Jeanskynebu the audience applauded

Spoonatects Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

TrueHello Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

StyleSk8r At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

John Truscott I don't know if the version of this DVD that I am reviewing is different from that of other reviewers. It is entitled "She, The Ultimate Weapon" hails from Bonzai Media Corp & has a running time of 90 minutes rather than 2 hours mentioned by others. It certainly stars Aki Maeda, easily recognisable as the insufferable goody two-shoes of Battle Royale 1 & 2. The film is very disappointing. I watched the anime some time ago (& was surprisingly impressed) so I know what is SUPPOSED to be going on, but it is put across very crudely & simplistically here. The script is poor with Chise spending most of her time bleating "Shu-chan" & Shuji bleating "Chise" in return, or there's some boffin character unconvincingly explaining what's supposed to be going on. Clearly nothing much was spent on special effects which varied from poor to rubbish. Continuity is bad & editing so badly ill-judged that with nearly every scene-change I kept thinking "What the hell happened there?" or "What did I just miss?". Perhaps the 30 minutes apparently missing from my DVD's running time accounts for this butchering (I wouldn't dignify it with the term "editing"). But above ALL other faults was the English sub-titling. It was atrocious - absolutely flipping ATROCIOUS. This is (or should have been) a moving story - of how war de-humanises & how love can overcome all adversities in a time of war. Decent sub-titling could have overcome the film's many shortcomings (which other reviewers have already detailed)to convey this message to the viewer - but it failed miserably to the point of derision. Whoever did the sub-titling deserves to be sacked, as does the person responsible for letting it be released like this. The anime of this was contained in 13 episodes of around 25 minutes each, or about 5 hours running time. I appreciate the problems the studio had of condensing this into 2 hours (or 90 minutes in the case of my DVD) but they should have thought of that before they started & commissioned sufficient expertise & resources to do justice to the source material. Some people have put the question of who was this war with. Well it's never spelt out but the aircraft bombing the hell out of Hokkaido are Soviet Union/Russian Tupolev Tu 160 long range strategic bombers - so make your own mind up.

mollyrb_80 I have to agree that this movie wasn't that good, especially if you saw the anime or read the manga. I was looking forward to this movie, I think they should of stayed more true to the anime/manga. The personalities of the characters were altered, Chise who is supposed to be clumsy wasn't really portrayed that way, Shuji who is honest and upfront even if it means being harsh was portrayed differently, Akemi who is supposed to be a loud mouthed tomboy was different in this movie and they didn't really develop the relationships of the characters like they should have. I agree that if you are a fan of the series or manga watch the movie just for the sake of completing the series but this isn't a good place to start if you haven't seen or read saikano yet, as it may alter your take of a very good anime/manga.

troika19 I have been tempted to check out the Anime for a while now but I seriously hope it is better then the movie and I suspect that it is.Aki Maeda pulls off a good performance but has little to work with and had zero chemistry with her co-star which leads to a number of awkward scenes especially when ever they are meant to be intimate.Another major flaw is that nothing is explained, we have no idea how Chise was chosen to become a Weapon (and where does she hide all those parts?) nor do we even have any idea who Japan are at War with or even why for that matter.Painfully average and a great premise that sadly just doesn't pay off.

gohmifune Where do I start? The plot of the movie, which is about a love between two high school students during wartime, while one is a living weapon, and their struggle to maintain that love is a very good plot. It is based on a manga by Shin Takahashi which was also turned into an anime in 2002, both of which I have yet to read or see.This review is about this live action adaptation however. Sadly, this honest to goodness was a terrible movie. It isn't as if one could site certain aspects, and say, for instance, the budget is at fault, or the acting is to blame. It is, sadly, a series of underwhelming and ineffectual elements that bring this film down.The acting is poor. Not to say Aki Maeda and Shunsuke Kubozuka are bad actors, but they didn't have much to work with, and seemed miscast. Neither seemed to have the physical range to draw the viewer in the story as well as being too old for their parts to a distracting degree.The script was weak, the leads act unrealistically, and behave irrationally. The film also plays for the heartstrings, but ends up being predictable, all the while not being compelling, and under-developing the characters. There are also pacing issues.Visually, it is unremarkable. The film uses green screen heavily and unnecessarily in too many scenes. The other special effects also have a cheap look to them, especially where minimalistic practical special effects could have been used. There is also no visual flair, as if there were no cinematographer or art designer to make the scenes look consistent and stimulating.The music and sound effects were fine, but unremarkable.Overall, the movie isn't devoid of enjoyment, and fans of the series shouldn't be discouraged to see it at least once just for the sake of completion. People unfamiliar with Saikano, this probably isn't the place to jump in as it isn't a very good movie or melodrama. It isn't the movie or the cast and crews fault, it just isn't inspired, and that is what kills it.