The storytelling seemed a bit japanese because there was a lot of talk about souls and all.
Agreed. He gave FotR the same rating as Someone and Someone go to White Castle.
Also yeah Mew, what the hell? Japanese media isn’t judged any differently from American media. Unless it was actually IN Japanese why the hell would anyone have trouble understanding about spirits and shit. You may as well say ‘how can people understand FFVII’s plot if they’ve never played anything else Japanese’.
It was Japanese because there were references of SOULS? That is a huge crock.
Maybe you should learn a little more about Japanese media before you start telling people they are ignorant of it. And just because a movie is from a different country, doesn’t mean that we can’t properly evaluate it.
And I do think that serious animated features are a much tougher sell. People generally regard animation as something for kids, so when a dramatic film like TSW comes out they don’t really know what to think.
Also, doesn’t the topic title “spirts within” sound really dirty?
Well, he does eat a lot.
The soul isn’t a concept that’s only well-known to the Japanese, Mew. Nearly every world religion mentions the soul or spirit in some context or another.
I think what you may have meant to say was that the concept of the “living planet” or “Gaia” might have been foreign to North American viewers, but this is not the case either. It’s a fairly common myth (for the lack of a better term).
I think what made the movie a failure in most people’s eyes was that it didn’t seem like Final Fantasy. The “girl hears the cry of the planet and follows her heart to stop the big evil corporation/empire/whatever from extracting energy/killing restless spirits/whatever” plotline from the games was there, but the characters were less fantasy inspired and more like people you’d see in a typical sci-fi movie. There was no magic, no Bahamut, no chosen heroes of the crystals, and there wasn’t room for the huge character development scenes you seen in RPGs because the movie was only just over 90 minutes long. It didn’t “feel” like a Final Fantasy. That’s not to say the movie was bad, because I thought it was rather entertaining.
Dalton, much of that can be said about FF6-11. The magic isnt like “fire!” or anything like that. It really had much more in common with FF7. The magic was the spirits within. The spirits that they were looking for, the spirit within Aki, the spirit of the planet… THAT’s the magic. True, there was no bahamut, there were no dragons… Unless you want to consider some of the aliens dragons, in which case, one of them could be named bahamut. Not every FF had Bahamut. There were no chosen hereos for the crystals because there were no crystals… Perhaps, Aki was the chosen one, by the planet, to save it… It has been a very long time since i watched it. IT did have it’s moments of character development, the meet of Aki and her ex, the scene in jail, and everyones death…
The reason why I assumed people would judge something Japanese differently because people tend to judge anime differently. Most fanboy/girl type people make a big deal becaus they are unfamliar. They would think an anime with an unoriginal story was brilliant. They are more focused on how differfent an English version is from Japanese, and not on the actual content of a show.
I think the point is that philosophical talk about souls and spirits generally goes over the head of the American public and hence translates into bad ratings and bad sales. The truth is that there wasn’t a whole lot of depth to all that talk about spirits, it was more of a plot point than something to actually internalize and think about. Maybe if it had a bit more of a point people would have gotten the point more.
The film really bored me, well at least i think it did, i was tired at the time of watching it and havent seen it since. From what i did see there didnt look much with action but more of quiet mumbling.
Personally, I thought it wasn’t too bad. I mean I’ve seen better things, but I’ve also seen worse.
And the whole thing with the spirits doesn’t always go over people’s head. It just depends on how well the idea is explained, and in “The Spirit’s Within” the concept was explained rather well, in my opinion.
The story was written Sakaguchi though. He was also the director. It is more Japanese than American.
As for the movie itself, I liked it. It wasn’t the best thing, but it wasn’t terrible.
and Eberts a complete dumbass
Roeper is a better and more intelligent critic because he gave
Jackass:The Movie ‘god help me THUMBS UP!’
and I dont really know why I trust Leonard Maltien
How is it Americans figured out the movie was dumb,yet some anime fanboys/girls think some anime with dumb plots can be brilliant?
It is because some people are good movie critics, and some are screaming fanboys. We could generalize by saying that everyone in America is either one or the other, but that would be rather silly.
Mew, do not confuse random statements with cause and effect. That’s like saying everyone knows cats ruin furniture, but people still stupidly have pet cats.
The spirits within sucked as bad as Chrono Cross IMO.
Bigdizzy, I dont understand the pic in your sig. It looks like a lamb is giving elmo a BJ.
Most anime fans i know are screaming fanpeople. Like on animenfo, message boards, or chat rooms
I like anime… i am hardly a screaming fanpeople… most anime fans i know IRL tend to be nerdy(thick glasses large waists) or kinda sadist(enjoys the rape scenes more than anything) I’m not really either of those.
I just hate when people forget how much clothing they NEED to wear when they go to conventions…
:moogle: I think thats okay. I like animerica sexy cosplay