Death Note started out as a manga written by Tsugumi Ohba and illustrated by Takeshi Obata. It was adapted into an anime series, which is available on Netflix and Hulu, and was also adapted into a live-action series in Japan, which is available on Crunchyroll. All of this is relevant because you should either read the manga or watch either of these versions before you watch this movie.
Death Note is a detective, psychological thriller. It revolves around a genius high school student, Light Yagami. One day he finds the titular Death Note. A Death Note is notebook that will kill anyone whose name is written in it in whatever way the owner describes, as long as it’s possible (not like “a dragon appears and eats them”). If the owner fails to write a description of the death, the victim will die of a heart attack. However, you have to have also seen the person’s face. Light makes a name for himself as Kira, choosing to kill those he deems morally unfit, which gains the attention of the world-renowned detective known as L. Light and L make this amazing dynamic of good versus evil because they are both driven by logic and their own sense of justice. Ultimately, L doesn’t truly care about anyone, but he does believe that killing is wrong. Light, on the other hand, kills people who “deserve” it, like rapists, pedophiles, murderers, etc.
That sounds like a really awesome plot, right? Well. That’s not what you get from this movie. You get the same plot on the most basic level: High school student Light (Nat Wolff) finds a Death Note and meets the Shinigami Ryuk (Willem Dafoe), he starts killing people, Interpol gets involved and sends L (Lakeith Stanfield). However, unlike in the manga/anime, Light and L are not the sociopaths they are supposed to be. They are driven by revenge and have deep emotional attachments that they should not have.
For example, Light is actually low-key in love with this cheerleader, Mia (Margaret Qualley), who he barely knows (not accurate to Light’s character). And their first interaction is him stepping in front of a bully who pushed her and yelling “DON’T TOUCH HER” like a two-year old whose older sibling took their toy. Light later meets Ryuk in detention, where he, as much as I HATE this metaphor, screams like a little girl. Literally, he screams and falls over and then bangs on the glass the way women in B horror movies do. It’s the most ridiculous thing ever.
Ryuk explains the Death Note and encourages him to use it on the bully. This is something Shinigami are NOT allowed to do. It’s a rule in the manga/anime! But I can let that slide. What I can’t let slide is Light’s first “test” of the notebook is writing that this bully gets fucking decapitated. And this decapitation happens from a truck crashing into a car, couldn’t be going over 30 MPH, and the ALUMINUM LADDER flies forward and knocks his face in half. All of the movie’s killings are like this, unnecessarily bloody with bodies exploding from impacts that would never cause that to happen.
I don’t want to get too much further in to the plot, so I’m just going to break down the characters.
Light – Light’s mom was murdered (didn’t happen in the manga/anime) so he’s all angry at his dad (a cop) and the world. The second person he kills is the dude that killed his mom. I can let that slide. That’s what motivates him to create his ideal world, instead his own egotistical view of himself and his intelligence. It’s the classic “someone I love died and now I have to avenge them” mentality. Light also cries. A lot. He has compassion and he doesn’t want to kill innocent people, including FBI agents who are searching for Kira (which he totally killed without hesitation in the manga/anime). He isn’t even smart about how he kills people. I know it’s a movie so it’s condensed, but L figures out who he is in like two seconds, because it’s SO obvious. He’s not interesting at all. He’s just a whiny, emotional boy who does regular high school bullshit.
Mia – Light is sitting at practice when Mia sits down and asks what he’s reading, and what does he do? HE TELLS HER. This girl he doesn’t know at all, except her name, he just straight up tells her he can murder people…AND SHE THINKS IT’S GREAT! Mia is just totally on board with this whole idea of murdering people with him. In fact, she’s so on board that they have sex after they kill someone and watch it on the news. Even though she can’t see or hear Ryuk (though, since she touched the Death Note she should be able to), she just believes Light when he tells her things Ryuk does or says without question. She kills FBI agents even though Light tells her not to. She even tries to kill his dad when he calls out Kira on live TV!
L – I liked L for a hot minute, but then it died and my heart broke. L, like Light, did not come across as highly intelligent and detached from the world. He also showed his face, his FULL face, like immediately! Granted, yes, it was to test his theory, but he’s supposed to be this super secret pro detective who few have ever even met, and here he is, just showing up to a press conference and flaunting his face. I do feel like the actor did a good job. He had the mannerisms, the way he sits, the way he talks, but he was given some shitty material to work with. L also finds Light at one point, in a PUBLIC place, where people are, and just starts calling him out on being Kira and talking about the investigation and his theories and shit. What the fuck, L? Zero secrecy happens in this movie. All important conversations take place in public areas, with lots of people, at a not whisper volume.
I’m also just gonna toss this out here, James Turner (Shea Whigham), Light’s dad, is the WORST cop ever. Not anything like his dad in the original series. And he’s always using his serious cop voice and his serious cop face and he can’t hold direct eye-contact for more than two seconds.
The salvation for this movie falls on the shoulders of Ryuk, who was not in the movie nearly as much as he should have been. Ryuk looked creepy as hell and Willem Dafoe’s voice was masterful. He had some great and witty lines, he had this awesome maniacal laugh, but we barely saw him. He also explained the Death Note as needing a human keeper, which is inaccurate and takes away from his character. He also pressures Light into killing certain people. Part of what made his character so great in the anime/manga was that he dropped his Death Note into the human world because he was bored. He just wanted to see what Light did.
I’ll give this movie a few points because of Willem Dafoe’s Ryuk and another because Keith Stanfield did do a good job as L considering what he was given to work with. If you really want to watch the movie, be my guest, but watch the anime or read the manga first. Do I recommend you watch it? That’s a hard no.
Rating: 4 out of 10
DEATH NOTE IS STREAMING ON NETFLIX
–Rachel Freeman
