Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within

It is not uncommon for technically irreproachable productions to have poor acceptance by the public and critics. This could be due to there are movies that require a certain effort for understanding and those that are easy to consume. When trying to mix the two, rejection is inevitable. It was possibly what happened with the animation “Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within” (USA / JAP , 2001). However, this film deserves to be revisited, not only for the technical sophistication with which it was made, but for the history, curious and outside Hollywood standards.

How is it possible that an animation generated by the most advanced computer graphics techniques, full of action scenes and with a beautiful soundtrack has fallen into this situation? The answer must lie in the plot, which involves aliens, spirituality and an apocalyptic environment. Add to that being based on a video game, which hardly results in good adaptations for the cinema.

The plot takes place on Earth, at the end of the 21st century. The planet had been invaded by strange beings, coming in a meteor, which fell in Central Europe. Unknown invaders kill all living beings, taking over their souls. It was only after many losses that humans, thanks to a more open-minded scientist, were able to discover a type of energy that, not only could protect humans, but also reach invaders. This energy, called bio-ethereal, was generated from microscopic organisms and provided not only the input for the machines to work, but they were also the machines themselves. It is as if it were a virtual-real reality.

A young scientist, Aki, has recurring dreams about the invaders in their original world, and seeks a way to nullify the energy that keeps the aliens alive. To do this, she needs to collect eight different spirits, whose combined energies can defeat the invaders.

At the same time, General Hein, bellicose and vindictive, wants at all costs to use a powerful weapon, stationed in Earth’s orbit, to destroy the invaders. Scientists try to deflect him from this idea, showing that this attack will only strengthen the enemy, since it is formed of pure energy. Indifferent to the appeals, the general obsessively continues his campaign, even causing the destruction of the barrier city of New York, just to justify the need for the attack.

While the general continues in his madness, Aki and a former boyfriend, Captain Gray, search for the two missing spirits to complete the “ecological” solution to the problem. Needless to say, the two are on target and at the exact moment of the general’s attack. To find out the rest, please watch the movie.

“Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within” represented an ambitious computer graphics project for the time, which brought the universe of the eponymous video game to the screens of the cinema with extreme realism. But as animations, even sophisticated, are still regarded by adults as child program, this movie bumped in the absence of a public able to understand the complexity of the concepts presented.

Lately, the movie industry understood that it is not enough to imitate reality, it is necessary to show it in an attractive way. Subsequently, Pixar took charge of consecrating computer graphics, with successes such as “Toy Story”, “Monsters Inc” and many others .

For those who enjoy physical media, both DVD and Blu-Ray have an exquisite edition on this movie. The screen format is the cinema original, anamorphic widescreen, and the sound features both English and Portuguese, both in Dolby Digital 5.1. On the disc, in addition to the film, comments from the co-director and the team are available. As Extras, the edition brings Making Of, Scenarios and Objects, Alternative openings, director’s comments, character files, vehicle scales, Editing Final Fantasy, Trailer research, First tests, Character transformation, Isolated soundtrack, storyboards and drafts, and, even the full script of the film! An extra fun is a glimpse of the “recording errors” of some scenes in the film.

“Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within”, which took four years and 137 million dollars to complete, deserves to be watched calmly, not only for the exquisite special effects, but mainly for its dense and intricate plot, showing that, in most cases, the enemy is not out there, but within each of us.