Seen: April 26th, 2007
Format: DVD
Rating: 4
I played Final Fantasy VII a long time ago on what was the only Playstation at the time. I rushed through it though, and really wasn't up to the final battle, which I never completed.
Thus is my geek cred thoroughly flawed.
Basically, this one is for the fan boys. The storyline was lost with a whole bunch of other junk somewhere in my hind brain, but I remembered enough to get the gist. But this wasn't really enough to enjoy it.
I'd imagine that you'd have to have lived this world via hundreds of hours of game time and hundreds more on forums, chat groups and at conventions to really completely follow what's going on here. I didn't. I got bits and pieces, and the basic story, but there was a whole lot of questions that I was left with. The fact that I didn't really care about the answers shows you where I'm at.
The animation is good. It's a little dated, but consistent with the style of the previous film and the cut scenes. The scope is grand and majestic. The visuals rich and vibrant.
The editing is a bit of a nightmare. It watches much more like a video game than a film. This means interesting camera angles and movements, which is great. But it also means frenetic editing, which makes watching many of the fight sequences very difficult. This is a DVD that probably would be better viewed on a small screen. On my large screen there's just too much going on. I actually switched from the Japanese soundtrack to the English one about five minutes into the film (which I rewatched) as I was finding it difficult to both watch the film and read the subtitles. This is a big compromise for me, as I'm a stickler for watching foreign films in their original dialogue.
In the end, see this if you're a serious FF7 fan, someone very interested in computer animation, especially as it pertains to gaming or perhaps interested in alternate mythos, especially of the Gaia form. Maybe you'll like it better.
The Good: Fanboy Panacea
The Bad: Gratuitous character inclusion
The Ugly: Spastic battle sequence jump cuts
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