Yes, it's that good

It's hard to stress exactly how strong I feel about this one without being able to ring the necks of all these nay-sayers. It is my opinion that anyone who doesn't like Final Fantasy probably wouldn't like any movie of this sort unless it had already been given the critic's seal of approval or loaded down with sentimental hokum (a la A.I.).
But then this movie wasn't made for those people. It was made for us science fiction fans and other people who can appreciate a good action flick when we see one, even if it doesn't attempt to convey a deeper meaning.

From the very first scene to the very last, Final Fantasy packs a punch that hasn't been delivered by a sci-fi flick since The Matrix. The story clips along at a nice pace, giving the appropriate amount of explanation without ever getting bogged down in the details. The battle scenes are unbelievably intense. The voice-acting, while not the movies strongest point, is above average. And did I mention the CGI? Final Fantasy is a beautiful concept. From the utilitarian stretches of Barrier City to the desolate wasteland that was once New York City, Hironobu Sakaguchi and Motonori Sakakibara's vision of the future is no less than inspired. This isn't just hype: Final Fantasy not only gives more bang for the buck than any other movie so far this summer - it represents the dawning of a new era in movie making.

Sure, some people may leave the theatre feeling that they never really got to know Aki's inner motivations. Or feeling that the secondary characters proved to be little more than fodder for the malignant spirits that have destroyed the earth. And some of that is true. The characters are fairly stock and the relationships between them are surface level. But the same people who let these things interfere with their enjoyment of the movie probably said the same thing about our other sci-fi classics like Bladerunner, Alien and T2 (to name a few). I think they're missing the point.

The point of a movie like Final Fantasy isn't to show that tried and true character arc that leaves us feeling all fuzzy and warm at the end. It's about stepping inside a particularly polished vision of the future and testing the limits of our technology to bring that vision to the screen in a neat little package that makes us all feel like we were actually there. Final Fantasy succeeds in doing that on every level.

I'm not going to waste my time telling you the entire plot and history of the movie. You can get that elsewhere. Truth be told, I really wrote this review as a response to the other few reviews that are already up about this movie. And I'm telling you, don't listen to them or me. Go and see for yourself.