r/movies • u/LiteraryBoner Jackie Chan box set, know what I'm sayin? • 5d ago
Official Throwback Discussion - Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within [SPOILERS] Spoiler
As an ongoing project, /r/movies will be posting Throwback Discussion threads weekly for the movies that came out this same weekend 25 years ago. As a reminder, Official Discussion threads are for discussing the movie and not for meta sub discussion.
Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001)
Summary
In the year 2065, a scientist races to save Earth from mysterious alien phantoms by searching for eight spirit signatures that may hold the key to humanity's survival.
Director Hironobu Sakaguchi Motonori Sakakibara
Writer Al Reinert Jeff Vintar
Cast
- Ming-Na Wen as Dr. Aki Ross (voice)
- Alec Baldwin as Captain Gray Edwards (voice)
- Ving Rhames as Ryan Whittaker (voice)
- Steve Buscemi as Neil Fleming (voice)
- Donald Sutherland as Dr. Cid (voice)
- James Woods as General Hein (voice)
- Peri Gilpin as Jane Proudfoot (voice)
Rotten Tomatoes: 44%
Metacritic: 49
VOD / Release Theatrical release
Trailer Official Trailer
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u/suckfail 5d ago
I was 19 when this movie came out and I saw it in theatre with my friends.
I really enjoyed it for what it was, and had a great time. It was one of the last movies we saw together as a group of carefree friends so that definitely influences my memory. The time right before we all got jobs and families and.. old haha.
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u/elchucko 5d ago
Hello fellow child of the early 80's... I too saw it with friends in theatres... Reading your comment was like looking at a reflection of myself.
I've hit a point in my life, now that my kids are grown up, where I'm back to enjoying going to movies with friends. I hope you've managed the same, or are at least doing well.
Stay awesome.
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u/jackmusick 4d ago
I went with my shitty step brother, and the only thing I knew from that game was Cloud’s (?) big ass sword. So imagine my surprise as a 10 year old where the movie had no swords.
Same feeling after the end of Avatar wondering when the bald kid was going to show up.
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u/Firetruckpants 5d ago
Aki Ross, (the protagonist), was supposed to be the first Tilly Norwood digital actress
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u/Sparrowsabre7 5d ago
Didn't she get a centerfold in playboy or something? They were really leaning into the "treat her like she's real" thing and I seem to remember a video of her added into bts footage interacting with real people.
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u/MrTeamZissou 5d ago
It was a Maxim spread.
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u/Sparrowsabre7 5d ago
Ah I forgot about Maxim. Those kinds of magazines are pretty much all dead now through a combination of irrelevance due to the ubiquity of internet porn and shifting social attitudes, though a quick Google tells me Playboy has started publishing an annual magazine again, I think they're the only one left and that's gotta be largely down to the wider strength of the brand (all the playboy logo merch etc) more than anything else.
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u/PentagramJ2 5d ago
P sure playboy magazine stopped including porn and is straight up a regular magazine now
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u/Sparrowsabre7 5d ago
That would make a lot of sense. As I say, the brand has been stronger than the magazine for decades now.
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u/TechnoMagi 5d ago
God damn that sure was an movie
I have like 3 copies of it for some reason.
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u/CosmackMagus 5d ago
Is it the same reason I have 4 copies of Lost in Space? The store slipped them into your bag when you bought other movies
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u/norway_is_awesome 5d ago
I used to own it on UDP for the PSP. What a time that was.
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u/Steamedcarpet 5d ago
I will always remember this Boston cab driver who was watching Bad Boys 2 on his PSP that he strapped to the car visor.
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u/Javerage 5d ago
Was watching a UMD movie on the PSP the other day and holy shit I forgot how fucking great the clarity of that screen could be for movies.
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u/Cramtastic 5d ago
I love telling my friends who are big Final Fantasy fans that I have never played a single game in the series, but I have seen two of the movies, this being one of them.
And for all the movie's flaws, it ended up being an influence on the aesthetic of Mass Effect, with the devs saying it inspired the look of the omni tools and holographic consoles, so I'll always be thankful for that.
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u/Steamedcarpet 5d ago
Haha is the second movie Advent Children? That must be so confusing
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u/deep1986 5d ago
Maybe Kingsglaive
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u/Steamedcarpet 5d ago
Haha I forgot Kingsglaive was a thing and I know I watched it.
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u/deep1986 5d ago
I've seen it twice, once with sound and properly watching it. Was completely bored then a year ago I watched it on the dealership TV when my car was being serviced. It was on mute and seemed much more enjoyable
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u/ltcuetf 5d ago
This movie never had a fair shot. 2001 audiences wanted crystals, summons, chocobos, giant swords. They got an original sci-fi story instead. Meanwhile Square was betting photorealistic CGI humans were the future of film, and landed dead center in the uncanny valley, so nobody talked about the story, just how “off” the characters looked.
25 years later, both criticisms were kind of right. It didn’t change cinema like Square hoped, but a lot of the mocap and digital-human tech we take for granted now started with this awkward first step.
Not a hidden masterpiece either though, the script’s got real problems. But way more interesting than its score suggests.
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u/Cramtastic 5d ago
Remembering now that they bet so hard on Aki becoming a "digital actress", she got her own spread in Maxim.
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u/deep1986 5d ago
They tried it again with Lightning as well, having her "model" for a fashion brand (the name of which has completely escaped me)
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u/oneAUaway 4d ago
There could have been other "modeling" deals, but I distinctly remember walking by a Louis Vuitton store and being bewildered to see window displays with huge posters of Lightning from Final Fantasy XIII.
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u/Short-Potential-7630 5d ago
I remember an interview with Tom Hanks where he was pondering whether Digital Actors would become a thing. So it’s the same artificial faces and voices from movie to movie.
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u/Trzlog 5d ago
They named it Final Fantasy, then didn't put any elements of Final Fantasy in it. That's on them.
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u/SoSDan88 4d ago
A rag tag group of warriors have to save the planet by finding a bunch of macguffins, directed by an eco friendly scientist called Cid. The planet is infested with alien spirits from a dead world, and they also must contend with a rabid military ghoul who laughs at the concept of the planet having a soul. By the end of the movie, it is Gaia herself who rises up and sets things right.
Its just FF7 and FF3 smashed together. Do not let the earth setting fool you. Sakaguchis fingerprints are all over it.
But there weren't any chocobos or buster swords and that's all people think final fantasy is, sadly.
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u/cerberaspeedtwelve 5d ago
I remember hearing that the main problem turned out to be hair. Square Pictures vastly underestimated how difficult human hair was to animate. Each hair is affected by movement, wind, head shape, clothing ... and other hairs around it, which makes animation a nightmarish chicken-and-egg situation. Rumor has it that 40% of the rendering time and budget was spent just on Aki's hair. All of the other characters were given buzzcuts and / or hats for this reason.
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u/SATX_Citizen 4d ago
I need to give it another look, without thinking of it as a FF film. I remember feeling exactly like you: I was expecting FFVII the movie. Or was that Advent Children? I forget.
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u/susususussudio 3d ago
I wanted FVII (literally. I thought the two would be related).
Got this movie instead and was like….ok? I didn’t hate it!
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u/Pancake_muncher 5d ago
It was an interesting time when Titan AE, Treasure Planet, and this were steering animation into scifi, but I don't think this has any charm or a sense of adventure those other movies did better.
In the end it's a failed experiment. At least we got a fun joke in Life is Strange with "I don't care, it's the best sci-fi movie ever made"
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u/feyd87 5d ago
Long time Final Fantasy fan here who saw this in theatres as a kid. Aside from the title and having one character named Cid, there’s nothing Final Fantasy about this movie.
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u/Approximation_Doctor 5d ago
At least it got a reference as a boss attack in FF16
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u/RorschachsDream 5d ago
Paladin in XIV also has a move called The Spirits Within too, so I feel like someone on their team is quite fond of it.
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u/nectarousness 5d ago
A bunch of travelers/warriors/healers searching for the macguffins that will bring about saving the world from utter destruction from an evil army whilst an antagonist opposes them and tries to thwart their every move isn't Final Fantasy?
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u/Vertical_05 5d ago
The characters design and setting is far from FF
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u/Howtobefreaky 5d ago
I don’t think its that far from FFXIII imo
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u/Vertical_05 5d ago
For starters, no one is using sword as a weapon, literally everyone is using machine guns.
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u/nectarousness 5d ago
Final Fantasy 8 would like a word...
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u/Vertical_05 5d ago
If you're talking about the gunblade, means you're splitting hair here. Irvine is 1 person among others.
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u/Golgon13 5d ago
Laguna?
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u/Vertical_05 5d ago
Again you're splitting hair here. You added 1 character from the flashback whilst in that said flashback there are 2 other characters that use non firearm.
We're talking about 2 characters out of franchise that spans 16+ titles here.
And I haven't even talked about the fashion design of the characters which usually is distinct and colorful from one to another. While spirits within all have soldier uniform alike with muted colors.
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u/Jealous-Try-2554 5d ago
FF13 hadn't happened yet when Spirits Within released and is generally considered a low point for the series. Terrible pull to try to defend this garbage movie lol.
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u/RegalBeagleKegels 5d ago
Played about 5 hours of FF in my life and it seems like FF to me. It's anime, it's got ghosts, it's got a spooky ruined city...
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u/Solomon_Grungy 5d ago
The marketing for this movie focused on the animations, I recall an ad about the detail for the main characters hair or something. When this was coming out I was confused because it didnt really give me a strong Final Fantasy vibe, like there’s no chocobos or nothing, why use the name?
The movie is pretty fun. Its fine leaving some of the details vague, how and why just aren’t very interesting anyways. Voice cast for this thing was top notch. I’ve watched it recently and enjoyed myself. Is this a thought provoking movie? Not really. Is it a fun one? Oh yeah.
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u/Ok-Ninja-9174 5d ago
I think I finally get it now, after like 20 years. It really was like "Our Final Fantasy cutscenes look like movies" "so lets make a movie" not a 'final fantasy movie' just a 'movie'.
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u/CreatureManstrosity 5d ago
I was very disappointed as a kid when I found out this movie had nothing do with the games despite sharing the name.
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u/Grendel1974 5d ago
Final Fantasy 7 came out in 1997 and was huge. It was not unrealistic to think this movie was going to be SOMEWHAT based on that. I maintain if they'd done that, it would have been a big hit. Maybe not breaking records, but much more fondly remembered than this.
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u/Steamedcarpet 5d ago
It’s crazy how huge FF7 was and why Square went all in on the remake series. For a-lot of people this was there first and only RPG.
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u/sludgezone 5d ago
Beautiful but soulless movie with the most distracting voice acting I’ve ever seen in any film.
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u/AiR-P00P 5d ago
"Whats with her?"
"Whats with her and the captain?"
"Whats with her and that stupid plant?... ... ... what?"
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u/NerdWithAKeyboard 5d ago
I tend to get shit for this, but I love the movie. I've seen it upwards of ten times and I enjoy it just as much every time. Soundtrack is especially good.
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u/SanderSo47 I'll see you in another life when we are both cats. 5d ago
They spent $137 million ($258 million adjusted) on this movie, but none of that money went to a good story or compelling characters.
Technically impressive, but soulless and a chore to sit through.
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u/rednecronomicon 5d ago
My mom rented this from Blockbuster for us to watch as a family. Neither of my parents play video games or watch animated movies. My mom really fucking liked it though and then proceeded to never explore the franchise further. I need to ask them what was up with that.
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u/gotaflattire 5d ago
I saw this in theaters.
Everyone agreed the movie looked great and the story was fine but the people I was with had been Final Fantasy fans for awhile by that point and it really didn't feel like anything from Final Fantasy.
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u/CeeArthur 5d ago
Visually, in terms of animated stuff, I don't think anything this impressive had ever been released up until then. Certainly not feature length.
So boring, just a slog of a watch.
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u/wikiwakatikitaka 5d ago
I think this movie may be considered a technical achievement back then (but even then Toy Story was released in 1995). Unfortunately the movie was really not that interesting, I remember nothing about it.
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u/romonster 5d ago
This was one of the first movies I ever pirated. And off a school computer at that.
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u/Sprinkle_Puff 5d ago
There was too much around this time using this same subject matter. Xenosaga was literally the same exact alien villain.
The fact that the only thing really connected it to the final fantasy universe was only at the very end was also a hindrance.
It should have gone the advent children route and not pushed for theaters.
Maybe we’d still have Squaresoft today
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u/Erikamel 5d ago
I was big into final fantasy at the time, and got my dad to see it with me. I apologized to him afterwards...
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u/HankSteakfist 5d ago
I saw this twice in cinemas as a 14 year old. Loved it both times.
It has a hell of a voice cast, featuring Alex Baldwin, Ming Na Wen, Keith David, Ving Rhames, James Woods, Jean Simmons, Donald Sutherland and Steve Buscemi
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u/MastaGAtomic 5d ago
Holy fuck I haven’t seen this name in ages. I remember when I was younger watching it repeatedly, maybe 10-11 years old or so. I’ve seen it since then but don’t really recall the whole plot or many details, but I remember it stuck with me for a while. Wild to imagine it’s 25 years old now. It actually did a lot to get me into science fiction outside of more common IPs like Star Wars and such. It also gave me what I can recall as being my first feelings of dread seeing the phantoms just…take your whole entire soul. I was dealing with the death of my mother at the time, and as I type this I kind of realize the connection there some. That’s neat.
Anyway I watched the movie again in my early 20s and realized it kinda sucked. Like a lot. Still has some weird feeling of melancholic nostalgia to me however.
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u/Burnouts3s3 5d ago
"That is a tasty plasma. Maybe I could sneak in and watch Final Fantasy: the Spirits Within. I don't care what anybody says; that's one of the best sci-fi films ever made." - Max Caulfield from Life is Strange.
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u/luckyplum 5d ago
I really like this movie even thou I know in my heart that it’s not at all good. My favorite part is how I remember sitting in the theater thinking “hold on, this movie makes absolutely no sense” and right then Steve Buscemi’s character says “hold on, this is startin’ to make some crazy kinda sense.” And I let out a monster belly laugh and the whole theater started laughing along with me. I know it sucks, and it still holds a special place in my heart. I’ll watch it any time.
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u/Armascout 5d ago
Man I don’t have much to say about Spirits Within but if we do one of these on Advent Children I’ll have a lot. That movie rocks so hard even if it’s incomprehensible to anyone who hasn’t played FF7
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u/Gaelfling 5d ago
I remember watching this with my dad and him being confused about the gender of so many characters.
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u/_attina496 5d ago
The most vibes > everything elss movie ever. But the vibes are admittedly really good
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u/AiR-P00P 5d ago
Just watched this a couple weeks ago, haven't seen it in maybe 10-15 years. Still holds up, love the aesthetic.
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u/Thomas_JCG 5d ago
I was so baffled by this movie as a kid. I knew Final Fantasy as the video game with knights and mages, but there was nothing about it in the movie. The plot was weird, and the characters was weird, the action was weird.
But I did like it.
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u/sgt_backpack 5d ago
My only real beef with this film is that they (allegedly) redirected a large amount of available funds from Xenogears to make it. I'm not a disc 2 hater but I'll always wonder what could have been if there was a bigger budget for that game. Who knows, we may have gotten more outside of episode 5.
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u/WorthPlease 5d ago
I watched this when it came out in theatres and was so confused that it was nothing like the final fantasy games I grew up with. It felt like a generic Sci-FI animated movie with Final Fantasy slapped on it for marketing purposes.
I'll have to check it out again.
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u/ChildofValhalla 5d ago
I remember seeing this in the theatre as a kid. Final Fantasy was massive at the time and Squaresoft was on a roll (seriously, look at their output during this era, it's unimaginable these days). The series was such a big part of kid / teen culture at the time that my friends and I would simply say the number of the game when discussing them and we all knew what we were talking about (so I was playing 9 the other day...).
This must have bored us to tears. I don't remember the film very well but I do remember the theatre being empty; my buddy and I sat at the back and did shadow puppets in front of the projector. Several characters on-screen had their noses picked.
I wonder if I'd like it on a re-watch, as an adult.
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u/mrbubbamac 5d ago
Fuck it I loved this movie, was playing a lot of FF8 and FF9 at the time
I thought it was awesome
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u/misterdhm 5d ago
I saw this in the theater when it came out, and while I was a little confused why it didn't seem more of a Final Fantasy movie it sure was an awesome experience. Aki's hair was the most amazing CGI I had ever seen.
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u/CoDe_Johannes 5d ago
The main theme of this movie was beautiful https://youtu.be/uPe_tJPpHKw?si=sJpumUKdeWsG78sj
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u/Current_Panda7591 4d ago
Movie would've been better if it was just called "Spirits Within"
I've gotta say, i love this movie. I'm not a big FF fan as ive only played the first game, however if you separate this movie from the FF brand, it's pretty interesting. The visuals, voice acting and soundtrack are nice, plus this was the main inspiration for Mass Effect, so that's cool.
Might get hate for this but this is my third favorite animated movie from 2001, after Jimmy Neutron and behind Shrek and Monsters, Inc.
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u/kidkolumbo 23h ago
The movie's good. I saw it release month and thought it was dog shit but read online an "umm actually" post about how core established elements of Final Fantasy as a series are in the movie, and decided to give it a spin like 10 years ago. It's actually great. And I bought it to rewatch it more recently and it's still great.
It makes sense to hate a film like this given when in FF's history it came out. RIP the guy who had to quit Square cause of how bad this movie bombed.
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u/Serenaded 5d ago
I loved this movie personally. I watched it for the first time this year and was blown away at how good it was. I'd never heard of it before so assumed it must've been terrible.
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u/Wreck-ItRob 5d ago
Not ashamed to say I own this in 4K. I've always thought it was a cool movie it doesn't have to be amazing to be appreciated!
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u/OrangeJuliusCaesr 5d ago
I’ll go against the grain, there’s a near brilliance to this movie that doesn’t quite hit its mark. Back then there was a portion of the fandom that hated the aesthetic of 7&8 and wanted a movie with goblins and character shouting “firaga!”
This was better than that, but since it failed square pivoted down the path of advent children to what they are today which is unfortunate
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u/Luca_Darc 5d ago
Apparently this served as an inspiration for this music video
https://youtu.be/GgxcvmkPD-I?is=z_C9NP0B1oCQk1CK