SFIAAFF: Death Note

When we heard about a "live-action" version of Death Note, the manga/anime series, we were skeptical. The elements of anime that makes it, well, anime are the fantasy behind the whole genre: scary, grotesque creatures, futuristic buildings and cars, supernatural events. Anime just doesn't seem to lend itself well to "live-action." It's difficult to imagine all of the imagery of anime coming together in a live-action version, at least in a believable way. To be truthful, we were scared mostly of the cheeseball potential this movie has -- in order to prepare for the movie, we didn't. We went in cold turkey: no looking at movie trailers, no imdb.com'ing the actors, no re-reading the synopsis, nothing.

This worked for and against us: once there, we discovered that the movie was actually a two-parter, a la Kill Bill, and we would only be privy to the first half. We weren't sure how to take this news (Will we be sorry?) but after watching the Death Note, there was only one reaction to be had:

We were cursing the heavens/movie gods for breaking the movie in two, with no. clear. release. date. of the second half.

But don't let that stop you from watching the movie: Death Note is a very well-done film about a law student named Light Yagami, who finds a notebook that can kill anyone whose name you write on its pages. Light uses the notebook to kill criminals and develops a following on the internet under the name Kira. As more and more criminals die, the police department decides to investigate Kira, with the task force headed by Light's own father. Light becomes desperate to cover up his identity after a genius investigator, L, begins to suspect Light is the killer and begins his pursuit of Kira/Light.