Horrorview.Com: Ghost in the Shell

Ghost in the Shell
(1985)
review by Annoyed Grunt

Sure, I watched Astro Boy and Vultron as a kid, but as the mid 90's rolled around I knew one thing for sure; I hated anime. Manga too. No matter how good the stories might have been, I hated the style. Hey, big eyes and speed lines might be your kind of thing, but I was growing increasingly bitter about the fact that most people knew Ash as a stupid kid with a red hat rather than a chainsaw wielding hero.
However, my stance changed this summer. I was in a used book store looking for cheap Punisher comics when I saw a trade paperback collecting the Ghost in the Shell manga series. I don't know why, but I bought it against all better judgment. And then a funny thing happened. I liked it. I still wasn't the biggest fan of the style, but I really enjoyed the story. Ghost in the Shell had won me over. I no longer hated manga. But anime still sucks, right? Well, shortly after a friend of mine showed me Spirited Away and clips from other Miyazaki films. This stuff was great and although I wouldn't be caught dead at an anime convention, I liked something called Kiki's Delivery Service. I was beginning to think I had been wrong all these years.

And then I saw Ghost in the Shell, one of the most popular anime films of all time.

How's this for a original plot? It's 2029 and the world has changed. Unlike many films, the world is not a post nuclear hell hole. It's a vibrant place and technology had greatly improved the 'corporate state called Japan". There are no robotic skeletons stepping on skulls here, but cyborgs play an important part of every day life. One such cyborg is Major Motoko Kusangi, the leader of a counter terrorism organization known as Section 9. The film follows her through the politically charged climate of the future as they hunt down a mysterious computer hacker known only as "The Puppet Master". Oh, and Motoko explores what it means to be human. Many of the reviews I read loved that last aspect of the film, going so far as to call it "deep" and "powerful". I can see how some people might think so, but that whole subplot was very derivative of Blade Runner. It was covered a lot better in the manga, but I was shocked that Motoko never reached out her hand and shouted "Kinship!"
The plot might sound a little cliched, but it was handled well in the comic. You got to know Motoko and her teammates very well. There's a lot of action, but there was a good deal of humour. Hell, it was deep enough to warrant a dozen pages of endnotes.. The Puppet Master was a subplot that helped keep the story moving and finally paid off in the final issue. Of course, the Anime didn't even come close to capturing the source material. It hit many of the same plot points, but it just seemed like they were going through the motions. You'd figure that an 82 minute long movie would be fast paced, but you'd be wrong. A lot happened, but most of the time it just seemed like filler. There's a sequence that just illustrates different parts of the city. It's about five minutes long and it's just there to establish mood, but it also seems like a way to pad out the running time.
On the commentary track for the second season of the Simpsons somebody said "The animation started looking really good when we had the animators draw people dunking basketballs while riding motorcycles". Ghost in the Shell is the same way; the animation is really good when cool stuff is going on. They take the extra time to make an exploding head look as good as possible. However, during the lengthy dialogue scenes it's the least animated thing this side of that old Hulk cartoon. The characters have the ability to communicate with radios in their heads without saying a word. That's all well and good, but they're standing still while this is going on. Seriously, we're left watching a still frame. And this is supposed to be one of the greatest animated films of all time?
Oh, and the dubbing is horrendous too. They try to have the dialogue match the characters by speaking far too fast, often leaving the viewer confused. I know a lot of the characters are machines, but would it kill the voice actors to show a little bit of emotion? The characters sounded as bored as I was watching them. Even the hardcore fans admit the dubbed version is terrible and maybe it's the greatest thing since sliced bread when it's subtitled, but I doubt it. Either way, I'm in no hurry to find out. To quote a friend of mine, "This should have stayed in the shell".