All You Need Is Kill is one of those great titles that says everything and nothing about the movie you're about to see. You know it's going to be action-packed and probably even a bit crazy, but the how, why, or what are entirely up for grabs.
Thanks to such an ambigious title, it's no surprise that every adaptation of the material feels distinctly different. Whether it's as a manga, graphic novel, live-action film, or this new anime version, each one has something unique to contribute to Hiroshi Sakurazaka's original work.
The basic premise remains the same: Earth faces an unexpected calamity from outer space, leading to devastating loss of life as an alien force reshapes the face of the planet. A year later, an unexpected hero emerges in the midst of battle as they find themselves reliving the day of their death over and over again, each time growing stronger in their fight to survive.
Here, that hero is Rita (Ai Mikami), a low-level member of an excavation crew tasked with scrubbing whatever they can from the alien entity that landed on Earth a year earlier. Unlike other versions, there is no all out war here, not yet at least. Instead, humankind has spent the last twelve months waiting in a state of uncertainty. Everything has changed, but no one can quite articulate how.
Then, out of nowhere, the alien entity springs to life. We witness the first strike of the war that will swallow the globe. Rita dies and instantly awakes in bed, back to relive the same day. She quickly figures out her new nightmarish reality and sets out to find a way to stay alive, even if it's just a few minutes longer each time.
All You Need Is Kill impresses instantly with a spectacular opening sequence, where Rita witnesses the first moments of the invasion. The stunning animation style, a mix of bright and poppy colors with sharply angular characters and mechs, makes for a visual feast that deserves to be seen in theaters. It has a striking mix marvel and dread and the film captures a sense of epic despair where you're both mesmerized by the scope of things, just before you realize how horrifying the outcome actually is.
It's just a shame this energy doesn't carry further in the story, and about halfway through into its less than 90-minute runtime, All You Need Is Kill loses its momentum almost entirely. After a wonderful first half that does something new with the material, the second is sadly far more conventional in following the source material. The characters are swapped in dynamics, but the short runtime and light script do nothing to explore this change in any meaningful way.
There are still great singular moments that make the big picture worthwhile. A late-stage two player running of the gauntlet, where giant mechs(!) and flower monsters(!!) go toe-to-toe is one of the most audacious and wild action scenes in recent memory. The film also keeps the tone surprisingly dreamllike and vague, which works well with the hallucinogenic visuals.
But if ever there was an adaptation that could have done with extra padding, it's this one. Just when things start to get interesting, All You Need Is Kill wraps up so quickly it feels like it's missing an entire act. Another twenty minutes could easily solve these issues, especially in beefing up the limp and currently unearned romance between the protagonists.
As a visual feast, All You Need Is Kill is a satisfying thrill that should satisfy sci-fi fans everywhere. It isn't the best adaptation of the material to date (that's still, surprisingly, the Tom Cruise film from the mid 2010s), but it is a worthy inclusion in the growing catalog.
