good qualities, just as I have no problem criticizing their faults

The comments that you make every so often about how awesome the Turks were are slightly overshadowed by the colossal amount of posts you’ve made about the various aspects of the game you thought were half-arsed. You‘ve pretty much taken every opportunity you‘ve had to voice your opinion on the AC, and most of the time you are just reiterating the same points over and over again. If you didn’t have a vendetta against the FFVII compilation, you wouldn’t waste your time discussing it as much as you do.

….in the same way I did criticize sakaguchi for trying to tell too much story in just over two hours. This I felt was Spirits Within's chief weakness, too much was attempted and there was just too little time to do it in. But overall I felt Spirits Within had far more strengths than weaknesses, and I hope that Mist Walker is successful enough that sakaguchi will be able to deliver more films and take what he learned on spirits within and apply it there, while I hope that Nomura actually bothers to watch spirits within and takes notes on how to direct with some coherence

Perhaps at the same time, Sakaguchi can watch Advent Children and learn how to keep people paying attention for more than 10 minutes before falling asleep.

[Loony BoB]

Reviews aren't designed to please everyone. I'm glad they're opening up for criticism, but so long as it's well written, and I believe it is, then the review won't change. Having said that, anyone is welcome to come up with their own review and if it's typed out well enough then we'll be more than happy to put it up on the frontsite as well.

[Ishin Ookami]

I wouldn’t say most of the people who were criticising the film did so because it wasn't a ‘Final Fantasy' movie. Indeed, out of the 100 that I read a good deal of them had never played a Final Fantasy game. I must admit though, there were some truly terrible reviews there. I want to kill the guy who tried to say that the phantoms were based off pyrflies with a rusty hook. Many of the reviews hit the problem with The Spirits Within right on the head: It’s boring. I’m not going to debate whether or not this movie was good or not in this thread though; I see you’ve made another thread on this particular topic that I might add to later.

Well tarsis, consider this social commentary, or just another POV, but from I notice the majority of video gamers out there are incredibly shallow. Even your thought on SW, stating "Its Boring" makes me wonder just how much depth are you capable of appreciating as I wasnt bored for a minute. I also disagree with your opinion on FFIV Advance being not as compelling as FFVII - X. as one of the things I always found amusing in the game is that while Cecil is redeeming his soul, kain is loosing his to his jealousy. By the end Kain can no longer stand to face cecil and rosa. and Leaves on a journey on the same day they are too be married. I thought that dynamic was very amusing and ironic. While the revelation about barretts daughter didnt really come off as a shock seeing as how the hints were given, that she didnt look anything like him. I thought escaflowne did that sort of plot point far better and made it so much more complex, and personally I always thought Barrett was one of the more interesting characters in FFVII, right next to Cid and RedXIII.

If you had then gone on to comment on the various other groups that would have disliked this movie (eg those unaccustomed to the 'Anime-ish' style of storytelling), this comment may have been more acceptable. As it is however, it needs to be either added to, or removed entirely.

I feel Anime-ish storytelling doesnt really apply here to the film, there were themes that are more prevelant in japanese cinema, such as environmental issues, but overall I thought sakaguchi just focused on telling a decent story, and despite the flaw of the story being too big for the time frame, it was successful. The only anime influences I could see was the nature of several of the plot twists. Hayo Miyazaki is rather notorious for plot twists in his films where the intial conflict or dilema in the film is on the verge of being solved, then throwing in a plot twist that undoes all of the heroic deeds done, and ups the ante by making the conflict more dire and larger in scale. but than again, the nature of those sort of plot twists have been around since Akira Kurosawa decided to have master swordsmen kyozo shot in the back in seven samurai's climactic battle just to illustrate how unfair life can be. So I suppose that the style of storytelling in SW comes back to being more japanese in tone rather than being "anime-ish".

The comments that you make every so often about how awesome the Turks were are slightly overshadowed by the colossal amount of posts you’ve made about the various aspects of the game you thought were half-arsed. You‘ve pretty much taken every opportunity you‘ve had to voice your opinion on the AC, and most of the time you are just reiterating the same points over and over again. If you didn’t have a vendetta against the FFVII compilation, you wouldn’t waste your time discussing it as much as you do.

Actually, when you do check out the post I made on this thread, check out one of the more recent ones when I compare a scene in Advent with a very similar scene in a film many argue to be John Woo's Finest, hard boiled. Basically I just make a point that Nomura's direction was one that screamed out in every scene "hey kids, isnt this cool" where as film makers like John Woo focus on making action scenes that ARE cool, far cooler than anything in AC, but also tell a coherant story. A good example would be the character of mad dog in hard boiled, who has roughly three lines in the film, but when he dies its a sad moment. Whereas when Kadaj, yazoo, and loz bite it, I felt nothing. For the "Isnt that cool" moments Nomura crafted, they were just ciphers rather than actual characters with opinions and feelings.

Nomura reminds me of a writer who wrote star wars novels for a while, called kevin J Anderson. Anderson sincerely loved the mythology and universe, but he had one fatal flaw, he couldnt write for beans. He quotes every line in the original movie and refers to it at least once a page, sometimes a refferrence to the original films, or other novels is made on every paragraph. Couple this with the fact that he couldnt write original dialouge worth a damn, and went for romantic pairings that make beauty and the beast look like romeo and juliet, and it's little wonder that eventually LUCAS, the same guy who thought Jar Jar Binks was a good idea at the time, told him to stop writing for star wars. The point for that anecdote is to illustrate that just because this guy could quote the original trilogy, he couldnt capture what made it interesting. In much the same way Nomura can imitate Wuxia, Anime, and Hong Kong action stereotypes but he cant emulate the substance of what makes the genre's and film makers successful.

So yah, There is alot wrong in AC, and I do point it out, just like I point out the good. It isnt my fault Nomura doesnt have an original bone in his body, and cant even imitate competently. sorry if you disagree, but thats where I stand.

Oh and incidently, I almost fell asleep watching Advent Children. :P

[Soul of Tarsis]

As I said, I’m not going to argue about either Advent Children or the Spirits Within in this thread to any depth. There are plenty of other threads (most of them made by you) were I can do that here. Since Loony BoB feels that there is no reason to change the article, I guess I’ll have to concede. As for you’re comment on how much ‘depth’ I can appreciate, I could the same about you and Final Fantasy VII AC, but that is for another time

[Cruise Control]

Story
The movie has a very basic plot. Mankind locked in a battle against an alien presence. Humans cowered behind barrier shields. Led by her dreams, Aki and Dr. Sid must collect the eight sprits to eliminate the aliens. The entire movie was an expounding upon the philosophy of the earth has life, and everything has a spirit.
The story is very well executed, but you get the sense of it being rushed, almost as if it was too big, for 106 minutes, but they tried to cram it in anyway.
8/10

Characters
TSW had several memorable characters, such as General Hein and Aki. It seems as if the rest of the characters are there just so you can feel bad when they die. They were just plain bland.
5/10

Graphics
The graphics in this movie rock. The entire movie is like an FMV from Final Fantasy 10. The fact that they didn't digitize any actors makes it even better. Motion for all objects is very fluid. The phantoms were particularly well done, and had a lot of detail considering that they only showed up red and orange. The mountains at the end were particularly impressive.
9/10

Sound
There was only noticeable music at like three different points. And each time it matched the atmosphere being conveyed perfectly. The range of sound effects was limited however, being mostly guns reloading, firing, or metal on metal noises. Voice acting for General Hein was memorable, but the others just meh. Though, this didn't have that big of an impact on the movie.
7/10

Overall
A definite must for a Final Fantasy fan. And even if you don't, like Final Fantasy, a pretty good sci-fi flick. I recommend it. Afterward, spend some time thinking about it, you may just find something worth thinking about.
8/10


EDIT: Holy Crap. That was riddled with errors. I ran it through MS Word and it checks out now.

[Markus. D]

my oppinion is to biased, I'd over compliment it.