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This short is featured on the Animation Show Vol. 3 DVD.

Gaëlle Denis’ trippy animation/visual effects film creates a wonderful surreal style animating and manipulating human actors. A young Japanese woman moves to a new city where she doesn’t speak the language. Intimidated by her new home, she seeks out common bonds with people who share her love of diving, but ultimately jumps into a unexpected dream-like experience that opens her eyes to a whole new world.

The unique look of this short is what resonates with the viewer. Denis combines live-action with pixelization with 2D and 3D animation. The oft-kilter world that these combined techniques creates is both inviting and strange, capturing nicely the feel of moving to a new, big city. The characters waddle along on skinny legs through a muted color cityscape. The lead female pops off the screen in her red and pink clothing. She’s truly a fish out of water in this new environment. Denis shows her skills at designing a world that perfectly mirrors the mood of her characters. In addition, the film pokes fun at London life, especially the rain. Take notice to the words that the young woman learns. Featured in the film, if one is familiar with the unique vocal style of Joanna Newsom, you’ll get a bit of the film’s vibe.

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Part documentary, part drama, this earnest BBC production tries very hard to legitimize the genius of 19th century composer Pyotr Tchaikovsky, while painting a portrait of his personal life and how it influenced his music. Split into two-parts for TV — “The Creation of Genius” and “Fortune and Tragedy” — the reenactments of Tchaikovsky’s life work better when they are freed of interruption from documentary host and composer Charles Hazlewood. Like its subject, the special seems to be looking for a voice.

Halzewood narrates the story of Tchaikovsky’s life as he travels to Russia to show us the influence the artist had on Russian culture, music, ballet and opera. We get moments from Tchaikovsky’s childhood when he is sent away to school and never recovers from the death of his mother when he was 14. Both Pyotr (Ed Stoppard, THE PIANIST) and his younger brother Modest (William Mannering, MASTER AND COMMANDER) were gay and frequented the homosexual underground in Russian and in the U.K. Tchaikovsky has an on-and-off affair with fellow music student Aleksey Apukhtin (Gyuri Sarossy, TV’s EASTENDERS) for years. As his fame grew, he became more worried about his homosexuality creating a scandal and set out to marry. After receiving a letter from admirer Antonina Milyukova (Alice Glover), he meets with the woman and subsequently marries her. Around the same time, he also meets Nadezdha von Meck (Lucy Briers, TV’s WIVES AND DAUGHTERS), a wealthy woman who would become his longtime benefactor and friend, even though she refused to meet him in person, always corresponding through letters. We follow Tchaikovsky’s turbulent marriage, his years as composer for hire and his death from cholera.

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Taken at face value one might not see the significance of this film. Put in context, as the start of a continuing series, it takes on the status of an epic undertaking that Roger Ebert once called “an inspired, even noble, use of the film medium.” Directed by Paul Almond as part of the WORLD IN ACTION TV series, SEVEN UP! wasn’t intended to be the first chapter in a series. Based on the Jesuit phrase, “give me a child until he is seven and I will give you the man,” the half-hour program was supposed to be one-off look at a group of seven year olds from different economic and social backgrounds. Original researcher Michael Apted transformed the first film into what it has become, the chronicling of the same lives every seven years since.

For this film, 21 children were chosen, but only fourteen become central subjects. John, Charles and Andrew attend the same pre-preparatory school and seem to have their lives all planned out. Suzy goes to an all girls’ school and is from a very wealthy family. Her sheltered world hasn’t only left her clueless about the world around her, but seemingly shell shocked. Jackie, Lynn and Sue are good friends from a working class neighborhood, who have no clue that they’d be consider the poor kids by others in the group. Tony is a tough kid from the East End of London, who has a girlfriend named Michelle, who he often disagrees with. Paul goes to a charity-based boarding school and his parents are divorced. Simon also goes to the charity-based boarding school and is the only non-white child in the group. Nick attends a one-room school in Yorkshire Dales and observes that he likes to go to town on holiday while city folk like to come to the country. Peter and Neil go to the same middle-class Liverpool suburban school and both want to be astronauts, but don’t think they need to go to university for that. Bruce attends a prestigious boarding school and feels that the most important thing in life is to serve God.

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Since Oscar-winning best picture FORREST GUMP was released, Robert Zemeckis’ film has easily moved into the pop culture consciousness. How many lines can you quote from this film? Who hasn’t done one Forrest Gump impression in their lives? Some scenes now gain a humor that wasn’t original there just because of the number of times they have been parodied. Having seen the film several times over the years and hearing varying impressions, I’m struck by how chameleon-like the themes are depending on the angle one wants to look at it. From destiny versus freewill to optimism versus pessimism to conforming versus rebellion, what does the film mean to you?

Forrest Gump (Tom Hanks, PHILADELPHIA) is a slow man, but he’s never let that get in the way of life. His mother (Sally Field, NORMA RAE) always said, “Stupid is as stupid does.” Ever since the first day of school, Forrest has been friends with Jenny (Robin Wright Penn, THE PRINCESS BRIDE). Their lives couldn’t be more different. Forrest’s mother is supportive and kind, while Jenny’s father is an abusive drunk. Despite having a twisted spine as a child, Forrest grows up to be a lightning runner, which allows him to attend the University of Alabama on a football scholarship. During the course of his life, he will become a witness to school integration, a Vietnam War hero, a international ping-pong champion, a shrimp boat captain, a millionaire businessman, a gardener at his hometown high school, and an inspirational guru. Jenny’s life course will traverse many of the more revolutionary and shady elements of the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s.

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After a limited release in theaters in 1998, this independent sci-fi film from Canada has garnered cult status since arriving on video. Using one set, director Vincenzo Natali creates both a claustrophobic mental torture chamber, as well as a mind-bending labyrinth. This sci-fi horror flick has gory bits for sure, but the mystery of the plot and what it means to the characters makes this film more exciting than all the slicing and dicing.

A man wakes up in a cube-shaped room with doors on all six surfaces. He moves to the next room and we learn quickly what happens when one ventures into the wrong room. Five other captives wake up in one of a series of interlocking cubes. Joan Leaven (Nicole de Boer, TV’s THE DEAD ZONE) is a Math student, who will be called upon to try and decipher the numbers engraved on the many doorways. Helen Holloway (Nicky Guadagni, LARS AND THE REAL GIRL) is a doctor with a big conspiracy theory involving the military industrial complex. Quentin (Maurice Dean Wint, HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH) is a cop with a superiority complex and a nasty temper. Rennes (Wayne Robson, AFFLICTION) is a fugitive escape artist who devises a way to check for booby-trapped rooms. David Worth (David Hewlett, TV’s STARGATE: ATLANTIS) is a young cynical man who doesn’t believe they’ll ever get out of the cube. Later the group will encounter Kazan (Andrew Miller, TRAPPED IN PARADISE), a severely autistic man with a secret gift.

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With Memorial Day Weekend coming up, this week’s lineup deals with the war experience on film, especially focusing on returning soldiers dealing with their lives after combat. Wars addressed include WWII, Vietnam and the current Iraq war. One documentary shows the recollections of a war planner. Others deal with family members’ reactions to their returning husbands, sons and friends. While the films this week deal with different wars from different eras, many of the problems veterans face when rejoining civilian life are universal. On this holiday set aside to remember those that didn’t return, it’s also good to note the innocence that parishes in those that survive.

Additionally, this This Weekend’s Film Festival marks the year anniversary of this column. Outside of a few weeks, I’ve been able to keep this a weekly event. While I never expected readers to watch all five weekly picks every week, I hope that this column provides insight and perspective into films you may have seen before or ones you have yet to discover. The more I do the column the more I learn about film, so I hope you’re finding use in it as well. Here’s to another year, and let’s get this week’s lineup rolling.

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The man in the Fedora hat is back. While the next installment in this franchise could be titled “Indiana Jones and the Search for Lightning in a Bottle,” which is what the series has been trying to capture since RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, the first new installment in 19 years nicely bridges the gap in time, in both the real and fictional worlds, placing the action in the 1950s and crossing ancient and modern myths. The aging hero can still take a punch, but he comes off wiser. For all he’s been through, he should have all the wisdom in the world already, but I’ll get to that later.

Director Steven Spielberg, working from a screenplay by JURASSIC PARK scribe David Koepp, gets the story cooking right from the start. Indiana (Harrison Ford) and his partner Mac McHale (Ray Winstone, THE DEPARTED) have been kidnapped by Russians, lead by Soviet super-agent Irina Spalko (Cate Blanchett, I’M NOT THERE), with her stark black Louise Brooks hairstyle and mysterious psychic abilities. She’s looking for the contents of a box in a government warehouse and needs Dr. Jones to find it. This incident kicks off an adventure that will lead our dashing hero to Peru in search of a highly magnetized (well, highly magnetized when the plot needs it to be) crystal skull, which could be the key to learning all the knowledge in the universe and beyond. So of course this would be of interest to the evil Commies, who want to get inside our brains and control our every thought. Along for the ride is greaser Mutt Williams (Shia LaBeouf, TRANSFORMERS), who informs Indy that his old friend Prof. Oxley (John Hurt, THE ELEPHANT MAN), who has dedicated his life to studying the legend of the crystal skull and it’s connection to El Dorado, is in danger. And lets not forget Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen), Indy’s girl from the original film; she’s back too.

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Master of horror George Romero returns for the fifth time to the zombie genre in which he reinvented. Romero’s observant eye hasn’t formed any cataracts in 40 years. His zombie pictures capture the eras in which they were made very well. Though LAND OF THE DEAD was released in 2005, Romero planned to make the rich get richer and the poor get poorer parable in the ’90s. So DIARY is truly his first statement on the first decade of the 21st century.

A group of film students are shooting a horror film in the forest. Jason Creed (Joshua Close, THE EXORCISM OF EMILY ROSE) is man behind the camera, the director. He wants to be a documentary filmmaker, but feels a horror film is an easier way to break into the industry. We are watching his story in retrospect as a documentary cut by his girlfriend Debra Moynihan (Michelle Morgan, TV’s HEARTLAND). During their shoot, they watch an Internet clip of dead people coming back to life and attacking the living. Tony (Shawn Roberts, LAND OF THE DEAD), the cynical make-up man (cynical because he wants to direct) doesn’t believe the news reports, believing its media and political fear mongering. But as the crew tries to get back to their homes, they learn more about what is really happening. And Jason is determined to film it all.

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Mixing the difficulties unique to Vietnam vets with the adjustment problems of all returning soldiers, Hal Ashby’s touching drama contrasts the pro-war and the anti-war sentiments by presenting two soldiers connected by their love for the same woman. Ashby isn’t a director that is common to the average filmgoer, but during the 1970s he made some of the decade’s best, including this film, HAROLD AND MAUDE, THE LAST DETAIL, BOUND FOR GLORY and BEING THERE. Without flash, he patiently develops his core characters, allowing emotions to build and accumulate into poignant and powerful reactions. This is one of those films that goes along at a steady pace then reaches a moment where it grabs you by the throat and propels you to another level.

Capt. Bob Hyde (Bruce Dern, FAMILY PLOT) has finally received his mission in Vietnam. With his departure, his wife Sally (Jane Fonda, KLUTE) is on her own for the first time. Inspired by her husband’s best friend’s girlfriend Vi (Penelope Milford, HEATHERS), she volunteers at the VA hospital, where she meets Luke Martin (Jon Voight, MIDNIGHT COWBOY), a paraplegic vet who was once the captain of Sally’s high school football team. Confined to the hospital, using canes to propel his wheeled bed around the narrow halls, Luke’s disposition is less than pleasant. Vi’s brother Bill (Robert Carradine, REVENGE OF THE NERDS) is in the hospital for mental reasons; the horrors of war have left him emotionally incapable with dealing with life. Other soldiers complain that they’ve just been forgotten; not given the basic information they need to handle life as a disabled person. Sally feels for the plight of the soldiers and truly wants to help, but the “real” world doesn’t want to think about the wounded men unless it’s one of their relatives. As Luke slowly comes out of his depression, Sally and he strike up a friendship that soon turns romantic. So what will happen when Bob returns home after the war doesn’t turn out like he imagined?

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Darker than the original NARNIA adventure, this new tale brings the original young foursome back to Narnia, a land that is now unrecognizable from the world they once ruled. Writer/director Andrew Adamson, along with fellow writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, stay faithful to C.S. Lewis’ original text, giving fans a faithful screen adaptation just like THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE. With more battles, the epic scale is heightened, but this doesn’t mean there are not any new internal battles for the original characters, which are the most intriguing parts of the second installment in the series.

Centuries after the Pevensie siblings left Narnia to return to England, the magic realm has been taken over by the Telmarines, who have forced the Narnians to live in secret in the woods. Prince Caspian the X (Ben Barnes, STARDUST) is the rightful heir to the throne, but his scheming uncle Miraz (Sergio Castellitto, ARTHUR AND THE INVISIBLES) has his eyes on ruling the kingdom. Caspian flees for his life into the forest, where a scuffle with Miraz’s men results in dwarf Trumpkin (Peter Dinklage, THE STATION AGENT) being taken prisoner and Caspian taken in by dwarf Nikabrik (Warwick Davis, WILLOW) and talking badger Trufflehunter (Ken Scott, CHARLIE WILSON’S WAR). During the fight, Caspian uses an ancient horn, which summons former kings and queens Peter (William Moseley), Susan (Anna Popplewell), Edmund (Skandar Keynes) and Lucy (Georgie Henley) back to Narnia.

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