Dragonball Evolution

Dragonball Evolution is a low budget 2009 American live-action movie based on the Dragon Ball franchise being made by 20th Century Fox. The story follows the adventures of the lead character, Son Goku, around his 18th birthday. The movie began being made in 2002, and is directed，produced and written by James Wong. It was first released in Japan and several other Asian nations on March 13, 2009, and later released in the United States on April 10, 2009.

Dragonball Evolution
Directed by	James Wong
Written by	Screenplay: James Wong Ben Ramsey Manga: Akira Toriyama
Produced by	James Wong Stephen Chow
Starring	Justin Chatwin James Marsters Jamie Chung Emmy Rossum Joon Park Eriko Tamura Randall Duk Kim Texas Battle Ernie Hudson Chow Yun-Fat
Cinematography	Robert MacLachlan
Edited by	Chris G. Willingham
Music by	Brian Tyler
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release dates	Japan March 13, 2009 Australia April 3, 2009 United States April 10, 2009
Running time	84 minutes
Countries	United States  Hong Kong  Mexico
Language	English
Budget	$30 million[1]
Box office	$57,497,699[2]

Justin Chatwin was cast as Goku, and James Marsters is Lord Piccolo, the antagonist of the movie. A video game of the movie, with the same name, will be released in March/April for the PSP.

Reception

Since its release, Dragonball Evolution was universally being rated and commented as the most poor manga adoption ever. On Rotten Tomatoes it scored 15% based on 55 reviews, while on Metacritic it received a rating of 45 out of 100 based on 10 reviews.^[3]

The original creator Akira Toriyama felt surprised of this live-action film and suggested to treated it as a different work form his manga.

original comments and translation

Japanese: 脚本やキャラクター造りは原作者としては『え?』って感じはありますが、監督さんや俳優の皆さん、スタッフなど、現場は超優秀な人達ばかりです。ボクやファンの皆さんは別次元の『新ドラゴンボール』として鑑賞するのが正解かもしれません。もしかしたら現場のパワーで大傑作になっているかもしれませんよ! おおいに期待しています!!

translation

As the original creator, I had a feeling of "Huh?" upon seeing the screenplay and the character designs, but the director, all the actors, the staff, and the rest are nothing but "ultra" high-caliber people. Maybe the right way for me and all the fans to appreciate it is as a New Dragonball of a different multiverse and dimension. Perhaps, this might become a great masterpiece of power! Hey, I look forward to it!!