Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within
Twenty five years after it came out, I’m not sure how much “Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within” has to do with the iconic video game series. I know that it is directed by Hironobu Sakaguchi, who also created the series (and wrote the original story), but in terms of the mythology of the franchise, I do not know how much it fits in. What I do know is that I appreciate the visual imagination of this film a lot, and it possibly should be better remembered than it is.
Fully CG-animated feature films had only been around since 1995, and none of them really attempted to make photorealistic human characters. Sakaguchi and the animation team at Square had already began doing things like this in the games, and- when it comes to the movie- they decided to bring that to cinemas. I believe this is my first time watching the film since July 2001, and it probably should be spoken about in the same vein as other CGI-animated films that have attempted photorealistic humans. In fact, I would almost say it does a better job than Robert Zemeckis’s animated films (“The Polar Express,” “Beowulf” and “A Christmas Story”) did in that department. (Although I’m still a staunch defender of “Beowulf.”) Yes, the uncanny valley effect in the eyes is still there, but I do think Sakaguchi and co. do an admirable job attempting to bring humanity to these artificial characters.
Dr. Aki Ross (voiced by Ming-Na Wen, which I completely forgot about) is a scientist on a desolate Earth. The year is 2065; years before, the Earth had a meteor land on it that hosted an alien species they know as Phantoms. Ross has been having dreams for a while now about the Phantoms, and conflict between them and humanity. That is how we meet her. While there are military forces that simply want to annihilate the Phantoms using a space-based weapon known as Zeus, Ross and her mentor, Dr. Sid (Donald Sutherland) are looking to the Earth for guidance. Aki goes out searching for “spirits” that, when combined, could help eliminate the Phantoms. The thinking is that the lifeforce of the Earth and living species, known as it’s “Gaia”- which is what the Phantoms consume- is the key to restoring Earth. On one expedition, Aki is confronted by a former romantic partner, Captain Edwards (Alec Baldwin), and his squad, who then gets immersed in the questions of whether a military action, or one based in science, will be decided by the remaining living council of humanity.
I wrote in my Repertory Revue of “Atlantis: The Lost Empire” lamenting how Hollywood animation studios didn’t really embrace science fiction as a viable genre, and yet, in the early 2000s, there were attempts to do so. I had completely forgotten about “The Spirits Within” as one of the attempts, and rewatching it, it’s certainly the boldest attempt. While very much rooted in science fantasy, it feels like an ambitious experiment to bring a Japanese sensibility to the genre- which anime had embraced for decades before- into wide release American cinemas. Working from a story by Sakaguchi, the screenplay is by Al Reinart (an Oscar nominee for “Apollo 13”) and Jeff Vintar (who would later work on Alex Proyas’s “I, Robot”), and it does a very good job of distilling the thematic concepts of the best anime for an American audience. Yes, visually the film feels like a video game the viewer is unable to play, but the images- especially Aki’s dreams and the Phantoms themselves- are breathtaking to take in. And Elliot Goldenthal’s score is ethereal and epic, capturing the imagination of the film beautifully. (In fact, Goldenthal’s score being isolated on the DVD- with his commentary- is why I purchased the movie on DVD.) The cast (which also includes Ving Rhames, Steve Buscemi, Peri Gilpin, James Woods and Keith David) does a good job injecting as much emotion into these characters as it can, but what you will take away from this film is the world it creates, even if it feels slightly out of reach because of the way it was created, and how new it was.
In doing some cursory research back at the film for this review- in part, trying to answer the question I began this review with- I was reminded that Roger Ebert really admired this film’s visuals, and I can see why. Yes, the technology had a ways to go, but simply from a worldbuilding standpoint, “The Spirits Within” really did fit into his wheelhouse of what he appreciated about science fiction, and the opportunity for new images. Rewatching it now, that is very much what sticks out to me.
