As a Ghost in the Shell fan I expected the worst and based on the initial reviews I was expecting to be proved correct, however after watching it by preconceived bias was blown away. It was a good movie, not as good as the original 1995 Ghost in the Shell movie, but that bar is so high few movies would qualify. Scarlett Johansson was almost perfect in the role, the only issues was she lacked the "Dirty Harry" confidence of the original movie. However in this movie she was only beginning her career, while in the 1995 movie she was an old timer who was ending her career, so that can be explained. The technique of having Aramaki speak Japanese worked, although he mumbled too much and I originally though he was speaking mandarin. I gave up trying to understand his Japanese and simply read the subtitles instead. When I saw Togusa for the first time, that fact he was Japanese confused me. For those who watch Japanese anime, almost everyone looks like a Caucasian, so I was use to that look. However once I realised why I was confused it all worked very well, as if I was watching an all-Japanese cast anime movie, such as Black Butler (which is also excellent). The only real issue was too much was being covering in the movie; it was too fast and lacked the feeling of the original 1995 movie as a result. You could easily resolve it by extending the movie and if I owned the rights that is what I would do, perhaps create two movies from the material. That way you could capture the slow motion and surreal scenes of the original movie, such as when Motoko rises up from the water. As for the controversy about race, we are not dealing with any type of objectivity. I simply ignored any of those comments as those who make them clearly lack an understanding of anime. Saying that it was good the movie was set in Japan and Aramaki reported to the prime minister, rather than the president. 優れた In summary, a good movie with excellent potential, which could have been done better and which could easily be reworked to remove the major issues outlined above.
Review of Ghost in the Shell
