To be exact, 劇場版NARUTO−ナルト−疾風伝絆 (Gekijōban Naruto Shippūden Kizuna), the 2008 Naruto movie i just watched a few days ago. It was good… With fun parts. But with the followings, i will go into spoilers, so if you haven’t watched the movie yet, rather don’t read on. (It’s worth watching.) I had the Dattebayo subbed version.
The very first scene probably made all the japanese loli girls scream out in the theaters, because it features their beloved Sasuke-kun. (I wish i knew what’s so cool about him…) I didn’t take a screenshot (on intention). But what comes after that is so funny i can’t avoid mentioning it. The “Sky Country” (空の国), which was defeated by Konoha in the Great Shinobi War, launches a surprise revenge attack. As the ships approach the coastline, they are in a formation which reminded me of the most complicated chinese character of three dragons and five clouds (in one character).
They attack with air corps, that fly using wings attached to the back. According to Neji, they work by using chakra to make the air move faster over the wings. They fly over the landscape in a way that may be very similar to a lot of people, since it very highly resembles the attack of japanese planes on Pearl Harbor, from the movie at least.
During the siege there’s one more scene that made me laugh out: when the largest flying unit (the single one machine) launches an energy beam attack virtually the very same way the aliens destroy the “earthling” cities in the Independence Day movie. I couldn’t really make a good screenshot of that, though i tried, i really did…
But at least after the bombardment the Hero of Konoha, and the Future Hokage and the Bearer of Other Two-hundred-sixty-seven Titles, everyone’s beloved Naruto jumps on the screen. A bit blurred, though…
He meets a mysterious doctor, and his apprentice, who’s looking for the master very… agressively. Unlucky for the apprentice, this seems to be too tiring for such a young one. But it turns out that their village (at least the apprentice originates from there) is under attack by the same sky ninja, so Naruto, Sakura and Hinata accompany them there.
Switch to Orochimaru’s hidden base, where he “asks” Sasuke to bring him the man who invented the forbidden rebirth technique. The one Orochimaru uses starts to be insufficient, and he hopes to get better ones from that man.
Also, Konoha is not the type to rest… They soon launch a counter-attack at the Sky Fleet (paradox, those are definitely not aircrafts, nor hovercrafts, though then they’d be full of eels), initiated by Sai… Now that bird looks cool.
But before we could see the final outcome of that battle, the view changes back to follow Naruto’s journey to the West village of Amaru (the apprentice). Seems Naruto is only brave as long as it doesn’t concern and wildlife… At least he’s pretty much freaked out by one single croco…
A flying sky scout makes them hide under the boat, when Amaru drops the scalpel received from the doc… So Amaru goes to retrieve it, while Naruto goes to save Amaru from the piranha-lookalike poisonous fish. And naturally he gets a nice bite, so the docs need to save him by sucking out the poison… That’s when Naruto realises something strange about Amaru, though he’s not sure yet, it makes him blush… As it turns out just a few seconds after, Amaru is in fact a girl… Surprise, the moment of truth.
As they approach the village, it’s already in flames and ruins. By triggering a trap, Amaru’s almost killed by a few dozen kunai, but is instead saved by Shinnō, the doctor. Who, by the way, dies in the process, leaving Amaru deeply depressed. Very depressed. So when Naruto meets her again at the “ruins beside the village”, her eyes are red, as it turns out she’s a jichuuriki as well, she has the Reibi, the Zero tailed Beast inside her. Naruto battles the Reibi, after a while relying on the Kyuubi’s (Ninetails) power…
Then he suppresses the demon, and frees Amaru as well from the possession. They enter the ruins, since the villagers may be hiding there… But the “ruins” turn out to be the mighty weapon of the Sky Country, Ancor Vantian, a huge flying fortress with a “superweapon” inside. And also Shinnō, who in turn turns out to be a madman highly adept at using the dark chakra, and having a pretty twisted view on human relationships and on humanity in general. This already foreshadows a nice fight. Amaru runs up to him when she first sees him, in joy, just to end up being laughed at, and thrown to the end of the hall… Bad boy, that Shinnō is. Hurting a cute girl like Amaru…
Meanwhile, the attacking fleet in the bay faces some problems…
I guess their surprise when they faced Shino’s cute little bugs. I guess it’s intended to be a pun, that the music of the scene is a rockish remake of the Flight of the Bumblebee. Matches here, though.
They ate up most of the ships, and i’ve to say, did that in a picturesque way.
Though that didn’t help Naruto much, who slowly got beaten to pulp by Shinnō. The old fart is in fact an adept user of the dark chakra, that works in the Reibi as well, and that enables him to use a body rebirth technique (any clues?). It kind of looks like a super-saiyajin transformation…
Naruto keeps on attacking him, and although he indeed delivers a few nice punches, he slowly gets really badly beaten up. In despair, Amaru almost commits suicide, but Naruto stops her. She also confesses her love for her master, but he just laughs at her. He says love is just nothing compared to the power of hate and despair, the dark chakra. That really knocks Naruto back to life and he severely beats up the “perfect body” of Shinnō… Not to mention this is the first scene where Amaru actually looks like a girl.
Just as Naruto would finish Shinno with a rasengan (how is that he can do one-handed rasengans only in the movies?), the chirping of birds sound, and his rasengan instead goes flying out of the dome.
Stunned by the appearance of Sasuke, Naruto just stands watching as he defeats Shinnō with chidori needles locking his chackra flow. Shinnō gives Sasuke the scroll that could help Orochimaru, but manages to escape as well. Naturally the guys go after him, though for what reason i don’t really know. They catch up with him in a place that reminds me of the Evangelion Terminal Dogma. Shinno there merges into the cocoon of the Reibi, and destroys the sky fleet, which he apparently just sent there for that reason.
He slowly overpowers Naruto and Sasuke, since the Reibi sucks away all the chakra they try to use. Sasuke realises this and releases the first level of his cursed seal. That’s not enough though, but the Kyuubi surely induces a fatal overflow error in the Reibi (simply overpowering it with the red chakra).
As the Reibi is kind of going out of control, being locked in the cocoon but being sieged with that massive amount of chakra, Naruto does one more freaky-named rasengan, which in contrast to its name looks cool.
As the cocoon is destroyed, massive amounts of clay-looking hands appear. To be honest, this whole scene kind of reminds me of the Fullmetal Alchemist movie, where Wrath fights Gluttony… Gluttony looked very much like this—or rather this thing left of the Reibi looks like Gluttony then. Although Shinnō believes it to be a Bijuu, a Tailed Beast, it is not. But Ancor Vantian starts to fall apart, and Amaru saves the villagers and Hinata (who was taken hostage, apparently) in a sky-boat. She wants to stay with Naruto but Sasuke simply throws her into the boat, as Naruto launches it—while in return Naruto cracks off the platform Sasuke’s standing on, making him “join” the boat as well.
Naruto gathers some strength and destroys the whole place with a lot of “determination rasengans”. (One more crappy name.) As the fortress is approaching the coast, the four-man cynic cell on the shore (Shikamaru, Kakashi, Sai and Shino, the ones sent to destroy the fleet) discuss that maybe they should run, because the ton-weight stones of the Ancor Vantian are falling closer and closer…
The fortress explodes, and Naruto is falling, totally resigned. Amaru sees that from the boat, takes one of those wings used by the sky ninja and jumps after him. Here come two mistakes. First, Amaru isn’t supposed to be able to use chakra, as far as i know. Then how can she operate that wing? Nevermind. She falls after Naruto, and to reach him drops the wing. Once again, according to the laws of physics, two objects in free fall will fall the same speed. So far as i know. Thus she shouldn’t have been able to reach Naruto, but she reaches him, and embraces him in a hug. And they go on discussing personal matters. (How is that Naruto always gets a girl propose to him in the movies?)
They survive simply because Jiraiya summoned Gamabunta (though for me it rather resembles Gamakichi) to cushion their fall with his “belly”. Amaru keeps Naruto in her hug, as the others approach, Sakura scolding him of course, but nothing really happens.
With that, it seems to be the end, but after the ending credits we get another scene with Sasuke in the environment of the first scene, standing on the water, wondering Naruto’s farewell words (“I’ll definitely bring you back to Konoha, Sasuke!”). And goes on practising chidori. With that, it’s really…
The end.