Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within

Earth 2065 AD.  Almost 35 years have passed since a meteorite crashed into the planet, unleashing an army of ghost like entities which have widdled down humanity to it’s fewest numbers.  The survivors struggle to endure within domed cites, cut off from the rest of the planet.  Dr. Aki Ross may have a solution to the conflict.  Experiencing dreams brought on a by a Phantom spirit infecting her body, Aki has been trying to piece a mysterious puzzle together.  But there are those who have had enough of waiting, who have lost much to the Phantoms and wish to see them ended no matter the cost to the planet.  It’s up to Aki, her mentor Dr. Sid and a team of specialist marines to win the race to end this supposed war. 

The announcement of a Final Fantasy movie in the early 2000’s was a pretty big deal.  Not only was it based on one of the biggest and most beloved video game franchises of all time, but it was also coming out alongside another video game adaptation, Tomb Raider, that same summer of 2001.  While Tomb Raider went on to become a modest money making if not really great movie overall hit, Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within took home the award for one of the biggest box office bombs in movie history.  It was such a bad turn out that it took another Final Fantasy game release, it’s long awaited PS2 debut Final Fantasy X and a merger with once rival Enix to save Square from a bad financial future. 

But the big question is: Was Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within really that bad to garner such a negative legacy?  Well…

I should start out by saying that I don’t outright dislike this movie.  It definitely doesn’t hold up well against time and I can definitely see why fans of the series kind of discount it.  I still thing TSW has some good ideas and boasts great production quality on the animation side that could’ve made for a really amazing Final Fantasy movie.  The animation was ahead of its time and boasted by some nice performances almost felt like a live action movie at times rather than a straight up high budget cartoon.  Lead character Aki Ross, shines on both an animated and deep character level.  She’s beautiful, tough, take charge and rarely ever not willing to go the distance to save humanity and stop the Phantom invasion.  Not to mention they weren’t kidding about the detail put into her character model, her hair alone is astounding.  Aki could’ve made a really good central character in a Final Fantasy story: driven, determined, a little at battle with her own beliefs but not willing to let that stop her.

But really, after rewatching it, that’s where my praise for the movie kind of stops.  Everything else about TSW is so cliché and done better in other films that it takes a lot of the enjoyment out of the film.  The film has an amazing voice cast including Alec Baldwin, Ving Rhames, Donald Sutherland and James Woods but their voice precense cant hide how unoriginal and depth-less their characters are.  Nothing really makes any of them stand out save for Baldwin’s Gray and Sutherland’s Cid (see there’s one FF staple that made it in, a character named Cid).  Gray and Aki make a cute couple and part of me wanted to see them make it.  Cid, well he’s a Donald Sutherland voiced mentor it’s hard not to like him.  James Woods’s General Hein is much less successful.  Even with his tragic backstory, his methods are so dumb and pointless that you cant sympathize with him or not shake your head at his actions.  It’s pretty funny when Hein pulls his biggest mistake just moments after we the audience find out what the Phantoms really are.  It’s hard not to think , “Wow it’s funny we found out what we know now just a few seconds before things went to hell”.

And honestly, it’s just boring after a while.  The action is pretty standard fare, with only the aircraft chase through the canyon really standing out.  But still this is nothing we haven’t seen done already and much better in other movies.  Even the awesome CG cant mask it. 

Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within was built up as an epic game changer and it really could have been.  If it had tried to be more like the games than inspired it than a generic American scifi film, it could’ve been the start of something really big and revolutionary for video game adaptations.  But sadly it will just go down in history as a very pretty but less than stellar film. 

6/10

But can a return to one of the actual Final Fantasy game realms bring about the film fans of the franchise have wanted to see?  That depends.  Do you like Cloud mopping for 2/3 of a movie?  Plot points that don’t get resolved?  Do you think Tifa looks better in black leather instead of shorts?  Yeah we’re doing Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children next week, hang on everyone.