Ghost in the Shell
Hello ladies, peoples, and animals it is I, the Arcane Reviewer! Here to continue Movie Month! Well looks like I get talk about one of the most beloved franchises in the world of anime. Ghost in the Shell! Those of you who don't know what Ghost in the Shell is I'll briefly explain. Ghost in the Shell was originally a manga written by Masamune Shirow back in May of 1989, then manga was very successful as the manga had a very cyberpunk tone and look which made it stand out from other manga. Another thing that made the manga very popular was the subjects of whether or not machines can have spirits and what it means to be truly human. Eventually the manga would gain so much popularity that Production I.G would end up getting the rights to produce a Ghost in the Shell movie and having Mamoru Oshii direct the film. Afterwards Production I.G would end up making an actual show but that's a review for another time. But enough with the history lesson, is the film any good? Well let's find out shall we?
Story:
The story takes place in a futuristic world in which technology is everything. Almost everyone has something cybernetic inside of them which make for a very interesting world that this film is set in. We see that because just about everyone has these cybernetic, (most importantly their brains are cybernetic) this world does have hackers and there is one in particular that is a big thorn in the side of the this world. His name is the Puppet Master and he is a very mysterious hacker that our heroes in this story find and finally put a stop to his crimes. But in the middle of all this we see that there are shady things going on behind all of this. We also see a lot of themes being presented in the film are gender/sex identity and self identity. So yeah this film has a lot of shit going on. I actually really like a lot of the things that are going on in the film but I won't lie to you, I did get a little lost after awhile. The movie is very complex and has some straight up heavy ass dialog that admittedly I did get a little bit lost. Now that's not a bad thing because that showed movie was able to take chances with the audience and treat them like idiots, which I liked. Now with the who deep philosophical themes going on I feel like it gave more weight to the film but at the same time I feel like it did open by questions that were never really answered. This could be a negative for some but I really didn't mind from a personal stand point. The story is pretty much a give and take sort of deal. You can either take what the film's going for and run with it or you can feel lost and not really understand what exactly the film is asking. It really does come down to what you can take from it.
Music:
This soundtrack is trippy. The music was composed by Kenji Kawai who did music for the Fate/Stay Night anime, the Death Note movie, Higurashi no Naku Koro ni, and Mobile Suit Gundam 00. Needless to say this man is very good at making some damn good music and this film shows. The music in the movie is borderline horror style and it fits really well with the whole cyberpunk theme going on. His music does raise the level of quality that this movie has and it was just an amazing thing to listen to. The music also did a fantastic job at setting the mood for a scene and feel as though it could have been any type of thing going on and he'll find a badass way of making the scene even more intense with the high quality of music he provides. So long story short music is awesome.
Characters:
Now this is a bit of a weird subject to talk about because the movie does have a good cast of characters and it does do a good job at giving them their own distinct personalities but in the long run the movie never really develops them. This isn't bad though because all the characters do in fact have very well fleshed out character traits and we do very much see that no really big character driven plot is going on say for our main heroin having some personal questions she wants answered. Though that was very minor though it does tie in to the overall plot. So characters are fine and dandy but the story doesn't give them a lot of room to develop but I can see that this is not a character driven story so I'm okay with it.
Voice Acting:
Okay just to make this short and sweet voice acting in this movie is alright. Some of the voices are actually pretty solid but some are also pretty silly to hear. This can be good or bad depending on what your stance on voice acting is. So it's up to you, I didn't mind it but I do know some will be distracted.
Overall:
Well this movie is pretty much a kind of "all up to you" movie. It is an odd beast to review because while I enjoyed it very much so and I do indeed love he world of Ghost in the Shell but in retrospective I can see why some people would be a little disappointed or blown off by the complexity of this movie. So I guess I'll say this. I highly recommend this movie but be warned, it might not be for you.
Arcane Reviews gives Ghost in the Shell a 8.5 out of 10.
You can watch "Ghost in the Shell" on:
Netflix (DVD rental only)
Google Play (Dub and Sub)
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