RAY DRAGONBALL - EVOLUTION - B

I must admit i refused to watch this film at the cinema, and i refused to buy it when it was released, but i get drunk and make multiple impulse purchase's.So one day this blu ray is posted and i put it to one side....I get drunk again and decide to watch it, the misses loved it but i was picking it apart all the way through saying that didn't happen, thats rubish, oh my god i can't beleve they've done this.Anyway i keep telling people to avoid the film and watch the anime, then for some reasion i watched the film sober and just watched it for what it was, which is a freaking AWSOME film! so what it doesn't stay true to the books, neither does the DragonBall z cartoon, so what you should do is just take a chill pill and relax, watch a great film and apreciate it for what it is.... an enjoyable adventure.So if you haven't seen it, you should do because your missing out, and if you love the books, history, anime etc... put those judging fingers away and just have fun.

I don't normally write reviews but have felt compelled to give this film its own right to a decent review. I am an immense dragonball/z/gt/kai fan, I am gutted to see how narrow minded dragonball fans are.I don't think people give this film the credit it deserves. Lets face facts is based on an anime long running tv programme - it has to change to make it believable, otherwise all reviews would be saying it is unrealistic. You can get away with a lot of things in an anime show, that a `real life' film couldn't really bend to make acceptable.Most of the storylines are there from dragonball. The one big difference is Goku isn't a kid - but it wouldn't fit if he was, not sure maybe I'm wrong here. However, the rest of the film storyline does follow similar bits from dragonball. For example,- Master Roshi trains Goku- Bulma finds Goku and looks for the Dragonballs with him- Gohan is killed- There are 7 dragonballs, Piccolo wants them, so does Goku, Bulma and Yamcha- The way we meet Yamcha is incredibly similar if not better- Goku turns into an Ape, not a massive one, but again made more realistic- Master Roshi is killed by Piccolo- They use the Dragonballs to bring Master Roshi back to life- A huge final battle with Goku and Piccolo- Goku wins the battle with Piccolo and Piccolo survives- Goku meets Chi Chi and they get into a relationship- Goku has similar dress/fighting outfit- Even Goku's hair is attempted to look similar!That's just as many as I can remember. Most storylines come from `the saga of Goku' and `King Piccolo saga'There aren't many well known actors in the film, which I think supports the film. It brings new life to the film and I personally find Justin Chatwin and Emmy Rosum really good at portraying the characters and character traits clearly on screen. There are also some characters missing like Tien and Krillin, but too many characters would be too confusing in the plot. Plus it needs somewhere to lead into for sequels.There are some, perhaps disappointments as always. I personally would like to see Shenron look more like the anime version, but again it looks realistic under the circumstances of a `real life' film adaptation. Goku looks and acts more like a modern teenager would, not a lost little boy, which some people may not like, but still has some of that `lost' and `vulnerable' side to him as he looses his grandfather and goes on a journey learning new things. Sometimes the pace goes too fast - the dragonballs get collected incredibly quickly and the journey at the end takes a very short amount of time.All in all I think they have done well to make a `real life' adaptation of an anime mange cartoon series. Not everything from the anime series fits, which is why it is so successful as an anime series and probably why people haven't taken to the film adaptation as, of course, it is going to be different in parts.Give it a try - a true dragonball fan would be able to see why things haven't transferred to the `big screen' as easily, why some storylines/characters/plot have been left out. If you wanted it to be just like the anime mange series they might as well have just condensed it and put that on the big screen. Come on people it is going to be different!Remember its been made to fit to make it more believable as real life, some things don't fit. You would find it daft if Goku was on a flying cloud, a cat lived in a tower and a pig named Oolong could talk and walk with humans!

With many popular franchises, Hollywood somehow manages to get it's grubby hands on it and 9 out 10 times we get a horrible confused mess. Dragonball Evolution is no exception.My first problem is with the actual movie title. Why Evolution? Why couldn't it have just been called Dragonball? The fact that this first movie has got a subtitle suggests it's a sequel, but it's obviously not. I guess it would have made too much sense to call it Dragonball!The story sees young martial arts whiz Goku begin a journey to find the mysterious and powerful dragonballs before the maniacal Namek Piccollo can get to them. Once all 7 have been collected, a dragon is summoned that will grant one perfect wish. If you are familiar with Akira Toriyama's manga and anime versions of this then this you will know that this is the basic underlying premise for the series. However, it is is the main premise for the movie.Overall this is one disappointing movie, it's not even so bad that it's funny, it's just plain bad. Why they hired Justin Chatwin is a mystery to me. Surely they should have gone for a bigger guy, more muscular guy seeing as Goku is meant to be the most powerful warrior in the universe. Chatwin's small frame and wooden acting makes it evident that he was a bad choice for the role. James Marster's as Piccolo isn't too bad but we hardly get to see him in the movie. And when we do, he's either talking about the dragonballs or out finding the dragonballs. Certain cliches in this movie remind me of the new Sam Raimi Spiderman movies, with Goku being an underdog who is picked on in school, a bit like peter parker. However, unlike the awesome Spiderman movies, Dragonball falls short in the fact that there is no chemistry between any of the characters, and Piccolo seems like a 100% baddie bad guy which is frankly quite boring. If you think back to Spiderman, the villains were interesting and each had motives and a personality, which often created morally grey villains that were entertaining, memorable and more importantly - believable. This should have been the same with Piccolo as he is a classic character of Japanese pop culture. Yet this pitiful effort of bringing him to life on the big screen is one of the main reasons this movie fails. And OMG Yamcha...his actor takes BAD acting to the next level...WOW!Action scenes were okay but I felt like I'd seen it all before. There wern't really any instances where I felt impressed or shocked by any of the action scenes. Although I did feel a twinge of happiness with the final showdown wich includes the auras and special moves from the series which are actually recreated nicely for this live action outing. That, to me was the highlight of the movie.You may think that I am slightly biased as I am a fan of the series however, I saw this movie with an open mind and put myself in the shoes of newbie to the franchise. However, this didn't alter my opinion. The movie is very cliched and very shallow. The movie feels extremely hollow with very little substance behind the characters. Like I said before, the basic premise of the dragon ball series was a base for the characters, plot and action; but unfortunately the movie could not pull off any of these three successfully, therefore resulting in a boring movie.Whereas the series triumphed, this movie will soon be forgotten and will sink in to the back of our memories with the many other below average anime/game movie conversions. Apparantly, Dragonball is planned to be a trilogy of movies, but after watching this one, I wont be as eager to watch the sequels. Overall, this movie is disapointing if you are a fan but more importantly it is a bad movie in general which should have, and could have been so much better.

I got this as a birthday present for a friend. He said it was good