Review of Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within

Introduction

Every now and then someone has a great idea for a 100% computer generated feature film . . . and unless it`s aimed at 10 year olds or features a certain galactic space ranger they fail hideously.

The latest attempt to push back the CGI boundaries is "Final Fantasy : The Spirits Within". It`s fair to say that this film flopped terribly on it`s cinema release, not because of any overly bad press from what I recall.

The story itself sounds exciting enough with an almost defeated mankind battling a race of alien phantoms for their very survival and indeed I remember cinema audiences wowing at the trailers. Whether it`s failure can be blamed on the fact it`s 100% cgi or that it`s closely tied to a computer game who knows, but now it`s on DVD I can see for myself.

Video

A large amount of fuss was made about the quality of the visuals when this was released at the cinema and it has to be said that the visuals on the DVD release are nothing short of stunning. Reference quality betond a shadow of doubt.

The effects really will wow you and the whole movie is jam packed with the kind of unique visuals only possible using computers. From the superb sequence set in Old New York to the incredible effect as a person`s spirit is ripped from their body . . . you WILL be amazed!

You could sit and pick holes in the animation of the main characters and the difficulties they seem to experience portraying emotions effectively in a number of scenes but to do that would be missing the point. You get to see on the sort of onscreen action that would simply not be possible without the aid of cgi and whilst you never really forget that you`re not watching real people there are instances where the animators get it all spot on. At those times you really do start to get very excited about the future of movies.

Audio

The Dolby Digital 5.1 is very well done however it falls short of the extremely high standard set by the visuals. What this DVD really needed was a dynamic and punchy audio track, something that borders on being too loud when the action borders on being too fierce. Unfortunately we get a soundtrack that does a great job rather than a terrific one. It does, however, benefit from being watched just that touch louder than you might usually so make sure the neighbours are out.

Don`t let all this negativity put you off as the soundtrack is definitely one of the better ones you`ll hear, I`m just greedy.

Features

Wow, what a bumper crop of extra features! Aside from a superb sounding animated menu here`s what this 2 disc set has to offer.

Disc 1
This disc plays home to all the commentaries with a choice between 3 tracks featuring co-director, animation director, editor and composer (with an isolated music score). There`s also something called `Blast and Boards` which allows you to watch the movie as a work in progress using storyboards and rough animatics. This can be accompanied with a very detailed commentary and set of subtitles. You also get a theatrical trailer and a photo shoot featuring Aki (the main female character) looking even more realistic than in the movie.

Disc 2
The menu sequence on this disc is an amusing little combination of live action and cgi treating the cgi stars as real people.

This disc kicks off with a very creative behind the scenes documentary. Not only is this highly informative in a technical sense it also really helps to explain anything you might not have quite understood about the film`s story. This documentary is somewhat revolutionary as it branches at various points to go into more details about certain subjects. A mini window appears whenever there`s the opportunity to branch off should you press select on your remote. This type of interaction is such a great idea and made an already interesting Documentary essential viewing.

There are also (in no particular order) character files, vehicle scale comparisons, trailer explorations - a behind the scenes trailer featurette, the Gray project - an early tech demo of the characters, more `Blasts and Boards`, Matte art exploration, Composite builds - showing how scenes were constructed, the original opening to the movie - which gives a much better explanation of the story to start with, Aki`s dream, oh and I haven`t even mentioned the Shuffler which allows you to have a go at editing a scene in the movie.

My personal favourites on disc 2 have to be the short selection of joke out-takes and the great take off of Michael Jaskson`s Thriller video.

To top it all off there is also some interesting DVD Rom items to take a look at as well, if you have the time that is.

Breathtaking.

Conclusion

I freely admit to only being interested in this DVD for it`s technical merits, being heavily into computers I was dying to see what had been achieved. After watching the movie I can say that not only is it a technical masterpiece but it is also a pretty smart movie as well.

The story moves along at a fair pace with very few slow points however as the film progresses you do start to feel as if you`re not really understanding what`s going on, especially as it moves towards the climax. This is more than made up for by some superb standout sequences including some genuinely moving moments making it easy to overlook the any flaws.

This is all packaged on one of the best DVD releases ever seen featuring reference quality visuals, high quality audio and superb extra features. Yes I would have liked a more lively audio track but no DVD release is perfect . . . but this one is about as close as it gets.