Okay, so if you've read all of the other reviews then you know that the animation of this film is AWESOME! It's an excellent step forward for hybrid animation. Also, though not all of the reviewers agree, my opinion of the action in this film was that it was sweet and sick (in the most radical fashion.) For the animation and action alone, this film is totally worth the price of a rental. Which brings us to the plot of the film; while some reviewers thought the plot was empty or lacked merit, I am of the opinion that those reviewers probably didn't pay attention to all of the dialog. The plot was well developed, more believable than several of the big-budget live-action Hollywood films (such as The Happening, which totally sucked,) and played along the social issue of fear of technological invasiveness quite nicely, though it was a rather formulaic script. The dialog was a little weak, and there wasn't much for serious character development, but the nonverbal scripting played quite well. After all, this was an animated action flick, and quite frankly it was one of the better offerings from the anime genre in recent years. To recap, this is worth the cost of the rental if only for the visual imagery. However, if you have a well developed sensibility for the suspension of disbelief, then you will also likely enjoy the story as a whole. I know that I certainly did.

The plot: After Japan withdraws from the United Nations and expels all foreigners, the West becomes increasingly suspicious that Japan is conducting illegal research on robotics and transhumanism.

Vexille is a generic cyberpunk story about of the evils of transhumanism, megacorporations, isolationism, and imperialism. The art is beautiful, but it seems wasted on such a derivative and clichéd plot. The story had some real potential, but they decided to dumb everything down, remove all subtlety, and turn the antagonist into a James Bond villain. This is the kind of movie that has themes that a 15 year old would find incredibly deep and philosophical, mixing in generic cyberpunk themes with Romanticism and technophobia. Very little of the movie was actually engaging. Both the characters and the action sequences were flat and mostly interchangeable.

Maybe this movie had a point when it railed against the lack of soul in technological advancement: the CGI art was beautiful but entirely soulless.

There are different elements in this film that simply clash with each other. There is the 3D animation that brings some very cool effects, but then almost no facial expression. Watching the film is like waiting for an in game animation to end so you can continue playing. Then there are the ideas in the film, that are very bold, but they are not really backed by a political and technological realism. The elite team that starts the film comes with these cool robotic suits, but they serve almost no purpose in the story. And I could go on and on.

The thing is that I liked the film, but it was like a jagged experience (pun intended) since there were great scenes, then really bad ones, then some great again, then some bad ones again. All ups and downs. When I think of this movie compared with others, what comes in my mind is Final Fantasy. The same weird immersion in a 3D world, but not really a strong emotional experience.

Bottom line: better than most, could have been better. Nice sci-fi, all 3D CGI.