@DonGable said:

I deliberately did not watch the original anime before this, and I am not the biggest fan of it either, but I will definitely watch it. I enjoyed the film for what it was. The casting was excellent, the performances of Pilou Asbæk and Michael Pitt, in particular, were great. Takeshi Kitano and Juliette Binoche also did a good job with their limited roles. I was a bit sad the latter's role killed off. One bit that was odd about Johansson was the overly macho walk she had in a few scenes that really didn't fit in. There's some very good points in this thread. The film could easily have taken out the full two hours and taken more risks, as you lot mentioned, and gone more philosophical. Since Major and Kuze were "rebels" against the progress of the technology it would have been a great fit. They already did a good job at setting up the world. The relationships between some characters could also have been fleshed out a bit more. A decent film with potential to be a lot more but was played safe. :)

I think her macho walk was intentional to show how she didnt really know how to 'walk' like a real person in her body. It made her seem robotic and out of place. As for the Anime and series, Im a huge fan so this was a pretty big let down for me. They decided to play it safe and go for a generic story line. Which is really disappointing considering the crazy amount of material they had to work with. Seriously, some great stories come from the series and they could have used so many ideas from it. But like everyone has stated, they played it safe and it came back to bite them in the ass.

@OddRob said:

I think her macho walk was intentional to show how she didnt really know how to 'walk' like a real person in her body. It made her seem robotic and out of place. As for the Anime and series, Im a huge fan so this was a pretty big let down for me. They decided to play it safe and go for a generic story line. Which is really disappointing considering the crazy amount of material they had to work with. Seriously, some great stories come from the series and they could have used so many ideas from it. But like everyone has stated, they played it safe and it came back to bite them in the ass.

It just looked odd and didn't really come off good to me. They should've used something a bit more subtle. Anyway, it seems like it was a good move not to watch the original first. :) This way I wasn't disappointed in this, and it seems like I can only be positively surprised by the original. In case I do like the original, what do you think of its sequel? It seems like the series has spun out in many directions over time with mixed reactions depending on the project.

@DonGable said:

@OddRob said:

I think her macho walk was intentional to show how she didnt really know how to 'walk' like a real person in her body. It made her seem robotic and out of place. As for the Anime and series, Im a huge fan so this was a pretty big let down for me. They decided to play it safe and go for a generic story line. Which is really disappointing considering the crazy amount of material they had to work with. Seriously, some great stories come from the series and they could have used so many ideas from it. But like everyone has stated, they played it safe and it came back to bite them in the ass.

It just looked odd and didn't really come off good to me. They should've used something a bit more subtle. Anyway, it seems like it was a good move not to watch the original first. :) This way I wasn't disappointed in this, and it seems like I can only be positively surprised by the original. In case I do like the original, what do you think of its sequel? It seems like the series has spun out in many directions over time with mixed reactions depending on the project.

The sequel is more focused on more philosophical elements, even more than the original. Ghosts, birth, humanity, AI evolving and more stuff like that. If you like the original Anime movie watch Stand Alone Complex and S.A.C. 2nd GIG after.

Thank you very much. :)

I've just watched this and thought it was visually beautiful and enjoyed it more than I expected given the limited critical success of the director. Yes, it is a shallow tale indeed compared to the original film, but a lot of Stand Alone Complex has zero philosophy and isn't really any of the worse for it. And we have to consider it wasn't targeted at GitS purists and so setting a tale that is more accessible in the GitS universe makes some sense.

I even quite liked the Motoko / Batou origin story, on the assumption it must have been approved by the creator. I did come to GitS as an adult, so I'm perhaps not as emotionally invested in the fantastic original as others.

The performances were all pretty solid from some very fine actors (although I thought Cutter hammed it up a little too much), the action scenes were pretty good (resisting Bay-istic nonsense) and I think it was made with love and affection to the source material rather than being nakedly commercial in nature.

Instead the main issues for me were:

• it highlights what a legitimate and powerful medium animation is. It can convey action and visual aesthetic beyond anything possible in live action and almost match live action for emotional impact.
• somewhat plain direction (infuriating to have a master director like Takeshi Kitano on the cast. A love action GitS with Hana-Bi era Kitano levels of direction could have been sensational, although the screenplay would need work too).
• too short a runtime to stand any chance of fleshing out Section 9, the Batou / Motoko relationship and telling a coherent tale.
  
• a seemingly intentionally bland soundtrack compared to the wondrous original

With all that said, I was actually quite glad I watched this and I can't say that of many remakes (True Grit... uh, heck, I'm struggling to name another)

6/10