“Actually our work depends on how much we can appropriate from other people’s work! Painting, music, films, literature … it’s all grist for the mill. We think of our work not as individual creativity but like a lifelong baton relay. Your work passes through your body and your life; you transform it into something, and then you pass it on to the next generation.” Hiyao Miyazaki interviewed by Roger Ebert for The Chicago Sun Times, October 1999

My Neighbor Totoro (1988)
Directed by Hayao Miyazaki
Written by Hayao Miyazaki
Produced by Toru Hara
86 minutes

Picking a film produced by Studio Ghibli is like tasting sushi when you’ve been raised on a diet of meat and potatoes animation from Walt Disney or Hanna-Barbera your whole life. The world of Hayao Miyazaki is one without heroes to cheer, villains to hiss at or talking animals to cue laughter. There are families and houses. Children learn to deal with change and to assume greater responsibility. In addition, the unseen surrounds them. As the story begins, there’s a slight feeling of unease, as well as fascination as the invisible world reveals itself. No film from Miyazaki exemplifies these sublime characteristics like the first to bring him an international audience, My Neighbor Totoro. 10-year-old Satsuki Kusakabe and her bratty 4-year-old sister Mei settle into life in the countryside, where their professor father has moved them to be closer to their mother, who recuperates from a long illness at a local hospital.

The Kusakabes are both excited and disquieted to discover their new house is inhabited by soot sprites, harmless creatures which scatter from light and whisper in the rafters. While Satsuki attends school, Mei explores the yard. There, Mei encounters two forest spirits, overstuffed rabbits which lead her into a magnificent camphor tree where the girl finds an even bigger forest spirit snoozing. Offering the name “Totoro”, the spirit vanishes before Satsuzki can meet him. She gets her chance while waiting for her father’s bus in a downpour and makes an impression on Totoro by introducing him to an umbrella. The spirits return the generosity of the Kusakabes by sprouting their garden to enormous heights. The spirits are unable to heal the girls’ mother and after losing her temper with her sister, Satsuki blames herself when Mei disappears. When search efforts by the townspeople falter, Totoro and his friends step in.

For his fourth feature film, animator Hayao Miyazaki sought a return to his childhood in Sayama Hills, which was farmland in the 1950s before it became suburban Tokyo. Miyazaki’s mother spent many years under bed rest with spinal tuberculosis, a detail that worked its way into the story. Executives at Tokuma Shoten Publishing Co. didn’t feel that sketches of Miyazaki’s nature spirits looked promising, so producer Toshio Suzuki proposed that Totoro be made in tandem with an adaptation of the novel Grave of the Fireflies and released as a double feature. A modest box office success in Japan, Miyazaki’s output began attracting comparisons to Walt Disney. Reaching an agreement with Tokuma for worldwide video distribution of Miyazaki’s films, The Walt Disney Company produced an English language dub of My Neighbor Totoro in 2005 featuring the voices of Dakota Fanning, Elle Fanning and Tim Daly as the Kusakabes.

Miyazaki’s compositions have fantastic depth of field, basking light on the old farmhouses, lush forests and rice fields the characters move past. To those who grew up on Josie and the Pussycats, the novelty of My Neighbor Totoro isn’t just the animation, but its spiritual depth. Respect for the natural world and an open mind toward the unseen course through the story, not as teaching points, but as an alternative to the lifestyle the Kusakabes are retreating from. My Neighbor Totoro is a bounty of both joy and imagination, as if Maurice Sendak’s Where The Wild Things Are had been adapted for an Eastern audience. The girls are stricken early on with a giddiness that doesn’t cross over very well, something Miyazaki would change with his Oscar winning Spirited Away in 2001, but the pure enjoyment of the film is how different it is. Instead of catering to what the we expect, this magic carpet takes us somewhere different.

Rotten Tomatoes “Tomatometer” average among 75,711 users: 94% for My Neighbor Totoro

Metacritic “Metascore” average among leading critics: N/A

What do you say?

“The studio wanted Raiders of the Lost Ark, clearly that’s what they wanted. They wanted a movie like that. ‘Can’t you just do that?’ They didn’t ever actually say that to me, but I know that’s what they wanted. ‘Xerox it.’ But I had other ideas and I thought it would have been interesting at least from my point of view, maybe nobody else’s, but to make the white lead … You know in the Tarzan films, Tarzan is white and he always saves the natives. ‘Oh, thank you, Tarzan.’ It’s just ridiculous. I was like, ‘What about if your white lead is a complete fool?’” John Carpenter interviewed by Eric Vespe, aka Quint, for Ain’t It Cool News, June 2011

Big Trouble In Little China (1986)
Directed by John Carpenter
Adaptation by W.D. Richter, written by Gary Goldman & David Z. Weinstein
Produced by Larry Franco
99 minutes

A gumbo of wildly divergent film genres handpicked from around the globe (head cook John Carpenter described his dish as “an action adventure comedy kung fu ghost story monster movie”), Big Trouble In Little China hasn’t lost its manic flavoring over the years. A generation of martial arts fantasies may not owe their existence to this production per se, but in a testament to its timeless élan, Big Trouble could be re-released and with the exception of Kurt Russell’s mullet, feel brand new. Blowhard trucker Jack Burton (Russell) rolls his rig into San Francisco on a dark and stormy night. Jack cleans the floor with Wang Chi (Dennis Dun) over a game of fan-tan and refusing to let his friend out of sight until he pays up, gives Wang a ride to the airport, where his green-eyed fiancee Miao Yin (Suzee Pai) is arriving from China.

When Miao Yin is abducted by a gang called the Lords of Death, Jack and Wang pursue the punks back to Chinatown, where they step into a brawl between the Chang Sing and their enemies, the Wing Kong. Exploding into the turf war are three supernatural warriors, Thunder (Carter Wong), Rain (Peter Kwong) and Lightning (James Pax), and their master, a 2,000 year old phantom named Lo Pan (James Wong). Jack and Wang escape and are clued by pesky attorney Gracie Law (Kim Cattrall) that Miao Yin is being held by the Lords of Death in a brothel. Before they can spring her, the three storms whisk Miao Yin into an underground city, where Lo Pan must wed a girl with green eyes to lift his curse of the undead. Out of his element as he encounters booby traps, beasts and ancient sorcery, Jack unleashes as much destruction as heroics aiding Wang and the Chang Sing in the rescue of Miao Yin.

Big Trouble In Little China was the title of a spec script by Gary Goldman & David Z. Weinstein. Set in the Old West, its concoction of cowboys and sorcerers sold producer Paul Monash, until he opted to move the story into the present. When the scribes refused, W.D. Richter was put on the payroll. The script doctor kept the legend of Lo Pan and dumped almost everything else. A USC classmate of Richter’s named John Carpenter had been developing an adaptation of Erich van Lustbader’s bestseller The Ninja and when the project fell through, accepted an offer from 20th Century Fox to direct Big Trouble. The film went into production at the same time as Eddie Murphy’s new comedy The Golden Child, which also mixed wise cracking and Chinese mysticism. To compete, Carpenter felt he needed a star like Clint Eastwood, but Fox approved Carpenter’s regular leading man Kurt Russell for the role of Jack Burton.

Aside from dismal box office returns, the distinction Big Trouble In Little China holds over The Golden Child is the mythology; even the hero’s truck has a backstory. Among the many elements in its composition, the rarest is the rapid fire repartee that brings to mind Bringing Up Baby and qualifies Big Trouble as the first of its kind: a screwball martial arts comedy. While its fight choreography has been eclipsed by the way action movies are prepared today, Kurt Russell’s redneck bluster and his commitment to playing the fool from start to finish are a laugh riot. Instead of settling for spectacle, the script goes the extra mile, building a universe before mercilessly dismantling it. In a credit to casting director Joanna Merlin and stunt coordinator Kenny Endoso, every actor from Kim Cattrall down to the stuntmen seem in sync with the film’s whimsical goofiness.

Rotten Tomatoes “Tomatometer” average among 120,473 users: 78% for Big Trouble In Little China

Metacritic “Metascore” average among leading critics: N/A

What do you say?

“We sent Barry Bernardi, who was our location manager, who also served as our associate producer, on a sort of all-expense paid trip across the country looking for the worst city in America. He stopped off at various places and they were much too clean and unworkable. He eventually called us up from St. Louis. There had been a recent fire, which had destroyed about 20% of the downtown area. Block after block was burned-out rubble. In some places there was absolutely nothing, so that you could see three or four blocks away these brownstone buildings in the distance.” Debra Hill interviewed by Michael Beeler for Cinefantastique, September 1996

Escape From New York (1981)
Directed by John Carpenter
Written by John Carpenter and Nick Castle
Produced by Larry Franco, Debra Hill
99 minutes

Juggling dire predictions for the United States as the nation dragged itself out of the 1970s and the creative freneticism of filmmakers in complete rapture with their medium is Debra Hill‘s production of a John Carpenter film, Escape From New York. One of the most enduring B-movies ever made, this low budget cirque du soleil stretched its budget and its vision to the limits, delivering a show quite unlike any action picture, sci-fi movie or western had up to that point in time, or for that matter, since. In the near future of 1997, soaring crime has resulted in modifications to the city of that never sleeps: Manhattan is now the country’s one maximum security prison. Waterways and bridges are mined. Paramilitary units and a containment wall surround the island, where the only rule is that once you go in, you don’t come out.

When Air Force One is hijacked and the president (Donald Pleasance) is jettisoned en route to a summit, Police Commissioner Bob Hauk (Lee Van Cleef) opts for a one-man rescue by convict Snake Plissken (Kurt Russell), nihilist with attitude who “volunteers” when he discovers tiny charges have been injected into his arteries. Given 24 hours to return the president, Plissken lands a glider atop the World Trade Center and with the clock ticking, navigates a Big Apple now the domain of deadly gangs and the worlds they’ve created. Plissken is rescued from cannibals by a cabbie (Ernest Borgnine) who reunites the gunslinger with his compadre Brain (Harry Dean Stanton), who occupies the Public Library solving problems for The Duke (Isaac Hayes), feared leader of the gang that runs New York and have taken the president.

Intrigued by the potential for NYC as an urban jungle after he sat through Death Wish in 1974, USC Film School grad John Carpenter wrote a strange, violent and apocalyptic script no studio wanted to touch titled Escape From New York. Six years later, Carpenter and his producer Debra Hill dusted it off to fulfill the second of a two-picture deal with Avco Embassy Pictures, bringing in a college buddy named Nick Castle to inject some irreverence into the nonstop action. Carpenter dreamed of Clint Eastwood playing Snake Plissken, while his financiers lobbied hard for Charles Bronson. Going against type, a child actor all grown up named Kurt Russell was cast, while the urban decay the filmmakers were desperately searching for was found in St. Louis, where a fire in 1977 had reduced 20% of downtown to ruins.

While the geopolitical landscape of Escape From New York remained purely speculative, Carpenter’s prophecy of rising gang activity and rioting actually came to pass, at least on the West Coast, where a deliriously overcooked 1996 sequel, Escape From L.A., was set. The joys of the original are the character actors who are as solid in front of the camera as the poor and hungry crew is behind them. In addition to Isaac Hayes, Adrienne Barbeau and Tom Atkins bring an understated nobility to their respective roles as gun moll and deputy warden. Carpenter composed a crackerjack musical score synthesized by Alan Howarth, while Dean Cundey utilized newly developed Panavision lenses to light exterior shots with remarkable depth. A classic western at its heart, the film’s “fuck you” attitude toward authority seems to embody the best punk rock music bombarding airwaves at the time.

Rotten Tomatoes “Tomatometer” average among 65,662 users: 72% for Escape From New York

Metacritic “Metascore” average among leading critics: N/A

What do you say?

“The most typical — and difficult — question people ask me is ‘What is Buckaroo Banzai about?’ If I could answer that in a single interview, I wouldn’t have spent two years making the film. I didn’t want to make a straight, genre film, and deliberately chose Buckaroo Banzai because it defied all the labels.” W.D. Richter interviewed by John L. Flynn for Sci-Fi Universe, 1995

The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai: Across the 8th Dimension (1984)
Directed by W.D. Richter
Written by Earl Mac Rauch
Produced by Neil Canton, W.D. Richter
103 minutes

Like a scrawny pup rescued from a ditch and taken home in the rain, whatever condition you find The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai: Across the 8th Dimension diminishes over time as this crossbred mutt of science fiction, comedy and superhero myth grows into a beloved member of the family. Ghettoized as a “spoof” and sometimes misconstrued as camp, part of the genre busting film’s immense charm is how effortlessly it exists as its own beast without ribbing other movies, or putting itself down. A franchise that never was, it leaped from the imagination of Earl Mac Rauch, a University of Texas School of Law dropout who was selling finance contracts for mobile homes in the early 1970s when a review for his novel Arkansas Adios caught the eye of screenwriter W.D. Richter, a fellow Dartmouth College alum.

Rauch regaled Richter and his wife Susan with the adventures of a hero named Buckaroo Bandy. The Richters were tickled enough to commission a script for $1,500. Over the next several years, Rauch abandoned as many ideas as he dreamed up; one that the Richters begged him to keep was the hero’s new name: Buckaroo Banzai. Meanwhile, Richter adapted Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Dracula and Brubaker, earning an Academy Award nomination for the latter. With the prestige to now direct, Richter wanted to make Buckaroo Banzai. He found an ally in David Begelman — then head of MGM — who departed the studio to form Sherwood Productions. Envisioning Buckaroo Banzai as his Indiana Jones, Begelman took the project with him. The producer had a distribution deal with Fox, but the studio was so bewildered by the finished product that they dumped it into theaters in late summer.

Buckaroo Banzai (Peter Weller) — neurosurgeon, samurai, hero in comic books — sheds his OR scrubs to test pilot a Jetcar capable of supersonic speed. With a device called the “oscillation overthruster”, the Jetcar successfully travels through solid matter and crosses the 8th dimension. Watching from the Trenton Home for the Criminally Insane is Dr. Emilio Lizardo (John Lithgow), a particle physicist who crashed the 8th dimension but was possessed by Lord John Whorfin, an evil Red Lectroid exiled from Planet 10 for sedition. Whorfin joins Red Lectroids John O’Connor (Vincent Schiavelli), John Gomez (Dan Hedaya) and John Bigboote (Christopher Lloyd) in a plot that threatens to annihilate Earth. The only thing in their way are Buckaroo and his inner circle of engineers who moonlight as musicians in a rock band, the Hong Kong Cavaliers.

A punk rock superhero compared to Spiderman or Batman, Buckaroo Banzai is Renaissance Man. His powers are pure invention and the crackerjack team he assembles to fight evil. Played with casual confidence by Weller, the man isn’t interesting so much as his orbit — a surgeon (Jeff Goldblum) with a cowboy fetish, a spirited blonde (Ellen Barkin) who’s a dead ringer for Buckaroo’s late wife, reptilian aliens who refer to Earthlings as “monkey boys” and good aliens who in their human form resemble Rastafarians for no reason. Unabashed in its goofiness, the mythology at play is so rich and so extensive that cast and crew seem to relax and enjoy the ride. The only downer is the wave of multimedia — sequels, TV series, books — that never materialized. Michael Boddicker composed the giddy electronic score, punching up the best end credits sequence yet devised for a film.

Rotten Tomatoes “Tomatometer” average among 15,473 users: 68% for The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai: Across the 8th Dimension

Metacritic “Metascore” average among leading critics: N/A

What do you say?

Promoting I’m Gonna Git You Sucka in 1988, Steve James, who appeared as “Kung Fu Joe” in the blaxploitation spoof, commented: “I always hated that label ‘blaxploitation.’ I wondered, why couldn’t there just be films with black stars? You know, you’d go around the corner from a theater showing one of them, and there’d be Dirty Harry. And nobody was calling it ‘whitesploitation.’” Right on, Steve! So in February, I’ll take a look at ten films featuring black stars from a certain era.

The Spook Who Sat By The Door (1973)
Directed by Ivan Dixon
Screenplay by Sam Greenlee and Mel Clay, based on the novel by Sam Greenlee
Produced by Ivan Dixon, Sam Greenlee
102 minutes

Any trip through “blaxploitation” would be missing something without The Spook Who Sat By The Door. Written in 1966 and published in 1969, Sam Greenlee‘s political thriller notched 1.5 million copies sold. The author went into business with Ivan Dixon, an actor and television director who’d gunned his way into features with Trouble Man in 1972. Greenlee & Dixon’s plan to finance and distribute the film independently stalled when black investors proved scarce; Greenlee’s attorney put up roughly $800,000 to get cameras rolling and United Artists acquired distribution rights, contributing $200,000 in completion bonds. Yanked from release by exhibitors fearful that the movie would spark revolution in theater lobbies across America, The Spook Who Sat By The Door went underground for almost 30 years.

In 2000, actor/producers Tim and Daphne Reid offered to distribute the cult classic on DVD through their Obsidian Home Entertainment. Fitting to Greenlee’s fantasy of America’s ghetto masses mobilizing into a resistance movement, The Spook Who Sat By The Door is hard hat wearing, metal lunchbox swinging independent filmmaking at its finest, a professional piece of work that makes up for what it lacks in budget with ample amounts of backbone. The material goes easy on the sermonizing to settle into a potent blend of social drama, character study and espionage thriller. Lawrence Cook is exceptionally well cast in the lead, soft spoken and scholarly, highly motivated and lethal, a militant Jack Ryan. Herbie Hancock composed a musical score that’s as durable, spartan and means-business as the movie.

Running a tight reelection campaign, a U.S. senator opts to raise his profile among urban voters by appointing a token black agent to the Central Intelligence Agency. One promising finalist appears to be Dan Freeman (Lawrence Cook), ostracized by his classmates for studying too much and initially overlooked by management due to his habit of fading into the woodwork. But Freeman’s physical, intellectual and personal assets match what the CIA is looking for and he wins the spot. Freeman spends five dutiful years in a sub-basement toiling as a document “reproduction section chief”, growing estranged from his childhood love, a social worker (Janet League) who wants to get married and start a family. Instead, Freeman resigns his position as the first black spy to return home to Chicago, ostensibly to become a social worker.

Freeman makes contact with the leadership of a street gang he ran with as a teenager. Unimpressed with the gang’s puny resistance against the pigs, Freeman drills the hoodlums in guerilla warfare tactics, from building explosives, to organization, to how to rip off the enemy (“Remember, a black man with a mop, tray or broom in his hand can go damn near anywhere in this country, and a smiling black man is invisible.”) Freeman connects with an ex-hoodlum turned cop (J.A. Preston) he hopes to flip to their cause, as well as a D.C. prostitute Freeman dubs “Dahomey Queen” (Paula Kelly) who becomes a crucial source of information. The Black Freedom Fighters of North America find their plans for armed resistance rushed into the field when Chicago police shoot a dope peddler, striking the match for rebellion.

What do you say?

Logging in to Netflix Instant for a movie to watch is like being hungry and shown to a food replicator. It doesn’t solve my problem — it introduces one thousand new ones. Luckily, I can see which genres are rated higher in nutritional content, in this case, 4 or 4 ½ star ratings out of 5 stars. “Documentary” had a lot of those. So did “Anime & Animation”. In the month of November, I take another trip around the globe to sample recent animated feature films. Next stop: Manhattan, New York, USA.

Sita Sings the Blues (2009)
Directed by Nina Paley
Written by Nina Paley
Produced by Nina Paley
82 minutes

Like a strange brew coated with aromatic honey, Sita Sings the Blues goes down easy for anyone wary of the letters “DIY” stamped on a movie. Cartoonist and filmmaker Nina Paley was introduced to the Hindu epic The Ramayana in comic book format while living in Trivandum with her then-husband. After their long distance breakup, Paley found solace in the records of jazz singer Annette Hanshaw, whose blues Paley felt echoed the myth of Rama’s long suffering wife, Sita. Over the course of five years, Paley animated and produced Sita Sings the Blues on a Mac in her Manhattan apartment, working primarily in Flash and editing in Final Cut Pro. Lending their expertise were sound designer Greg Sextro, three friends from India who ad-libbed narration and the French band Masala Dosa, who found Paley on the Internet and contributed a song. Her production budget was practically zero.

While Annette Hanshaw’s recordings were public domain, Paley discovered that the publishing rights to the songs she needed would cost her $220,000. She managed to get legal clearances for $70,000 by making sure Sita Sings the Blues wouldn’t reap millions at the box office, giving her movie away for free under a Creative Commons license known as a “copyleft”. Screened at the Berlin International Film Festival in February 2008, Sita Sings the Blues played to wide acclaim at every other film festival on the planet before being issued on DVD in July 2009. While the mission statement and means in which Paley produced her film are more fascinating than anything that really ended up on screen, Sita Sings the Blues is lifted by its abundant wit, enterprising mixture of ancient myth with jazz and its equation of modern day struggles with the centuries old mysteries scribbled down in The Ramayana.

In San Francisco, Nina (Nina Paley) and Dave (Sanjiv Jhaveri) have their relationship thrown into upheaval when Dave receives a job offer taking him to India. Three shadow puppets (Aseem Chhabra, Bhavana Nagulapally, Manish Acharya) begin a story from the Hindu holy book The Ramayana, in which Rama (Debargo Sanyal), the virtuous Prince of Ayodhya, is sent into exile on the eve of his coronation. Rama pledges to rid the forests of the raksha demons terrorizing their holy men. In spite of the dangers, his loving wife Sita (Reena Shah), who cannot live without her husband, accompanies Rama on his crusade. Sita expresses her devotion and self-sacrifice through the 1920s jazz recordings of Annette Hanshaw. Back in San Francisco, Dave departs on his journey to India, leaving Nina unsure when she will see him again.

Ravana, king of the island Lanka, seeks revenge against Rama by ordering his minion Maricha to transform into a golden deer, distracting Rama on a hunt long enough for the treacherous monarch to abduct Sita. Refusing to force himself on his captive, Ravana lets Sita decide whether she wants to become his. She remains loyal to her husband, but once rescued, Rama questions his wife’s purity. These doubts spread throughout the kingdom and Rama decides to send Sita into exile, even though she is pregnant with his twin sons. Once in India, Dave develops similar doubts about Nina. He remains distant when she arrives for a visit and when Nina travels to New York for a job, Dave breaks up with her via email. Nina finds solace in Sita, whose long and lonely exile ends when she offers to prove her purity to Rama.

Rotten Tomatoes “Tomatometer” average among 574 users: 87% for Sita Sings the Blues

Metacritic “Metascore” average among leading critics: 94 for Sita Sings the Blues

What do you say?

Logging in to Netflix Instant for a movie to watch is like being hungry and shown to a food replicator. It doesn’t solve my problem — it introduces one thousand new ones. Luckily, I can see which genres are rated higher in nutritional content, in this case, 4 or 4 ½ star ratings out of 5 stars. “Documentary” had a lot of those. So did “Anime & Animation”. In the month of November, I take another trip around the globe to sample recent animated feature films. Next stop: Brussels, Belgium.

A Town Called Panic (2009)
Directed by Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar
Screenplay by Stéphane Aubier & Vincent Patar, story by Stéphane Aubier, Guillaume Malandrin, Vincent Patar & Vincent Tavier
Produced by Philippe Kauffmann, Vincent Tavier
77 minutes

If Pee-wee and his pals in the playhouse were still on Saturday morning television, A Town Called Panic would be exactly the type of entertainment they’d get a kick out of. Belgian animators Stéphane Aubier & Vincent Patar became friends while attending visual arts school La Cambre during the 1980s. For his thesis project, Aubier crafted a manic stop-motion short out of generic toy figurines — cowboys, Indians, farm animals — and papier-mâché sets. Their professors were unimpressed, but in 2000, Aubier & Patar returned to the concept, writing, directing and supplying voices for several 5-minute shorts co-written and produced by Vincent Tavier. Dubbed from French to English and distributed on Nickelodeon U.K. by Aardman Studios, A Town Called Panic was such a hit that Aubier & Patar were hooked into making a feature length film.

Aubier & Patar settled on remaking an episode titled “The Card Thief”, which juxtaposed hijinks in town with the world of Atlantis that existed underneath. Their tiny team in Brussels spent 260 shooting days putting 1,500 plastic figurines through their paces. The result is a comic jewel, rapid fire in its wit, textured in its characters and as crazy as a peach orchard boar. A Town Called Panic is probably too good to be called a cartoon. Its herky jerky stop-motion animation is charming, but it’s Aubier & Patar’s willingness to lob balls into left field — rather than cater purely to kids — that makes their work so special. Amid the madness, characters that are little more than plastic figurines with excitable voices resonate with more emotion than human beings in contemporary live action movies seem to be able to. Viewers seeking laughs and little more are likely to have a field day here.

A day in the town of Kir begins like any other. A bicycle postman delivers a package to temperamental farmer Steven (Benoît Poelvoorde), as well as a parcel to the Gendarme (Frédéric Jannin) who maintains law and order. Coboy (Stéphane Aubier) and Indien (Bruce Ellison) are rousted from sleep when Postman visits them next. Over breakfast, their roommate Horse (Vincent Patar) mentions that today is his birthday. Desperate to find a gift on such short notice, Indien hits on the idea of building Horse a barbecue. To distract him, Steven sends Horse on an errand to pick his children up at school. There, the chemistry between Horse and equine music teacher Madame Longrée (Jeanne Balibar) is palpable. Ordering the bricks to build Horse a barbecue, Coboy enters 50,000,000 units on the computer instead of 50. Upon delivery, panic grips Coboy and Indien.

Other than Steven getting angered when his wife Janine (Véronique Dumont) dances with Postman, Horse’s birthday party goes off without a hitch. After dark, Horse is awakened when the 50,000,000 bricks Coboy and Indien stashed on the roof crush their house to smithereens. Once he throttles his roommates, Horse begins rebuilding the walls of their house. Once night falls, thieves make off with their walls. Adding two plus two and getting five, Gendarme throws Steven in prison for the crime. To prove their neighbor’s innocence, Horse, Coboy and Indien stake out the scene of the crime the following evening and catch three sea monsters robbing them. Pursuing the mischievous creatures to the ends of the earth, Horse places himself in serious jeopardy of being tardy to the piano lessons Madame Longrée has invited him to.

Rotten Tomatoes “Tomatometer” average among 1,811 users: 86% for A Town Called Panic

Metacritic “Metascore” average among leading critics: 70 for A Town Called Panic

What do you say?

Logging in to Netflix Instant for a movie to watch is like being hungry and shown to a food replicator. It doesn’t solve my problem — it introduces one thousand new ones. Luckily, I can see which genres are rated higher in nutritional content, in this case, 4 or 4 ½ star ratings out of 5 stars. “Documentary” had a lot of those. So did “Anime & Animation”. In the month of November, I take another trip around the globe to sample recent animated feature films. Next stop: Kilkenny, Ireland.

The Secret of Kells (2009)
Directed by Tomm Moore, Nora Twomey
Screenplay by Fabrice Ziolkowski, story by Tomm Moore
Produced by Didier Brunner, Viviane Vanfleteren, Paul Young
78 minutes

Sprouting from low budget animation and growing to beanstalk heights is The Secret of Kells. Director Tomm Moore, art director Ross Stewart and character designer Barry Reynolds began scribbling the film in 1999, while Moore attended Ballyfermot College in Dublin. Their concept was a feature that would draw from Celtic design they were seeing popularized in everything from advertising to tattoos. Upon researching the Book of Kells — an illustrated 8^th century manuscript of the Four Gospels — Moore and his friend Paul Young founded a company: Cartoon Saloon. After six years, they landed financing through Didier Brunner and Viviane Vanfleteren, producers of The Triplets of Belleville. With a budget of roughly €6 million ($8 million USD), production began in 2005 under head of animation Nora Twomey and spread to 200 animators across France, Belgium, Brazil and Hungary.

Ignored in Western Europe upon its release in February 2009, The Secret of Kells became the first animated film to win the top audience prize at the Edinburgh Film Festival in July. With a storyline involving a young illustrator who struggles to complete a timeless work of art, word of mouth spread among animators, particularly in Hollywood. The result was a surprise Oscar nomination for Best Animated Feature alongside Coraline, Fantastic Mr. Fox, The Princess and the Frog and Up. The Secret of Kells picks from the cart that is Disney animation of the 1990s — cute animals and comedy — but the film boldly transcends formula by ignoring pop culture and dipping into the wells of mythology and imagination. Fanciful, refreshing and powerful, it conjures the feeling, if not the expanse, of The Hobbit. Bruno Coulais composed a musical score that makes vivid use of traditional Irish instrumentation.

Deep in the forests of Ireland during The Middle Ages, walls sturdy enough to repel an invasion by marauding Northmen are rushed to completion around the abbey of Kells. The young Brendan (Evan McGuire) is nephew of the taciturn Abbot Cellach (Brendan Gleeson), but far from being obsessed with defenses, the boy spends his time in the scriptorium with illuminators devoted to printing manuscripts. Seeking refuge at Kells is the illuminator Aidan of Iona (Mick Lally) who along with his white cat Panguar Ban fled his island abbey when Northmen destroyed it. Captivated by tales of the Book of Iona — whose magnificence is said to transform despair into hope among all those who gaze upon it — Brendan agrees to help Aidan by gathering oak berries that can produce the emerald green ink he needs to complete the book.

Venturing into the forest for the first time, Brendan is surrounded by ferocious wolves. Coming to his rescue is a white haired girl named Aisling (Christen Mooney), a mischievous spirit who takes a liking to Brendan. Wandering into a section of the forest he where he is not allowed, Brendan encounters Crom Cruach, a dark, sleeping spirit responsible for all the death and destruction Aisling has witnessed through the ages. Reprimanded by his uncle for leaving the abbey without permission, Brendan is further dejected when Aidan informs him that he will be unable to complete the book without a crystal that makes intricate drawings possible. According to legend, Crom guards these crystals in its cave. As Northmen advance on the abbey, Brendan returns to the forest to obtain the prize that will help bring his country out of darkness.

Rotten Tomatoes “Tomatometer” average among 3,430 users: 81% for The Secret of Kells

Metacritic “Metascore” average among leading critics: 81 for The Secret of Kells

What do you say?

Logging in to Netflix Instant for a movie to watch is like being hungry and shown to a food replicator. It doesn’t solve my problem — it introduces one thousand new ones. Luckily, I can see which genres are rated higher in nutritional content, in this case, 4 or 4 ½ star ratings out of 5 stars. “Documentary” had a lot of those. So did “Anime & Animation”. In the month of November, I take another trip around the globe to sample recent animated feature films. Next stop: East London, U.K.

Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)
Directed by Wes Anderson
Screenplay by Wes Anderson & Noah Baumbach, based on the novel by Roald Dahl
Produced by Allison Abate, Scott Rudin, Wes Anderson, Jeremy Dawson
87 minutes

10-year-olds playing in their rooms with tens of millions of dollars begets the sixth film from Wes Anderson. The filmmaker was so enamored by the work of Roald Dahl — citing the author’s 1970 book Fantastic Mr. Fox as the first he owned — that in 2001, Anderson lobbied Dahl’s widow Felicity for the film rights. Five years later, Fox announced they would finance and distribute the stop motion animated picture. Shot over one year at Three Mills Studios in East London, Anderson actually spent most of that time in Paris. His decision to collaborate via email did not sit well with his crew, while animation director Mark Gustafson — who made the claymation ad campaign for California Raisins — was bewildered by some of Anderson’s creative decisions, which subverted modern technology and were painstaking to execute. The budget arrived at roughly $40 million.

One of the most impressive feats of Fantastic Mr. Fox is how Wes Anderson tries something completely different here while crafting what also feels very much like an Anderson film, from its misunderstood mastermind, picture book compositions, retro soundtrack (“Heroes and Villains” and “Ol’ Man River” by The Beach Boys are used to memorable effect) and unmistakable whimsy. It’s like Bottle Rocket brought to life by puppets on loan from a 1960s holiday TV special. Unlike Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, the story has little if anything to say, but the rudimentary design of the special effects is such a welcome respite from 3-D and the bombastic digital effects that litter children’s films. Though Anderson cut a narration by Jarvis Cocker, the English musician appears out of nowhere as a folk singer and contributes to a soundtrack that includes a beautiful score by Alexandre Desplat.

Mr. Fox (George Clooney) promises to turn over a new leaf for the pregnant Mrs. Fox (Meryl Streep) after his grandiose ambitions snare them in a trap while stealing chickens. Two years (12 fox years) later, Mr. Fox ekes out a living as a newspaper columnist while coveting far greater prosperity. He purchases a beech tree, ignoring the advice of his attorney Badger (Bill Murray) that his neighbors would be three of the meanest farmers in the valley. Walt Boggis (Robin Hurlstone) is a fat chicken farmer. Nate Bunce (Hugo Guinness) is a dwarfish duck and goose farmer. Frank Bean (Michael Gambon) is a turkey and apple farmer, quite possibly the meanest man alive. Mr. Fox moves his family into their new home, but is unable to resist the temptation of one last job, drafting his dim-witted superintendent — the opossum Kylie (Wally Wolodarsky) — to assist.

Searching for an identity, Mr. Fox’s awkward teenage son Ash (Jason Schwartzman) is frustrated by the arrival of his cousin Kristofferson (Eric Anderson), whose athleticism wins him an invitation to join Mr. Fox’s gang. After successful raids of Boggis’ chicken coop and Bean’s alcoholic cider cellar, all three farmers stake out Fox’s tree and open fire, shooting off his tail. The family soon has bigger problems when the farmers try to dig them out, sending the critters tunneling underground for survival. Rescued by an assortment of badgers, beavers and rabbits, Mr. Fox retaliates by tunneling into the farms of his tormentors. In a bid for his father’s approval, Ash attempts a raid of his own, employing the help of Kristofferson. When only one of them returns, Mr. Fox contemplates a suicide mission, only to come to his senses and recruiting his friends in a go-for-broke rescue mission.

Rotten Tomatoes “Tomatometer” average among 111,105 users: 79% for Fantastic Mr. Fox

Metacritic “Metascore” average among leading critics: 83 for Fantastic Mr. Fox

What do you say?

Logging in to Netflix Instant for a movie to watch is like being hungry and shown to a food replicator. It doesn’t solve my problem — it introduces one thousand new ones. Luckily, I can see which genres are rated higher in nutritional content, in this case, 4 or 4 ½ star ratings out of 5 stars. “Documentary” had a lot of those. So did “Anime & Animation”. In the month of November, I take another trip around the globe to sample recent animated feature films.  First stop: Emeryville, California, USA.

WALL-E (2008)
Directed by Andrew Stanton
Screenplay by Andrew Stanton & Jim Reardon, story by Andrew Stanton & Pete Docter
Produced by Jim Morris
98 minutes

The most visionary film by Pixar Animation Studios to date — reaching for Fantasia, surpassing Tron and marrying science fiction to romance magnificently — is WALL-E. The idea was hatched in 1994 during a session in which animators tossed out ideas for a follow-up to Toy Story. One concept was the last robot on Earth, a machine that was stuck doing the same solitary job for all eternity. Andrew Stanton, who would co-direct and co-write A Bug’s Life and Finding Nemo, thought this was the saddest character he’d ever heard of. Animator Pete Docter agreed and the pair would return to the idea in 2002. Using the screenplay for Alien as a reference, Stanton & Docter wrote a script driven by description as opposed to dialogue. At a minimum budget of $180 million, WALL-E became the most expensive project from Emeryville yet. Every cent was bankrolled by Pixar’s parent company Disney.

After development testing got underway in 2005, Stanton and the story crew watched Charlie Chaplin or Buster Keaton films during lunch, getting into Harold Lloyd’s work for ideas as well. The absence of singing animals in an animated film would be cause for celebration; the absence of dialogue for the first 40 minutes of this picture is a revelation. If the film has a star, it’s sound designer Ben Burtt, who pioneered the field in Star Wars and E.T. The Extra Terrestrial and for WALL-E, engineered every click, blip and pop as if was language. Loaded with as much substance as audio/visual splendor, the film offers sophisticated entertainment for anyone in the mood for diversion while illustrating that mankind cannot keep producing garbage (or Wal-Marts) faster than the ecology can sustain them. Sigourney Weaver is nearly imperceptible as the voice of the Axiom’s computer.

In the distant future, mankind has abandoned rising toxicity levels on planet Earth for destinations beyond the stars. Carrying out his program unaware of these changes is WALL-E (voiced by Ben Burtt), a robot manufactured to scoop up and compact trash. WALL-E brightens his lonely routine by saving the best pieces of refuse — cigarette lighters, utensils, a VHS tape of Hello, Dolly! — to store them in the shipping crate where he powers down at night. One day, an infared dot appears on the ground. WALL-E chases the dot oblivious to a spacecraft that roars down on him. The craft dispatches a sleek anti-gravity probe that begins scanning the ruins. WALL-E becomes instantly smitten. Risking annihilation by her state of the art defenses, WALL-E introduces himself to the probe, whose name is EVE (voiced by Elissa Knight). Taking cover from a windstorm, he invites her to his home.

EVE reveals her directive when WALL-E shows her a seedling he discovered and keeps in an old shoe. EVE confiscates the plant and powers down, but WALL-E tethers her in Christmas lights and takes her on his rounds so they can remain close. When the spacecraft returns for the dormant EVE, WALL-E hitches a ride as it blasts through the cosmos. The spacecraft docks with the Axiom, an interstellar ocean liner where mankind has resided for the last 700 years. Due to disuse atrophy in zero gravity, humans have devolved into blobs that live out their days in a perpetual beach resort, drinking their food in cups and tended to by robots. The seedling WALL-E and EVE return sets in motion a protocol by the ship’s lethargic Captain (voiced by Jeff Garlin) to return to Earth, but the computer who really runs the Axiom takes measures to stop this from happening.

Rotten Tomatoes “Tomatometer” average among 192,598 users: 89% for WALL-E

Metacritic “Metascore” average among leading critics: 94 for WALL-E

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