As children, Edward and Alphonse Elric lost their mother
to illness. In an attempt to resurrect
her through alchemy, Alphonse lost his body while Edward lost an arm and a leg
bonding Al’s soul to a suit of armor.
Years later, the two travel the land searching for a way to restore
their bodies. The answers they seek lie
in the fabled Philospher’s Stone, one of the greatest relics of Alchemy capable
of even bringing the dead back to life.
But dark traps have been set for the brothers and even darker truths
threaten to shatter their resolve. That
wont stop Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist. To restore his brothers body, he’ll risk
everything, even if the ultimate cost is everything he has.
Live Action adaptations of Anime are tricky. There are some things you can only do with
Anime as your key storytelling tool, from character behaviors to feats of epic
awesomness. Sometimes, filmmakers can
get it right. I’ll always look to the
2006 Death Note Duology and the first Rurouni Kenshin film as the gold
standards of making good adaptations (the second and third RuroKen movies were
good but not fully great). But for every
win, there’s a colossal failure. Just
look at last year. 2017 gave us two
highly anticipated Live Action Anime films in Ghost in the Shell and Netflix’s
America Death Note. Both fell flat on
their face for various reasons (I gave both semi ok reviews that seem more
generous in retrospect). That same year,
we got a Fullmetal Alchemist movie. To
say it’s the best of those three films that came out in 2017 is hard to
say…cause even when it tries to do things right it doesn’t take things in the
positive direction Live Action Anime films need to go.
Let’s start with Ed and Al, the heart and soul of this
entire story. Both in the film and
Anime, they go through a tragic ordeal that would leave anyone broken beyond
repair. What makes them both so
endearing are two things: their optimism, which is often tested but never fully
broken; and their amazing brotherly banter.
Neither are fully present in the film.
The Ed that we know is fully aware of his guilt in what happened to him
and his brother but in the Anime and Manga, he masks it behind sharp wit and a
fiery temper. Ryousuke Yamada plays
Edward in the film with all of his guilt and depression on full display. The film has a couple moments of lightheartedness,
though few and far between, and even there Ed acts less like his normal, short
fused self…and in truth he probably wouldn’t raise too much of a fuss that I
used the “s” word just then, he is that out of character. This dramatic approach works on rare
occasion, especially during the infamous Shou Tucker scene (you know what I’m
talking about if you know the franchise).
Otherwise, I feel like the casting is more to blame than the writing as
I could see Anime Ed saying a lot of these lines in his usual form and acting
his usual self while doing so. It’s
actually hard to tell if Al is equally or much worse off. Sure he looks awesome and taken right from
the source material with his armor design.
But Al doesn’t really do much for most of the film and sounds even more
depressed than Ed…when he’s actually talking.
I swear, Al is mute during several moments when he could easily speak
but I guess chooses not to? That bugged
the hell out of me. As a result, Ed and
Al feel like shadows of the characters we know and love. Their live action portrayal officially, for
me, ranks up there with Nat Wolff’s take on Light Turner in Netflix’s Death
Note. If the film cant be supported by
its iconic leads then it is bound to fail in the end.
Clocking in at a little over 2 hours, you can feel the
Fullmetal Alchemist movie dragging on, even when it’s jumping from one
important part of the story to the next.
Unless you are well versed in the universe already, the movie doesn’t give
much time to digest things and even less emotional impact to keep you
invested. Even the Shou Tucker
storyline, while the climax is ok, fails to deliver the full gut punch of the
Anime or Manga (both of which told the story in one or two episodes or chapters
with a much better handle on events). At
the end of the day though, this movie is meant to be an opener for a franchise,
nothing more or less. As such, it has a
beginning but kind of fumbles around deciding how much it wants to get in
before it wraps up. A couple of the
Anime’s more memorable epic moments feel less than stellar as a result and
definitely lack the “hell yeah” enthusiasm they instill when youre watching
them in the TV series. Actually as the
film went on, I could only wonder why I don’t just pop in the 2003 TV Series or
Brotherhood and watch those vastly superior stories right away.
Possibly one of the biggest flaws of the film lies in its
greatest strength: the visuals. This
movie looks like Fullmetal Alchemist.
From the sets to the costume design to the Alchemic effects. Everyone looks like they came from the Anime,
especially Al and Hughes. Ryuta Sato
brings all the warmth, humor and seriousness that makes Hughes the guy he’s
always been. He is the one shining
beacon that kept me hoping this film would right itself. But, just like Ghost in the Shell, Fullmetal
Alchemsit relies too much on nodding to the source material and, as a result,
tries to mask its storytelling flaws behind it.
Even moments taken directly from the Manga or the Anime feel like they
lack the fun or heart that made them so memorable and epic in the first
place. I was fooled once by Ghost in the
Shell (I think I even praised being able to spot most of the many references),
I was not going to be fooled this time by Fullmetal Alchemist.
It’s funny. There
have been two Fullmetal Alchemist series (the 2003 TV Anime and Fullmetal
Alchemist Brotherhood). Both are shows
with very long episode counts but never once will you hear anyone complain
about that. The shows (and even their
respective films: Conqueror of Shamballa and The Sacred Star of Milos) are a
roller coaster of emotion, heartache, excitement and hope. Those are four emotions I felt next to none
or very little of while watching the live action movie. Ed and Al aren’t acting like they should and
suck up all the hope and fun from the narrative. The moments when the action should kick in
feel half assed or bare boned. The
emotion is kept of full on depressing with nary a sent of optimism or
hope. I will say I felt heartache. Cause in the wake of Ghost in the Shell and
Death Note, 2017 needed a big win in the Live Action Anime category. Fullmetal Alchemist was not that win. And that’s kind of sad.
3/10
(Jeez, im calling this right now: Next Anniversary im
picking something a lot more positive to review…maybe not something live action
either…dammit why’d I have to review the Rurouni Kenshin Trilogy back to back).
No comments:
Post a Comment