Rating: PG-13
Runtime: 2 hours, 2 minutes
Director: Robert Rodriguez
Quick Impressions:
“Look on the bright side, at least your tears are working.”
When I heard that line (perfectly delivered by Christoph Waltz), I decided, “Okay, this movie is beginning well. Maybe it actually has something to say.”
But then almost two hours later, I started to worry, “Wait! Maybe it has too much to say! It is going to end eventually, right? Maybe the movie doesn’t know it has to end!”
And then panic set in. “Wait! James Cameron co-wrote and produced this, right? Does that mean we can expect fifteen sequels which will arrive in ten to twenty years? Are we going to get a theme park before a sequel?”
There had better be a sequel! The theatrical trailers left me with the distinct impression that this was an original film and a stand alone movie, but when the end credits rolled, I discovered it was neither.
Alita is based on a Japanese cyberpunk manga series called Gunnm (which explains why the story is so visually rich and inventive). As long as this movie isn’t a Titanic-sized disaster (I mean like the doomed voyage, not the wildly popular film), James Cameron plans to make two sequels. Of course, you never know with him.
I’m still waiting on those Avatar sequels, but I will admit that the Pandora section of Disney’s Animal Kingdom is gorgeous (plus my daughter bought her coolest souvenir there). I also think that Alita has a visual aesthetic that would be right at home in Animal Kingdom or even in neighboring Epcot. Iron City already looks like it was designed by Disney Imagineers. (I don’t mean that as an insult, either. It looks amazing!) And you know, maybe all this glib talk of mine isn’t so far-fetched. The film opens with the flash of a 26th Century Fox logo. Surely all the ink will be dry on Disney’s acquisition of Fox by then. Maybe we will see a cityscape from Alita at a Disney Park in the future.
The Good:
I’ve long felt an affinity for fellow Texan Robert Rodriguez, but while I’ve never hated any of his work, it’s also true that I’ve never loved it. In the past, I always had massive respect for the way Rodriguez did everything himself. He wrote, directed, produced, scored, shot, edited…you name it. (I’m surprised he didn’t play all the parts himself! In that one Spy Kids sequel in 4D, he probably supplied all the smells for the scratch-and-sniff card!) You can’t help but admire somebody who takes total ownership of his projects that way. But for Alita, Rodriguez simply directs the film, leaving the other tasks to different people, and judging by the results, I’d say that’s for the best.
This is by far the best Robert Rodriguez movie I’ve ever seen.
I’ve flippantly mentioned that the movie looks like it’s set in a Disney park, but what you should take away from those jokes is that Alita‘s visuals are outstanding. Iron City is so atmospheric. Watching, I thought of Blade Runner, Inception, Casablanca, Romeo and Juliet, Castle in the Sky, WALL-E, and other atmospheric films that escape me at the moment. (Brief glimmers of association would flicker through my head. This is the kind of movie that reminds you of so many different things that it can only be its own thing.) (Nobody ever says, “This is a total ripoff…of these 865 existing works!”)
The story also seems to take inspiration from various other films and stories. First I thought, “Hey! It’s Pinocchio!” (It kind of looks like that one, too.) Then I realized, “Now it’s starting to remind me of that 80s movie we watched with my older son when he was little with Star from Lost Boys…” (It’s Solarbabies I was reaching for, though it’s actually even more like Rollerball.) It’s a little bit like Labyrinth. (You can’t trust anyone. People are always staring out out windows across an intricate landscape. Jennifer Connelly is there!) But every time I thought I knew what famous film Alita was cribbing from, the story would shift and remind me of a completely different film. Now that I know it’s adapted from a manga series, that kind of story mixing and genre mashing seems less surprising. But it’s definitely the most polished and mature work I’ve seen from Robert Rodriguez. (This might have less to do with his maturity as a filmmaker and more to do with the size of his budget.)
The casting of the movie almost made me laugh, but non-Oscar buffs might not even notice that the entire supporting cast of Alita is made up of actors acclaimed for their supporting prowess. There’s two-time Best Supporting Actor winner Christoph Waltz, soon-to-be two-time Best Supporting Actor winner Mahershala Ali, Best Supporting Actress winner Jennifer Connelly, Best Supporting Actor nominee Jackie Earle Haley, and two time Best Supporting Actor nominee Edward Norton.
With a cast like that, I would hope Rosa Salazar felt very supported. She makes a compelling lead. (She’s a much nicer person here than in Bird Box.) From a technical perspective, the motion capture is also flawlessly done. I began the film extremely aware of it, thinking things like, “Imagine Andy Serkis’s despair if they give Salazar an Oscar!” and “Oh wow! They gave her big pores like mine! So sometimes even cyborgs get big pores!” But as the movie went on, I found myself often forgetting about the motion capture. There’s a line where Alita’s friend Hugo tells her, “You’re the most human person I’ve ever known.” And that’s how I thought of her, too, as a human girl with exceptionally big eyes. (Christoph Waltz likes them that way.) (Eek! That sounded sinister! I was only trying to reference to his work in the movie Big Eyes in a humorous way! Not sure I pulled that off.)
I spent most of the movie trying to place the actor who plays Hugo. (I was sure he must have been a famous child actor who grew up.) As it turns out, his name is Keean Johnson, and I’m not familiar with his work. I did like his performance here, though (despite the fact that I had some frustrations with the character).
To me, the most baffling thing about Alita is its February release date. As long as they go in knowing that this is only the first part of a planned trilogy, fans of the genre (or any one of the cluster of related genres represented) will like this movie. I’m sure people would have paid to see it in the summer, and a summer release date would have encouraged more people to take a chance on it. (Maybe I’m the only one who thinks that way.) But maybe we’re supposed to latch onto the Romeo and Juliet (and maybe Pinocchio and Geppetto) aspect of the story and think of this particular installment of the Alita franchise as a movie for Valentine’s Day.
It does have really heavy echoes of Romeo and Juliet at more than one moment, and it ventures into Titanic territory near the end. (My husband and I had so much fun joking about this scene on the car ride home. Funniest was our imagined conversation between producer James Cameron and director Robert Rodriguez of how to handle one heavy-handed moment that seems extremely meme-able.)
Action scenes aren’t really my thing, but I will say that the fight choreography is impressive throughout the film. Some dialogue feels slightly cringe-worthy. But other lines (like the one I quoted at the beginning of this review) feel inspired. (I do think that Alita’s ability to shed tears is a major theme of the movie, and her capacity for empathy is extremely important to Waltz’s Dr. Ido.)
Inventive in a number of ways, Alita continually surprises us with its genuinely unpredictable story. Christoph Waltz gives by far the best performance which is hardly surprising because he also has what is (conspicuously) the best part. (Mahershala Ali makes the best exit, though.)
Best Scene:
Early on, in a single scene, we learn a great deal about both Alita and Dr. Ido. The early part of this scene is fantastic because (unless you’ve read the manga), you truly have no idea what is going to happen next.
Best Scene Visually:
Iron City looks amazing, top to bottom. It’s so detail rich. And I love that enormous unicycle bike Hugo rides. (I realize it doesn’t make sense to call it a unicycle bike, but to call it a unicycle makes it sound old-timey, when actually it looks technologically advanced.
Every scene looks amazing. There’s such depth as we look across the city. The film also makes great use of elevation (not surprising given its themes). We get some epic stares out of windows, and (as you would expect) lots of looking up. But almost ever.y scene features characters lurking at multiple heights and depths. It’s a great way to fill the frame and makes the visual storytelling dynamic and exciting.
The scene of the film that most excited me is the one that’s so different. Abruptly, Alita leaves the city and ventures to a strange place where she finds a massive artifact. (At first I thought the movie was going to veer off in an Empire Strikes Back direction. I kept getting hints of that film, anyway.)
Best Action Sequence:
I love the game near the end when Alita first learns that she’s in danger, then discovers that she’s not the only one.
I also like the final scene of Tanji (Jorge Lindeborg Jr.), who reminds me of Mercutio. (But really nothing can top the last few minutes of Vector, better than the rest of Mahershala Ali’s performance in its entirety.)
The Negatives:
I get the impression Robert Rodriguez is far more enthralled with the concept of weaponized amputees than I am. Parts of this movie made me wince and recall the gory Planet Terror part of Grind House, featuring Rose McGowan and her machine gun leg. There’s such rich, symbolic fodder lurking behind the idea of ripping people apart and fitting them with new limbs again and again. On the page, this would intrigue me, but I find the ugly brutality of it all a little off putting.
That said, I should mention that Alita contains no real gore. Most of those battling are cyborgs, and the bloody death of one entirely fleshy defender is shown off camera. We see pooling blood, but no body, no carnage.
The idea of putting the (physically) diminutive Jackie Earle Haley into the most gigantic, hulking mechanized body possible is quite clever, and Haley has a pretty good part, but some of the other supporting cast does not fair as well, mainly Jennifer Connelly and Mahershala Ali. Nothing is exactly wrong with either of their performances, but I feel like they’re capable of more and are almost wasted in these roles. Both have nice flourishes at the end, but their early scenes in the movie are clunky (especially their scenes together).
My husband and I agreed that Edward Norton’s character should have been revealed differently, probably much, much later in the story. A very late reveal of that character would leave us with the feeling of, “Gasp! Now I realize there’s so much more to this story that we don’t know.” Instead, we get a painfully early reveal, which makes us feel frustrated for over an hour as we realize increasingly that the movie is weighed down by a complicated backstory and won’t possibly have sufficient time to clear everything up within the remaining runtime.
That, actually, is the major flaw with the movie, and it affects most of the scenes Ali and Connelly share. (To say more would be a spoiler.)
Also, the film feels a bit unfocused, in general. We’re pulled in so many different directions, and (in my mind needless) conspiracies are everywhere. Much of what we see feels like unecessary confusion and non-essential plot threads, but, then again, we’re not getting the whole story in this installment. As a single film, Alita is ridiculously incomplete. As a first chapter, it will probably hold up pretty well (as long as Chapters 2 and 3 really are coming). Ever take so much time writing the most mind-blowingly excellent introduction that you ran out of time to write the rest of the essay? That’s what Alita feels like as is.
Overall:
If you usually like dystopian, post-Apocalyptic, cyberpunk sci-fi and go in realizing that you’re only going to see the first part of a trilogy, you should like Alita: Battle Angel. If you’re unprepared to see just the first part of a story, though, the ending will definitely leave you with an, “Okay, so Sam and Frodo are getting into a boat…” kind of feeling. For a February release, this movie starts really strong. For a first installment, it finishes strong, too. But if further installments do not follow, then the film is horribly, horribly incomplete, like an intact brain and a strong, beating heart without limbs.
