Ghost In the Shell

Ghost In the Shell

Based on the beloved classic anime film of the same name from 1995, Ghost In the Shell (2017) is a live action take on the same story with lead actress Scarlett Johansson taking the role of "Major". The story follows Scarlett's character, who was saved by scientists from death by having her brain put into a robotic shell to keep her alive, the first of her kind. With her new body and skills, she is eventually made into a super soldier type character who is used to stop terrorist acts of sorts around the city. During one of her missions, she stumbles upon a hacker who leads her to question more than she is supposed to, leading her to question the truth about her existence.

Where Ghost in the Shell truly stands out is in it's visuals. They did a very good job recreating the cool and unique cyber-punk world from the original film. The city really feels like a futuristic, sci-fi city with lots of bright neon lighting and holograms, cool technology and vehicles, but still having the feel of a modern Tokyo-like city. I think they captured the setting of the original anime film very well, and thanks to modern film making technology, it looks amazing in the live action setting. Scarlett's character was also well done with the CG, there were cool scenes where you get to see her being formed that looked very nice. The visuals definitely made this a film worth watching in the theatre.

The story is where the film can struggle a bit. Scarlett is really the only memorable part of the movie, as all the other characters don't really have a lot of time in the movie or are just not very fleshed out. The closest thing we get is her partner "Batou" who is the character she spends the most time with, still not really a lot of time, because the only thing we really learn about him is he cares about Scarlett's character and he likes dogs. The film chooses to focus on one major aspect of Scarlett's character and that's her figuring out her humanity. The humanity story can be interesting and it makes sense from her position as a human brain inside of a cyborg body, but it also got boring at times and it felt uninspired at times as well. The action scenes were also done well enough, thanks to the visuals used throughout and the cool world. The visuals and action aren't always enough to make up for the way the story progresses, sometimes some scenes being boring despite of the visuals. 

Scarlett is one of the reasons to give this movie a shot, she does try with what she's given to work with and she does a good job for the most part. The other reason is how beautifully unique the visuals and effects are, and how the city feels like a real living and breathing futuristic place. It's sad to say the story could be weak at times and a lot of the characters felt unmemorable, but it still all works well together to make a good movie. It's definitely worth a watch just for the visuals alone, and the story is put together well enough to keep you going for the two hours this film lasts.

Grade: C+ , Visually fantastic. Passable Story.