Review of Death Note (2017) by Vince S — 25 Aug 2017

I went in knowing this wasn't going to be an adaptation of Death Note but an Americanized spin on the idea of Death Note and managed to honestly enjoy it. Anyone who gives this movie a negative review because of how it differs from the source material is missing the point.

That being said, despite the interesting things that it does do, it falls short from being a truly good movie due to how it relies on convenience more than being genuinely smart like the original material as well as leaving off with a cliffhanger ending and the expectation of getting a sequel.

*SPOILERS*.

Although I did not like the gory Final Destination-esque death scenes I will admit that it works well for an American audience familiar with the Final Destination idea of death catching up with people.

The idea of splitting Light's personality into two people (one who wants to just get rid of guilty people and one that has the god complex) and making this movie's Misa (Mia in this movie) the manipulator is definitely interesting.

There's a clear divide in the intelligence level for Light in this movie vs Light in the original material, but L seems to be on the same level as L in the original material (aside from getting blinded by emotions), so you get the feeling early on that this Light does not stand a chance and is going to lose this game handily, which works well for trying to squeeze this down into a movie.

Ryuk is far more aggressive and antagonistic in this than the original material, whereas the original Ryuk just drops the book into the world and waits for something to happen, this one drops the books onto someone and eggs them on to write in it.

Death Note rules are either bent or made up for convenience in this film, most of them didn't bother me but some of which that were explicitly done for convenience do (ex: If you write someone's name in the death note but burn the page their name is written in before they die then that person is spared, but it can only be done once).

The cliffhanger ending is what really brings the whole movie down, though: Light is in a hospital bed recovering from falling into the ocean from a Ferris wheel, his dad comes in after figuring out he's Kira and asks him to explain, but off elsewhere L has found a page of the death note and, being emotionally compromised after Watari's death, struggles with whether he wants to right Light's (or his dad's?) name in the Death Note page. Ryuk appears in front of Light (this movie's way of saying someone is about to die from their name written in the death note) and begins laughing as he says "You humans are very interesting." And then the credits roll, leaving the plot unresolved and clearly banking on a sequel.

All in all, an interesting spin on the source material, but holding itself back to much to be truly good.