Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children (2005)

An ex-mercenary is forced out of isolation when three mysterious men kidnap and brainwash the city's children afflicted with the Geostigma disease.

Directors:

Tetsuya Nomura, Takeshi Nozue (co-director)

Writers:

Kazushige Nojima, Brian Gray (English screenplay)

Stars:

Takahiro Sakurai, Ayumi Itô, Shôtarô Morikubo

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Takahiro Sakurai	...	Cloud Strife (voice)
Ayumi Itô	...	Tifa Lockhart (voice)
Shôtarô Morikubo	...	Kadaj (voice) (as Shoutarou Morikubo)
Maaya Sakamoto	...	Aerith Gainsborough (voice)
Keiji Fujiwara	...	Reno (voice)
Taiten Kusunoki	...	Rude (voice)
Yûji Kishi	...	Yazoo (voice) (as Yuuji Kishi)
Kenji Nomura	...	Loz (voice)
Shôgo Suzuki	...	Vincent Valentine (voice) (as Shougo Suzuki)
Masahiro Kobayashi	...	Barret Wallace (voice)
Kazuyuki Yama	...	Cid Highwind (voice) (as Kazuyuki Yamaji)
Yumi Kakazu	...	Yuffie Kisaragi (voice)
Hideo Ishikawa	...	Cait Sith (voice)
Masachika Ichimura	...	Red XIII / Nanaki (voice)
Miyû Tsuzurahara	...	Marlene Wallace (voice) (as Miyuu Tsuzuhara)

Storyline

Two years after the events in "Final Fantasy VII", a disease called 'Seikon-Shoukougun', or 'Geostigma', is spreading through the planet. This disease is believed to have been caused by the body fighting off foreign material that invaded the body two years earlier, at the end of "Final Fantasy VII". Guilt-ridden and haunted by his past, ex-SOLDIER Cloud Strife has decided to live a secluded, solitary life away from his friends while maintaining "Strife's Delivery Service", whose headquarters is located in Tifa Lockheart's bar, the Seventh Heaven. Tifa's bar serves as an orphanage for children stricken with Geostigma. Here, Tifa keeps an eye on Barret's six-year-old daughter, Marlene, while Barret searches the planet for an alternative energy source to the Planet's energy, Mako. One day, Cloud receives a phone call from the former Shinra, Inc. president, Rufus, asking him for protection from a mysterious man named Kadaj. Kadaj, in the meantime, along with his brothers Loz and Yazoo, ...

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Plot Keywords:

based on video game | profanity | disease | silver hair | phone | 

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Taglines:

Is it for the children, for a memory, or for himself?

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Genres:

Animation | Action | Adventure | Drama | Fantasy | Mystery | Sci-Fi | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG-13 for sequences of intense sci-fi action violence

Details

Official Sites:

Official Square Enix Advent Children Site (English) Official Square Enix Advent Children Site (Japanese)

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Release Date:

14 September 2005 (Japan)

Also Known As:

Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children

Company Credits

Production Co:

Square Enix Company, Square USA

Technical Specs

Runtime:

101 min 126 min (director's cut)

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Kadaj's weapon is named the "Souba". Loz's weapon is named the "Dual Hound". Yazoo's weapon is named the "Velvet Nightmare". Cloud's sword is named the "First Tsurugi". His original "Buster Sword", given to him by Zack, is used to commemorate the spot Zack was killed. Cloud's bike is named "Fenrir".

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Goofs

In the scene when Cloud comes to fight Bahamut, while taking the sword from the bike, the sword model is briefly seen passing through the other sword model.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Elena: Tseng! Look at this.
Tseng: Pay dirt.

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Crazy Credits

During the last half of the end credits, as the credits roll there's a video of a CGI cloud zooming along real roadways on his motorcycle. At the very end, there's a shot of his delivery service office desk, with a new photo on it.

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Alternate Versions

A 23 minute 'Special Edition' was shown at the Venice Film festival.

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Connections

Referenced in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (2018)

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Soundtracks

Divinity
Lyrics by Tetsuya Nomura
Latin Translation by Taro Yamashita
Composed by Nobuo Uematsu
Orchestrated by Kazuhiko Toyama
Conducted by Taizo Takemoto
Performed by Tokyo Philharmonic Chorus (uncredited)
Recorded & mixed by Toru Kamekawa (uncredited)

User Reviews

The rating for this is ridiculously high. Any normal person would despise it.

Weak cinematic follow-up to the hit Playstation game. I think a majority of people who have played the Final Fantasy games consider VII the best (I slightly prefer VI myself), so this was certainly a good idea. Unfortunately, the execution is very poor. Video games and movies are different media, but the filmmakers here don't seem to realize this. They also seem to think that the most entertaining part of the Final Fantasy series are the endless battles, because that's all this movie is. The plot is largely incoherent. This is a mainstay of the series, that the story is somewhat difficult to follow. However, you play the video game for hours and hours and you start to get a sense of the mystery and mythology. You just can't do that in a two hour movie (I always imagined that it might work well as a television series). The film looks awesome and sounds awesome, but otherwise it's kind of a piece of junk. Even the American Final Fantasy movie was better.