Battle Angel Is A Dog

A little note before I review this film as a whole: any movie that decides to show how evil a character is by having them kill a dog instantly loses a huge amount of respect from me.

Based on the Japanese manga, Gunnm or Battle Angel Alita, this movie follows an amnesiac cyborg (Rosa Salazar) who is rescued from a scrapyard by Dr Ido (Christoph Waltz). After being renamed “Alita”, the teenage cyborg slowly learns more about the futuristic cyberpunk world of Iron City and the mysterious floating utopian city of Zalem, as well as a bit about her own past life along the way.

You can tell this was based on a longrunning manga series. Storylines that should’ve taken up multiple volumes are crammed into a mere two hours of film (two agonising hours). The result is a very muddled and rushed story.

The film isn’t helped by the character of Alita herself. While she starts out all right, she soon becomes overly aggressive and
annoying, seeking out unnecessary fights and causing most of her own problems.

The supporting cast don’t improve matters either, as the plot’s need to make them all “edgy” prevents you from being able to feel sympathetic when things go bad.

And this is a post-apocalypse film. Of course, things go bad. The entire finale is one massive doom and gloom fiasco.

The positive this film can boast is its visuals. Spectacular cyborg fights that previously would’ve only looked good in animation are perfectly translated into this live-action medium.

Once again, we have another live-action Hollywood film based on a Japanese  manga or anime that doesn’t deliver.

My advice overall is to steer clear of this film. There are many better cyberounk stories out there to be enjoyed.