Hey folks, Harry here... I've recently been doing quite a bit of spying on Final Fantasy and learning quite a bit about it. They had the first test screening last night, and this review is unfortunately the vibe I think we'll see from most folks on FINAL FANTASY. From personal knowledge I feel the movie is better than this review tells... Basically the film will be very Eastern in thought... almost like a Buddhist Science Fiction film. In much the same way that GHOST IN THE SHELL and PRINCESS MONONOKE were not for all American taste... this film, from what I know, is also a bit deeper and less action than many are expecting. As for the whole 'photoreal' bs that the marketing on this film has been promoting. This is HYPER-REAL... It is a different aesthetic, somewhere between TOY STORY and REALITY... Since it is the first film of its type, it will take some getting used to, and perhaps some never will... But for now... here's the first review anywhere that I've seen for FINAL FANTASY.

Sometimes you can show a movie too early. And the gutless wonders at Sony with their sad dependence on testing brought out Final Fantasy too soon. I was really, really excited (you'd have to be to go out to Chatsworth) when I heard the rumors about a Final Fantasy showing. I had to be there.

Now I wish I hadn't. Whatever Final Fantasy turns out to look like in the end, the bad vibe coming out of this premature showing will haunt it forever.

For those of you who haven't been paying attention, Final Fantasy is a movie based on the hit video game and the first computer-animated movie attempting to be completely "photo-realistic." And the movie starts off by trying to live up to its billing. The main character, Aki, is featured from the get-go. She looks very unique, beautiful--you'd like her. Okay, maybe her hair doesn't move quite right but who's counting? A kick-ass animation job. Kudos to Square.

Then she opens her mouth.

This was the first worrying thing about Final Fantasy. None of the supposedly "photo-realistic" characters move their mouths with any sort of realism. Almost like badly-dubbed Kung-fu flick. But it is distracting--and takes you right out of the movie. I'm praying this is because the film isn't finished yet. Maybe the mouths are the last to get fully animated. But if not...goodbye photorealism.

The plot is well known. The earth has been ravaged by an alien invasion courtesy of a nasty meteor. These alien phantoms freely roam the earth sucking the lifeforce out of everything. Humans can only survive in "barrier cities" (cities enclosed in a forcefield) or by shooting the hell out of the numerous phantoms. Aki (ably voiced by Ming-Na), the young protege of Dr. Cid (Donald Sutherland's voice), are part of a politically-sensitive scientific program to defeat these phantoms with the bio-energy waves all lifeforms give off. Aki collects what few plants and animals she can find still alive in the barren wastelands of the earth in order to find the correct bioenergy wave. (A little complicated, but think of it as using the Force.) Meanwhile evil Army General Hein (voiced by James Woods) is eager to do away with Aki & Dr. Cid's project and blow the hell out of the phantoms with his huge space cannon, the Zeus project.

Needless to say, Aki's occupation is very hazardous but she is saved from the phantoms by a group of marines, led by her old flame, the chisel-featured Captain Grey. (Grey and the rest of the other characters are as generic as Aki is interesting. Alec Baldwin, Steve Buscemi, Ving Rhames, and Peri Galpin's vocal talents are wasted on these extremely dull characters.) Aki's life is further complicated because she's been infected by a phantom (kinda like in Aliens) which is causing her to have weird dreams of another planet and perhaps think like a phantom.

Decent plot right? She fights the phantoms and the blood-thirsty Army in an attempt to save the Earth.

That's because I haven't told you the whole thing.

The second and majorly worrying thing about Final Fantasy is how stupid the plot is. The characters are constantly explaining about the Spirits, the Earth's Gaia (it's blue!), Alien Gaia (it is, of course, red) and many other tiring things we don't care about. Why Aki knows she needs to capture exactly 8 life spirits to kill the phantoms is never explained. Perhaps Eight is enough.

The plot is very Japanimation-y. Or as the person behind me so aptly put it, it is full of "metaphysical crap."

Making matters worse, the animation is far from completed. The movie's real strength are the wonderfully detailed backdrops and its dream sequences. But since the movie still had plenty of scenes (even the ending!!!) which were animated with the roughest technique possible (we're talking Atari 2600 here), I couldn't get any sort of feel for how good the animation really is. Why you would let someone view Final Fantasy in anything other than its final form is beyond me. The result is very jarring and definitely hurt all of the opinions coming out of this showing.

Perhaps some of this can be fixed. I want to stress how rough this "cut" was. But I have to tell you, if this movie were live action, it would suck. The plot, characters, and direction are hopeless. Maybe the animation can save it but from what I've seen, I wouldn't count on it.

Bottom line, Final Fantasy isn't Star Wars or Blade Runner or The City of Lost Children or Toy Story. It isn't even The Phantom Menace. It is definitely in Titan AE territory but a little better. If you're a fan of the game I suppose you have to see this, but if you're not, you'll be sorely disappointed.