MOVIEWISE — December 29 2017

Pieter Pohl, founder of Innovation Films and marketing manager of CMD Entertainment Africa, sheds some light on the latest movies.

INSPIRING NEW MOVIES NOW ON DVD!
CMD Entertainment Africa brings you inspiring new movies on DVD this festive season. The Case for Christ, Return to the Hiding Place, I’m Not Ashamed, Joseph and Mary, Peter: The Redemption and a new animation series for kids — IESODO. This Christmas season spend some quality family time together watching these thought-provoking, heart-warming and uplifting stories. Visit CUM Books and Takealot.com to get these fantastic DVD’s as gifts for your loved ones.
For more info visit www.cmdafrica.com

SUNDAY BLOCKBUSTER
(Sunday December 31 2017: MNET 101 20:05)

GHOST IN THE SHELL
Movie trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEDctELIm3I
PG13VL

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Summary:
Based on the cult Japanese comic this futuristic drama explores a once human, cyber-enhanced soldier built to stop the world’s most dangerous criminals.

Movieguide Review — “Effective, Provocative Science Fiction Thriller”
Ghost in the Shell is a live action, international reboot of the acclaimed 1995 Japanese animated movie developed from a comic book. Updated for the 21st Century, the new movie stars Scarlett Johansson as Major, a young woman whose brain has been encased in a female robot android shell that allows her to track down a mysterious terrorist, who’s murdering high-level members of the Hanka Corp, which provides cyborg technology to humanity, including the government. As such, the movie is effective but could use a little more heart and a better villain. Thankfully, it contains only a limited amount of foul language, but it’s set in a dark, violent world, though the violence is less intense and less disturbing than many other recent PG-13 action movies. The strong moral worldview stresses justice, defends retaining one’s soul and humanity, and has a nice mother-daughter subplot during the second half, but it’s marred by a light revenge motif that taints the justice theme.

Consequently, this Ghost in the Shell has a strong moral worldview with some redemptive qualities. It includes the aforementioned, uplifting mother-daughter subplot. Also, the good guys are willing to risk their lives and even sacrifice their lives for their partners. Furthermore, the movie has a strong patriotic or Pro-American motif where Major’s special police unit is tasked with fighting cyber terrorism, promoting justice in society and protecting people from harmful uses of technology, including people who try to hack into other people’s cyborg enhancements. As such, the unit opposes any attempt, especially criminal attempts, to subvert cyborg technology out of greed or totalitarian interests.

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Sadly, although there’s very little foul language in Ghost in the Shell, the movie’s positive worldview is marred by a light revenge motif. This revenge motif taints the justice that’s obtained in the movie’s ending. Even so, the rest of the movie has such strong positive elements that, in general, Ghost in the Shell leaves media-wise moviegoers with a generally positive experience.

That said, although the violence isn’t super-gory, there are moments where the cyborg characters damage their cyborg body parts or lose a cyborg arm or leg. Ghost in the Shell also suffers from a high body count. Many bad guys are shot dead or killed, and one good guy is shot dead in the head. Some of the violence and cyborg enhancements will be scary for sensitive moviegoers, especially children. Finally, the heroine’s hard cyborg body is flesh-coloured with multiple parts showing edges. So, it’s sometimes almost like she’s nude. Other times, when she does wear clothes, it looks like her cyborg body is covered with a realistic artificial skin, which doesn’t make sense considering the other images of her cyborg body parts. Either way, however, the nudity isn’t really explicit.

Overall, Movieguide® advises strong or extreme caution regarding Ghost in the Shell. — www.movieguide.org