Death Note (2017)Directed by Adam WingardMy exposure to Japanese anime is fairly limited. A few months ago, I watched the 37-episode "Death Note" anime (itself an adaptation of the comic series written by Tsugumi Ohba and drawn by Takeshi Obata), and loved it. The show is about high schooler Light Yagami who comes across a notebook that gives him the power to kill anyone by writing their name in it. Light uses it to kill criminals and wants to become the God of a new world, where no crime exists. L is the detective who tries to track down this "Kira" ("killer" – the word people use to refer to the mysterious force behind the criminal murders), and Ryuk is the Shinigami (Death God) who has come to our realm to amusingly observe all this. The anime was fantastic, thrilling and left you exhilarated, it was so well written and very cinematic at times.I had a sinking feeling when I saw the trailer for the Netflix-produced film adaptation. It had a nice look, but it didn't seem anything like "Death Note". The movie hit Netflix a couple of days back and I watched it. The overall outline is similar – high school student Light Turner (Nat Wolff) discovers the note, a romance between him and fellow student Mia (Margaret Qualley) brews, the Kira killings take place, and L (Lakeith Stanfield) vows to stop them, and there is Ryuk, voiced by Willem Dafoe.However, I didn't like this adaptation at all. I understand they were trying to do something different with the material, but I didn't like the changes. Light in the original is highly intelligent, not an emo teen. L would never lose control as he does here. I missed the mind games between the two. Ryuk is hardly in the movie and even his character is different and not detached like in the original.One who has not seen the original may like this, however, as someone who loved the anime, I can't help but compare the two and this falls very very short. The music is pretty nice, and the cinematography (David Tattersall) is very good, but that's about all the good things I have to say about it. I'd rate it 6/10.This sketch of Ryuk was done with Prismacolor pencils on black paper and scanned. #285 / 27-Aug-17
Posted by Intagrate Lite