Having just gotten to see it this afternoon(Sept. 17th), let me just say that Innocence was definitely worth the wait. Everything about the movie exceeded my expectations, from story, to pacing, to how fucking beautiful it was. If it's playing in a theater near you, do yourself a favor and go see this movie.
Bear in mind that this movie continues along the first movie's storyline, which exists in a separate universe from the manga and series, and that this was Written and Directed by Mamoru Oshii, making it quite the different creature than anything Shirow creates. Without spoiling, I was rather surprised that it actually drew on stuff in the manga as much as it did, as I was under the impression that Oshii was completely off doing his own thing in the universe.
If you do want spoilers, you'll just have to wait, as I want to be able to go through the film again and dissect it.
Batou is a living cyborg.
His whole body, even his arms and legs are entirely man-made.
What only remains are traces of his brain
and the memories of a woman.
In an era when the boundary between humans and machines
has become infinitely vague,
Humans have forgotten that they are humans.
This is the debauchery of the lonesome "ghost" of a man,
who nevertheless seeks to retain humanity.
Innocence...
Is what life is.
Production I.G ˇTOKUMA SHOTEN ˇNippon Television Network
ˇDENTSU ˇDisney ˇTOHO ˇMITSUBISHI Presents
BASED ON THE MANGA BY :Shirow Masamune
WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY:Mamoru Oshii
SEQUENCE DIRECTION:Toshihiko Nishikubo Naoko Kusumi
CHARACTER DESIGN:Hiroyuki Okiura
MACHINE AND VEHICLE DESIGN:Atsushi Takeuchi
SUPERVISING LAYOUT ARTIST:Takashi Watabe
SUPERVISING ANIMATORS:Kazuchika Kise Tetsuya Nishio
ART DIRECTOR:Shuichi Hirata
PRODUCTION DESIGNER:Yohei Taneda
DIGITAL EFFECTS SUPERVISOR:Hiroyuki Hayashi
VISUAL EFFECTS:Hisashi Ezura
LINE PRODUCERS:Ryuji Mitsumoto Masatoshi Nishizawa
MUSIC BY:Kenji Kawai
SOUND DESIGN:Kazuhiro Wakabayashi
PRODUCER:Mitsuhisa Ishikawa Toshio Suzuki
PRODUCED BY:Production I.G
CO-PRODUCED BY:STUDIO GHIBLI
DISTRIBUTION(Japan):TOHO
