Say whatever else you want about last year`s Ghost in the Shell adaptation, which pissed off most fans by changing the ending and allegedly missing the point. At least it looked great, sporting the budget, design, and effects it deserved. The same can`t be said for director Fumihiko Sori`s live-action Fullmetal Alchemist adaptation, which manages to feel cheap in every imaginable way.Fullmetal Alchemist follows the Elric brothers Al and Ed in a pseudo-European world where the science of `alchemy` is nearly indistinguishable from magic. As kids, the brothers became disfigured after an alchemical ritual gone wrong--Ed loses an arm and a leg, and Al his entire body, his soul coming to rest inside a hulking suit of armor. Years later, the boys have joined the army as official State Alchemists in the hopes their adventures will lead them to the Philosopher`s Stone, which Ed can theoretically use to reunite Al with his real body.The movie`s issues start immediately, as it brushes over the Elrics` origin story in a weird hurry to get it over with. The scene of the ritual gone wrong cuts off halfway through, followed by a jarring jump several years into the future. Audience members unfamiliar with the source material are likely to simply scratch their heads at the ensuing action scenes, in which a young man in an ill-fitting blonde wig chases down a magic priest with the help of an empty suit of armor. When the movie finally revisits that opening scene, it`s as a flashback Ed sees while dreaming. And to add to the confusion, it`s the adult version of the character--not the child--who loses his limbs and strikes a deal to get his brother`s soul back.There are some things that simply seem less plausible in live action than in an animated format, and Fullmetal Alchemist seems eager to brush past as many of them as possible. The movie uses multiple early scene info dumps to lamely get its core rules across: Alchemy isn`t magic, despite looking like it, because of the `law o ...
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