Last updated on March 17, 2013
Yay, Monday Update again!
Ace Attorney: The Movie – Did you play any of the Phoenix Wright games?
Shame on you if you didn’t. If you have a Wii or a DS-compatible device, you’ve got no excuse but to go play it NOW.
Ahem…so, Capcom’s Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney series probably stands as one of the only “adventure” style game I’ll bother to play (not for lack of trying – I just don’t “get it”, I guess). Not only is it quirky, weird, and distinctly Japanese – it also has the most awesome hairdos in the entire world. Barring that, Capcom did an excellent job translating the series (known as Gyakuten Saiban in Japan, or “turnabout trial”) for a Western audience, sprinkling in references to American pop culture to make up the difference from the even-more-crazy Japanese original. Not that this makes the popularity of the “Silver Samurai” any less weird or strange in a seemingly American setting, but you can’t win with everything, can you?
At heart, they’re puzzle games dolled up with courtroom trappings. Usually you’ll start with an investigation session which will shed light on the events that occurred, and try to piece together how to declare your client innocent. After all, you’re a defendant, not a prosecutor, and as per game logic everyone you defend is innocent by default. Most times, you won’t have enough information to know EXACTLY what happened on the spot, and you’ll need to cross examine the witness, find their contradictions, and show them up. It’s not in the who (every time, the culprit seems pretty obvious) but in the how, and figuring out what order to present evidence, people, etc., is a delight and I love it dearly. Phoenix Wright, your player character, turns out to look like the most incompetent attorney on the planet, and it’s only with your help that he pulls the answers straight out of thing air. He’ll hem and haw, sweat profusely, and delay as long as possible for a dumb deus ex machina to swoop in and save the day when you get that ESSENTIAL piece of info that puts everything together. It’s all done on the spot (sometimes timed, sometimes not), and somehow makes courtroom proceedings exciting.
The film, surprisingly, emulates INCREDIBLY well. If I had to make a claim, it’s the best movie based on a video game that I’ve ever seen. Not that this is saying a lot when you’re comparing it with Super Mario Bros. or Double Dragon, but it beats them simply by being an engaging AND entertaining experience comparable to other ACTUAL films. The games were rather passive experiences already, at least in terms of active moment-to-moment activity; usually, you’d read reams and REAMS of text, and then the game would let you figure out what to do, contemplating the information on hand. The film does much the same, and gives Mr. Wright (or whatever his name is in Japan, because it’s obvious nobody has those names just by matching the subtitles with their speaking voice) those same moments of thinking. Of course, you can’t spend forever like the game would – otherwise, the film would have no pacing – so the essential info to solving the case comes in shots and spurts. It shows rather than tells, and you can probably figure out where things will go if you pay attention to seemingly innocuous information – hey, like the game!
For those into the series, the film follows the first, second and fourth cases of the original game – they all linked together into a single narrative, and Takashi Miike (director of movies I probably won’t ever see, but I did watch 13 Assassins so there’s that) plays around a bit with the structure, but you see and hear the exact same story beats. I dare say that I’d call it a little darker, if not by color palette than by some of the intensely creepy stuff that you’re shown at parts. Overall, though, I’d call it a PG-13 for all us Americans – it never goes too far beyond where it needs to go.
And that’s to the movie’s credit for sticking to the game, as it had a rather great plot already. Honestly, I don’t even want to spoil it or anything, so I’ll just leave it at that. All the actors, though obviously not looking the same as their counterparts in-game, play their parts accurately and competently. Some of them seem a little miscast (Gumshoe’s a little too young probably, and Maya a little too old), but I honestly wasn’t bothered by it as much as other people. Seriously, somebody makes a crazy movie about a video game series, and you’re still going to complain even if it’s just SLIGHTLY off? You can never please some people, really.
Of course, a film based on a video games follows those game conventions to the letter, at times. Phoenix Wright makes frequent use of the game’s absurd logic, its universe where trials only take place over a period of 3D, and some of the most insane twists and turns you may see in a courtroom ever. Attorneys can tamper with evidence, witnesses get primed out of their mind to speak in a certain way, and there’s certainly no rules in this courtroom. There’s even an audience that buys tickets and floating video screens (when they do flashbacks, it’s a nice touch that the screens become CRT monitors rather than holograms) – when they win, literal confetti pours from the ceiling. I mean, seriously, when one witness gets on the stand (and you’ll know which one when it comes), it’s hard not to just burst into uncontrollable laughter. The judge doesn’t seem to mind the utter insanity happening before his eyes. For all the murder and seriousness, the movie’s got its own sense of humor that stays true to the world of the video game. If you cannot accept this, you will HATE this movie. Having grown up with games, I couldn’t help but enjoy it immensely.
Best of all, no prior experience required! If you’ve never played the games, you’re in for a treat – I found myself totally engaged even knowing where the story would go, so that says something. Not much else to say on that front – it’s a fun, engaging, enjoyable video game-style idea turned into a film. If you’re willing to put up with the odd absurdities of the Phoenix Wright universe and get into the alternating humor/drama mold, you’ll find a lot of fun here. As for an English release…well, either you caught a screening or you didn’t (and there are…shall we say, other means to procure and watch it), but there will definitely be a DVD/streaming release in the future, so look for it.
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That’s it for this week. We’ve got a THEME this week, so stay tuned for it!
