bmayert - 2017-01-19 19:32:56

In preparation for the upcoming western release of Persona 5 I was looking for an entry point into the series–preferably one that takes less time than playing the games yourself. I don’t think this is it. It’s probably a better idea to just play the game yourself or watch a let’s play. Perhaps once I’ve done that I’ll return to watch movies 2-4 but certainly not any earlier.

—-

Persona 3 the Movie #1 looks amazing and has a great soundtrack, that much is clear. At some points it makes it very obvious that it’s based on a video game but that doesn’t bother me. I found it lacking in some other parts.

Characters and Emotion
The main character, Yuuki, is the first thing that just feels off. He’s the silent type, which immediately isn’t great for a main character (just compare how uninteresting Jotaro was as the third JoJo part’s main character and how great he was as a mentor in the fourth part) but he doesn’t even feel like the silent character who secretly does care (or perhaps has some mental issue and finds it difficult to care) that you expect him to be. It just feels like he genuinely doesn’t care about anything or anyone and just goes along with the flow because he has nothing better to do–until the plot demands him to care and then he suddenly does. I expect this is at least partially a flaw of the adaption, not the source material, as I have seen a few minutes of a let’s play that had him say more lines than this entire movie.

Junpei was fun to watch although the little character development he had was off-screen (presumably again better in the game). The other characters just kind of were there and sometimes did a thing (Yukari at least looked good while standing around), it didn’t feel like they actually mattered and had actual feelings of their own. Even Mitsuru who really had a lot of dialogue just didn’t feel right.

Interestingly, the character I was able to care about and like most was Moriyama–the bully who isn’t even part of the main cast. I expect it is because her interactions with Fuuka had some emotion in them. Every other scene that felt like it was supposed to be emotional, especially toward the end, just had all of its emotion drowned out by the (admittably beautiful) music. Her scenes didn’t.

Setting and Mechanics
The movie does manage to establish a cool and interesting setting–a seemingly normal city that warps into a shadow-infested nightmare at midnight and somehow the moon is weird–but I would like it to explain a bit more. I understand that this is the first of four movies so naturally it sets up mysteries instead of resolving them but there’s so much about it that I feel deserves an explanation. Especially about the series’ main mechanic, the Personas.

There are some very vague spoilers in this following paragraph, they shouldn’t be enough to actually spoil the movie for you (which is why I didn’t mark the review) but I thought I’d mention it anyway.

Perhaps it’s because the movie expects you to be familiar with the game or franchise and with the Persona mechanic but for someone who was looking for an entry point, it really doesn’t explain the personas very well. It explains the basics–they’re weird Stands that you can summon by shooting yourself with a special gun, there’s different versions of them, and they can do elemental attacks–but really nothing beyond that. Is there some special requirement for summoning a different Persona than your normal one? How do those Persona rank ups work? Why do all basic Personas look like pseudo-mech characters and similar to the Shadows but that one Persona just looks completely different? How are these people getting exhausted and taking damage–is it because their Personas get attacked, or because they have to spend energy to make their Personas do things, or is the summoning itself exhaustive? What’s so special about the gun and why does Yukari seem scared of using it at first? Why didn’t it work that one time? This all feels like rather basic stuff–not mysteries because the characters clearly know–but the movie explains none of it. This is the first movie, the one that’s supposed to lay the groundwork for the other ones. While it does introduce the story and the setting and some characters, it fails at properly introducing the audience to the main supernatural part.

—-

Rating
I do very simple ratings, based on the old smiley face ratings that Hummingbird used to offer. Shows I really enjoy get 5 stars, shows I really don’t enjoy get 1 star, shows that didn’t manage to make me care about them get 3 stars. Persona 3 the Movie #1 is the latter, though I chose to give it an additional half star for its good visuals and music and for confirming to me that its source material is probably worth checking out.

kiarra01 - 2015-08-03 08:17:12

I loved the games, and this animated movie series has succeeded far beyond my expectations. ~10/10 would want to feel again

garland95 - 2015-05-08 06:01:09

lesch.celestino - 2015-02-23 20:56:08

As someone who's a fan of the persona franchise, and having played P3P over and over again, I was very sceptic of the release of 4 persona 3 movies (especially since there were already anime and all).
But when I watched it, I felt all the things I felt when I first played P3P (in a good way).

I definitely didn't regret watching it, in fact I can't wait for the other movies to come out :)

maritza.leuschke - 2014-09-27 06:51:01

it actually made yukari seem like a decent character but it still couldn't trick me into believing she was anything more than garbage.

pgleichner - 2014-06-05 16:42:28

Persona 3 the Movie 1: Spring of Birth

How does the Persona 3 Movie hold up to the the game after its release?

Story:

The directors took the movie in a slightly different direction then the game, but mostly it still remains faithful. There are little things involved like how SEES gets special weapons to deal with shadows instead of just getting them from the police officer who knew something was wrong with the city. Most of the issues with the story are nitpicks at best but it does seem a little silly at times to not add the police officer (and mall area, which makes no appearances in this movie) but give extra time to random classmates that Junpei knows.

Animation:

Solid, all the personas are well animated and it was hard to find fault with much even the 2nd time through.

Sound:

A few remixes of the game soundtrack and it still sounds great. P3FES stands as one of my favorite JRPG soundtracks and it was a smart decision to keep most of the tracks in there but mix them up. Why fix what isn't broken?

Character:

This is where the movie falls short from the game and its my main point of contingency. In the game Makoto, who is still the main character of the movie, is a blank slate that you are most likely meant to project yourself onto (because you can name him obviously) and him acting hollow and emotionless is mostly expected because of this. However bringing this to the movie makes it seem unrealistic at best and straight up frustrating at worst. When the movie starts the Dark Hour is upon Makoto and his music player is disabled. Still, he proceeds to not give any reaction at the screams of others and the blood on the streets, and just waltzes straight over to the SEES facility acting like nothing happened. Indeed, this becomes the issue of the entire movie where Makoto just says very little and gives no emotional reaction to any of the events. He acts almost as a baby, just soaking up and repeating words that other characters have said and giving very little reaction to the problems of others.

His character does develop and gain personality later on but it really doesn't excuse anything. He's not a baby, he's a high school student. No high school student would ever act (or not act) as Makoto does. He's just a blank slate that pushes the plot forward.

Enjoyment:

Makoto's character and the little changes to the story they make for no particular reason stay in the back of my mind as the story progresses. Watching the fights still makes this worth a watch but honestly if you are a fan of the game it can be quite frustrating.

In Conclusion:

Could Makoto have been made into a better character? Absolutely. I think it was incredibly sloppy to give him what they did and try to fix it later. If you have the time to sit down and experience the game for yourself it will definitely serve as the superior experience.