If there are awards for cutting trailers than the editor of the SURVEILLANCE trailer should win Best Polishing of a Turd award. He or she shows more understanding of filmic storytelling in a few minutes of clips than director Jennifer Lynch shows in an hour and half. She hasn’t directed a film since the laughably terrible BOXING HELENA. She has actually made a less entertaining film than that disaster.

A grizzly murder starts off the film. FBI agents Sam Hallaway (Bill Pullman, SPACEBALLS) and Elizabeth Anderson (Julia Ormond, THE FIRST KNIGHT) arrive at the small town police station where the only survivors of the killing spree are being held. Capt. Billings (Michael Ironside, TOTAL RECALL) and his bumbling officers, Degrasso (Gill Gayle, TV’s DEADWOOD) and Wright (Charlie Newmark, 1990’s LORD OF THE FLIES), haven’t even questioned the witnesses yet. Officer Jack Bennett (Kent Harper) is blooded and beaten and very defensive. Bobbi Prescott (Pell James, ZODIAC) is a drug addict with a lot to hide. Stephanie (Ryan Simpkins, A SINGLE MAN) is a perceptive little girl who has just lost her whole family.

Nothing makes sense about this film from the start. Harper and Lynch’s script doesn’t even seem to understand how humans act, especially cops. In fact, the film’s hatred of cops makes Alfred Hitchcock’s paranoia about police look innocent. The cops in the film fall into either idiots or sick sociopaths. I understand they’re supposed to be some hicks, but they don’t even do the basics of police work. Bennett and his partner Jim Conrad (French Stewart, TV’s THIRD ROCK FROM THE SUN) find the house of the first murders, but seem to have the rest of their day clear to shoot out tires on random cars along the highway. You know, for kicks, they like to abuse their authority and torment random motorists like one’s that have small kids in the car. And why does Agent Hallaway have surveillance equipment set up in three separate rooms to watch three separate interrogations happening at the same time? How is he following all three at the same time? And why does key points in the story in one interrogation not overlap another? Oh forget it, why even argue about logic.

The characters aren’t even consistent to how they’re established. Bennett and Conrad are disgusting inhumans, but turn into concerned law enforcers when the psycho killers seem to be coming around. Now I don’t have any objection to showing bad cops, but the film’s agenda seems to make the police look like power hungry sickos or crude imbeciles. All the other characters talk about how all cops are corrupt and untrustworthy. But then Stephanie, who is bright enough to figure out signs of a murder in a moving car on the highway, has no problem confiding in the same officer who moments before groped her mom (Cheri Oteri, TV’s SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE) and pinned her dad (Hugh Dillon, GINGER SNAPS BACK: THE BEGINNING) to the concrete with a gun to his head.

The pacing is an awful grind. Lynch takes a painfully long time to even get to the witnesses’ stories, which is the meat. She has the witnesses narrate as we see what really happened. Of course, Bennett and Prescott are liars. And they’re also the least interesting witnesses for the audience. They’re despicable characters. Why not focus on the only sympathetic one, Stephanie? She’s smart and sweet and extremely well balanced emotionally for a little girl who just saw her stepdad smashed by a car and her mother and brother shot dead. And of course, the film has a twist. And some might argue that it helps explain away some of the problems. But it doesn’t explain away why none of the characters got a funny feeling and figured it out. None of it makes any sense at all.

Lynch is playing make believe and hopes we play along. But we need to believe that any of this is based on reality. In your premise, you can lie to your audience once and get away with it. This whole film is a lie masquerading as “real life.” Case in point, Lynch uses a terrible flat shot of a wall with crime scene photos on it. Then for no logical reason, she cuts away to a distracting reverse shot from the point of view of the wall as the characters look over the photos. It’s obvious the shot was done by shooting through a glass wall with the photos printed on translucent paper. The shot rips the viewer out of the moment with pointless style. Then it gets worse. The characters begin to take down the photos revealing completely that they are not printed on photo paper, but something like the plastic sheets from an overhead projector. Yep, this production is straight out of a high school AV club.

As for the actors, they have no parts to play. Pullman gives his typical squirrelly performance. While she’s the best thing in the film, Ormond is totally miscast. She even shows her range in an unusual role for her. But she has a natural grace that makes you think every moment she’s on the screen — why is Julia Ormond in this trash?

If Lynch is trying to comment on the abuse of power from people in trusted authority positions, she fails miserably. She wallows in their depravity. This isn’t as gory as torture porn like SAW or HOSTEL, but at least those films have a semblance of story and character. Lynch focuses on her most disgusting characters and gives us no one to root for. She just wants to show us how people humiliate and torture other people. Why would we want to watch that unless it has something to say about how it affects the world or the innocent? Without that it’s just a snuff film. In her version of the world, serial killers have more humanity than cops and violence has no effect on people as long as it doesn’t kill them. I wish someone had killed this film before it was made so it wouldn’t have affected me as it did. It pissed me off.

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Damn, Audrey Tautou is sexy. In this French romantic comedy, she changes the charge in the air when she enters a room. This is very good for the role she plays. She’s a con woman who seduces rich men and lives off their generosity until she finds a better money source. She gets jewels and clothes and fancy rooms in fancy hotels and they get her. The millionaires are getting a steal.

But who’s not getting a steal is the sleepy waiter Jean (Gad Elmaleh, THE VALET). One night, dressed in a tux, Jean hops behind the bar to mix himself a drink. Tautou’s Irene strolls in and thinks he’s the jackpot. After a hot night in one of the empty hotel rooms, Irene discovers she was slumming it when a shocked family shows up in the morning. But Jean is still smitten and offers to pay for her as well. She humors him by bleeding his savings dry in a few hours.

Having been fired and now with no savings, Jean is at rock bottom with a huge hotel bill due. In a twist of ironic luck, the wealthy widow Madeleine (Marie-Christine Adam) feels sorry for him, pays his bill and invites him to her room. Impressed, Irene decides to teach Jean some tricks of the trade.

Tautou and Elmaleh make for a great duo. As stated at the start, Tautou is radiant. And I have to admit that I rarely notice costuming in contemporary films, but Virginie Montel’s work fits Tautou exquisitely. The dresses slide down Tautou’s body, which oozes sex appeal. When her luck wears out, she has such an innocence to her face that she seems desperately lost. Elmaleh isn’t classically handsome, but he has great charm. When he’s playing the bashful waiter, he’s like a lost puppy dog and when he’s playing the confident gold digger, he’s like a sleek greyhound.

Director Pierre Salvadori developed the script with Benoit Graffin and Franck Bauchard. The structure has more in common with conman tales than romantic comedies. It’s loose to move wherever it wants to go. In doing so, it creates a believable romance. Irene isn’t necessarily uninterested in Jean because he’s poor, but because he’s a wimp. When he learns the ropes of the con game, he comes alive and into his own, which makes his very attractive to Tautou’s con woman. Rom-coms where adversaries become lovers take skill to pull off and Salvadori takes his time to make the switch feel real. Irene’s lessons in cons are their courtship ritual.

Salvador’s work is made easier with the chemistry between his leads. They make for a winning couple. The best part is that at first you think they could never work and by the end you think they’re destined for each other.

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This family film is based on the American Girl toy line. That doesn’t seem very promising does it, but you’d be jumping to wrong conclusions. The popular dolls are based around stories and this one is brought to the screen with an old-fashioned charm. Patricia Rozema’s adaptation never gets cloy with its Great Depression era tale, dealing with the time period innocently, but honestly.

Kit Kittredge (Abigail Breslin, LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE) desperately wants to become of star reporter. Her father Jack (Chris O’Donnell, BATMAN & ROBIN) has just lost his car dealership and the bank is threatening to foreclose on their house. While he goes off to Chicago to find work, her mother Margaret (Julia Ormond, LEGENDS OF THE FALL) rents out their extra rooms to boarders. Mr. Berk (Stanley Tucci, THE LOVELY BONES) is a magician. Miss Dooley (Jane Krakowski, TV’s 30 ROCK) is a sexy dance instructor. Miss Bond (Joan Cusack, WORKING GIRL) is the flighty driver of a mobile library. Mrs. Howard (Glenne Headly, DICK TRACY), whose house was foreclosed on, moves in with her son Stirling Howard IV (Zach Mills, HOLLYWOODLAND), who defends Kit when boys at school pick on her for her family’s situation.

The town is buzzing over a string of muggings and robberies that are being attributed to hobos. This is a case for Kit. Through her investigations with her friend Ruthie (Madison Davenport, OVER THE HEDGE), she becomes friends with Will (Max Thieriot, 2007’s NANCY DREW) and Countee (Willow Smith, I AM LEGEND), two kids who live at the hobo jungle down by the river. Kit tries to sell a story about the camp to publisher Mr. Gibson (Wallace Shawn, THE PRINCESS BRIDE), but he has no interest in a kid reporter writing about hobos.

The drama deals honestly with the ramifications of the Great Depression on families. It’s a bit sanitized for smaller kids, but never makes it easy. With the current poor economic state of the world, this seems like the fitting tale to show kids dealing with the same issues.

The plot is one straight out of the Hardy Boys, but the characters feel fresh. Oscar-nominee Breslin brings the right kind of pluck that a junior reporter of the 1930s needs. But the world is a tough place and Kit isn’t immune to its difficulties. Breslin plays Kit’s later disillusionment with real sincerity. O’Donnell and Ormond make a compelling pair as her parents. Ormond carries herself as a woman with the weight of the world on her shoulders, but acts with a light grace and humanity. And of course one can count on quality comedic support from Tucci and Cusack.

The film takes Valerie Tripp’s Kit Kittredge stories and makes an engaging mystery/drama out of them. The who done it isn’t surprising, but the characters are. The impact of the crimes on the characters we care about drives the story. Kit is a fighter for the truth. Because the film is based around some hard truths, it takes on some weight. Kids in films are either stupid or geniuses. These kids seem just about right. It’s this truth that makes this film worth watching.

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Heartbreak and mix CDs, isn’t that what the teenage years are all about? They start off Peter Sollett’s romantic comedy in one of those one crazy night plots. As the title suggests there is a boy named Nick and a girl name Norah and there will be music involved. This hit or miss comedy does a good job with those parts, but it disconnects before the upload is finished with the rest.

Nick (Michael Cera, JUNO) is pinning over his ex-girlfriend Tris (Alexis Dziena, BROKEN FLOWERS). He keeps making her mix CDs to win her back, but she just tosses them in the trash. This is where they are recovered by Norah (Kat Dennings, THE 40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN), who loves Nick’s taste in music. She’s also loves his Queercore band, The Jerk-Offs, which also includes the gay members Thom (Aaron Yoo, DISTURBIA) and Dev (Rafi Gavron, INKHEART). Rumors hit the school that the publicity shy band Where’s Fluffy? is playing a secret concert in NYC. Thom and Dev drag Nick to find them, while separately Norah and her best friend Caroline (Ari Graynor, An AMERICAN CRIME) do the same. As one would expect the paths of Nick, Norah, Tris and Norah’s friend with benefits Tal (Jay Baruchel, KNOCKED UP) will cross during the night.

Based on a novel by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan, adapted by Lorene Scafaria, the story handles the budding romance between Nick and Norah well. But for too long the plot follows the standards of this kind of film. Norah and Tris don’t like each other so she fakes having a boyfriend and kisses Nick not knowing that he was Tris’s ex, which is unlikely. Of course now Tris becomes interested in Nick again. Nick single-mindedly obsesses over Tris so Norah is put off, stringing out them getting together. Thom and Dev latch onto some dimwitted dude called Lethario (Johnathan B. Wright, YOUTH IN REVOLT). Caroline gets smashed and goes missing and gets disgusting things in her mouth, because that’s funny.

At some point, the plot finally puts Nick and Norah together alone and then it clicks. Cera and Dennings have chemistry together, given characters that have some depth and connection for each other. They have their own agendas that don’t put their future together at the forefront. We believe these are two young people who are getting to know and like each other. The rest of the film is a distraction. None of the other characters emerge as more than types. There is a great tradition of having high and low comedy in the same film, but it doesn’t work here because the low in from the gutter and the high is from the heart. Dev and Thom are annoying and the Caroline is just gross, not comedy. Tris is a cliché and doesn’t even seem like a girl who’d go for a guy like Nick in the first place. And Sollett’s direction at the end is painfully drawn out for pointless effect.

Nick and Norah’s romance is like the club playing that fresh new song everyone loves, while the comedic asides are them following it up with some overplayed kitsch tune. For the target audience, both tones might work to some degree. Teens who connect with the shy, but cool, attitude of Nick or Norah will connect with the film. For adults, this playlist is like new songs that sound like the songs you listened to as a teen that make you wonder why you thought they were so original back then.

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When I was putting together my top 50 films of the 2000s list, Baz Luhrmann’s groundbreaking musical was among the top 20. Every musical of the 2000s that came after owes a bit of their success to it. The energetic flick breathed life into the dying genre both financially and artistically. Mixing tragedy with humor and song, the film tells an epic love story through a medley of modern popular music.

Christian (Ewan McGregor, STAR WARS prequels) moves to Paris to become a bohemian writer. He falls into an acting troupe led by little person Toulouse-Lautrec (John Leguizamo, SUMMER OF SAM), who believes that the naïve author will become the voice of the bohemian revolution. They go to the Moulin Rogue to pitch their new play to burlesque star Satine (Nicole Kidman, DEAD CALM). However, she mistakes Christian for The Duke (Richard Roxburgh, VAN HELSING), a wealthy man who the Moulin Rouge owner Harold Zidler (Jim Broadbent, IRIS) hopes will turn the dance hall into a legit theater. Through his song of truth, beauty and love, Christian quickly wins the heart of Satine, who must string along The Duke for the benefit of the majority.

The true ingenuity is how modern music from the likes of Elton John to Nirvana to The Police is used together. In context to the story, the songs take on new meaning and dimension. The raucous medley titled “Zidler’s Rap” combines the can-can with “Smells Like Teen Spirit” and Madonna’s “Material Girl” to enthusiastically introduce the setting of the Moulin Rouge perfectly. It really feels like a bohemian Mecca. While this is a contemporary take on the genre, Luhrmann even pays homage to classic musicals with the unexpected use of “The Sound of Music.” And Madonna’s “Like a Virgin” will never be the same as it is sung by Zidler and The Duke. However, the show stopper is the “Elephant Love Medley” where Satine and Christian battle back and forth using various love song choruses. Elton John’s “Your Song” serves as its core and soul. The whole medley stirs the heart and makes one fall in love with silly love songs again.

The film offers a bit of everything. The tragedy of Satine suffering from TB is set up early, which adds tension to the whole story. A ticking clock on Christian and Satine’s romance. But the early sections of the film are filled with broad, screwball comedy. Luhrmann has a fondness for speeding up footage for laughs like they did in Keystone Cop serials. This is the only film he’s used the technique where it worked. It’s the scene when Satine and Christian are pitching “Spectacular, Spectacular” to The Duke and it works because it adds a frantic pace to a frantic moment. Luhrmann patiently tip toes from these scenes into the wide-eyed romance and then slips into the tragedy without a bump in the process. It’s a remarkable directing effort and a surprising Best Director omission from the Academy for a film that was nominated for Best Picture. (It was a strange year for the Directing category where two directors whose films were not nominated for best picture received nods — Ridley Scott for BLACK HAWK DOWN and David Lynch for MULHOLLAND DR.)

Speaking of Oscars, the film won deserved Oscars for Catherine Martin’s art direction, Brigitte Broch’s set decoration, and Martin and Angus Strathie’s costume design. Through the art and set direction, the world is washed in reds and sparkles. From Satine’s elephant room to the Moulin Rouge to the Duke’s dank castle, the locations are like characters, mirroring mood perfectly. Donald McAlpine’s Oscar-nominated cinematography makes it all look gorgeous. Watch how his use of shadow during the “El Tango de Roxanne” sequence transforms the lively theater into a lonely, uneasy place. And I’d be remiss not to mention Jill Bilock’s Oscar-nominated editing for it is part and parcel to Luhrmann’s success in keeping the tone just right.

Luhrmann was inspired to make the film after seeing a Bollywood musical while on a trip to India. From Christian’s Indian-themed play to the storytelling approach, the Bollywood influence is all over this film. Since then Bollywood has found a cult following in America. But what Luhrmann did was make the Bollywood hodgepodge of melodrama and music work for English-language audiences.

MOULIN ROUGE! is a spectacular spectacular. Christian is a romantic setting up an epic tale of love and loss. Satine is the prostitute with the heart of gold, as well as the tragic beauty. Their love is exciting, fun and full of life just like love is supposed to be. His optimism and purity makes her feel innocent again. When The Beatles’ “All You Need is Love” pops up, you believe that’s all this film needs, because love lifts it up where it belongs and makes his iconic lovers heroes.

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Read my original review of UP IN THE AIR.

Paramount brings Jason Reitman’s Oscar-nominated feature to Blu-ray with a quality transfer and interesting features package. The 1080p visuals have a nice balance of tone and film texture. While this isn’t a visual spectacle, this presentation is about as good as it can get. Details really shine in the film’s wider shots, especially in the opening title sequence where we get a bird’s eye view of various American landscapes. The color palette also stands out in the darker lit lounge scenes like the one where George Clooney and Vera Farmiga’s characters first meet. Like the visuals, the soundtrack isn’t one to show off the surround sound with. However, for those who are aware of the subtleties Blu-ray, they will be happy with this disc. While you never feel like you’re lost in the sounds of locations like the airports, the back speaker presence is used nicely to create a sense of location. This is a dialogue-centered film and the lines are crisp and clear.

The special features are interesting. Writer/director Jason Reitman, Director of Photography Eric Steelberg, and First Assistant Director Jason Blumenfeld participate in the film’s commentary. In an enthusiastic fashion, they discuss the challenges and approaches they took to creating the various scenes. It’s interesting to learn how they approached interviews with real life individuals who had been recently laid off. Reitman also delves into his creative process, which will be quite engaging for fans of the director or fledgling filmmakers.

Complementing the commentary track is the deleted scenes package. They also include commentary from Reitman, who explains the reason why the scenes were cut and which ones were the most painful for him to see go. With the commentary track, he shows how directors manage pacing and tone. I particularly liked how he addressed humorous scenes and a fantasy sequence that were cut because they felt like they were from another film. Funny scenes that feel out of place in a film are one of my top complaints. Story has to come before laughs.

“Shadowplay: Before the Story” is a brief featurette on the making of the film’s title sequence. The disc also includes a music video for Sad Brad Smith’s “Help Yourself,” video storyboards for airport sequences, and “American Airlines Prank,” a shot filmed only to scare American Airlines execs on how much turbulence would be displayed in the film.

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Forget about THE TWILIGHT SAGA: NEW MOON release this Saturday, you’re not going to see that mope fest on my list. Two weeks ago was a great week for family titles and so is this one. And there is a few titles I missed that I’d love you hear your thoughts on.

Pick of the Week
The Princess and the Frog
I placed Disney return to hand-drawn animation in my top ten of 2009. This fairy tale musical presents a new Disney princess for the modern era. The film subtly addresses many of the complaints people have with the “princess-fication” on little girls. In this film wishing on a star isn’t going to get you your dreams. Note to Blu-ray owners: this one is gorgeous in 1080p.

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Queue Qualified
Astro Boy
This isn’t a great animated feature, but it was an entertaining. Based on the famed manga and anime of the same name, the story follows a scientist who builds a robot in the image of his dead son, but casts him out when he isn’t exactly like his lost boy. Certainly a good title for fans of ASTRO BOY and younger kids.

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The Wizard of Oz
Warner Bros. released two deluxe versions of this family classic last year. Now it brings out a barebones Blu-ray edition for those who can’t afford $50 or $35. The word is it looks breathtaking. What a great way to re-connect with Dorothy, Toto, the Scarecrow, the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion.

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Buzzed About
Brief Interviews with Hideous Men
When John Krasinski signed onto THE OFFICE, he used his money to acquire to rights to a collection of David Foster Wallace short stories. He used those stories as the basis of his feature writing and directing debut. A female graduate student (Julianne Nicholson) deals with a recent breakup by conducting interviews about relationships with various men. Cast includes Timothy Hutton, Max Minghella, Lou Taylor Pucci, Will Arnett, Dominic Cooper, Chris Meloni, Josh Charles, and Frankie Faison.

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Broken Embraces
A new Almodovar film is always worth checking out. I really wish I wouldn’t have missed this one in theaters. Harry Caine, a blind writer, struggles with scars from 14 years ago. He was then still known by his real name, Mateo Blanco, and directing his last movie. Reviews say Almodovar muse, Penelope Cruz, is fabulous.

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Dillinger is Dead
While I haven’t liked every film Criterion has put out, they are all at least provocative choices. This one, from Italian writer/director Marco Ferreri, follows an industrial designer who discovers a gun wrapped in a newspaper that announces the death of bank robber John Dillinger. There is great debate about the meaning of surreal end.

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Read my original THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG review.

As they did with their other recent animated release PONYO, Disney understands that animation is the cornerstone of their company and gives due respect to its release on Blu-ray. Disney Feature Animation’s return to hand-drawn animation is an explosion of color in 1080p. From the dark night scenes in the bayou to the brightly colored Mardi Gras scenes, the painterly frames don’t loose any of their luster. I didn’t even see color banding in the deep reds. The presentation makes one very aware that there is real artwork dancing across the screen. The DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 audio matches the picture quality. Randy Newman’s music presentation is amazing, coming across the full range of speakers. The full soundscape is this way. The swamps come alive in the room with insects and creatures. Sounds whirl around the speakers from front to back, especially in scenes when voodoo magic comes alive. The rich picture and sound makes for an immersive home viewing experience.

For fans of the film, the presentation is supplemented wonderfully by the special features. Directors/co-writers John Musker and Ron Clements, and producer Peter Del Vecho participate in a nice audio commentary, giving behind-the-scenes details about the film’s development, as well as capturing the collaborative nature of animation by pointing out individual contributions of the artists that worked on the film. The disc also offers a Picture-in-Picture track where the film plays with a combination of pencil tests, storyboards, key animations and temp animation.

The “Magic in the Bayou” feaurette is a nice 22-minute look at the making of the film. The mini-doc delves into the development of the characters and the history of the film’s development. When Pixar and Disney joined forces, two separate FROG PRINCE tales were brought together to make this version pitched by Musker and Clements.

The disc also features unfinished deleted scenes. Some include scratch dialogue and others the final actors. There is a dressing-making scene between Tiana and her mom, an alternative introduction to Louis, a scene where Prince Naveen challenges Tiana to stop and smell the roses for once, and a scene where Naveen confides in Ray about his feelings for Tiana.

There is a collection of shorter topic-centered featurettes on the disc that were previously released online before the film was released. They include: “Bringing Life to Animation,” which shows how live-action reference footage is used; “The Return to Hand Drawn Animation;” “The Disney Legacy;” “A Return to the Animated Musical;” “Disney’s Newest Princess;” “The Princess and the Animator,” which shows how Tiana was designed and animated; and “Conjuring the Villain.”

Closing out the disc are a Ne-Yo music video for “Never Knew I Needed,” extensive art gallery, and “What Do You See: Princess Portraits,” an interactive game where fireflies make out the faces of princesses for players to guess who is who.

One of the ten best films of 2009 turns into one of the best Blu-ray releases of 2010.

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Read my original PONYO review.

I say this a lot, but animation was made for Blu-ray. Disney does a remarkable job transferring Hayao Miyazaki’s latest world of wonder and whimsy to 1080p. The artists’ rich color palette pops. Look at Lisa’s pink car. Look at the deep blues of the fish waves. None of the details of the gorgeous hand painted art are lost. One can see the brush strokes in the backgrounds. The underwater scenes come alive with Studio Ghibli’s attention to detail from the particles in the water to flow of the water. The audio matches the picture very well. The English track is in DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and the Japanese track is in Dolby Digital 5.1. Or course the former is far better than the latter. The English track has clear dialog and great directionality. At one moment a call from the rear speaker actually made me turn. The English version simply balances all the elements of the soundtrack from the dialog to the music to the sound effects better.

As for the special features, English-language executive producers Frank Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy give a brief introduction to bringing PONYO to the U.S. in “Meet Ponyo.” In lieu of a commentary track, the disc offers a Storyboard Experience where the Japanese storyboards play in the upper right hand corner along with movie. The color watercolor paintings often match the art on the screen exactly.

The World of Ghibli - Behind the Studio provides a host of short featurettes on various aspects of the famed studio and PONYO. “A Conversation with Hayao Miyazaki and John Lasseter” is one of the best giving the Pixar head a chance to chat with his friend about his latest film. “Creating Ponyo” has Miyazaki explaining his inspirations for making PONYO. One of which was having a lot of young children around the studio. He wanted to make a TOTORO for them. “Ponyo and Fujimoto” covers Ponyo’s father and his complex actions. “The Nursery” reveals secrets about changes in the story, as well as one of Miyazaki’s secret desires. “Telling the Story” interviews producer Toshiro Suzuki about working on PONYO and with Miyazaki. “The Locations of Ponyo” takes ten minutes from a Japanese Studio Ghibli documentary to venture to the small village that inspired several of Miyazaki’s films. It’s the best feature on the disc. “Scoring Miyazaki” talks to Joe Hisaishi about composing PONYO’s music. He was a little shy about how easy it was. “Behind the Microphone” looks at Marshall and Kennedy’s effort to put the all-star cast together. Many knew Miyazaki’s work and were eager to participate. It’s funny how they found their youngest stars. Did we really need a bonus Jonas?

The World of Ghibli - Enter the Lands is an interactive world where fans can learn more about the worlds of Ghibli films, PONYO, KIKI’S DELIVERY SERVICE, MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO and CASTLE IN THE SKY. The menuing is a bit awkward but once you get the knack of it I saw the appeal for younger kids to discover new elements. The material isn’t anything too special though, basically trailers and character bios. As is becoming standard with Disney releases, there’s a personality test feature that tells you which PONYO character you most resemble. The worst part of the experience is that films like PRINCESS MONONOKE and SPIRITED AWAY are featured on the main map, but cannot be visited. What’s up with that tease?

Rounding out the disc there are two Japanese trailers and previews of the special featurettes on the new special editions of MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO, KIKI’S DELIVERY SERVICE, and CASTLE IN THE SKY.

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Lars von Trier’s disturbing film was the most controversial film at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival. Reactions were love it or hate it. The French reviewers who lean toward art films generally loathed it, while American reviewers were the most kind. Some called it torture porn. Others complained it was violently misogynistic. I found it a brave, unblinking decent into the abyss of the worst of human experience.

The story begins with He (Willem Dafoe, THE ENGLISH PATIENT) and She (Charlotte Gainsbourg, 1996’s JANE EYRE) having passionate sex. It’s snowing outside and their young son crawls out of his crib to get a closer look out the window. The child falls to his death. She sinks into unbearable grief. He is a therapist who doesn’t agree with the way the doctors are treating his wife and decides to treat her himself. He forces her to confront her greatest fears. The scariest place she can now imagine is their cabin in the deep woods called Eden, where she spent the previous summer with her son working on her thesis about gynocide. The more callously He pushes her, the more disturbed she becomes, which leads to violence both mental and physical.

The film is too complex for one reading. But the Biblical implications are obvious. The story takes the Adam and Eve tale and projects the negative onto the screen. Instead of being cast out of Eden, they journey to it. The garden is not a paradise, but Satan’s playground full of chaos. Birth is simply the start of death.

In this world, we have He and She. Their attempts to get over grief and pain only create more grief and pain. They are extreme examples of the standard perspective of males and females. Dafoe makes He cold, analytical and controlling. Gainsbourg crafts She as emotional, sensual and easily persuadable. In the Biblical account of Eden, Eve eats of the apple and gains knowledge. The same is true in the dark Eden. She studies the history of the gynocide of women. The torture of women as evil. Consumed by guilt, she starts to believe that women are evil. As she becomes more unsettled, He begins to believe it too. Self-hate and blame consume them and it is what tortures them.

Dafoe and Gainsbourg sink into their characters. Dafoe is calculating and aloof. He wants to forget the tragedy as quickly as possible, but he can only do so if his wife does the same. Gainsbourg brings real emotional torment to her role. Most will be struck by her unflinching dedication to the extremes of part from the sex to the nudity to the violence. But it’s the despair that seems more daring. While their characters are made up of extreme traits, they play them naturally. Their honesty allows us to believe in the story. They are real no matter what surreal occurrences happen around them.

Von Trier has never been shy to shock his audience. The black & white prologue shocks with its graphic sex cross cut with impending tragedy. Later he delves into torture and self-mutilation that would make HOSTEL fans cringe. But he’s not taking on any topics that Ingmar Bergman didn’t address decades ago. All he does is push the imagery to extremes. He shows what others wouldn’t. I believe he’s challenging himself as much as his audience.

Von Trier, who borne the Dogme 95 film movement of simple, natural films, breaks all those rules in this film. The entire film is artifice. The woods are full of surreal special effects. The trees pulsate. He and She make love in the forest and arms come out of a tree groping for them. Acorns rain down from the trees onto the cabin’s metal roof like a natural audible water torture. A deer gives birth to a dead fawn. A buried crow refuses to die. A fox disembowels itself and calls out, “Chaos reigns.”

What drove von Trier to make this film? Whatever it was he was uncompromised in its vision. Many of his films have dealt with man’s inhumanity to man. Innocents preyed upon by a cruel world. But are their innocents in this film? The son was an innocent. He and She were engaging in a passionate moment of love when a cruel twist of fate thrust grief, pain and despair on them. It could happen to any of us. How we react depends on whether we live in a world made by God or Satan.

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