RENAISSANCE

Directed by Christian Volckman
Screenplay by Matthieu Delaporte, Alexandre de la Patellière, Patrick Raynal, Jean-Bernard Pouy
Starring Daniel Craig, Catherine McCormack, Romola Garai, Ian Holm, Kevork Malikyan, Jonathan Pryce

Reviewed by Matthew C. Brown
September 14 2006

A stunningly unique slice of future noir, Renaissance hands A Scanner Darkly its ass. It hands Minority Report its ass. Actually, it hands any Dick post-Blade Runner its ass, and Renaissance is just Dick Lite.

My assumption would be that this film was made with motion-captured 3D cgi actors in a computer-generated world, and then Waking Lifed all to hell with a contrast geometry so high that it reduces the film to black and white - literally. Unlike any other black and white film where the predominant grade in the image is grey, Renaissance is exactly two things: black, and white. (Okay, occasionally pale blue, and twice, Crayola.)

So at the very least, you've never seen a film that looks like this, or looks this good at looking like this. Additionally, Renaissance boasts one of the best-conceived cities of the future ever put on the screen, setting itself in Paris around about the middle of the 21st century. Eschewing grand statements for simple evolution of technology and the occasional jaw-drop (the bad guy's office, suspended like a dew drop over a massive chasm, is a particular visual delight), Paris 2050 feels like a real place tied directly to the world we live in now. It's just a hell of a lot cooler.

In this world a cop named Karras is trying to find a missing girl whose sister is repeatedly pleading with him (and fucking him) to get the job done. You've seen all this before. There is a car chase that has to be seen to be believed, and other concept action sequences that are a frenzied feast for the cinematic senses. The rest of the story is low-key and laid-back and takes a bit too long to get where it's going, but otherwise, Renaissance is a bold success in the ever-widening genre of animated movies that aren't really animated movies. By telling a unique, thrilling tale that could not be achieved any other way, Renaissance stands head and shoulders above many of its brethren, and explores new pathways to cinematic gold.