FINAL FANTASY VII : ADVENT CHILDREN

Country: Japan
Release Year: 2005
Genre: CGI Animation / Sci-Fi / Action / Adventure
Lanugage: Japanese
Running Time: 101 minutes

[Cast]
Shotaro Morikubo
Steve Staley
Toru Ôkawa
Quinton Flynn
Keiji Fujiwara
Crispin Freeman
Taiten Kusunoki
Yûji Kishi
Dave Wittenberg
Kenji Nomura
Shogo Suzuki
Masahiro Kobayashi
Kazuyuki Yama
Yumi Kakazu
Greg Ellis

[Music Composer]
Nobuo Uematsu

[Art Director]
Yusuke Naora

[Directors]
Tetsuya Nomura
Takeshi Nozue


If there's ever a movie to be made to do justice to its original idea, in this case a world cult phenomenon that is FINAL FANTASY VII for the first generation Playstation.

FINAL FANTASY VII:ADVENT CHILDREN (2005)
Is that film.

Unlike the 2001 CGI fantastique FINAL FANTASY:SPIRITS WITHIN(2001), FINAL FANTASY VII:ADVENT CHILDREN pays homage to the groundbreaking Playstation RPG classic that was released way back when...1997 to be exact! I know...I stood in one of the many lines that formed the release day of the Playstation game.

SQUARE-ENIX has never disappointed in terms of the storyline, although convoluted at times it never deterred me from enjoying their masterful creation, and unsurpassed storytelling. In terms of their CGI mastery? Well...let me put it this way. Disney, Dreamworks SKG, and PIXAR has got nothing on them!!!

Period.

Hayao Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli does but then again they're mostly traditional hand-drawn animation, and not so much CGI. Then again, Miyazaki-san doesn't need to!

FINAL FANTASY VII:ADVENT CHILDREN has set the standard for ultimate CGI wizardry.
But let's not get ahead of ourselves shall we? Okay. First. The storyline stays true to the Playstation game in fact, it continues from where the game left off. A casual viewer who isn't familiar with the game will still enjoy it's wonderul absorbing storyline, and jaw-dropping computer animation. However...viewers who aren't familiar with the series will lack that certain special 'Oomph!'

Gamers, you know what I mean!!!



But, for the viewers slash gamers out there who watches this flick will no doubt get a very explainable kick out of the many homages SQUARE-ENIX, has scattered throughout the movie. There are many, many references to the game for example:
there's a battle scene between Tifa, and one of the Kadaj brothers and after the scene a barely audible but familiar jingle comes into play.

This is no surprise but, the very clever way SQUARE-ENIX has incorporated this, and many other familiar themes exclusively for us...gamers is without-a-doubt a personal thank you to all who has enjoyed not just the Final Fantasy VII series but the entire Final Fantasy Franchise.

(Pic courtesy of IGN)

Now to the technical side. The CGI. What can I say? It's almost as if you're watching a FMV intro of one of their FINAL FANTASY GAMES except for a whole 101 minutes!!! The CGI's are Jaw-dropping to say the least, you won't believe your eyes!
Everything from facial expressions, body motion, the environments everything is so life-like.



The fact that SQUARE-ENIX was able to include every single main characters in the game was an absolute blast to watch, seeing them in full action is a complete and utter amazement!!! I was yelling and screaming when I saw my favorite character YUFFIE, what a hottie! Even seeing the aeon BAHAMUT (dragon that is summoned to assist in battles) in full motion glory is stunning! This is how a game-based movie is supposed to be done!!! If only there were able to include all of the aeons in the game, now that would be sweet! SHIVA, anyone???



The music. Thanks to Nobuo Uematsu. The music is so vivid, and so rich that it makes this movie all the more engrossing. Let's face it, the music element is important in the games, and indeed in the movie there's no exception. The music composition is Nobuo-san's best work yet.

It features many intense action scenes that does the series the justice it desrves. If only the games turned-based battle scenes is as intense! But anyways, action fans will love it, drama fans will enjoy it, and gamers will embrace it.



My rants, and ravings will not do this movie justice. All I can say is, "GO, SEE THE MOVIE!!!" I can't stress this enough. "GO SEE THE MOVIE!!!" Although I do have one suggestion, that is watch the FINAL FANTASY VII:ADVENT CHILDREN in its original Japanese language. With english subtitles of course for all you non-japanese speakers so don't cheat yourself!!!



Kudos to SQUARE-ENIX, FINAL FANTASY VII:ADVENT CHILDREN will remain for a long time as one of their many monumental achievements to come.