So, if you have been a huge fan of the Attack on Titan anime, let alone the manga, then you will have to test your patience with the 2015 live action movie, I am not dissuading you from watching this , no, I'm just telling you to do so with the right attitude, The movie is vastly different from the books, and sometimes in a bad way.
The narrative is similar to the original, human population is caged behind giant walls, where they must live in fear of the Titans, huge humanoids that consume humans for reasons that no one can grasp, As a child his mother is eaten by a Titan and this horrific experience cements Eren's life path, He joins the military, learns to fight back and eventually finds out that the Titans are not what they are said to be, Of course, all that fundamentals remain intact but the journey to them is where the movie truly begins
What mainly concerns me is the character changes and the world changes, Some of the characters from the anime were cut, changed, or even entirely replaced with new characters in the movie, the ones who don't necessarily serve the same purpose, if you are a fan of the anime , you will feel that lack of your favorite characters in this movie,The emotional connections you built with those characters over the anime don't transfer here because the people you're watching are essentially different versions of them.
The Titans themselves are really unsettling and I will give them credit for that, There's something deeply uncomfortable about watching these things move, the way they grin with this blank, vacant expression while they're doing the most horrifying things, the practical and visual effects for the Titans aren't perfect by any stretch, but they get the job done in terms of making them feel like a real threat, A few of the action sequences where the military soldiers use their gear to swing between buildings and take on Titans are actually exciting and well shot.
The tone also has a little bit of an unevenness, The original Attack on Titan works because it earns its emotional weight, It's a real death and a real event and it's a really powerful one and it's really memorable, the deaths in this live action movie don't happen in the same way, in parts because you haven't spent enough time with the characters to feel their loss, but also because of the pacing.
Haruma Miura's Eren is best doing what he can with what he has, and at times, it's clear he's trying to play the part that he has to play, However, the script doesn't leave him or anyone else enough space to develop the character of Eren in a way that allows him to be an interesting and complex character in the original story.
But if you come without prior knowledge of the anime/manga, you may prefer these movie to a hard core fan, As a standalone action horror movie set in an interesting world, they're watchable enough, Just enough dramatic moments and eerie scenes in Titan to keep you glued to your seat, It's not a calamity, it's just not as close as the real one.
It's better to go into it curious, because truthfully it's the anime that is the real magic and nothing of this magnitude changes that.
Rating: 80/100
Originally posted through scrobble.life/movies.
