Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
CaptainKenshiro
Even though this is my favourite anime film and I place it as my second favourite anime of all time and two days ago marks the third time I have watched it (five in total if you include the times I watched 2.0) I never attempted to review it because I do not consider myself up to the task and so many people already covered it there is very little left to say about it, but since I finished the most recent entry I might as well go back to the (technically second) beginning of it all.
You most likely know the gist by now, three years from now in the Ghost in the Shell universe technology is so advanced most people have prosthetic cybernetic implants all over their bodies and computerized brains and there is a unit within the Japanese forces, branded as Section 9, supposedly dedicated to hunt…
Read at the sourcek-0da
Several weeks ago, I was able to see Mamoru Oshii’s Ghost in the Shell in theaters-- a monument of Otakudom, presented to me in the way it was meant to be seen. And similarly to Science Saru’s TV remake that aired last summer (The Ghost In The Shell) I have mixed feelings.
If nothing else, Ghost in the Shell’s animation is spectacular. Simply proclaiming that the movie has top-tier aesthetics would be a great deserve to the craftsmanship on display. Niihama is alive, mechanically and biologically. The film does an excellent job with its environmental storytelling; Niihama is awash in its own mechanical melancholy, while still retaining an essence of humanity. The streets have neon, holographic signs, and below, passersby mingle at open-air markets. Niihama of 2029 is not a happy society,…
Read at the sourceSuper-Banana8785
Ghost in the Shell is a very good, visually stunning movie that still holds up. The animation of this movie looks very fucking cool with its dark alleys, bright ass neon signs and its very good atmosphere that draws the viewer completely into the story. With its though provoking story, there's also very good action scenes that are thrilling and beautifully animated that keeps the viewer hooked onto the movie. As much as i think this movie is very good, the only issue that i have with this movie is that at some points of the movie the pacing slows the fuck down. Some scenes feel dragged out to the point where i think the viewer watching those scenes will debate in their mind wheter they should give a fuck about whats happening in those scenes. Overrall, this a very good movie with a very go…
Read at the sourceKurry1984
There's a reason this is an all time classic and why it inspired films such as the Matrix. It's as beautiful visually as it's story written. In an age where technology is outpacing our ability to understand it, this film feels uncomfortably real. It asks the audience, what makes you *you*? A question that seems non-nonsensical at first, "of course I know who I am" but once you start to think about it, as do the cast in the film, you begin to untangle the complication and uncertainty that is life.
Visually Ghost in the Shell is like nothing else, it's beautiful but grey and claustrophobic. It's architecture is harsh but comforting, it's world bleak but inspiring. Words can not describe how it makes you feel. The plot is fairly straightforward but that doesn't detract from the story becaus…
Read at the sourceAshParth
It's odd how this movie is celebrating its thirtieth anniversary when it was actually released in 1995. Better to know that it is due to this movie being thirty in terms of theatrical release here in the States as it is past thirty last year when it was originally released in Japan. Yeah. That's the answer to my previous question. Anyway, I would like to share my history with Ghost in the Shell as a whole since I have to confess, I'd never seen this movie. I grew up with the Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex anime series in my teens, staying up all night to see this, Cowboy Bebop, Outlaw Star and Inu Yasha on Toonami/adult swim. I love that series, and due for a re-watch so I would relive my memoria along with a proper review. I've watched the 2017 live-action adaptation starring Sca…
Read at the sourceelumizu
What makes you, you?
In 1995, director Mamoru Oshii’s adaptation of Masamune Shirow’s Ghost in the Shell imagined a future where humans could replace their bodies, connect their minds directly to a global network, and potentially alter the very foundations of their own consciousness. That future was set in 2029. A date that once felt impossibly distant. Now, watching the film, with the 2030s already looming on the horizon, creates an interesting sense of unease. We obviously haven't reached the world of full-body cybernetic augmentation, but some of the questions Oshii asks feel less like SF than they did 30 years ago. In an age of social media identities, AI-generated content, digital footprints, deepfakes, and increasingly blurred boundaries between our physical and online selves, Ghost…
Read at the sourcekiner_shah
I watched this anime movie after seeing some clip in a YouTube short video and I liked it!
The direction in this movie is amazing! The shots, the action scenes, the conversations, etc. everything is so good. This is sci-fi combined with mystery combined with philosophy. It raises some very good questions about one's existence and what defines us and our lives.
The story was a bit confusing to me, honestly. There were many things that were unclear and I had to make some assumptions. It wasn't bad though, I understood most of it. The action scenes were awesome and there were many details there, be it artwork for weapons, sound of guns firing, futuristic machines, etc. Environment art was also very good. The city, streets, people, etc. very well visualized.
The characters were so cool espe…
Read at the sourceSpider-Mate_MSA
Metamorphosis Of The Mind
This is straight up one of my favourite sci-fi movies of all time now. I adore every single second of it.
The fact the same animation studio behind Psycho Pass, which recently became one of my favourite animes ever, made this movie is ironic and kind of explains why I love it so much.
Before I review the movie, I wanna talk about how Ghost in the Shell changed so much thanks to this adaptation. I read the original manga first, since there were apparently big changes between the movie and manga, so I thought I might as well see what the source looked like. I'll be honest, the manga was fun for sure, but didn't leave as much of an impact on me as I thought it would. It's a run of the mill episodic thriller adventure story, where Kusanagi and her friends solve som…
Read at the sourceyumemirumono
I really love the plot because it tackles the whole concept of existence—how a cyborg just wants to live and exist like a human. The meaning behind the story runs super deep. On top of that, the storytelling is really well-crafted, and you can tell the animation was made with the highest quality possible. The world-building totally resembles the Hong Kong slums, which fits the dark, cyberpunk vibe they were going for perfectly.
So yeah, if you’re into cyberpunk anime, you’re definitely gonna love this movie. Even if cyberpunk isn't really your thing, I’d still say give it a shot—it’ll totally open your eyes to just how amazing an anime movie can be across the board. Every single aspect of this film complements each other.
That said, you definitely need to focus while watching because the…
Read at the sourceGOODBOYMODZZ
Rewatched this after nearly two years, and I'm finally going to watch the sequel as well. I mean the pacing is just some of the best in any movie ever. It's already short at 78 minutes when the credits start, and it also happens to be a movie in which literally every scene is an incredible and memorable scene. It never fucking lets up from start to finish in terms of the engagement and entertainment factor. It creates a world and takes an awesome concept like the ghosts and shells, and uses those to explore so many thought provoking and philosophical questions. The Puppet Master is also insanely predictive of the direction that AI in real life is starting to head towards. It's maybe my favorite showcase of a sentient AI I've ever seen in a movie. His personality and self questioning is so…
Read at the sourceTinyTony404
Going into Ghost in the Shell, I expected a lot more. Everything I had seen about this movie made it sound like one of the best anime films ever made, but after watching it, I honestly found it pretty average.
The biggest issue for me was that it just didn't grab me the way I expected it to. The ideas and themes are interesting, but I never got fully invested in the story. Maybe my expectations were too high because of how much praise this movie gets, but it didn't have the impact I was expecting.
One thing I will say is that the animation and visuals still hold up really well. The atmosphere is great, and you can see why this movie had such a big influence on other sci-fi films and anime.
My other issue is the amount of fanservice. Also, do they really need to keep showing us badonkers…
Read at the sourceTheBiggestAnime
TL:DR It's a movie that is a movie and has movie components and does movie things....
Preface that I don't like movies usually. Most movies (not talking only anime) are less than 2 hours runtime. This is simply not enough time to create a story especially if its going to be as dense and serious as Ghost in the Shell is. I'm starting with this movie bit because Ghost in the Shell is a victim of it being a movie - just not enough time to get me invested at all in the actual plot and just have a bunch of cool stuff happening + 2-3 philosophical discussions.
Ghost in the Shell ......is okay. It has amazing artstyle , great animation , very creative sci-fi components and the philosophical moral dilema about ''what makes human - human'' is....admittetly somewhat shallow (at least to me who's…
Read at the sourceSpike_Spiegel06
i wanted to watched this movie before i start with the new series that's animated by science saru that just came out this tuesday and safe to say, this one is obviously BETTER than that fuckass live action from 2017 that shouldn't have even happened btw. anyway, the animation in was great,from the action sequence, the city, the character designs, etc. everything in this movie is Meticulously crafted and to be honest, i'm such a sucker for 90's anime in general, especially the artstyle. the story was really good in my opinion, it was really philosophical annd it handles its themse very well and the characters are really interesting and well written.
Read at the sourceTheNioky
I didn't understand a single thing, but gg for the insane production value.
Mamoru Oshii and Production I.G. must have been on some seriously good crack for this movie.
The drawings are gorgeous and detailed, the backgrounds are stunning, the animation is meticulous (I’ve rarely seen bodies feel so tangible in motion), and to top it all off, the directing completely plunges us into this bleak, washed-out universe thanks to the immersion created by the multi-layered moving environments.
It’s incredibly impressive.
But yeah, the storyline is way too dense and complex for no reason, all for an ending worthy of the biggest "Huh?" uttered right as the credits roll, completely stunned by the lack of understanding of where it was even trying to go.
I also don't really dig how different the vibe…
Read at the sourcechumchummaru
From my perspective, it didn’t really grab me, and for a long time I avoided both the movie and the manga. As I mentioned in my review of the manga, I’m not a fan of cyberpunk. I watched the movie just to see how they adapted it.
The movie adapted chapters 1, 3, 9, and the epilogue from the manga, which didn’t bother me at all, since the chapters were always self-contained—even if they did follow on from the next ones in their own way—and you can’t fit all 11 chapters into a 1.3-hour runtime. What bothered me was how it all turned out. They cut out any lighthearted parts, altered most of it, and tried to give it a psychological undertone. Yet the manga is set in the classic 90s action-comedy genre. The only thing I liked was the nostalgic old-school animation.
Read at the sourcerocklacus11
I was lucky enough to watch this at my local arthouse cinema on the big screen and to say the least it was an almost magical experience.
Knowing that this movie was considered by many as one of the best works in anime, animation and even fiction as a whole I went into it with high expectations, but seeing all the scenes that inspired some of my favorite pieces of art (for example MGS 2) for the first time and realizing there in the theatre that it is this piece of media that had such an effect on my favorite creators was something of an emotional experience for me.
The beautiful animation and choreography combined with an intriguing and deeply philosophical story kept me on edge throughout the entire (somewhat disappointingly short) length of a movie where even the calmest and quietest…
Read at the sourcejapaneseanime98
The Matrix copied this Japanese animated cyberpunk film. This Japanese animated cyberpunk film is that influential. The Japanese anime is about how technology will evolve and shape society. Japanese anime always showed both the pros and cons of technology. Even if we humans merged with technology. We still will have problems. Ghost in Shell predicted the future.
The question you should ask yourself? Does technology improved lives or did just create new problems for the human race.
If humans merged with machines. Would will be still human? Would we still be us?
I give this Japanese animated film a 94%. Myanimelist rating of 9 out of 10.
Read at the sourceCynthesia
How do you know you are who you think you are?
A classic philosophical question and the basis of Ghost in the Shell. A film which tackles a no longer distant future in which cybernetic enhancements are commonplace. When it’s possible to continuously augment one’s body and mind, increasing one’s capabilities and access to information, there’s no practical reason to decline the offer. However, an unexpected, and often unobserved, cost is associated with each enhancement. When your body and mind become so easily replicable, how can you be so sure that you remain yourself?
The film opens with a shot of the main character, Kusanagi, looking out over the city, ruminating over all of these things while she waits for a chance to engage on her mission. The cityscape is not as dystopian or futuris…
Read at the sourceDanTheMan2150AD
A philosophical mood piece wrapped in cyberpunk armour, grappling with what it means to be human when the boundary between flesh and code has dissolved, it's hard to understate just how monumental Ghost in the Shell is. A quiet, haunting reminder that in a world of infinite connections, the search for identity may be the most human act of all. Bearing all the hallmarks of a noir thriller with its dense, rain-soaked future, the film creates a darkly gothic environment that is aided by the use of slow-motion action and longer, contemplative shots in which characters sit motionless. Mamoru Oshii delivers a visually stunning film, lingering on crumbling neon cityscapes, wires, water, reflections, and crowds, letting the world breathe without ever slowing the pace. The city itself feels like a…
Read at the sourcejlzap
This movie is a whole bunch of nothing. There is ZERO character development and world-building throughout the whole thing. They throw you straight in but never give a backstory. You don't get attached to anyone or anything throughout the whole film, there are no stakes involved for the viewer. It makes for things to be either confusing, boring, empty, or all of the above.
The first actual bit of emotion we get from any character is an hour and fourteen minutes in; and as a viewer, I didn't even care what happened in that scene. It's a shame because this concept is great, but it was totally wasted. It was slow-paced, which was annoying some times and cool other times. I mean, it really shouldn't take over 30 minutes to actually begin the movie. The sound design was great and I really liked…
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