Moustroll Good movie but grossly overrated

Organnall Too much about the plot just didn't add up, the writing was bad, some of the scenes were cringey and awkward,

Micah Lloyd Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

Yvonne Jodi Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

Sharon Kerr-Bullian I picked this up on a lark because the cover was three hot Japanese babes, and the flick was directed by the same guy behind Ghost in the Shell. For a bargain bin find, it was well worth it.I'll say straight away, if you're not into hard sci fi (especially written hard sci fi), you're probably going to find it dragging and dull, and you're going to hate the intro.If you don't really like Japanese movies/anime/manga, you might struggle to like this film. If this is your first Japanese movie, put it down, and go pick up Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children instead, it has a more universal appeal, and fewer long scenes that don't advance the plot.The basic plot: The world had some big problems, there was a big economic collapse, wars, stuff like that. Afterward, the world fell into a kind of dark ages where everything (technology especially) stagnated. People were no longer satisfied with their lives in the false utopia that followed all the problems. A lot of them found an outlet for their most basic human emotional needs in a video game named Avalon. This movie follows a group of players in a second imagining of Avalon, named Avalon-F, which is basically a MMO/Hunting game on steroids. The characters all start off trying to solo a big boss, which the game informs them is not really possible. However, the gamers are stubborn and want the glory/advancement for themselves, and it takes them a while to come around to working together. The movie is about them finally coming to the decision to work together, and the struggles, internal and external they go through in the process.There are lots of long, pretty shots where you don't see anything that advances the story in a meaningful way, just gives you things to think about. I enjoyed it, I like meandering around in video games and exploring my surroundings, so for a movie about a video game to do that was fun for me. That said, if you're a passive viewer who doesn't like sitting around waiting for action to happen, this movie is not for you.I loved the costume design. Lucifer in particular was great. She appears to have feathers for hair, which will make sense if you keep watching. I love the personal moments that show this character having fun, she's a pretty character, and looks like she really enjoys herself in this virtual world. She finds unexpected ways to have fun, considering the premise of the video game she's playing.My biggest complaint about this movie comes from the choice of having the actors wear masks, but not recording their voices in a recording studio later. It makes their speech very hard to follow because it's muffled all the time. Movie making 101 should have told the director not to make that mistake.Overall, it's a good movie, and it hits all the right points for me. If you can pick it up cheap and like sci fi and Japanese movies, go for it.

keal I'm a fan of Oshii's Avalon. The haunting music, the subdued colors, the quiet, restricted lifestyle of the main characters, Oshii's quirky little games of putting things like dogs and statues through the film, making you wonder why they're there. Not to mention the scene where Stunner chows down on eggs and sausage, and we watch the whole meal.It's all there in Assault Girls! This seems to be a direct sequel to Avalon. Same haunting music, subdued colors, quiet characters... yep, there's a dog, a statue, and now, a snail (poor snail goes through a lot!) Of course, there's a scene where someone's chowing down on eggs and sausage.Yes, the pace is slow. But beautifully colored skies, people meandering around the landscape, solemn music, really gets you into a contemplative state. If that's all there was to the movie, I'd agree, it's a boring way to spend 70 minutes. But there's a point to this.**SPOILER ALERT** The bulk of the movie has the 4 main characters pondering having to work as a group to get to the next level of the game they're playing. They can't do it individually. So, near the end of the movie, they get together.They kill the monster.Here's the best, and I swear, most unexpected ending. It all happens in the last couple minutes of the flick All the players are racing to get out of the game, first one out gets all the spoils of war. But the main player with the big gun, doesn't have a way out of the game. Everyone's laughing at him. You think to yourself, what a way to step on someone that helped you out. He agreed to split the reward, but looks like he's getting nothing for his efforts.Then he blows a fuse, and shoots down all the other players, yelling that he's going to become a player-killer! So in the end, everyone gets screwed, and it's an all out war between the players.A quiet, slow-paced film with a hell of a twist in the end that made me laugh so hard my sides hurt! The guy's 'I've had it with this game!' face as he unleashed his ammo on everyone was just so funny, I kept rewinding and laughing.EDIT: If you haven't watched Avalon (you don't have to) you might have a harder time tolerating the utterly strange elements in the film. Why use Japanese actors and force them to speak English? What's with the semi-cheesy cgi? Here's a little trivia. Director Oshii has a long-standing peeve about Japan's insistence that movies from their country should be in Japanese language. Why he's over the top about this, I don't know. But he purposely made the film Avalon with Polish actors speaking Polish, and now this follow-up with Japenese actors speaking English. I think it's great.My one complaint about this film, along with Avalon, is that they're both poorly marketed and advertised. Very misleading. Both films should be packaged together, along with a short documentary or interview with the director, explaining the mysteries of the films.Avalon and Assault Girls, my 2 favorite movies of all time. Can't wait for Oshii's next meditative sci-fi adventure!

mmushrm This is a bad movie. Honestly this movie is a big waste of time and not in a good way. Its slow, its boring and its pointless.The starting 8minutes is someone Japanese guy narrating, in English, some pseudo psychology about humanity and war and how people escape into the virtual world for their excitement and of course killing. The guy drones on with only still images on screen.Then the movie starts and this is where I give the movie major points, the CG is very very well done. amongst the best I have seen thus far in regards to flow, texture etc. (otherwise I would've given this movie a 1).The Characters...lets just say there is no character development. You only see the characters (avatars) as they are in the virtual world. One of the characters, Lucifer (crow girl) seems to be there only to fill up space. No idea why she seemingly dances (badly) for no reason. Hard to believe that she is actually an Oscar nominated actress.The plot is they are going to kill some giant worms for points. Thats it. Like I said some of the shots are very well done, CG and live landscape shots. But pointless and slow, a lot of just walking around. I mean at least half the movie is walking around aimlessly with landscape shots and shots of a snail.For those of you old enough to remember video games (before CG really took off circa early-mid 90s) where the cut scenes were real actors (wing commander, privateer etc), this movie is like that.Waste of time. watch it for the CG and some nice landscape shots but have your remote handy to fast forward the movie.

latinwolf316 Just saw this movie at the New York Anime Festival and it was a major disappointment, making me wish I didn't waste time waiting to see it when I could have gone home sooner. The first 15-20 minutes of the movie had a narrator describing the economic conditions leading up to this video game world. This should have and could have been done in less time. The few fight scenes that there were in this movie were very short. Some people walked out within the first 30 minutes of this movie and the remaining audience started giving this movie the MST 3000 treatment. I don't think anyone watching this movei liked it going by the audience responses. It takes more than trying to look artsy to make a movie, there has to be some plot and this movie really had none. Really I've seen porn movies with more plot than this stinker.