VGflicks: Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (Part 1)

There’s quite a bit of history to a movie such as Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. It’s actually ironic as I find everything surrounding the movie more interesting to talk about than the movie itself.

But first the basics. This movie was released in American theaters on July 11th, 2001. It bears the name of Final Fantasy, but instead of being a direct adaptation of any game in the franchise (which would probably require an entire series rather than a mere film), it instead features its own story. It’s implied to be a part of the Final Fantasy series, but the connections stop there. It features the blend of fantasy and science-fiction that the franchise was veering towards at the time (in FFVII in particular). But that’s it; the film feels like Final Fantasy “in name only”.

Picture taken from the sets of the film, as actors in mo-
cap suits were playing their parts.

It’s also known as the first animated film released worldwide featuring photorealistic CGI, a practice that would become a staple of video games years later. Photorealistic CGI in cinema would be used a couple times with performance capture (AKA motion capture, or mo-cap) for entire films, as seen in Polar Express, Monster House, Beowulf, A Christmas Carol, Mars Needs Moms… all movies that have seen ground-breaking success and were never made fun of for crossing into uncanny valley territory. This movie was the first to fully use the technology, thus being a pioneer in this new way to animate movies. For 2001, that’s impressive. And knowing how far the tech has come since, I guess we can thank it for this contribution to the world of animation and special effects. That said, the mo-cap effects here are showing their age in a way that’s fairly noticeable.

The people at Square Pictures had high expectations for this film, hoping to achieve box-office success (of course) but also making plans for the future. The silliest idea, if you ask me, is that of “animated actors” – that is, they were hoping to reuse the models of the human characters in The Spirits Within in other roles in future feature films. We’re not talking “these characters reappear over the course of multiple films”, we’re talking “these models appear in different movies, as different characters”. A few problems with this idea: I can imagine this getting confusing after a while for viewers. CGI technology was improving quickly at the time, so the models would be outdated eventually. And finally, this movie bombed HARD, making 85 million dollars worldwide at the box-office for the 137 million dollars it cost to make. It’s one of the biggest box-office bombs of all time.

They even tried to pass her off
as some sort of top model. 

The movie straight-up takes on the tropes
of horror movies, in the second half.

Doesn’t help that this movie had big hurdles to overcome, some of which are related to its very identity. It’s an animated movie targeted at teenagers and adults, as its subject material is too dark for kids, not helped by its overall look, and the imagery frequently veers into horror territory. In 2001, adult animation was already a thing: movies like Fritz the Cat, Rock & Rule and Heavy Metal existed, and shows like South Park and Family Guy had been running for a few years already. That's not even mentioning the hundreds of anime for older audiences. However, animation was widely considered in the West as a medium only for children, and arguably, it still is to some people nowadays, in spite of several famous adult animated shows making the rounds. In 2001, an adult-oriented animated film was a risky bet. This wasn’t helped by the marketing department not being sure who to market the film towards, which is never a good sign. To adults? To teenagers? To children? The same happened to Don Bluth’s film Titan A.E. just a year prior (as nobody was sure whether it was better suited for kids or teenagers), and that one bombed too. It was thus an uphill battle for Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. And it lost.

That’s for the backstory. Now, let’s focus on the film proper, shall we?

Nowadays it just looks like an average game, but back
in 2001? This was stunning.

The movie begins on December 13th, 2065. Following a devastating alien attack 34 years prior, humanity has suffered great losses. The remainder of mankind lives in cities protected by domes. Our protagonist, Dr. Aki Ross (portrayed by Ming-Na), has been searching with her colleagues for a way to end the invasion. She’s been plagued by strange, possibly-prophetic dreams, which she records in a database.

Okay, as a proof of concept, these first few minutes are fantastic – Aki Ross is one of the most detailed CGI characters I’ve ever seen, from the spots and creases on the skin, to the tiny folds on the hands, the fabric of her clothes, every single eyelid and strand of hair. Those, for the record, were all animated separately, and the movie looooves to show off by having her turn her head and provoke hair motions as often as possible.

As soon as her whole body needs to move, however? Some of her motions feel a bit stilted, mechanical, unnatural perhaps. Understandable, it was the first full film made with mo-cap, they couldn’t get everything right on the first try. There’s a dissonance between the amazing quality of the character models and the lesser quality of their movements, at several moments in the film.

"Can you see the monsters?" "No, they're like ghosts!"

Aki lands her ship in the desolate Old New York City. There’s something to be found here, that may help in the fight against the aliens. Nicknamed Phantoms, they’re invisible; they can’t be seen by the naked eye, so humans patrolling Earth have visors and wrist computers to detect them, along with guns that blast lights to bring those aliens out of hiding, and a different gun that can actually hurt these things. How? I don’t know. As she’s about to be assaulted by an alien, Aki is rescued by the Deep Eyes, a group of soldiers that specializes in hunting and killing these extraterrestrials menaces. She keeps searching for a life force emitting a blue energy. It turns out to be a plant, and after she picks it up she's carried away by the Deep Eyes once they’ve killed the monsters around them.

Good to know that surgery is hands-off in the future.
...Then again, for treating an alien illness...

The Deep Eyes are led by Gray Edwards (voiced by Alec Baldwin, looks like Ben Affleck… for some reason), who has a personal connection to Aki. The members of the team are scanned for any sort of alien infections they may have caught back there, and Gray tests positive. Don’t worry, Aki knows how to operate an alien parasite out of someone, so she does it in just the amount of time needed. Yep, the scene even had a ticking timer, like this thing was a bomb inside the guy. Another scientist, Dr. Sid (voiced by Donald Sutherland), arrives to take Aki to the lab, to analyze the plant retrieved in Old NY.

Time for some much-needed rapid-fire exposition: Dr. Sid was the scientist who discovered the energy signature of the Phantoms, which allowed mankind to develop weapons and measures to defend themselves against the menace. He also theorizes that there's a similar, opposite energy signature within the Earth, dubbed Gaia (basically, the planet’s soul). They need to collect roughly eight “Spirits” containing the Gaia energy, all in different life forms from Planet Earth, and this plant is the sixth one they’ve found. Sid believes that this will allow them to create a ray of opposite energy that will cancel the aliens’ own, destroying them. Got all that? Good! It’ll be on the test at the end of the semester.

Can Donald Sutherland bring a little bit of quality to this whole thing?
Well... he gets points for trying, at least.

If this sounds to you like it belongs more in the domain of faith and esoteric spirituality than in science, you’re correct! Dr. Aki Ross and Dr. Sid don’t sound like very trustworthy scientists when they go off about these theories of “planetary soul” and that maybe it can end the invasion. Not helped by the fact that Sid, in all his great scientific wisdom, incinerates the notebook in which he’s kept all of his research. Because that’s smart.

James Woods, being told to tone it down, when actually
he wants to Hades his way through the movie.

Later we’re at a council held in New NY. One man present, General Hein (voiced by James Woods), just wants to blast the shit out of these aliens with the Zeus Cannon, an orbital ship whose weapon  can shoot a beam of energy down at the planet. Dr. Sid, on the other hand, explains that the aliens came to Earth on a meteor that fell on it, and that blasting that meteor will only cause more aliens to come out while also damaging the planet and its spirit. Then he comes forward with his plan of collecting Spirits.

Sid faces the council’s disbelief until Aki pipes up, saying that there is proof that the Gaia energy can weaken the Phantoms and render them somewhat harmless – and she proves it by revealing that she’s affected by the Phantom illness, the same she cured out of Gray earlier. She was operated by Sid, who created a membrane around the illness, isolating it and making Aki the first Spirit.

After the council, Aki tells Gray about the other Spirits collected. As for General Hein, he orders the Deep Eyes to keep an eye on Aki, allegedly so she stays safe while seeking the last two Spirits. His real goal is to keep her under watch, believing that the alien infection she contains makes her dangerous to other humans, or a traitor to mankind. General Hein, our human villain, everybody – even in alien invasion movies, gotta have one of those assholes.

Christ, those are huge!

A couple days later, Gray and the rest of the Deep Eyes – Jane the tough girl, Neil the jokester, and Ryan the best friend – follow Aki on a mission to retrieve the seventh Spirit. They locate it within the backpack of a soldier found dead in a field, because apparently some of the technology invented to fight off the aliens relies on the energy of living creatures and somehow one of those pieces of tech had Gaia energy inside of it. The alien ghosts here are humongous, and after the Spirit is collected, the group barely has time to escape in a flying ship.

Having your soul literally sucked out of your body
sounds like a pretty crappy way to go.

A masked soldier accompanying them on the ship is actually working for General Hein and threatens them, until Neil drives the ship in such a way that the soldier is struck by a Phantom limb that’s gone through the ship, and we get to see the guy’s soul literally ripped out of his body, then eaten by the ghastly alien creature. Soul, life force, call it whatever you want; that’s a thing ghosts do, apparently. Aki faints due to the Phantom illness inside her, so Grey orders Neil to take them back to Dr. Sid.

Back in New York, Sid operates on Aki while Grey, laying by her side, offers support. And merely by holding her hand, while he’s sedated, he somehow gets to enter into and see her weird dreams. Let’s… let’s not question it. If I stopped to question every single thing that doesn’t ring right in this film, I would need three parts, and I want to keep it short. In the dream, Aki explains that these dreams are a form of communication she receives from the little bit of Phantom sealed inside her body, which is why she’s been recording her dreams – she hopes to make sense of its message before it’s too late. Both Aki and Grey get to witness the alien Spirit’s memories of its own planet blowing up, with a large chunk of it sent across space in the direction of Earth.

Meanwhile, Hein has found Aki’s dream recordings and plans to use them as evidence that Aki is possessed by her Phantom and works for the enemy. He orders Aki, Sid and the Deep Eyes arrested for treason. Why? Because he’s the bad guy, that’s why.

Okay, I’m stopping here for the plot. I’ll continue in Part 2, but before I stop today, I guess I need to bring up what is, so far, the other big issue with the film. Namely, that everything about it is painfully average. The plot tries to combine fantasy and science-fiction, as shown with the borderline-magical aspect surrounding Gaia, the Spirits and the Phantoms, as well as the technology (tools, weapons, force fields, etc.) invented by humans to fight off the threat. Both parts… don’t mesh too well. The resulting mix is confusing, and at times completely nonsensical.

Now pictured: Ryan and Jane reacting to what Neil, the resident idiot,
just said.

What else is average? The characters. For the most part, there isn’t anything all that interesting about most of them. The Deep Eyes are each a common horror movie character type – the ex (Grey), the funny guy (Neil), the tough girl (Jane), the best friend and token minority (Ryan). Aki is bland, and Dr. Sid isn’t convincing as a man of science. James Woods, as General Hein, acts like he was told to remain calm and composed, when really he’s itching to play Hein (an enemy who’s anything but subtle) as a yelling, hyperactive madman. The film attempts to explain his behavior, stating that he lost his wife and daughter in the attacks – but considering everything he does, it doesn’t get him the least bit of sympathy.

Had the technology allowed it, this could have just been
done with live-action actors and special effects around
them. But no, it has to be mo-cap CGI.

That’s for the personalities; when it comes to their looks, once again, they’re unremarkable for the most part. Animation allows for character designs that pop out with color and style. We can go overboard because it’s animation; the physical appearance of a character can say so much about them. This movie came out in the same year as Shrek and Monsters, Inc., both of whom have characters with designs that tells the viewer a lot, before these characters even say a word. There’s none of that here. These characters just look like 3D humans, not exaggerated in any way, shape or form, almost like they just scanned the actors and went “Alright, that’s all we need!” The less we say about their delivery of the script, the better!

And if you’re hoping to find any interest in the set pieces or the art direction, well, think again. Per the grim tone of this battle between humans and aliens, damn near everything is set in the greys and browns. There’s not much in terms of colors to be found here. The movie adheres to the “real is brown” mentality that’s been done for several “realistic” games. The result is uninteresting to watch. I get that there’s only so much color to be had in a post-apocalyptic scenario, but damn.

Anyway, I’ll be back in Part 2.