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will first grant you that I find the main premise behind Final
Fantasy: The Spirits Within to be just a little silly, with its focus on the
Earth as a "living being" with a spirit and other such New Age
nonsense. Then again, what did you expect going into a movie called Final
Fantasy? A dissertation on human psychosis? Final Fantasy is the
second popular video game turned movie in 2001 next to Tomb
Raider, and both have a dedicated fan base that is required to approve
of the adaptation in order to give the movie repeat viewings (re: box office
success). This occurred with Angelina Jolie's Raider (something I suspect
had more to do with her artificial breasts than the actual quality of the
movie), but it didn't happen with Final Fantasy.
Final Fantasy opens with Doctor Aki Ross (voiced by
Ming-Na) onboard a ship orbiting the Earth. We learn through narration that the
Earth is infested with creatures called "phantoms" that looks like
bipedal squids (some the size of man, others as big as a skyscraper) that are
composed of bright red and orange energy. The phantoms kill humans by simple
touch, literally stealing their life force (or life energy) and are invisible to
the human eye unless shot with a weapon that makes them visible.
Aki Ross is on
a mission to collect 8 objects that are infused with "spirits" of the
Earth, and by combining all 8 she and her mentor, Doctor Sid (Donald
Sutherland), believes they can "reverse" the phantom energies into
positive energies, thereby saving the Earth and humankind. Of course not
everyone believes in this New Age stuff, and one of the nonbelievers is General
Hein (James Woods), who would rather blow the phantoms all to hell and has
constructed a weapon in space called the Zeus cannon to do it. Can Aki and Sid
save the Earth in time from Hein's insane need for revenge? Will Captain Gray
Edwards (Alec Baldwin) get some action from Aki? And will Aki's hair continue to
move for no apparent reason?
I like Final Fantasy. Let's get that out of the way
first. Is the animated film's "Earth as spiritual living being" idea
any crazier than the idea of an alien that bursts out of a person's chest after
planting eggs in them? No, of course not. You go into a science fiction movie
prepared to swallow the idea of flying ships that shoots lasers at each other.
And you go into Final Fantasy expecting all kinds of wacky explanations
about living energy, life forces, life energy, and spirits. I mean, folks, just consider
the name of the movie!
Final Fantasy, as many people know, uses computer
animation exclusively. And the result is, in a word, breathtaking. The
scenery crackles with life and so do the characters. As hard as it is to
believe, the animated characters in Final Fantasy are so lifelike that on
more than one occasion I found myself thinking they were actual human actors!
The only real moments when the animated characters come across as what they are
(computer generated images) are when they stand still and their arms sort of,
well, just hangs there. There are scenes with Gray and Aki that are just so damn
lifelike I felt a shiver run up my spine. And ladies and gentlemen, this is only
the beginning. Can you imagine what they can do in 5, or 10, or 20 years
from now? I wait with bated breath.
Like a lot of animation nowadays, Final Fantasy
boasts a great line-up of actors providing voices. Ming-Na (TV's "ER")
provides the voice of leading lady Aki, and she does all right, but there are
some awkward moments mostly during narration. Alec Baldwin (Gray) does the tough
guy soldier very well, and his character animation sometimes looks like
Baldwin's real-life younger brother, William. Rounding out Gray's squad of
commandos are: the always reliable Steve Buscemi as Neil, the smart-aleck
genius; Peri Gilpin as Jane, the tough gun-toting chick; and Ving Rhames as
Ryan, the token black character. (Hey, even animations must have token black
characters!) As Hein, the conniving General, James Woods does what he can with a
grossly underdeveloped character. Actually, the animation character that looks
most lifelike is the Sid character voiced by Donald Sutherland. God did he look
real!
For sci-fi buffs, a lot of the action in Final Fantasy
may look familiar. Gray's squad and much of Final Fantasy's beginning and
middle looks like an animated version of James Cameron's Aliens, complete
with armored Marines (in this case, military commandos) toting big guns that
fires large bursts of pulse energy. The movie also excels in character and
vehicle designs. The looks of the phantoms are eerie, especially watching them
literally seep through the walls behind you. The ships, hovercrafts, and other
vehicles in the movie also harkens back to Cameron's Aliens, with the
rough-and-tumble look and large wheels. And also like Aliens, Final
Fantasy has a long sequence where the phantoms (aliens) finally penetrate a
city (building) and go on a rampage, chasing our heroes through buildings (long
corridors) and finally to a ship hangar, where many of the characters die
heroically to allow the others to escape.
Despite my lack of interest in the "Earth as Gaia, a
spiritual being" premise, I did like the Gaia vs. Zeus allegory. The
ancient Greeks first conceived of Gaia as the creator of all living things (re:
the Earth) and Gaia herself gives birth to various Gods, one of which is Zeus,
the Greek God of the Sky, or Sky God. The cannon in Final Fantasy orbits
the Earth (re: in the sky) and fires large bursts of energy from the sky at the
land (lightning from the sky, get it?). Greek myths are filled with stories
about children who commit patricide, something Freud would have a field day
with.
The year 2002 saw the creation of a new "Best
Animation" category at the Academy Awards, but in perhaps the most blatant
miscarriage of justice, Final Fantasy was overlooked. This just goes to
show you that the failure of Final Fantasy at the box office means more
to these supposedly "informed" Academy voters than the actual quality
of the movies they're nominating. True, Shrek and others were deserving,
but to leave out Final Fantasy rings of stupidity and nearsightedness on
the part of the voters.
Final Fantasy is a monumental piece of filmmaking
and it's a shame it hasn't gotten the credit and the success that it deserves.
Like all things that are before their time, it will take a new generation to
truly appreciate something so ground-breaking as Final Fantasy: The Spirits
Within.
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