I saw the first DeathNote movie today and decided I should write a summary of it and what I thought of it.
Cast
Light Yagami: Tatsuya Fujiwara
L: Ken'ichi Matsuyama
Ryuk (voice): Shido Nakamura
Soichiro Yagami: Takeshi Kaga
Misa: Erika Toda
Raye Penber: Shigeki Hosokawa
Naomi Misora: Asaka Seto
Shiori (original character): Yuu Kashii
Sayu Yagami: Hikari Mitsushima
Sachiko Yagami: Michiko Godai
Watari: Shunji Fujimura
Matsuda: Souta Aoyama
Aizawa: Shin Shimizu
Ukita: Tatsuhito Okuda
Mogi: Ikuji Nakamura
My opinion on the Story.
I think the story at the start is extremely fast moving and slightly confusing. I think it is confusing because you see Light Yagami writing in his DeathNote and then later on you see him finding the DeathNote. This also differs from the manga/anime because in the manga/anime he finds the DeathNote outside his school, whereas in the movie, he finds it in an abandoned alleyway.
In the manga, between the chapters shows you the rules of the DeathNote. In the movie they still show this when Light is about to kill someone, the rules come up and he read them aloud and then it shows him using that rule. As in, "You must think of the persons face as you write their name in this note so that others with the same name won't be affected." and he thinks only of one person he is killing.
Ryuk the Shinigami is animated in this movie. The animation of Ryuk is quite good apart from when he laughs, he looks more like a gaming character. The animations of his wings are quite good when he flies and when he travels through walls and windows. Whenever Ryuk eats an apple, the animation of the apple disappearing is always very good.
The casting of Watari and Misa Misa was exceptionally good. The actor, Shunji Fujimura, plays Watari and looks alot like the drawings of Watari in the manga. Erika Toda, who plays Misa Amane, plays the role of Misa very well and acts like Misa does in the manga. She plays the perfect steryotype of a dizzy blonde. But some casting isn't so good, as you can't tell which members of the Japanese Taskforce are which until their names are said aloud.
Some parts of the movie differ to the same parts in the manga. Firstly, Ray Penber, as he is known in the manga, has a different name in the movie and when Light finds out that Ray has been following him, he confronts him, where as in the manga he actually doesn't. When Ray goes onto the train to be killed by Light, Naomi follows him on there whereas in the manga she doesn't. Misa is added properly into the story differently in the movie than in the manga. In the movie, she is added into the storyline when a stalker attempts to kill her and the stalker is killed by someone using a DeathNote and then the DeathNote drops out of the sky. In the manga, Misa already has her DeathNote when she is added into the storyline.
Light is made out to be a cruel person towards the end of the movie, as his plans out Naomi Misora and Shiori's (His Girlfriend) deaths even though he loves Shiori.
As the film comes to a climax, the film ends when L meets Light for the first time.
Overall, I would give The First DeathNote movie, a 8/10 because even though you constantly have to read the subtitles because its all in Japanese and the vast amount of swearing in it, the basic storyline and the charcters all play their parts brilliantly.
