Father Geek reporting in with Edgard and the rest of the Euro-crew and their regular Monday morning Euro-AICN column. Its a big one this week with lots of good info and reviews (including one on CTHD that I almost deleted, but...)

I really like CTHD, and I like it for the very reasons our reviewer from Eastern Europe hates it, Edgard and Ozy seem to agree with ol' Father Geek on this too.

Now just for the record Father Geek loves all kinds of martial arts films; started collecting the posters back in 1970. I have dozens of trailers on 16mm film, and on DVD I have all the Bruce Lee's, the old SAMURAI series, YOJIMBO, 7 SAMURAI, IRON MONKEY 1 & 2, all the CHINESE GHOST STORIES, the whole ONCE UPON A TIME series, SIX-STRING SAMURAI, MR. VAMPIRE, A MAN CALLED HERO, THE GOD OF COOKERY, and tons of Jackie Chan, David Chang, Jet Li, Tsui Hark, Andrew Lau, John Woo, and on and on and on.

Hell, I even went to the premiere of RUSH HOUR at the Chinese in Hollywood, and threw Kung Fu film fests here in Austin in the 1970's. I was at the biggest, loudest screen in town for opening day of the DRUNKEN MASTER 2 re-issue. I am a Kung Fu maniac, no doubt about it. And I LOOOOVE the motion picture CROUCHING TIGER HIDDEN DRAGON!!! I love it because it is different from all the rest. I love it because it embraces other genres. I love it because it isn't just another in the long line of straight action kung fu films. I love it because it dares to expand the very nature of the genre. I love it because it DOES have those inbetween-the-fights character and plot development scenes. Father Geek loves it because it isn't a Kung Fu flick... its a KUNG FU EPIC!

EURO AICN

Hey folks... Edgard here with a long edition of the Euro AICN news... We got a nice report on HARRY POTTER this week, while Ozymandias got news on Woo's next, WINDTALKERS, and Schwarzy's THE SIXTH DAY... and as almost every week now, we have a new review on CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON (but a very negative one this time,... can't say more about it, I am ANGRY that someone hates that film). There's also a review of BLAIR WITCH 2 and the wonderful MEMENTO that I really recommend again... And don't forget to check out the new BROTHERHOOD OF THE WOLVES trailer, cool film ahead !

So let's no wait any longer & let's go for our weekly European Tour :

UK

* From our pals fron Netribution (www.netribution.co.uk), a cool report on HARRY POTTER : An exclusive report by James MacGregor for netribution.co.uk : Former Monty Python John Cleese has confirmed that he has accepted a role in the new Harry Potter movie, now filming in North East England. Netribution sources say Cleese just gave a lecture at Cornell University, where he confirmed he will play Nick the Nearly Headless Ghost. The movie is shooting at the ancient Norman cathedral at Durham -as revealed exclusively by Netribution two weeks ago- where the crew have spent a fortnight setting up lighting rigs, fake cobwebs and fake "Hogwarts" pillars in the cathedral¹s interior. Principal photography got underway last Friday, with some photography inside the cathedral and some outside in dark alleyway areas high up on either side of the nave, where the public do not normally have access. Filming may be split between Durham Cathedral and Alnwick Castle in Northumberland, dependent on weather. Some shooting has already taken place at a remote railway station, high up on nearby moors.

Snowy owls are also appearing at the location. They have been loaned in by zoos around Britain over the last few weeks and they¹ve been under training with animal wranglers in preparation for the shoot. Local sources tell Netribution that the cathedral location has been quite open and accessible by the public until now, when parts of it have been closed off as principal photography gets under way. Durham Cathedral, a European Heritage Site, is know among film fans as the principal location for Elizabeth. It is best known among Christians as the place where the earthly remains of St Cuthbert were finally laid to rest, after being moved repeatedly for many years to avoid disturbance by Viking invaders. It became famous as a place of sanctuary where any fugitive grasping the lions head knocker on the cathedral door was guaranteed the protection of the church authorities. Film crews are clearly not seen as a threat to the peace of the remains and whilst they will be operating under the protection of the church authorities whilst filming in the cloisters, they will almost certainly be paying for some expensive insurance cover.

* From Empire Online (http://www.empireonline.co.uk); some news on the new film from Ken Loach : If you found yourself thinking that the Tories’ privatisation of Britain’s railways was hardly the most riveting subject matter to bring to the silver screen, you could hardly be held to blame. However, it would appear that Ken Loach has a somewhat different idea having just begun principal photography in Sheffield for The Navigators, a drama about life, love and… Railtack. Loach, who met critical acclaim with 1998 drama My Name Is Joe, is directing the film which stars Joe Duttine, Tom Craig, and The Full Monty’s Steve Huison. The movie follows the effect of privatisation on a group of track workers who try to keep the signalling system running while dodging the occasional train. Divided up into competing groups by the leap into private ownership, the circle of friends try to balance their turbulent personal lives against the prospect of redundancy or low pay without benefits. Filming on The Navigators is due to wrap in mid-November.

* Ewan McGregor should start in England next summer a film on Billy Fury, a star of the British pop in the 60's. Fury died in 1983 from a heart attack while he was preparing his come-back. This will be McGregor's second attempt to be a pop star after Todd Haynes' VELVET GOLDMINE.

* Next November, Peter Greenaway will start to shoot the first film of a trilogy on the 20th Century. This trilogy will follow the destinies of 92 characters and 92 suitcases through 92 events, from 1928 to the fall of the Berlin's wall in 1989. Don't ask for more details, I don't know ! These 3 films will also be cut in 16 short TV films of 30 minutes each. Vincent Gallo will be part of the first movie (shot in the USA and Japan) and Madonna will be in the second (mostly shot in France). Isabella Rosselini and Tchéky Karyo will also appear. But the main actor has yet to be cast as Philip Seymour Hoffmann could not do it. The shooting of the 3 films will probably last over 2 years.

GERMANY

* Simplicissimus brought us some news on German films... here it is :

Moin Moin! Here's some info from the website of the German Export-Union:

IM JULI opens the first Festival of German Cinema in Los Angeles : MADE IN GERMANY - 1st ANNUAL FESTIVAL OF GERMAN CINEMA LOS ANGELES will be held in the Laemmle Music Hall Theatre in Beverly Hills from 3. - 9. November 2000. Cinephiles and representatives of the mediaand the film industry will have the opportunity to see 14 contemporary German feature films, two documentaries as well as a German-American short film programme. The parliamentary party chairman of Bündnis 90/DIE GRÜNEN, Rezzo Schlauch, will open the festival before invited guests and with director Fatih Akin and lead actress Christiane Paul in attendance. The first Festival of German Cinema in Los Angeles is being organised by the German Export-Union in cooperation with the Goethe-Institut, the German Federal Film Board (FFA), the State Minister for Culture and Affairs of the Media as well as the six major economically-oriented film funds. A jury consisting of American industry representatives has selected the following films for the programme:

GIGANTIC (ABSOLUTE GIGANTEN) by Sebastian Schipper,

ENGLAND! by Achim von Borries,

FALLING ROCKS by Peter Keglevic,

FRIENDS (FREUNDE) by Martin Eigler,

GREEN DESERT (GRÃœNE WÃœSTE) by Anno Saul,

HOME GAME (HEIMSPIEL) by Pepe Danquart,

IM JULI by Fatih Akin,

THE INNER SECURITY (DIE INNERE SICHERHEIT) by Christian Petzold,

MARLENE by Joseph Vilsmaier,

BACK HOME TO THE REICH WITH BUBI (MIT 'BUBI' HEIM INS REICH) by Stanislaw Mucha,

PARADISO - SEVEN DAYS WITH SEVEN WOMEN (PARADISO - SIEBEN TAGE MIT SIEBEN

FRAUEN) by Rudolf Thome,

THE POLICEWOMAN (DIE POLIZISTIN) by Andreas Dresen,

SUMO BRUNO by Lenard Fritz Krawinkel,

TUVALU by Veit Helmer,

NO PLACE TO GO (DIE UNBERÃœHRBARE) by Oskar Roehler and

FORGET AMERICA (VERGISS AMERIKA) by Vanessa Jopp.

Attendance has already been confirmed by the directors Fatih Akin, Andreas Dresen, Veit Helmer, Lenard Fritz Krawinkel, Christian Petzold and Sebastian Schipper as well as the actresses Hannelore Elsner, Julia Hummer, Claudia Michelsen und Christiane Paul who will travel to Los Angeles to personally introduce their films to the audiences. All of the cinema-goers will have the chance to put their favourite films in the running for an "Audience Award".

If you want my advice on the films which already had a theatrical run in Germany: GIGANTIC, IM JULI, TUVALU, NO PLACE TO GO are brilliant, MARLENE is crap.

Tschüss,

Simplicissimus

* This one comes from Screendaily : No Place To Go (Die Unberuehrbare) has been selected as Germany’s nominee for the foreign-language Oscar. The Export Union, which picked the film from eight candidates said: "The subject of reunification has never been portrayed in German cinema as succinctly and subtly differentiated as here". Directed by Oskar Roehler, the film was produced by Distant Dreams FilmProduktion, Geyer Werke Berlin and ZDF. Distributed by Advanced it has notched admissions of over 200,000 in Germany and is sold internationally by Bavaria Film.

DENMARK

* From Screendaily, some news of the Danish box-office with a big success of a local animated film : Danish animation Help! I Am A Fish is currently storming the Danish box office, sinking local competitor Dancer In the Dark. Just two weeks after its release Help! I Am A Fish has achieved admissions of 177,243 from 60 screens. In comparison Lars von Triar’s Dancer In The Dark has grossed $885,020 – the equivalent of 151,904 admissions - after six weeks. According to distributor Nordisk, much of the animation’s success was due to the school holiday week when the film’s box office increased 240% from the first week to the second. The other major releases also suffered against this domestic hit. The DreamWorks SKG/Aardman Productions’ animation Chicken Run grossed $284,403 from 41 screens while suspense thriller What Lies Beneath, grossed $247,655 from 38 screens. In Finland where audiences are even more suspicious of non-US animations, Help! I’m A Fish was received well, scooping a box office of $64,776 from 27 screens in its opening week.

FRANCE

Two websites to check out cool stuff... First, the French distributor of SCARY MOVIE (opening here on 25th October) made a cool website in 3-D with games and stupid stuffs, quite fun to look at it :

* Just Click Here

Then there's more to see about THE BROTHERHOOD OF WOLVES (opening here on 31st January 2001), a new website and mostly a new teaser... this movie really looks like... woaw !!... I just can't wait to see it...

* Go Here

EUROPE

* From Screendaily, some news on the next European Film Awards : Three Asian titles – Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Wong Kar-Wai’s In the Mood For Love and Edward Yang’s Yi Yi – are among the six films to be nominated for the Screen International Award for non-European film at the European Film Awards (EFA). US titles Erin Brockovich, Gladiator and O Brother, Where Art Thou? will also compete. Nominations for the rest of the EFA categories will be unveiled on November 7, with the award ceremony taking place on December 2. Screen International editor in chief Colin Brown commented: "Screen International whole heartedly supports the European Film Academy and its prestigious annual Awards. They stand for everything that we as a European based trade paper covering the business of worldwide cinema have been championing for the past 25 years."

OZYMANDIAS CORNER

* Empire Online (http://www.empireonline.co.uk) have some good stuff today: Pinewood and Shepperton, the two biggest film studios in the country, have been given the greenlight for a merger which could change the face of the British film industry. The department of Trade and Industry has given the go ahead for the move and the two studios could find themselves under the same ownership as early as the end of this year. Former Channel 4 chief Michael Grade first proposed the merger in August after acquiring Pinewood earlier in the year. The combination of the two studio giants will mark the inception of a film and television complex worth more than £130 million that could rival Hollywood in size and ambition. Blighty has repeatedly lost out to big budget pictures that have taken their cameras to bigger and cheaper premises overseas. The new super-studio should be able to offer more attractive packages to filmmakers, luring a greater number of productions to film on these shores. However, with Britain still not offering filmmakers the tax breaks available in many other countries, the competition from locations such as the Fox studio complex in Sydney will remain tight.

* They've also got: Yorkshire-born actor Pete Postlethwaite this week explains why he's turned down two of Hollywood's finest directors due to family commitments. In an interview with TV Times, the actor explains that when Steven Spielberg asked him to screen-test for Jurassic Park 2 he had to decline because he'd just become a father for the second time. What's particularly jammy is that Spielberg then turned around and offered Postlethwaite the part without a test. Perhaps Pete's hoping that Martin Scorsese will do the same. Pete also turned down the opportunity to appear in the director's latest project Gangs of New York which is currently filming in Italy. 'I wouldn't have been able to spend time with my family before starting work on it,' he explains. 'But yes, I wrestled with the decision, it seemed impossible to turn down. The script's great - Gormenghast on acid...Plus Scorsese is one of my favourite directors, for God's sake.'

* Also Showbiz Ireland have some stuff from my part of the world........ : The Irish based actor Daniel Day-Lewis (who won an Oscar for Neil Jordan's My Left Foot) is reported to keen to play Irish playwright Samuel Beckett in a biopic set to go into production next year. Day-Lewis's may return to movie making in Ireland if the project goes ahead. His last film was back in 1997 when he starred in Jim Sheridan's movie The Boxer. Day-Lewis is currently filming Martin Scorsese's Gangs Of New York with Leonardo DiCaprio and another Irish actor Liam Neeson. Day-Lewis, who won his Oscar for playing paraplegic Irish writer Christy Brown in 1989's My Left Foot, lives in Ireland and holds an Irish passport. His friend and the Irish film Producer Noel Pearson, who worked with Day-Lewis on My Left Foot, told The English newspaper the Daily Express that Day-Lewis was his first choice to play the reclusive author of Waiting For Godot and Krapp's Last Tape.

* Aside from that Empire Online have this one - ever fancied getting your hands on some serious movie kit????? Read on.....

From Empire Online: Get your credit card out for a piece of Alien action. If you’ve ever wanted to own a piece of Ms Ripley’s talent, then here’s your chance. An online auction is selling off props from the classic 1979 film. Lot 1 is a still from the movie, signed by the cast and Ridley Scott, and could be yours for a mere £250-£300. Or perhaps you’d prefer the side arm pistol as used by Kane, played to stomach-exploding perfection by John Hurt, or a pair of ‘spare’ Alien feet for £1,500? A complete Alien costume might be yours in time for Christmas if you’re willing to part with £15,000. But the most coveted item must surely be Ripley’s flame-thrower, a snip at the predicted price of £7,000-£8,000. Bids are invited at www.fleetwoodowen.com, an auction site run by Mick Fleetwood of Fleetwood Mac and memorabilia merchant Ted Owen.

* You'll probably remember Robert Bernocchi,our guy at the Venice Film Festival this year. Well he and his magazine La Finestra sul Cortile have come up with this from the set of the new John Woo movie...

I have no doubt this guy is working on Windtalkers, so this morning we published this information on our site.

A few weeks ago i received a message from a guy who is involved in the production of Windtalkers. He said: "we're one week late with the shooting. The weather was very ugly and it rained very much, moreover in the valley where we are shooting there is a different climate, so it rains even if in the rest of the island the weather is nice. We have almost finished to shoot the most important battle and this week we have been making many close ups to Cage and Slater". But a few days later i received a concerned e-mail by the same guy: "The executives from MGM arrived on the set a few days ago and they changed many parts of the script, including the most beautiful scene of the battle, when an american tank destroys a japanese bunker. John Woo is trying to save this scene, even because it was very expensive to prepare and it would be very stupid to not do it. Someone says that we're going to stop the shooting here the 6th of october and not at the beginning of november as planned. We'll be at Ka'a'aka Valley till next week and then we'll move to Dillingham. I'll let you know as soon as possible". Unfortunately, i didn't receive any other message.

Robert Bernocchi

La Finestra sul Cortile

* This last week saw a showcase in the IFC here in Dublin of some shorts from the next generation of young Irish filmmakers from my Alma Mater - our man Santa was there of course..... : ANYONE WHO WAS AROUND the Irish Film Centre in Dublin earlier this week could have caught themselves a load of short films for free, as Ballyfermot College were showing off this year's graduate work. I love shorts, but when they're on a big screen, and admission is free, they're a hell of a lot better. There was one advertisement, two music videos, a handful of five minute shorts and two ten/fifteen minute films (formats ranged from Mini-DV to 16mm). And these last two... well, I thought I should give them an added work in particular. 'Cause this is a small, begrudging country we live in, and work like this tends to make up for a lot of the shite that gets commissioned.

"DAY ONE", written by director Barry Kelly and producer Declan Cooney features a boy who's born, lives and dies in the same day. The sort of subject matter that could have very easily slid into mawkish sentimental (like Francis Ford Coppola's JACK), it steered clear of almost every cliché thrown at it - no mean feat. Joe O'Reilly's ambitious "SOUL TRADER" played like a cross between FAUST and GROUNDHOG DAY - a young man dies in and makes a deal with the devil in order to avoid an eternity in Purgatory. He has the chance to relive his last day on earth on the condition that he can find two souls to take his place. Most shorts will avoid overly complicated camera set-ups, but here it tracks, spins and stalks after the actors. And kudos to the director and DP Aidan Staunton for the strikingly surreal vision of the afterlife, which would be impressive regardless of the budget. A quick note about the funniest short and wonderfully titled, "CONFESSIONS OF A SCUMBAG" (dir: Declan Cooney, scr: Leo Corrigan) - lead actor Darren Healy can be seen in the considerably more downbeat feature CRUSHPROOF doing the same thing WITHOUT the laughs.

* And a sad, sad story this week from the current capital of film production in Western Europe. I'd only been down there recently for a screening of a trailer reel of the upcoming Cyberworld... If you ask me putting the thing in a less that happening area didn't help along with the lack of effective advertising. I was talking to a couple of the (now out of work!) guys down there and they said that they'd been playing the T_Rex feature for nearly 6 months now... Sad really. This one from the IFTN site: Dublin IMAX Cinema Closing : Operated by Belfast’s Sheridan Group, IMAX in Dublin’s Parnell Centre has closed. IMAX originally opted for a Dublin based operation because of the number of tourists numbers moving through the capital each year (over 5 million – about the population of Ireland), as the operation would not have been viable depending on an Irish audience alone. The operation was ultimately hampered by a shortfall in audiences attracted to the large-format programmes, and also by the slow development of other local leisure outlets.

* Our good friends at Empire Online were talking to Roger Spotiswoode this week... He was in the UK to show a 30 minute showreel of The Sixth Day to UK journos (any of you who saw it interested in telling us what it was like?!?!?! Mail me at ozymandias@dublin.com!) They spoke to him about a few cool things - the full interview is at Their Site

EO: What stage is The Sixth Day at?

RS: 'It's got so many CGI shots it's really late - we're still adding effects to it now. They're just incredibly time-consuming. The aeroplane in the film is mainly virtual and it's taken five or six months for a two-second shot which costs something like $100,000. The first full screening will be in LA next week.'

EO: Were you after the 'action Arnie' or 'new man Arnie'?

RS: 'Slightly New Man, I guess, because it has some action in it but it's really more of a suspense thriller.I think [Arnie] wanted to try something with more words. On the other hand he's also going to do Terminator 3 - he likes to reinvent himself.'

EO: Was Bladerunner an influence in making this film?

RS: 'I wanted to do something slightly different. Bladerunner's a wonderful film, but it's set in this sort of post-apocalyptic world, I thought this would be more interesting if it was set in our world, in just a few year's time. It would be more scary if it felt like this is really the world we're in rather than some stranger's world.'

EO: Have you filmed this with any DVD extras in mind?

RS: 'There's a lot of storyboards, a lot of animatics, but there aren't very many deleted scenes. It's like Tomorrow Never Dies - we used ever single scene we shot in the film.'

EO: Have you chosen your next project?

RS: 'I'll be doing The Spire - a William Golding novel about building the spire on Salisbury Cathedral - it couldn't be more different [to The 6th Day]! We're going to be filming in Salisbury for about six weeks next year - I'm casting it at the moment.'

EO: Could you be persuaded to do another Bond?

RS: 'I had an interesting time on Bond. I'm glad I did it and I wouldn't want to do another one. They're sort of a puzzle. It's fun to try once and I tried to move it as much as everyone else would let me move it, which was a tiny little bit. I wanted women who weren't shaped the usual Bond way. I wanted Michelle Yeoh and I got her. I wanted a script that made more sense than usual and I got that, but it was a difficult film to make.

And finally I'm gonna say this again - there have been a load of people getting in contact with me recently wanting to get involved with the Ireland/UK arm of Euro AICN and the deal is simple if you want to get involved with us too! If you've seen a movie that hasn't been released in the US yet that you'd like to review, have access to any whispers, info or talk from movie sets anywhere in Ireland or the UK or just see and movie related stories that you think I might be interested in mail me here at: the penthouse.

L8r,

Ozymandias

Euro AICN Ireland/UK Office, Penthouse Suite, Ozymandias Towers, Dublin, Ireland.

Mail me @ ozymandias@dublin.com

****************************

REVIEWS

* Here's a couple of early Xmas presents from our man Santa - his reply to mine and Harry's opinion of Blair Witch 2 and a review of one of the most intruiging looking movies of the next few months...... First off Christopher Nolan's Memento...

MEMENTO (18s, Released Ireland October 27th, Britain 20th - I think - and the US... who knows?)

I HAVE A FEAR of giving too much away about this terrific noir thriller about lies, murder and memory loss, so in the best tradition of theological debate, I'll keep it vague. Anyone with a short attention span or who has a BURNING SENSE OF CURIOSITY about what I thought of MEMENTO, then I'll put you out of your misery. It's really, REALLY terrific.

MEMENTO centres around Leonard Shelby (Guy Pearce), a former insurance-investigator whose sole purpose in life is to track down and kill his wife's murderer of his wife. Trouble is, Leonard suffers from a bizarre form of memory loss - he can remember everything of his life before "the accident" but cannot recall what happened 15 minutes ago, where he is, what he's doing or where he's going. All Leonard has as a guide are a series of Polaroid photographs, index cards and the disturbing tattoos adorning his body. He can't trust himself, let alone the people he meets. All he has left to remember is vengeance.

Members of the ROMEO MUST DIE audience may wish to make other plans, however, as a good deal of MEMENTO requires the audience to pay a little more than a modicum of attention to the screen. Imagine LA CONFIDENTIAL stripped of almost all the subplots, and re-edited so each scene is out of synch with the one preceding it. MEMENTO fishes in the same waters as films like ANGEL HEART, LIAR and OPEN YOUR EYES but what sets it apart is the brilliantly unconventional structure:- the film opens at "The End" and works its way back. Whereas something like THE SIXTH SENSE put all its eggs into one big climatic twist (which most people had already figured out), the twist in MEMENTO is the film itself - constantly shifting the audience's expectations about characters and their motivations. The chances of something coming out this year to match MEMENTO for its striking originality are slim. See it now and then try to figure it out.

THE BOOK OF SHADOWS: BLAIR WITCH 2

I'VE JUST READ OZYMANDIAS' and Harry's review of BLAIR WITCH 2: THE BOOK OF SHADOWS, and - it would be the understatement of the year to say I was surprised. Shocked and startled, even. Right - a great start. I can feel the hackles rising already.

I loved the first film. Loved it. And last night I saw BLAIR WITCH 2: THE BOOK OF SHADOWS, and my feelings… well, let's start at the beginning, and the good points (keep the reader on your side, Santa, keep 'em on your side…). The first five minutes are an excellent jumping point from the first film, and a terrific set-up to the BOOK OF SHADOWS. A blizzard of documentary-style footage surrounding the hype of THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT - some real, some fake. So apparently the film WAS all made-up. So apparently the kids DIDN'T disappear.

The town of Burkitsville has since been flooded by a BLAIR-WITXH aficionados; BLAIR WITCH merchandising and tours is big business. Among these is a young man who's been recently released from the local mental asylum. Why, we don't know. Is he cured? We don't know that either. So all well and good. The story can go either way.

And then the credits roll, you look in horror at the screen as Marilyn Manson blasts out of the speakers. A long, aerial shot over trees. Young people in what looks like the Scooby-Doo van - BLAIR WITCH HUNT written on the side… Images of THE CRAFT flash past your eyes and you start to feel cramps scuttling up and down your side…

I REALLY WANTED TO LIKE THE BOOK OF SHADOWS. I've said it before - I LOVED the first film. And honest to God, I wanted to like this. I wanted to give it a chance. The press notes are forwarded by a Director's note from Joe Berlinger. He lays out his intentions - what he thought of the first film, how he wanted to take the BLAIR WITCH in a new direction. Well, no-one thought that it would be a simple "Camcorders in the woods" sequel. No-one expected it to be the same. I know I didn't. But I wanted it to have something in it… a taste of the sheer spirit of the first film. The fear of being cut off and haunted by things you hadn't been scared of since you were a child. That dread of the unknown that you could never quite put into words. And BOOK OF SHADOWS didn't have it. I heard talk of how much effort was going into the look of the film - 35mm saturated with evil. Naively, I imagined the fairy-tale woods of SLEEPY HOLLOW… or the out-of-synch reality of DON'T LOOK NOW. The five characters - the bickering couple writing a book on the basis of the BLAIR WITCH, the (perhaps) unhinged tour guide, the "wiccan" and the Goth chick - they go out to the woods, they "lose" five hours and are then haunted by flashes of horrific things they may or may not have done.

For a great deal of the film, I DID NOT BELIEVE THESE people in the roles they were in. I didn't believe their dialogue. I didn't believe them, plain and simple. I didn't believe the house that the majority of the film takes place in - an elaborate abandoned factory, built on the site of ancient Indian burial grounds, used for Satanic rituals and had several Connie Chung Christmas specials… (probably). It's filled with expensive surveillance equipment, the sort you'd expect a possible felon barely out of a mental asylum to have. It's similar to the ludicrous apartment James Marsden had in GOSSIP. Sorry, let's pull things back into perspective. BOOK OF SHADOWS is nowhere in the league of that. But saying it's a cut above the average horror film is damning it with faint praise. Sure, it's not CHERRY FALLS, or the woeful SCREAM 3, but what kind of recommendation is that? BOOK OF SHADOWS evokes memories, not of being lost in the woods, but of last year's HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL re-make.

Drowned children appear in hospitals, murdered toddlers stare like rabbits into oncoming headlights. A half-naked girl dances backwards under dark trees. But these moments are fleeting, and in any rate have been done, many times before. The blurring of reality and fiction so alluded to by Berlinger are lost through the flabby script. Are the police reports from the past or present? Why do the wiccan's family have no recollection of having a daughter? This should feel like intrigue, but it doesn't. It feels like an omission, like something overlooked in editing BOOK OF SHADOWS down to a lean (and marketable) 90 minutes. And the title? Maybe the BOOK OF SHADOWS is actually a metaphor, but it smacks of an executive "What-A-Great-Idea!" idea, having NOTHING to do with the story.

Is there a BLAIR WITCH? Is it all in their minds? The horrible truth is, you can't bring yourself to care. The scene when the five wake up from the night in the woods, tiny pieces of torn paper settling on them like fresh snow - this is how I'd like to remember the BOOK OF SHADOWS. The chilling serenity of it all washed over you… unlike most other parts of the film, where the mood is robbed of any emotional wallop by the intensely overbearing soundtrack.

I wanted to like this, honestly. But I didn't. I couldn't.

The press notes make mention of the BLAIR WITCH series… and THIS filled me with fear. The Blair Witch doesn't live on the screen anymore - it's no place for it. It lives in a very dim cave at the back of our minds and that's where we should leave it.

Santa

* Edgard here to introduce Ethan's review on CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON... Man, I DON'T like that review... But of course I could not keep it for me, besides it's the first negative review of Ang Lee's masterpiece (yes, Ethan it is a mastepiece) I received so I had to show it to you all. In my opinion, Ethan saw CT,HD as a pure kung-fu movie and then was of course disappointed. I said it before, this is more a drama with action... If you go see it expecting MATRIX IN CHINA, you will end up disapointed... This movie is slow, there're a lot of talking... You MUST know that before seeing it... But here's Ethan with his review... If you already saw CT,HD please use the Talk-Back to reply or send us directly your reviews... it's certainly a movie that deserves to be talked about a lot...

CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON

`Crouching Tiger,Hidden Dragon` is one of the most anticipated movies of the Y2K. But Y2K turned into one of the weakest movie seasons in history. It delivered us decaf Verhoeven and De Palma`s worst movie. During the same season Zemeckis and Polanski failed us and overall by the end of the summer we missed joy on the big screen. Of course you can always say that 1999 was too good to be true and you`re right...

Ang Lee`s movie was hyped. We heard (and felt) great buzz about it because Chow Yun-Fat, Michelle Yeoh and Yuen Woo Ping were attached. I, personally, have unclear feelings about Ang Lee. His Taiwanese opus is too derrivative while his Hollywood works are a mixed bag. I must admit- I avoided `Sense and Sensibility`. Not my cup of tea. But I loved `The Ice Storm` ,maybe because Christina Ricci gets jiggy with Elijah Wood...Even `Ride With the Devil` made some sense to me because I admire this period...To be honest it looked like a Civil War period eye candy to me.And then,I got to see `C.T.H.D.`. Oh,boy!

`C.T.H.D.` is the painful example of Ang Lee`s incompetence. I tought that `The Ice Storm` was a well directed picture. `C.T.H.D.` looks like a movie that was made by a person that barely came to the set. Honestly, I hope that Ang Lee was absent because if he REALLY was there, I`ll start doubting his filmmaking skills. `C.T.H.D.` moves along the edge of creative sanity. First of all-the casting.Let alone Chow and Michelle, all other actors look the same. I am not Chinese and I know that it is difficult for foreigners to identify the people of other race. Even though, `C.T.H.D.` isn`t Ang Lee`s private project so he has to think about audience around the world not just in his homeland and neighborhood. Miscasting is such a typical Asian filmmaking trap. Guess, Ang Lee should have seen Patrick Leung`s masterpiece `Beyond Hypothermia` as an example of competent casting in HK cinema. Ang,remember, actors have to look different so you can follow the plot! `C.T.H.D.` script is a troubled and messy piece of writing. It combines short action set-pieces and long sections of moronic ethical chit-chat. `C.T.H.D.` also features one of the longest flash-backs in cinema history which appears near the beginning describing how one female character got kidnapped and seduced, or something. This flash-back wasn`t presented with the use of the filmmaking grammar-it is a chaotic escapade that puzzles and disturbs the audience.

Rare action scenes are great. These are a work of a genius. I am sorry Ang,but genius applies to Woo Ping. Sadly these memorable scenes are not a redeeming feature. I enjoyed them, of course, but they are too rare and too short if you compare them to the endless sea of boredom that drowns this movie. I happen to own `C.T.H.D.` on a bootleg VHS and I don`t feel the urge to put it again into my VCR. Not even to see Woo Ping`s great work again. Why? Because I`d have to fast forward through hours of Ang Lee`s spills and mistakes. If `C.T.H.D.` had been made under the banner of Shaw Brothers of Golden Harvest it would have had a redeeming feature- hope that HK exploitation meisters would take Yuen Woo Ping`s kung fu extravaganzas and put them into some other,better, movies. Sony won`t do it. They are too major and too satisfied with this bomb.

`C.T.H.D.` is the Asian equivalent of `Ride With the Devil` because it is another Ang Lee movie about something that Ang Lee doesn`t understand. In `R.W.D.` it used to be American Civil war, in `C.T.H.D.` it is HK cinema and the cinema itself.

See `Beyond Hypothermia` instead.

Ethan

*****

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