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My Pitch: Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001) Production Budget: $137 million Total Domestic Gross: $32 million (Worldwide $85 million) If The Spirits Within didn't have Final Fantasy in front of its title, I fully believe it would have been more positively received than it was in its 2001 premiere (which bankrupted the studio that made it, being their debut film). A slightly-derivative but completely gorgeous space opera, the film features a wonderfully realized future setting, ahead-of-its-time production design, a dynamically Gothic score by Elliot Goldenthal, and so much more. The film's environmentalist message (with hints of Eastern philosophy) is unconventional for a film of this genre, and its solid cast does a surprising amount with their stock characters. (Not many adolescent sci-fi actioners feature an antagonist moments away from killing himself in disgrace.) All of this results in an interestingly flawed film that does just enough right and different to justify a second look.
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Sep 2, 2013 01:12
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| # ¿ May 14, 2024 17:29 |
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Oh thank god, thanks CloseFriend! I'm on vacation, so I'll have plenty of time to watch my film and take plenty of notes, so I can spend some time when I get back writing/polishing.
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Oct 7, 2013 04:19
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I'm gonna try to get mine finished in the next day or two - it's a bit of a rush job, but I'm not going to bite off more than I can chew.
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Nov 8, 2013 19:02
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Sent mine tonight.
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Nov 9, 2013 07:11
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It's a bummer that the book isn't happening  However, in the interest of getting people to see it, here's my slapdash, first-draft-y essay on the merit of Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within if anyone is interested. Even re-reading it, I'm finding a bunch of things I need to fix if I were to refine it, but here it is anyway. Hewlett fucked around with this message at 19:31 on Apr 13, 2014 |
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Apr 13, 2014 19:27
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| # ¿ May 14, 2024 17:29 |
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Payndz posted:The creators seemed so worried about the CG characters in Spirits Within looking "cartoony" that they dialled their expressions way, way down - with the result that they seemed as stiff and unemotive as Thunderbirds puppets. Ironically, the only time I thought Aki and co really came alive was in some of the gag reel stuff (like the Thriller spoof), where the animators cranked their expressions up far beyond anything in the film itself. Yes, to be fair, the film still suffers from being a bit ponderous and self-serious, but for me that added in a weird way to the film's ambitions - it wanted to be just as boring as a live-action space opera! Also, in the most recent viewings of it I actually thought the film had a nicely wry sense of humor, as long as you're willing to just run with the rest of the Deep Eyes being the Aliens-ripoff comic relief Marines. I love the scene where they literally all conspire to sabotage a space elevator so that Aki and Grey can have a romantic moment. "That's amore, baby."
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Apr 17, 2014 18:46
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