Naruto Shippuden: The Movie
The movie was so very and disappointingly average- on form with the usual Naruto Shippuden anime. Don’t get me wrong, the manga version has had some notable moments which I won’t mention as each of these is spoiler-ific. However Naruto Shippuden: The Movie is a sub-par non-cannon spin-off, with some hardcore corny to match.
The film starts on a very promising note with Naruto’s “death” as alluded to in the enticing trailers that had sprouted up over the web. This could let the viewer think that the film is actually good. Don’t be mislead. Despite the opening (which actually showed potential), the movie dips worse in quality the further it gets in. This shows through the incredibly animated opening and some of Naruto’s smoothest animation yet… Which later is compared with the hideous looking CGI animation that is used on a mass of irritating statue-fodder- that bear a very strong resemblance of the enemies shown in the FullMetal Alchemist full-length feature film, Conqueror of Shamballa. As you can gather from this review thus far, the rest of the film is fairly lack-lustre and "meh".
The roles of Sakura, Neji and Lee are annoying, (Sakura in particular, who seemed to regress back into her old role in the original Naruto) and uninspired. The afore-mentioned characters seem to forget about all the character-growth they went through before Naruto’s infamous time-skip and for the most part, this is irritating and idiotic. The major villains of the film are given no characters; there is no sympathetic aspect to them which makes them entirely lifeless. They follow the same old routine of Naruto, and pair off to fight each of them. Boring.
The film is in the Shonen genre of Anime, which is portrayed through the clichéd humour (yes, the main character’s stupid, we get it already), the dated music and the lack of character development for each of the major characters. As well as the typical central female in each of the Naruto films that seems to fall in love with him. Yawn.
The animation was good for the most part, but as usual the faces of the characters look like they’re built from rock and their faces are normally emotionless and passive. (Now, now Narutards don’t use the excuse of Ninjas being emotionless. These people certainly aren’t Ninjas. More like wizards.)
The storyline was bland and the film's direction was never really engaging enough. Unsurprisingly, the best scene of the film was the last minute, which actually made me laugh for a good reason. Naruto’s annoying stupidity finally pays off I guess.
Summary: You’d be better off watching and buying “Naruto The Movie: Ninja Clash in the Land of Snow”, which makes to be a far better instalment in the series and it even comes packed with a then-original idea to boot! It seems that the “mature” Naruto has only matured like cheese. Creating a bad smell.
LAA Rating: *1/2
Rating System:
* - Horrible
*1/2 – Very Bad
** - Bad
**1/2 – Good
*** - Very Good
***1/2 – Excellent
**** - Masterpiece