Bayonetta: Bloody Fate (2013)

Admirable film.

A different way of telling a story

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

I spent some time today to watch a Blu-Ray copy of this film. As a gift from my brother, we planned to watch the subtitled original together. This review will cover the Funimation dub, so obviously there will be differences.The story possesses many similarities to the plot of the first Bayonetta video game, with a few differences that make it more original overall than many other movie tie-ins. Granted, it's still not enough to make it seem like more than video game cutscenes drawn in anime, but it delivers on the action and occasional humor or drama with more success than others of its kind. If you have played Bayonetta, then the characters should feel very familiar. For audiences who haven't one bit of knowledge, they can be hard to grasp considering how reliant the writing is on the game's plot. We have the trope of a protagonist's family member for a villain in Balder, the forgotten child Bayonetta, her enabler Jeanne, the tough guy Rodin, and the informant Enzo, the characters are only as complex as they are in the game they came from. To its credit, Bayonetta does have a more deep plot compared to many other video games, so it does work out. Very easily, the animation is the best thing about this movie. The fantasy elements, monsters, and action work gracefully and pristinely with Gonzo's style of anime. The effects are enough to make the fights compelling to watch, while the ideas from the video games (such as the Gomorrah that Bayonetta summons with Avavago) look really amazing with the environments.If you like Bayonetta or are familiar with the franchise, this film is somewhat unremarkable besides just looking like an eye candy version of gameplay. For common audiences (no children, there is graphic violence, language, and nudity, like a classic R film), it may come off as just another otaku movie that isn't designed to cater to a general audience. I didn't find it too interesting, but for some people, its very strong animation and overall higher quality compared to other video game movies may come off as a delightful surprise.

Bayonetta: Bloody Fate is a fantastic addition to the first game. It's basically perfect as far as sticking to what the series is, however it also adds depth to lots of the characters and clears up some confusing plot elements from the game. The animation is generally fantastic from Gonzo, though there are some consistency issues with the drawings. The movie is a bit rushed because they had to fit a story from a game with nearly 3 hours of cut scenes into a 90 minute window and still provide the needed level of action. Overall though they did a good job of getting as much stuff into the movie as they could from the first game. They managed to even deepen the personal stories between the characters in the game and made the connection and story between Bayonetta and her parents a very memorable one. Now to talk about the different versions of the movie. This movie is almost unquestionably the best dub Funimation has ever done. It's very common that you hear fans complain about Funimation dubs sucking and when they dub licensed properties they almost always use in-house actors to save budget. That isn't the case here at all. Funimation went all out with this movie and brought as much of the original cast as possible (and from the director's commentary went EXTREMELY out of their way to get Hellena Taylor in to play Bayonetta. Going as far as delaying the film by 2 months. Not to mention having to track down the original actors who were uncredited in the first game, and inaccurate on IMDb.) The actors were all great here in reprising their roles, and in fact I have to single out Hellena Taylor as she even managed to improve upon Bayonetta from the game as she has a better understanding of exactly how to play the character after having done it for years. They didn't bog the movie down with a silly script and instead tried to keep everything as true to the game as possible (more on this in a second..) The only real thing that sticks out as a mistake is having the Auditio talk in English, but it's a forgivable one. Hats off to Funimation as it's pretty clear they have improved immensely at dubbing Anime in the past 3 or 4 years. Now as far as the Japanese version goes. AVOID IT AT ALL COSTS. It does sound weird saying that about an anime, but it 100% applies here. Bayonetta was designed as an English game and the movie really should have been as well. The Japanese voice cast is horrible and doesn't fit the game or characters what so ever. Nothing against any of the actors as I'm sure they are great, but talk about a mismatch. Even Hideki Kamiya himself, the creator of Bayonetta said he didn't think she should ever have a Japanese voice. The translations of the dialogue from the first game are wholly inaccurate and the character does not seem right at all in Japanese. Bayonetta's Japanese voice actor doesn't get what makes the character special at all, and instead turns her into almost a cliché Japanese lead female character ala Lightning from FF-XIII. Even the movies theme song "Night I Stand" sounds much better in English, where as it just sounds almost.... off key in Japanese.In closing if you're a fan of Bayonetta you should own this movie. In fact if you haven't already done so you should go out and buy it now so Gonzo has more of a reason to give us a sequel! If you don't know anything about Bayonetta you might find it all a bit odd, though I do have to say that I watched this film with someone who had no clue about the game and they actually found themselves enjoying it.

So here we have another "bad is good and good is evil" type of nonsense, which seems to be a prevailing subject these days.I started watching this not knowing anything about the subject matter, but I didn't last long. It's just a bunch of clichéd, gratuitous, ridiculous tripe. If you are a brainless clod who likes thinking "evil is cool because reasons", then this is for you. No thanks, that mess is beyond obnoxious these days.Also, IMDb said I didn't have ten lines of text which is just as ridiculous. One can get their point across without having to write a novel, and I've seen shorter reviews than mine on here. Just another unnecessarily restrictive process IMO.

Nobody's reviewed the new movie yet on IMDb (probably soaking up every last minute of the new game and the re-release), so I thought I'd step up.Bloody Fate is a mixed bag. Intense action, check. Iconic sassy hyper sexual feminine character in spex stripping half-naked, double check. Mercilessly killing faceless nondescript enemies, check. Half-baked exposition characters thrown in randomly to keep the plot loosely connected, yep. Poor pacing, unfortunately.Bloody Fate sticks to the first game in the series almost verbatim. Don't let the director's commentary persuade you otherwise. The characters, the lore, the events, even the inside jokes feel like their ripped straight from the cut-scenes. Even the chronological areas visited and recalled by our heroine come from the first game. Which is good, REALLY good... if you are a fan of the first game. If you are a casual watcher, Bayonetta: Bloody Fate is going to feel a little hollow and stale, which is something Bayonetta is anything but. But if you're a fan of the series, you'll get way more bang for your buck.90 minutes is a lot of time for a single entry anime, but to fit all the events from the game into a film while still keeping up the interests of the niche fan base, things were cut. We start off with a bang, and then a roar, Bayonetta doing what she does best killing Lumen angels in church before going up against a Beloved. A little explanation, more action, and then the movie goes from a roar to dull murmur at the 30 min mark. With the entry of a certain figure that will no doubt go down as the most annoying supporting character since the Brown Wizard, the movie turns cringe worthy. Minor spoilers would give away who this person is, which is just simply THE definition of irony. Trust me, the twist will surprise no one. (I lost count how many times the word Mummy was mentioned after 30.) What follows is a gratuitous display of fan service PG boobs, and unnecessary clothed crotch and butt shots. Fans of the series will be at home with this, newcomers in a mixed crowd will probably be looking back and forth. For a title that made TV-MA, this blows. We're adults, show nipples. With the amount of time they spent drawing Bayonetta's body parts, they may just as well.Things pick up again after the 50 minute mark, but suddenly the movie goes to fast too keep up with how places are connected, and where our heroes are headed. The verbiage of the series is arresting, and you wont get it in one sitting, even if the tropes are routine. Fore shading and plot twists come out, but the whole three realms and Purgatory references along with the theological aspects are just too filler to get in one sitting. Even more distracting is the action, which even in the middle half doldrums doesn't stop.All that being said, when it comes to classic femme fatale, perfectly executed BAMF moments, eccentric character creation and perfectly drawn animation, Gonzo and Toei really did their homework. I have the Blu-ray and I have yet to find a single artifact or banding issue in the movie. Gorgeous doesn't do B:BF justice. Also, the original voice actors from the first game make their return! If you weren't aware, Hellena Taylor actually voiced the character before the Japanese voice actors were picked, making Bayonetta by default British. Saucy, British... You'd think you were listening to a sex chat operator.As far as additional features, the set is lacking. A director's track along with Hellena Taylor giving a brief history of Pinewood studios is just about all there is. Trailers, and storyboard sketches comprise the rest. If there's a complaint I have about additional features, it's that there's no subtitles for the English dub, and the audio is by default in 5.1 no matter what language you pick. For people who like to know exact words this is frustrating. British is NOT American, and accents distract.All in all, Bloody Fate does well, but has some issues. Think Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust, but with a chick, and a really annoying child. If it weren't for the second act lull, I'd give it a nine because the movie does what the games do; kick ass and look good doing it! I'd recommend Bloody Fate for anyone who loves Bayonetta.