Thursday, January 20, 2011

Death Note - Japan

          Director:  Shusuke Kaneko
          Year:  2006
          Plot:  “A battle between the world's 2 greatest minds begins when Light Yagami finds the Death Note, a notebook with the power to kill, and decides to rid the world of criminals.”

          Now seen as this is about some of my favorite movies, I just have to do a few posts on the Death Note live action movies.  Now of course, Death Note was originally a anime, but this is the movie they made with real people.  I have to say that I watched these movies before actually really watching the anime or reading the manga.
          From what I heard some people say, if you have read the manga or watched the anime, you might not like this movie.  I do know that they changed a few things from the manga, one being that L is one of the main character in all three of the movies, and Mello never makes an appearance at all.

          I really did enjoy this movie.  I know Ryuk isn’t the embodiment of amazing cgi, but he isn’t that bad either.  As far as cgi goes in Asian live action movies, he was actually really good.  I also love the character.  Even someone who hates foreign movies loved Death Note mostly because of Ryuk.
          Now for acting.  I know that many seem to think that the acting in this movie was horrible, but I haven’t quite seen this.  Sure there are points where Light gets a little too theatrical, but it works out later in the story.  I also have to mention that some people have issues with Light simply because the actor is short.  Alright, I know Light is supposed to be tall and all, but I would rather have a short but good actor over one cast just because they’re tall.
          I also think that Ken'ichi Matsuyama who plays L did an amazing job.  I don’t know too many that would be able to act out all of L’s quirks.  I know he was only supposed to be in part of Death Note, but really, who would want to get rid of him?  I mean especially when Ken'ichi did so well playing him.
          I can’t really say all that much more because this is only one piece of the puzzle, but I would like to mention the point that some other people brought up to me before.  Apparently, the things that happen in the movie are illogical.  I find fault in this idea.  The things are really quite logical (besides a killer notebook and death god).  Light is very intelligent and plans everything out.  I was able to understand fully how everything came about, and what slight mistakes led to the ultimate ending.

          I loved this movie.  It was really interesting to watch to see how Light was going to get out of the various problems he runs into.  I’m sure there are plenty of faults between the manga/anime and this live action, but you really have to take into account that the anime/mang was allowed to be a lot longer.  These movies are really only two movies from the manga, and a lot had to be taken out.  The third, is not based off the manga/anime, but a separate story involving L.

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