yet whatever philosophical nuggets were lurking amid Oshii's tangled plotting, they surely merited closer consideration by a filmmaker who wasn't trading in gloss, and doesn't merely regard human beings as elements of design
slinky, cyberpunk action flick makes its style the entire statement, pondering a future of human-robot synergy simply by visualising it in as much eye-popping detail as possible
it's a very pretty movie that pulls you into this futuristic world. As a sci-fi flick, it strives hard to be "Blade Runner" or "The Matrix" but it doesn't stand a ghost of a chance
in "Ghost in the Shell," the mind and soul of a brilliant original being are extracted, preserved, and rehoused in a sleek, expensively built, technologically advanced new body, enhancing her original abilities at some cost to her identity
for all the visual quality, it's let down by story - partly because Paramount has insisted on shoot-outs, punch-ups and careening cars. The manga had ideas and brains and not so much violence; the film has action and a slightly queasy perv factor
director Rupert Sanders ("Snow White and the Huntsman") doesn't offer much new in the way of action - it's the usual shootouts and parkour - while the script (a three-writer effort) consistently fails to surprise us
despite the beautiful eye-popping world it creates, the sci-fi film Ghost in the Shell is a defective mess with lifeless characters, missed chances for thematic exploration and a minefield of political incorrectness
by Sara Stewart [New York Post ]
by Tim Robey [Daily Telegraph ]
by Rafer Guzman [Newsday ]
