Alita: Battle Angel

***Alita: Battle Angel*** is a 2019 American cyberpunk action film based on Yukito Kishiro's manga series *Gunnm* (or *Battle Angel Alita* in English). It was directed by Robert Rodriguez, produced by James Cameron and Jon Landau, and written by Cameron and Laeta Kalogridis. Rosa Salazar stars through performance-capture animation as Alita, a cyborg who awakens in a new body with no memory of her past and sets out to uncover her destiny. Christoph Waltz, Jennifer Connelly, Mahershala Ali, Ed Skrein, Jackie Earle Haley and Keean Johnson star in supporting roles.

Announced in 2003, production was repeatedly delayed due to Cameron's work on *Avatar* (2009) and its sequels. After years of development hell, Rodriguez was announced as *Alita*'s director in April 2016, with Salazar cast as the lead the following month. Principal photography began in October 2016 in Austin, Texas, mostly at Rodriguez's Troublemaker Studios, and lasted until February 2017.

*Alita: Battle Angel* had its world premiere at the Odeon Leicester Square in London on January 31, 2019, and was released in Hong Kong, Indonesia, Macau, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan on February 5, 2019, marking Chinese New Year. It was released in the United States on February 14, 2019, by 20th Century Fox in RealD 3D, Dolby Cinema, 4DX, ScreenX, and IMAX 3D formats. It is the first film produced by Lightstorm Entertainment since *Avatar*, and the last film released by 20th Century Fox before the acquisition of 21st Century Fox by Disney. The film grossed over $404 million worldwide, making it Rodriguez's highest-grossing film, and it received generally mixed reviews from critics, who praised Salazar's performance, the action scenes, and the visual effects, but criticized the screenplay.

## Plot

In 2563, 300 years after Earth was devastated by a catastrophic war known as "The Fall", scientist Dr. Dyson Ido discovers a disembodied female cyborg with an intact human brain while scavenging for parts in the massive scrapyard of Iron City. Ido attaches a new cyborg body to the brain and names her "Alita" after his deceased daughter. Alita awakens with no memory of her past and quickly befriends Hugo, a young man who dreams of moving to the wealthy sky city of Zalem. She also meets Dr. Chiren, Ido's estranged ex-wife. Hugo later introduces Alita to Motorball, a *Rollerball*-like racing sport played by cyborg gladiators. Secretly, Hugo robs cyborgs of their parts for Vector, owner of the Motorball tournament and the 'de facto' ruler of the Factory, Iron City's governing authority.

One night, Alita follows Ido; they are ambushed by a gang of cyborg serial killers led by Grewishka. Ido is injured, and Alita instinctively fights using "Panzer-Kunst", a lost combat art for machine bodies. She kills two of the cyborgs and damages Grewishka, who retreats. Ido reveals that he is a Hunter-Warrior, a bounty hunter hired by the Factory. Grewishka goes to Dr. Chiren, who is working for Vector, for help. Despite Alita believing that fighting will help her rediscover her past, Ido discourages her from becoming a Hunter-Warrior. Alita finds a highly advanced cyborg body in a crashed spaceship outside the city. Recognizing that the body belonged to a Berserker—deadly shock troops of the enemy nation United Republics of Mars (URM) from the Fall, of which Alita was a member—Ido refuses to install Alita in it.

Frustrated, Alita registers herself as a Hunter-Warrior. At the Kansas Bar, she and Hugo are unable to recruit other Hunter-Warriors to help her take down Grewishka. Zapan, a cyborg Hunter-Warrior bully, provokes Alita, and she severely beats him in a fight, triggering a chaotic bar brawl until Ido arrives to intervene. Suddenly, an upgraded Grewishka appears and challenges Alita to a duel, revealing that he has been sent by Zalem's technocrat overlord, Nova, to destroy her. Despite her combat skills, Alita's body is damaged by Grewishka, before Ido, Hugo and Hunter-Warrior dogmaster McTeague arrive and force Grewishka to retreat. Ido apologizes and transplants Alita into the Berserker body.

Having fallen in love with Hugo, Alita enters a Motorball tryout race for the prize money to send Hugo to Zalem. Hugo's relationship with Alita leads him to decide to quit his criminal job. He confronts his partner Tanji, but Zapan appears, kills Tanji and frames Hugo for the murder of another cyborg. Hugo narrowly escapes and calls Alita for help; she abandons the race and finds him just as Zapan does. Zapan mortally wounds Hugo. Dr. Chiren, having changed her mind about working for Vector, offers to help save Hugo by attaching his severed head to Alita's life support system. When Zapan sees through the trick and attempts to stop Alita, she seizes his prized Damascus blade and disfigures him.

Ido transplants Hugo's head onto a cyborg body and tells Alita that Vector's offer to help Hugo reach Zalem was a lie; as an exiled citizen of Zalem, Ido is certain that citizens of Iron City cannot enter Zalem without becoming a motorball champion. Alita storms the Factory and confronts Vector, who reveals that Chiren has been harvested for her organs. Vector summons Grewishka, but Alita's new nanotech body allows her to easily destroy him. She forces Nova to speak to her through Vector. When Nova threatens to harm her friends, Alita fatally stabs Vector.

Ido tells Alita that Hugo has fled to climb a cargo tube towards Zalem. Alita catches up to him and pleads with him to return with her. He eventually agrees, but a serrated defense ring dropped by Nova shreds his body and throws him off the tube. Alita catches him but cannot pull him up. Hugo thanks Alita for saving him before falling to his death.

Months later, Alita is a rising superstar in the Motorball tournament. Cheered on by the crowd, she pledges vengeance by pointing her plasma-charged sword toward Zalem, where Nova watches from above, smirking.

## Cast

See also: List of Battle Angel Alita characters
* Rosa Salazar as Alita, a revived cyborg suffering from amnesia
* Christoph Waltz as Dr. Dyson Ido, a renowned cyborg scientist, part-time bounty hunter and Alita's father figure
* Jennifer Connelly as Dr. Chiren, Ido's estranged former wife, a masterful cyborg engineer who works for Vector
* Mahershala Ali as Vector, an influential entrepreneur at the Factory with criminal connections who also serves as Nova's proxy
* Ed Skrein as Zapan, an arrogant sword-wielding bounty-hunting cyborg who develops an egotistic vendetta against Alita
* Jackie Earle Haley as Grewishka, a huge criminal cyborg who works for Nova as his personal assassin and enforcer
* Keean Johnson as Hugo, Alita's love interest and a morally conflicted scrap dealer
* Jorge Lendeborg Jr. as Tanji, Hugo's scrap-dealing friend and accomplice in crime who is more underhanded and does not share Hugo's ethics
* Lana Condor as Koyomi, a teenager who is friends with Hugo and Tanji
* Idara Victor as Nurse Gerhad, Ido's assistant
* Jeff Fahey as McTeague, a Hunter-Warrior who leads a pack of cyborg dogs
* Eiza González as Nyssiana, a wanted criminal cyborg assassin and one of Grewishka's subordinates
* Derek Mears as Romo, a wanted criminal cyborg assassin and one of Grewishka's subordinates
* Leonard Wu as Kinuba, a top league Motorball player whose limbs were cut off by Hugo's jacking gang
* Rick Yune as Master Clive Lee, a Hunter-Warrior who claims a record of 207 kills
* Casper Van Dien as Amok, a cyborg who is responsible for the death of Ido's daughter
* Elle LaMont as Screwhead, a cyborg who's referred to as being one of the most lethal Hunter-Warriors hired by the Factory

Michelle Rodriguez plays Alita's cyborg mentor Gelda, Jai Courtney cameos as Motorball champion Jashugan, and Edward Norton has a cameo as Nova. All three are uncredited.

## Production

### Visual effects

The visual effects were provided by Weta Digital, DNEG and Framestore and supervised by Joe Letteri, Eric Saindon, Nick Epstein, Raymond Chen and Nigel Denton-Howes. Weta Digital was the primary vendor for the Alita digital puppet, which required the company to redesign its motion capture methods to capture all the subtleties and complexities of Salazar's performance.

## Release

### Lawsuit

On January 30, 2019, Epic Stone Group, a Florida-based multimedia company, sued 20th Century Fox for trademark infringement over the "Battle Angel" name. The lawsuit claims that Epic Stone Group had filed the trademark for "Battle Angel" in 2009 for computer games, action figures and other merchandise, and it had filed a new application in April 2018 to use the name on DVDs, e-books, films and television programs. On May 30, 2019, Epic Stone Group filed to dismiss their trademark infringement suit against 20th Century Fox with prejudice.

## Legacy

In September 2020, a social media campaign took place with fans petitioning for U.S. cinema chain Cinemark to re-release the film in theaters before the end of the year as a way to gauge public interest in a potential sequel. Cinemark quickly responded stating that they were considering it. On October 7, James Cameron confirmed that the film would indeed be returning to select theaters on October 30 while voicing support for #AlitaArmy. Director Robert Rodriguez also voiced his support for the movement. Regal Cinemas and AMC Theatres also confirmed that the film would be shown in their theaters before the former announced the temporary closure of their locations due to diminishing returns as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

About the movie's reception, Rodriguez said, "The fans still didn't let anyone forget that they loved that movie. It's almost better than having a movie that does really well but no one remembers in 6 to 8 years."

## References

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1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 [TBA Film releases]. *Variety Insight*.
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Cite error: Invalid `<ref>` tag; no text was provided for refs named `TheWrap`
3. ↑ [TBA *Alita: Battle Angel* (12A)]. British Board of Film Classification.
4. ↑ [TBA Alita: Battle Angel (2019)]. IMDb.
5. ↑ O'Hara, Helen. [TBA Alita: Battle Angel Trailer Breakdown].
6. ↑ Cite error: Invalid `<ref>` tag; no text was provided for refs named `Ali`
7. ↑ Keys, Rob (November 13, 2018). [TBA James Cameron's Avatar Was Originally Written to be Rated R].
8. ↑ [TBA Alita: Battle Angel – Meet Cyborgs Zapan and Grewishka In Exclusive Images] (November 27, 2018).
9. ↑ Lesnick, Silas (October 18, 2016). [TBA Leonard Wu Joins Alita: Battle Angel]. ComingSoonNet. Retrieved on July 27, 2021.
10. ↑ [TBA A definitive ranking of the robots in Alita: Battle Angel].
11. ↑ [TBA ALITA: BATTLE ANGEL - The Art of VFX].
12. ↑ [TBA Weta Digital: Moving Cities and Bringing Anime to Life].
13. ↑ Template:Cite magazine
14. ↑ [TBA Battle Angel - Trademark Details].
15. ↑ [TBA Epic Stone Group Inc. v. Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp. (1:19-cv-20395) District Court, S.D. Florida].
16. ↑ <templatestyles src="Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css"></templatestyles>Mike, Reyes (October 1, 2020). [TBA "Sounds Like Alita: Battle Angel Will Be Coming Back To Select Theaters"] Check `|url=` value (help). Cinemablend. Retrieved October 22, 2020.
17. ↑ <templatestyles src="Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css"></templatestyles>Mike, Reyes (October 7, 2020). [TBA "How James Cameron And Robert Rodriguez Are Joining Alita Army For Battle Angel's Re-Release"] Check `|url=` value (help). CinemaBlend. Retrieved October 22, 2020.
18. ↑ [TBA Robert Rodriguez on his Long-Awaited Return to Family Films - Exclusive Interview] (December 28, 2020).

## Literature

* 2018: Pat Cadigan: *Alita: Battle Angel - Iron City* (Prequel-Novel), Titan Books, Template:ISBN
* 2019: Pat Cadigan: *Alita: Battle Angel - The Official Movie Novelization*, Titan Books, Template:ISBN
* 2019: Abbie Bernstein: *Alita: Battle Angel - The Art and Making of the Movie*, Titan Books, Template:ISBN

## External links

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* Template:Facebook
* Template:IMDb
* Template:Anime News Network

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