From the man who granted us the 21st Century’s Casablanca—AKA, The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl—comes a deliberately anime-persuaded frenzy of crisp awesomeness that is unfortunately held down by its inconveniently spattered storyline structures. Alita: Battle Angel highlights visually some of the most—if not, the most—muscle-fueled, groundbreaking CGI action segments ever—a produce often typified within projects associated under the name: James Cameron—but, flunks to poise all of the tumbling, thickly dense plot-based scraps and metals that it wants to cram into its minimal two-hour runtime.
Make no bones about it, the first act of this movie was nearly worthy of a one star in my book. The writing was atrocity at its mountain top, the narrative was zooming left and right uncontrollably, and my spirit of inquiry was extinct. Mercifully though, what bears on is MUCH more luring and furthers its valuable, idiosyncratic action spectacles and bloodthirsty, borderline PG-13 (reaching for an R-rating) Japanese-influenced combat absurdities. Mainly, however, the brawny, badass evolution of our darling, charming main character, Alita, is what nurtures this film from nosediving off into an abyss.
Alita: Battle Angel is a suitable live-action introduction to a (plausible) franchise based off of a beloved manga that should have most of its followers entranced. For those who are unfamiliar though, it—in all probability—will turn out to be a hit and miss due to its deficiencies within its confusingly impulsive diegesis anatomy and sometimes, unforgivably colorless dialogue. With that in mind, I am nevertheless, eager to see what the future of Alita sequels have to offer, as they have a sturdier chance of becoming grand now that this freshman ingress has been windswept and evaluated.
Verdict: C+
The high-voltage motorball stadium sequences are worth the ticket though.
Two Words: Hans Landa
“Alita: Battle Angel” is now playing in theaters.
Burning the Celluloid 
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