Inceptional
Member
I've never seen so many people bending over backwards to try to find something to like about a shitty movie. Fucksake.
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Ghost in the Shell |OT| I was born in the sea of information
- Thread starter Trokil
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kitchenmotors
Banned
So no one is allowed to like this movie because you think it's shitty?
Ok, sure. I loved it and I watched the original in the 90s as a kid. I thought the costume, set design and music were all really well done. And despite controversy with the casting, I felt they were pretty on point with the exception of the head of Hanka. I would love to see a second movie that focuses on the team of Section 9 a bit more.
wesleyshark
Banned
There's plenty of things to enjoy about this film. Like, a whole lot.
demosthenes
Member
Saw it last night. While I enjoyed the original more I thought this was a good movie still. Will post more later, in late for my last Saturday of busy season 😄
andythinkpad
Member
OK here is my thought without looking at any review or comments here:
The set and art design is awesome 5/5. It really captures the Masamune Shirow's watercolor palette which was never translated to anime very well. They look great and stand shoulder to shoulder with Fifth Element's set
The directing is 3/5 and the script is 2/5. It needs a few revisions to sort out the dislogue. And the script feels like it was written by a non Hollywood outsider. It's missing a lot of things to make it a proper 2 hour self contained movie.
There was no proper introduction of the real bad villain; no foreshadowing of the final fight evil machine (Spider Tank is a terrible name btw); the fake villain (McGuffin) was never setup properly. I think there was no established shot of Batou either. These are really basic elementary stuff a B-list Hollywood writer wouldn't mess up.
As for more personal preference. I think the future other world is not introduced properly. I rather hear somebody give a short monologue of the new future than some text which nobody reads. And you have this lame Japan/HK/white people hybrid nation state and you couldn't make up some cool cyberpunk dystonia background? It feels shaky without a narration to set the tone.
Finally for the overall direction of the story. I have absolutely no problem of the prequel/origin story approach of the direction. I have no problem with it and I think it could have made a strong story if the script is there. I have owned GitS manga since the mid 90s, I am as much a GitS fan as any ody on this forum. I don't mind the origin story approach. The worse scene in the movie is the scene in the HK mother's apartment. It was written and directed terribly.
The score feel piece meal and disjointed. Some pieces are great.
Overall I give it a 2.5/5
It's better than the Final Fantasy movie but worse than the Power Ranger movie. That's where I will place it.
BTW Scarjo looks chunky in her invisible suit which is LOL.
The set and art design is awesome 5/5. It really captures the Masamune Shirow's watercolor palette which was never translated to anime very well. They look great and stand shoulder to shoulder with Fifth Element's set
The directing is 3/5 and the script is 2/5. It needs a few revisions to sort out the dislogue. And the script feels like it was written by a non Hollywood outsider. It's missing a lot of things to make it a proper 2 hour self contained movie.
There was no proper introduction of the real bad villain; no foreshadowing of the final fight evil machine (Spider Tank is a terrible name btw); the fake villain (McGuffin) was never setup properly. I think there was no established shot of Batou either. These are really basic elementary stuff a B-list Hollywood writer wouldn't mess up.
As for more personal preference. I think the future other world is not introduced properly. I rather hear somebody give a short monologue of the new future than some text which nobody reads. And you have this lame Japan/HK/white people hybrid nation state and you couldn't make up some cool cyberpunk dystonia background? It feels shaky without a narration to set the tone.
Finally for the overall direction of the story. I have absolutely no problem of the prequel/origin story approach of the direction. I have no problem with it and I think it could have made a strong story if the script is there. I have owned GitS manga since the mid 90s, I am as much a GitS fan as any ody on this forum. I don't mind the origin story approach. The worse scene in the movie is the scene in the HK mother's apartment. It was written and directed terribly.
The score feel piece meal and disjointed. Some pieces are great.
Overall I give it a 2.5/5
It's better than the Final Fantasy movie but worse than the Power Ranger movie. That's where I will place it.
BTW Scarjo looks chunky in her invisible suit which is LOL.
UnemployedVillain
Member
Really? Because I saw the new movie 2 nights ago and rewatched the 95 movie last night, and I forgot, but the Major in the old one had an actual personality. Aside from the boat scene, she acted spunky and authoritative, but pensive and reflective. In the new one Scarlet acts like she's confused, less like an adult reflecting and more like a child learning about the world, and doesn't give off the impression of being the team leader at all and you wonder what makes her qualified aside from simply being in the strongest body
Granted those issues were probably because of the script and directing
1. Spider Tank comes from the original move. There's nothing lame sounding about it unless you want a needlessly "cool" name for no reason
2. The text intro also comes from the original movie (it's completely different though) It takes 10 seconds to read, and monologues are corny and break immersion. All the character have grown up and lived in this world. Why would one randomly be commenting on it like they just arrived in the future or something?
andythinkpad
Member
Well they picked the bad parts of the property then.
And those are just small things. The script is the big problem.
Also the movie over world is different from the mange/anime over world. You have people talking Japanese and English to each other? That's different world and different society. You have to give it a 1-2 sentence explanation. I am not talking about the man-machine integration in the opening text.
I really disliked it. The dialogue felt so stupid and the delivery felt wrong in almost every instance. It's like all the characters talked with elippsises interjected... Every... Where... 
It wasn't cool, it felt cringy most of the time.
The only redeeming thing was the cool sets and visual design choices.
It wasn't cool, it felt cringy most of the time. The only redeeming thing was the cool sets and visual design choices.
UnemployedVillain
Member
Why? It's in a future that has advanced far enough to create full cyborg bodies. The assumption is that they have universal translators. I think what made that particularly jarring is that there were only 2 characters speaking another language. It would have been less weird if we had multiple characters speaking various languages and everyone understanding each other as if it was nothing special
I disagree - they're physically interacting with holograms and modifying every part of their bodies with cybernetics and you want a quick scene where they ask someone they've been working with for years,
"hey, how come we can understand you, grandpa?"
"Cybernetics, idiot!"
"OHHHH LOL"
See this is why audiences are treated like babies - this movie does a great job of throwing you into an alien dystopian future and letting the viewer make inferences for themselves and people see that as a negative.
andythinkpad
Member
So? Doesn't mean HK and Japan will merge into 1 country no matter how advance the technology is. This is my nerd answer if you want to be nerdy about it.
My point is the movie is missing a scene to set the tone for a different future. Cyberpunk novels usually has different interpretation of nation states.
But in none of her previous origins was she
a teenage japanese girl that fought for anti-technology who is kidnapped and turned into a cyborg cop
I'll agree that there are flashes of decency in the movie. But it was mostly when they were borrowing stuff we had seen before from GitS. I perked up a little bit during that stuff.
It's a shame they took this route and made basically a superhero origin story version of GitS. With where they leave it, a sequel might actually feel like SAC.
UnemployedVillain
Member
The 95 movie was actually set in an amalgamation of Tokyo and Hong Kong. I think it was suppose to evoke this idea of a futuristic Asian hub city, kind of like a London or NYC for that region (which I guess HK, Tokyo and Singapore technically already are, but still), but they just did a really shitty job of it. It could have been a scene (like you suggested), but it could have just been more examples of people speaking different languages. Not having all the banners only show Chinese/Japanese on them. And not having a major tech company only seem to produce caucasian bodies
I dunno, unless the sequel is set like a decade out, the setting is fundamentally different. In all other iterations full cyborg bodies, while not commonplaces, were certainly not a new, recently perfected thing. Making the Major a special snowflake in that regards drastically changes the setting and the types of stories they can tell in it. It's disappointing. This was basically the Robocop reboot with a female Murphy
Yes! Exactly! I hadn't seen anyone mention it until now, but this shit really got under my skin. It was like the director told ScarJo to act and walk 'like a robot' and she does and it looks stupid.
Rolled my eyes all through the overly dramaticized origin story. I mean, does the audience have to know all of the details on the Majors life and how she was made from the start? I mean, when I saw, for example, Silence of the Lambs, I didn't need to know Everything about Agent Starling or have the movie focus on where she came from, it focused on the case, well, and Lecter, but still.They're interesting characters because of who they are in the present for the movie. And the same holds true for the Major and Section 9.
The visuals were good (besides a ton of and overuse of holograms like people here mentioned).
I hated hearing "fans" walk out of the theater saying it was exactly like the original.
Man the eyerolls at all the "ghost" and "shell" dialogue, it was painful the first time, but by the 4th or 5th?
Hahahaha, yeah forgot about that. Way way overusage of those descriptors. "She has a ghost.....in her shell"
audience :"ohhhhhhh". :/
The first time was awful but after that it just became the terminology in which they referred to it. They said it maybe three times altogether. I'm pretty sure they do the same thing in the source material.
UnemployedVillain
Member
In the original it was said in an offhand way as a slang for consciousness. In this movie, every time they said it, it's like they told the actors to make sure the audience got it. It was like the guy from Office Space explaining his Jump to Conclusions mat
I really don't remember being beaten over the head with it in the original movie and they definitely don't do it in SAC. Besides it's something that doesn't need to be exactly said in the movie. If the audience can't discern what the title means in respect to the movie, then they shouldn't be watching this.
It'd be like watching a James Bond movie and having him look towards the camera and be all "Oh, and Diamonds Are Forever" <wink>
And yet, just a few posts ago, someone felt like the movie needed to explain why a world where people are replacing all of their organs would ever possibly be able to understand someone else's language - when translating programs are something that currently exist in our world right now.
Yeah, I'm not fan of hand holding, in movies or video games. I had a co-worker who didn't like the Logan movie because they didn't explain exactly how Logan got that way, like he wanted a Star Wars like text-crawl at the beginning or something.
I guess there could have been a suttle way for the director to show a translating program was in effect. Maybe a really quick garbled audio cue the first time Aramaki talks to show something happened there? That wouldn't have been too jarring, and the audience would be able to put it together.
That's what makes this movie odd though, is it holds the audiences hands in some areas but not in others.
Yep. I expected worse. It's basically a by the numbers action movie. A pretty one at that.
CosmicGroinPull
Member
Violence Jack
Member
Alright, GAF, Angry Joe, and Double Toasted got me on board. Seeing it at a matinee showing in a few hours with no expectations.
Go to the OT thread for Ghostbusters (2016). Ugh.
s_mirage
Member
I've been critical and sceptical about this film from the get go, and I liked it. I don't need to bend over backwards to find something to like when I went in expecting to hate it, only to be surprised when I didn't at all. You didn't like it? Fine, that's your opinion and it's as valid as anyone else's, but don't assume that everyone who says they did is somehow forcing themselves to find nice things to say.
polyh3dron
Banned
You know Major, you really are a Ghost In a Shell.Man the eyerolls at all the "ghost" and "shell" dialogue, it was painful the first time, but by the 4th or 5th?
hipsterpants
Member
Just saw it, I probably give it a 2/5. Amazing visuals but everything else was pretty bleh. Also their reason for Major being white was hilarious. Would have been better just to make her 100% white. She's like a reverse Psylocke.
Went with a group of friends to watch it last night and we were all literally falling asleep. When the credits rolled, the people in front of us were talking about how boring the movie was and how it was making them doze off.
The movie looks nice but man, it just couldn't hold my interest.
The movie looks nice but man, it just couldn't hold my interest.
Now that is an entirely different can of worms as far as motivations go.
Same. I really wish they had them all more involved.
UnemployedVillain
Member
Also another thing that didn't make sense was about the antagonist
Kuze goes on about Hanka stole the Major's life through kidnapping her, placing her in a prosthetic body, and rewriting her memory...then he goes and rewrites the memory of a random garbage man. In the original movie, this was done by the Puppetmaster, which was a sentient AI whose only human quality was recognizing its own existence, but didn't care for meaningless things like individuality and memory.
The films are technically separate from the TV series (same inspiration, but different "canons"). And the TV series also has a film in that continuity
Oshii's films:
Ghost in the Shell (1995)
Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence
Stand Alone Complex:
Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex - Solid State Society
Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. 2nd GIG
Arise:
Ghost in the Shell: Arise
Ghost in the Shell: The New Movie
Watch Oshii's films first, and then Stand Alone Complex if you want more. I'd say Arise is a pass but some people like it. It deals more with Major before she joined Section 9 and they kind of change her character a bit. Not a fan of the designs either.
kitchenmotors
Banned
I'll be honest, the original movie is slow too and I feel like they chose to take pieces from the GITS universe to keep it moving a bit more. But it is a slow movie.
And that's awesome that people going into it with no knowledge of the original or anime in general are looking for more.
I also love the cast. It really held together the slow moving parts. A sequel focusing on section 9 without the fluff would be awesome.
andythinkpad
Member
What's everyone's opinion on the hair pieces? I thought they were over done and fake.
Giolon
Member
The original movie is good, but a little sparse meat wise, albeit with a lot of philophosizing about what it means to be human, and it's still an all time classic. If you watch this, you'll recognize a lot from the new film, but with an entirely different story.
The series Stand Alone Complex is the best of GITS, available streaming on Hulu now I believe. It focuses on Section 9 as a squad as they solve a series of unrelated crimes and with an overarching plot in each season. Here is where you really get a sense of camaraderie between the squad members and full character development for most of them. Some people criticize it as being too talky loaded with too much techno-jargon but I feel it's best at fleshing out the world.
Arise I haven't seen, but all I've ever heard is that it's fine. It brings nothing new to the table as it basically retreads the plot of the original movie but spaced out over and entire season, and the other story beats have all been seen before in other GITS media like SAC.
ScarJo's was awful. Everyone else was fine.
Antagonists being hypocrites isn't anything new - this would be the equivalent of "sometimes you have to break a few eggs".
He also kills innocent people which is taking away a lot more than their identity.
Fantastic article.
formasymphonic
Member
You don't need to, the down side is that after you do watch them you will realise why what they did with Kuze was bad, and why much of everything else is considered to be so lacking — but frankly, the series' are the best of what GitS has to offer, so you would be missing out if you don't.
Solid State Society is chronologically after 2nd Gig btw. It follows about 2 years after its ending.
I went late at night and was riveted the whole way through. This is one of the most divisive movies I can remember.
Ban Puncher
Member
Gotta save something for 'Ghost in the Shell 2: Ghostbusters' coming 2019.
MugiwaraCole
Member
*cackles at the Friday box office*
Haven't seen the movie but it wouldn't surprise me if the ending is that
The way people are talking about it, it kinda seems like that has to be what happens.
And if it is the case, people are bad at talking about movies and not spoiling them.
the major is actually asian and the body is just a white lady.
The way people are talking about it, it kinda seems like that has to be what happens.
And if it is the case, people are bad at talking about movies and not spoiling them.
s_mirage
Member
If GitS continues to underperform, Fox might be shuffling a little nervously. Alita: Battle Angel is based on a less well loved franchise, may also be hit by accusations of whitewashing, and has nearly double the budget.
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