It's probably the best route to get general audiences invested into the material, as the fish-out-of-water, hero's journey was Hollywood's method of choice for decades. It also moves at a decent pace, with uncharacteristically restrained direction from Robert Rodriguez, opting for an almost Spielbergian tone. Does it work? F**k YES! Alita contains performances that are so damn good they almost seem out of place, considering how boilerplate the plot is. But there may be a bit more going on with our young cyborg protagonist, than meets the eye… Metal will clash with metal, cybernetic parts will fly, mysteries will be revealed, balls will roll, double crosses will occur, while hitting a bunch of check marks on the cyberpunk cliché list. Set in a post-apocalyptic future, a youthful looking cyborg is found by a kind doctor, reassembled, and taught the ropes of how the lower half lives, in the vast hellish slums under the shadow of a better world literally floating above them. What else would it take to make it over the line into that most coveted and most jealously guarded of territories? The one they call "Good?" Alita: Battle Angel may provide the answer. As for anime itself, premium television may provide a more permanent answer, though we did get a mediocre but decent-looking picture with Ghost in the Shell. Hell, even video games have a couple of decent or at least passable movies of the week to enjoy. But the funny thing is…they used to say the same about comic books and we know how that turned out. We know the rule: no good live action films can come from anime and manga. Alita: Battle Angel is a visually stunning and entertaining film that reaches a little further than it can grasp. Also, the set and character designs are really creative, featuring a variety of interesting future tech and several different types cyborgs. Still, the action scenes are incredibly exciting and dynamic. And the script is kind of a mess, as it's all over the place setting up multiple story threats (several of which are never resolved). Rosa Salazar gives an impressive motion-capture performance as Alita, but there's an "uncanny valleyness" about the character design. Based on a Japanese graphic novel and adapted by James Cameron, the story follows a cyborg who's rescued from a junk yard with no memory of who she was, but after she becomes a bounty hunter she starts getting pieces of her memory back meanwhile Nova, the mysterious leader of the sky city Zalem takes an interest in this new cyborg after she demonstrates some long forgotten fighting techniques.
James Cameron and Robert Rodriguez team up for the sci-fi action film Alita: Battle Angel.