GHOST IN THE SHELL : Tuesday 4th April 2017.

'GHOST IN THE SHELL' which I saw earlier last week is a Japanese media franchise that had its origins way back in 1989, having been published as a series of comics aimed squarely at the youth and more mature male market written and illustrated by Masamune Shirow, which is the pen name for manga artist Masanori Ota. The works under this title have subsequently led to two theatrical anime movies, two anime television series, an anime television movie, a theatrical live action movie, and several video games. The original premise told of the fictional counter-cyberterrorist organisation Public Security Section 9 (a special-operations task-force made up of former military officers and Police detectives) led by protagonist Major Motoko Kusanagi in mid-21st Century Japan. Here, computer technology has advanced to the point where many members of the public possess cyberbrains, technology that allows them to interface their biological brain with a variety of networks. The level of cyberization varies from basic minimal interfaces to almost complete replacement of the brain with cybernetic components, in cases of severe trauma. This can also be combined with various levels of prostheses, with a fully prosthetic body enabling a person to become a cyborg. Major Motoko Kusanagi, is such a cyborg, having had a terrible accident as a child that ultimately required her to use a full-body prosthesis to house her cyberbrain.

With that lesson over, this live action version finally hits our screens after some time of dazzling Previews. Directed by Rupert Sanders in only his second feature film outing after 2012's 'Snow White and the Huntsman', this film was released in the US at the end of March, having Premiered in Tokyo a fortnight earlier, was made for US$110M and has so far recouped US$125M and has garnered largely average Reviews.

This adaptation centres around Major (Scarlett Johansson) - the first of a kind cyber-enhanced human who has been perfectly engineered to be the ultimate soldier who exists only to stop the world's most dangerous notorious criminals. After an impressive opening credits sequence in which we see Major produced and ultimately come to life, we learn that in this near future world 73% of all humans have some sort of technological enhancement - these can take the form of limbs, eyes, internal organs for enhanced vision, strength and stamina and intelligence. Hanka Robotics is the world leading cutting edge company and the forefront of augmentative technology, and they are working on a secret project to develop an all mechanical synthetic body, or 'shell' that houses a human brain containing the mind, memories, the soul, or 'ghost', hence 'Ghost in the Shell'! The test subject is Mira Killian (Scarlett Johansson) the only survivor of a cyberterrorist attack that left her body trashed and beyond repair, but her brain intact and fully functional.

Doctor Ouelet (Juliette Binoche) is Mira's designer and she objects to Hanka's determined CEO Cutter (Peter Ferdinando) to weaponise Mira against future terrorism threats, but she reluctantly agrees, because really, what else can she do? We then fast forward a year, and the fully functioning weaponised Mira has now secured the rank of Major at counter-terrorist bureau 'Section 9'. Major now works in a tight knit unit of similarly cyber enhanced humans to varying degrees -  Batou (Pilou Basaek), Togusa (Chin Han) and Chief Daisuke Aramaki ('Beat' Takeshi Katana) - the latter being the Chief Executive Director of Section 9. Major and her team successfully thwart a terrorist attack at a Hanka business conference dinner, destroying a rogue robotic geisha after it murders a hostage.

Back at Hanka HQ the now defunct geisha robot is being examined, where it is determined that it was hacked by an unknown presence known only as 'Kuze'. The Major takes it upon herself to break with normal protocols and 'dives' in the geisha's artificial brain, which could be potentially very dangerous, as it proves to be with the unknown Kuze launching a counter-hack. This causes Batou to disconnect her from the robot geisha, but not before she has determined that the location of the hack is from a Yakuza nightclub. The Major and her crew converge on the club but a trap has been set, during which an explosion occurs costing Batou the sight in both eyes, and significant body damage to the Major's shell.

Kuze is systematically taking down Hanka operatives, and following the murder of a senior researcher,  Major comes to the conclusion that Doctor Ouelet is next on the hit list. Batou has now had surgery giving him pair of telephoto X-Ray vision eyes, and the Major has had a full body overhaul making her as good as new. They rush to locate Ouelet who is under siege from two garbage collectors who are under the mind control of Kuze. One of them is taken out by Batou and the other is captured alive still under the control of Kuze, and interrogated by the Major.

Togusa is able to trace the location of the hack, which leads them to a place where a large cohort of humans are all linked together creating a network of intelligence. In the ensuing fray the Major is separated from Batou and Togusa and is captured by Kuze (Michael Pitt), who reveals himself to be just like her, but a failed predecessor to the experiments that ultimately created her - the project known as 2571. Kuze is sympathetic to the Major and means her no harm, instead urging her to question her own human memories to seek out the truth to who she really is and how she came to be. He then frees her, and escapes into the night.

Seeking the truth the Major confronts Ouelet, who confesses that she was the 99th test subject, and the only one of the previous experiments to survive. At this point Cutter decides that the Major has become too much of a liability and a risk to the future project and that she must be terminated, and that Ouelet should switch her off for good. Instead Ouelet gives the Major a stimulant serum and an address which will help answer her questions as to her origins and helps her to escape the Hanka HQ. Cutter shoots Ouelet dead and advises Aramaki that the Major has gone full rogue, cannot be trusted and is to be terminated on sight.

The Major traces back the address given to her by Ouelet. This leads her to a dense high rise apartment block that is occupied by a widowed mother whose only daughter disappeared a year ago, was subsequently arrested and then took her own life in custody. Her name was Motoko Kusanagi. Meanwhile Cutter's henchmen all try to take out Batou, Togusa and Aramaki who all thwart the attempts on their respective lives, while the Major follows her human memories to the place where Motoko was last seen alive. Once there, she meets with Kuze again and together they recollect their lives of just over a year ago as anti-enhancement protesters who were abducted by Hanka as test subjects for the cyber experiment project.

Cutter has been tracing the Major, and remotely deploys a 'spider-tank' to take them both out with heavy artillery once and for all. Ultimately Kuze perishes at the hands of a sniper from Section 6, but not before the Major was able to disarm the spider-tank by ripping out its motor, costing her an arm in the process. Batou and Togusa come to the rescue, better late than never, while Aramaki shoots Cutter dead. Later, repaired and back to full fighting fitness, Major Mira Killian is getting used to her true identity as Motoko Kusanagi, and embraces her mother, before returning to her day job at Section 9.

'Ghost in the Shell' is a visual feast for the senses - all futuristic heavily stacked urban development, bright neon lights, holographic advertising billboards, and cyber enhanced bodies at every turn. There will be inevitable comparisons to 'Blade Runner' and there are nods also to 'Terminator', 'Robocop' and even 'The Matrix' that will keep you amused and entertained as you seek out these references and keep a watchful eye on the storyline which is really rather basic when you distill it down. That said, Johansson plays her character well, but for a film that explores what it means to be human amidst mad scientists, megalomaniacal Chief Executives, terror plots, brain transplants, body hacking and futuristic metropolis Asian life, then this is all too lightly skirted over in favour of the CGI and the action which is well realised and delivered I hasten to add, but how true this is to the original source material only you can determine, if you know it, and if you really care!

-Steve, at Odeon Online-