Full speed ahead! No need for a story when the pictures are flashy!
In the weeks and months leading up to the release of The Golden Compass, it was hard to escape reading about how the Catholic League was calling for a boycott of the film. I guess it was to be expected. The fantasy novel's author, Philip Pullman, is an atheist and the series does take the Catholic Church and authority in general to task, more…

A film with a lot of holiday cheer.
Christmas movies are usually about Santa Claus and this film does not stray too far from that premise. This romantic holiday flick is narrated by a sweet, kind-hearted Santa's helper who spreads the holiday cheer. Played by Queen Latifah (who's also one of the film's producer), she does not allow anything to stop her, not even a…

An incredible collection of characters covering all levels of British society.
Written by Musgo Del Jefe Little Britain is an incredible collection of characters covering all levels of British society from the Prime Minister's office to the small village of Llandewi Breffi. All these characters are created and played by Matt Lucas and David Walliams. The show consists of 20-30 short sketches per 30-minute show featuring…

A magnificent film warrants a better DVD.
The Order of the Phoenix picks up a few months after the events of The Goblet of Fire, where Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) witnessed the reincarnation of Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes). Potter warns of the the dark lord's return, but the Minister of Magic, Cornelius Fudge, denies it, and becomes suspicious of Potter, Hogwart's Headmaster Albus…

Small Canadian town is taken out by a giant squid. That’s all you need before knowing you can watch Jaws instead.
Eye of the Beast should have been titled The Movie Where Absolutely Nothing Interesting Happens. This dull, generic, and completely pointless creature feature is poorly paced beyond all comprehension. It’s loaded with an ending beyond ridiculous, and barely any creature to speak of. As soon as a monster movie opens and two teenagers are…

A party and a fight, plus a little of the old sentimental ‘guy loses girl/guy gets girl back’ equals the best Gossip Girl yet.
The usual Josh Schwartz formula, a party and a fight, plus a little of the old sentimental guy loses girl/guy gets girl back equals the best Gossip Girl yet. Then again, maybe I just relate to the 'boy isn’t good enough for the parents' plotline way too much.Party of the Week: There was also a tea party, but that’s small…

Combining the look and feel of movies like Sin City and Blade Runner, first time director Christian Volckman delivers a movie that is ultra-stylish, although the story itself does not feel all that special. Despite the familiar feeling, the film brings a bold, fresh look to the animated film genre. It is a science fiction tale of cops and criminals, kidnappers, and the misuse of science for personal gain. More than anything, the film is breathtaking for its use of motion capture and rotoscoping, utilizing the concept of adapting a graphic novel to the big screen, sans graphic novel.

The year is 2054, the place is Paris. This not terribly distant future finds most of the citizens employed by a cosmetics company called Avalon. This company seems to have their hands in all sorts of things, and they are massive. Avalon sort of reminds me of Resident Evil's Umbrella Corporation, or in the real world, Microsoft or Apple (which is funny considering IBM has credit for their technical support of the film). A young woman named Ilona (voiced by Romola Garai) is one of their most promising young scientists, that is until she is mysteriously kidnapped. The police detective assigned to the case, Karas (voiced by James Bond himself, Daniel Craig), sets out to find her. Along the way he meets her boss, Jonas Muller (Ian Holm), a gangster named Farfella (Kevork Mialikyan) who has a past with our hero, and his love interest Bislane (Catherine McCormack), who is also Ilona's older sister.

The story moves along in a straightforward manner; nothing is terribly deep, but Renaissance is nonetheless captivating. In some films, the lack of a deep story ultimately brings the film down a few notches, despite whatever else it may offer in interesting setting or style (see Perfect Creature). Renaissance does not have any big twists or turns; it is refreshingly straightforward as Karas moves forward in his investigation, as Bislane does some searching of her own, both intent on reaching the end and finding Ilona.

Karas is interesting even if he is cut from the same cloth as most other brooding heroes. There is something about him that hints of a tragic past, and ties him to Farfella. Actually, the character is not unlike Daniel Craig's other character, James Bond, a man of few words, a man of action, and a man willing to bed women while in the pursuit of his objective. There is even a scene early on where he gets the assignment which plays out like a meeting between Bond and M.

In the end, Renaissance seems less concerned with the story (although it is good), and more concerned with the style, the look, the environment, and the details. Yes, the world of 2054 Paris is completely immersive. The detail is spectacular, a science fiction noir with carefully thought out camera placements, interesting use of light and shadow, and it feels very real, like you could reach out and touch it. It is much like the way Sin City and 300 were shot, but taken a step further. Instead of just shooting the actors in front of a green screen and adding in backgrounds, the actors' movements were motion captured, manipulated in the computer, and placed within the CG-constructed Paris. It is a striking look, and the decision to use purely black and white is one that pays off in spades. The details just jump out, and the facial expressions and movements look very natural.

Audio/Video. Both English and French language tracks are included; the film is from France and was only dubbed for the US and other non-French markets (obviously), but they did a good job of bringing in very good voice talent that fit the nature of the characters here. I listened to the English track, a Dolby 5.1 track that sounds quite good, well representing the dialogue and score. Video is a gorgeous 2.35:1 anamorphic transfer. It just looks fantastic, no complaints from this viewer.

Extras. A single extra is included, but it is a good one. It is a half hour 'making of' featurette that looks into the origins of the story, and how the concept centered on the idea of a motion captured black and white animated film, with the story coming later. It follows through the design, shooting, and post production phases. It is much better than a fluff piece, I only wish we had more.

Bottom line. I really liked this movie. I wasn't sure at first as it did open a little on the slow side. Still, the characters were interesting, and I just wanted more of this black and white world filled with people who live in the grey area in between.

Recommended.

Christopher Beaumont spends much of his time writing about entertainment when he isn’t sitting in a movie theater. He is known around the office as the “Movie Guy” and is always ready to talk about his favorite form of entertainment and offer up recommendations. Interests include science fiction, horror, and metal music. His writings can be found at Draven99’s Musings, as well as Film School Rejects.

Let me get this out of the way. I am not an anti-Semite. And Night And Fog is not a good documentary, assuming it can even be called a documentary.

I say this because the near universal praise for Alain Resnais’s 1955 black and white, and color, film is ill-founded. Most of it has to do with a) the seeming impolitic nature of criticizing anything that displays Nazi butchery, and b) the fact that the 31-minute long film was the first "real" attempt at categorizing the Nazi horrors of World War Two to the world at large. This was long before canonical terms and figures like "The Holocaust" or "six million" dead Jews were prevalent in pop culture. This film, however, is more agitprop than documentary, from the almost facile way it treats its subject matter, with quick edits to the ponderous, and badly written attempts at poetic narration, voiced by Michel Bouquet.

It would be another few decades before the detailed savagery of the Nazis would get its filmic due, with Marcel Ophüls’ 1972 four-plus hour long The Sorrow And The Pity, Claude Lanzmann’s 1985 nine-plus hour Shoah, and the BBC’s 1974 landmark 26-hour long documentary, The World At War. All three of these films, plus many others, have made Resnais’s film look quaint, to be kind.

That’s not to say that Night And Fog is an outright bad film. It’s not. It’s just not that good, both stylistically, and more so, factually. If the style were brilliant, the mangling of history would not be so bad, and if the reverse were true, the same would apply. But, here, a mere ten years after the war, Resnais makes a definitive claim of nine million dead in the death camps. In the years since, Nazi and Holocaust deniers have denied everything, while Nazi fetishists – is there any other word to call those so obsessed with such degradation? – have claimed thirty million or more. Jews have clung to the canonical Six Million figure, to the exclusion of the millions other dead, and the masses killed by Communist regimes, under the likes of Stalin, Mao, Castro, and Pol Pot, which dwarf even the highest amounts attributed to the Nazis, have been given almost no scrutiny. In recent years, with the release of supposedly classified Nazi archives from Germany, the death tolls have again been claimed higher than the accepted ten to twelve million total, approximately half of which were Jews.

Yet, there is a certain flippancy that one sees with such historically important claims, and, after the seriousness of the Nuremberg Trials, the almost blasé approach of Resnais to this film is a bit unnerving. Of course, stürm and drang is not necessary, merely an incisive look at the reality. That requires no bad poetry and a bit more time. This blame has to fall on writer and minor poet Jean Cayrol, as much as it does Resnais. And yes, they were explicitly making an agitprop film for the French government, which chose to hide its Vichy complicity, as Resnais notes in a radio interview included on the Criterion Collection DVD of the film. There is one still photograph of a Nazi death camp in southern France, where French police can be seen. This was obscured upon the original release but included in the DVD. Yet, if that was done to the film, one can only imagine what other compromises were made, thus effectively nullifying the film’s artistic and historic impact.

If artists and writers in the Soviet bloc countries of the time could figure out ways to outsmart their censors, so should have Resnais. On the positive side, Resnais has claimed he wanted to make the film more than just a look backwards at the Second World War, but a comment on the then current French-Algerian war. Thus he called the death camp inhabitants deportees, not Jews, and used a larger figure for what he believed was the total amount killed (Jews and others) — nine million people.

Of course, the manifest flaws in the film’s structure, some badly synched images and music, and the bad narration, did not deter those of a Leftist bent from praising the film for its statement rather than its art. French film director Francois Truffaut called Night And Fog the greatest film of all time. Well, no. Often, when dealing with war films, or Holocaust films, there is a tendency to trivialize mass murder, by making patriotic excessiveness a virtue, or dripping the story in melodrama. Night And Fog comes down in the middle, yet still misses its mark, because it seems as if Resnais had no real target, despite his claims about the Algerian Resistance.

Yes, we see bodies plowed into holes, stacks of skulls and mounds of human hair, and while that may have shocked years ago, one must be aware that Bela Lugosi’s original turn in 1931’s Dracula, by Tod Browning, was also considered by some to be far too scary for film. Now it’s hokum, and Night And Fog is the documentary equivalent of Dracula. One might argue he’s not to blame, since time and history have swept by his film, but a truly great artist knows that his work will stand up not only upon first peek, but decades later, centuries after that, and as far into the human future as one can envision. This is why the best of Greek tragedies speak to a reader today, and why Night And Fog fails.

And, a final word on the narration, written by Cayrol and voiced by Bouquet. Aside from the pseudo-poetry, there is a condescending tone throughout. Oftentimes, Bouquet chides a viewer for not believing what is being shown (an unwitting invitation to Holocaust deniers in years hence), and then offers platitudes like, "Words are insufficient." Well, not really, not in great art. And while, at 31 minutes, there was obviously no attempt to be comprehensive about the death camps, much less all of World War Two, there is not even an attempt to distill the experience. This lack of focus and air of flippancy make a strange combination for the viewer to chew on, for there is no reflection, no analysis, and what is presented seems almost parodic.

The film’s score is no great shakes either, often being wildly out of touch with the images onscreen. Hanns Eisler plays flute and woodwinds against horrific images, which only further underscores the film’s seeming California surfer dude approach to the subject matter. Music need not be didactic and ponderous, thus recapitulating a terrible image of the dead, but it need not flounce lightly off the carcasses, as well.

Other than the five minute Resnais radio interview, there are only a few essays on the film. As Resnais was still alive at the time of the DVD’s release, one wonders why there are no interviews with him, nor even a commentary. And, as usual, Criterion really flubs it when they use only black and white subtitles, half of which wash out when the white of the black and white segments are shown. All in all, Criterion really shafted the public on this release.

Night And Fog is an interesting curio from the late post-war period. It was made at the height of the early Cold War, and the beginning of the end of Colonialism. While Resnais’s attempt to link the Nazi genocide with Colonialism’s many genocides was ahead of its time, the actual work of art has to stand on its own. It simply fails on all the counts enumerated. Heavy-handedness cannot replace deftness, purples prose cannot replace spare description, and poor scoring cannot replace the sometimes necessity for just an image and quietude. And while poor critical thinkers might believe criticizing a film like Night And Fog is tantamount to blaspheming the memory of the Nazi victims (Jews and others) I would caution those with that view to cogitate on just what such a facile and flippant representation of the dead, by Resnais, says. I claim not anti-Semitism, just not too good art. Unfortunately, these days, even saying that can get you called a Nazi.

Now, what was that saying of Santayana’s about history and doom?

On Tuesday's General Hospital:

While talking to Logan about Cody, Cooper encouraged him to be completely honest with Lulu. We were fed a few more clues to 'the horrible deed' of Logan's, but none of the details. After breaking away from her imposed house arrest by Edward, Monica, and Alice by blackmailing Alice, Lulu pressed Logan for details about why Cody is so angry. He avoided her direct question but detailed for her the general horrors of war.

Cody is an interesting addition to the landscape of the teen-set, a complex character being played expertly by Graham Shiels. I'm enjoying watching his evolution on both the daytime serial and on the Night Shift.

Tracy was also worried about Lulu's involvement with Logan and when talking to Scott was unsuccessful, she called Nikolas telling him his sister was in real danger. Tracy's selfless caring concern for Lulu, however caused Alan's ghost – a manifestation of her guilty conscience – to fade. Hopefully, this is not the end of Alan, as his role as Tracy's conscience has been not only hilarious but poignant to watch.

In the meantime, against Cooper's advice, Maxie sat down with Cody to try and find out the secrets of Iraq. She found herself on slippery, yet familiar, ground when she pointed out Cody's obvious signs of addiction.

So, Maxie's going to go down that same path as last year, stealing and buying illicit drugs for a guy. Didn't she learn anything from the experience with Lucky? Just once, I'd like see her do the right thing.

I guess Jason is allowed visitors at Pentonville now, as he had a revolving door of them in this episode. First Carly came with her usual whining and moaning she does when her life is a mess. She repeatedly pushed Jason to just dump Sam, until he finally spilled to her it was over, by Sam's initiation. Amelia showed up later to warn Jason Sam is a loose cannon out to destroy him and he would be smart to claim his child and point the finger at her as an accessory to the kidnapping. Jason outright bitterly refused. I get the feeling, even after everything that has happened between them, he still loves Sam.

Sam, however, took a break from her packing to warn Nikolas that now that she and Jason are over it is likely Liz will dump Lucky and pursue him and he should steel himself to be there for his brother. Soon after, Carly showed up to gloat about Sam finally being a footnote to Jason's life. The war of words elevated till Sam could take no more and slapped Carly. I guess we'll have to wait for Wednesday's episode to see if Carly comes back at her.

On Wednesday's GH:

• Ric delivers subpoenas to both Liz and Sam to testify against Jason.
• Back off is the warning Jason has for Amelia
• It's Coop to the rescue when Maxie gets in over her head.

Wife, mother, aspiring novelist, and music editor at BC Magazine, Connie Phillips spends most of her time in a fantasy land of her own creating. In reality, she writes about music, television, and the process of writing, when she’s not cheering on her kids at equestrian events. Contact: Phillips.connie@gmail.com

Rocky Balboa is a movie that needed to be made. Contrary to early naysayers, this franchise needed more closure than it got back in 1990 when audiences last visited with a cinematic icon. Sylvester Stallone directs, acts, and writes this final sequel and the result is a moving, nostalgic, and engrossing effort worthy of the Rocky name.

Balboa is a flashback to the first installment of the franchise. Instead of following closely with the eventual opponent and building him up to create tension in the closing moments, it takes the opposite approach. This is squarely focused on Stallone, which takes nothing away from Antonio Tarver's believable performance in his first film role after reigning as real life light heavyweight champion.

Characters are re-introduced and follow Rocky's surprisingly long turn back into a pro boxer. Lesser characters make a re-appearance for nostalgia's sake, such as Spider Rico, again played by Pedro Lovell. The movie builds its story around the death of Rocky's wife, and nearly everything focuses on that point. Fans looking for a rousing ego clash along the lines of those featured in Rocky III or IV are in for a wait. The emotional impact of the first 30 minutes is a complete departure from what the series had become.

This leads to a nearly flawless conclusion aside from a few blatant and distracting product placements. A trick ending sends the film in a direction that leans towards being predictable, then twists again to end the franchise on a somber note. The final words of the film could not have been chosen better.

With only brief flashbacks and a somewhat darker tone, Balboa avoids extensive use of nostalgia to carry itself. Led by multiple re-workings of the classic theme "Gonna Fly Now" at all times, it's the right way to mix old with new. Even though the film contains less than 15 minutes of total boxing, these scenes are believable and at times mirror any real life, pay-per-view boxing event.

As expected, the script contains countless inspirational lines designed to bring the audience out of their seats to cheer. While at times forced, careful direction and believable performances splice these moments in where they should be. The inevitable training vignette is a long time in coming and the payoff is stronger because of it.

The range of emotions created in Rocky Balboa is unmatched by any of the preceding movies in this series. Every open plot hole or question is clarified or answered, and it's done so with a sharp eye for details. This is an acceptable and yes, needed finish for a Hollywood legend.

Video is grainy is spots, and this intentional. Colors are bright and contrast is high which, again, is intentional. Detail is spectacular, and this sharp transfer is stunning for DVD.

Audio kicks in, and the classic theme has never sounded better in 5.1. The fight sequence is incredibly immersive, with the crowd seemingly in the room with the viewer. Punches land with brutal bass. The rest of the film is fairly muted given the dialogue driven nature, though there are some nice random ambience if you listen for it.

Seven deleted scenes begin the extras, including an alternate ending that runs a little over three minutes. It’s in the spirit of the series, yet simply doesn’t feel like the right way to go out. A minute and a half of bloopers are unexpected for a drama, though well worth watching. Skill vs. Will is a 17-minute 'making of' that provides a decent look at how the film came to be, and why it needed to be made.

Reality in the Ring is a 15 minute look at how the final Balboa fight was filmed. Virtual Champion takes a short behind the scenes look at the computer simulation was crafted. A commentary by Stallone adds another great bookend to this series.

Rocky Balboa includes flashbacks to each film in the series, with the exception of Rocky V. Stallone himself admitted in interviews the 1990 effort was a “weak link.” While not quite as bad as some would make it out to be, it was hardly the way to leave this otherwise superb franchise out to dry.

Matt Paprocki is the reviews editor for Digital Press, a classic video game website which he called home after his fanzine (Gaming Source) published its final issue. The deep game collection which spans nearly 30 systems and 2,000 games line his walls for reasearch purposes. Really. He has also begun writing freelance for the Toledo Free Press.