Sci-Fi Month: REDUX #10

It's back!

This time last year, I decided to declare April my unofficial Sci-Fi month, where I blog about my favourite genre fiction. Last April, I did up a list of my top 10 shows and top 10 movies, one roughly every weekday.

This year, I'm going to have just the one top 10 list, but it's one that I think will intrigue even die-hard fans. In terms of a ranking system, these are again just my personal opinions based on how I felt the movie ranked alongside its fellows. It's also worth mentioning that - with perhaps a couple of exceptions - you would never hear these movies ranked in "Greatest Sci-Fi" lists of any kind; not necessarily because they're BAD, but more because they don't quite reach into the levels of "instant classic".

Without further ado, Look Out It Is a Blog is proud to present:

The Top 10 Best Sci-Fi Movies You've (probably) Never Heard Of

#10: Renaissance (2006)

What It Is

Renaissance is a 2006 fully CGI-animated film from France, with a star-studded localized English cast that includes Daniel Craig, Catherine McCormack, Jonathan Pryce and Ian Holm. It depicts a near-future Paris in 2054, where tough cyberpunk cop Bathélémy Karas (Craig) is dispatched to investigate the kidnapping of a scientist who was working towards a genetic process that may hold the key to eternal life. He is joined by the missing scientist's sister, Bislane Tasuiev (McCormack), but quickly encounters resistance from sinister cosmetics company Avalon, and its Machiavellian CEO Paul Dellenbach (Pryce).

Why You've Never Heard of It

Renaissance did not get much of a wide release in North America, and utterly failed to recoup its budget of €14 million, seeing a return of only $1,831,348.00 from box office receipts worldwide. Although there is a DVD release available now, early negative critical reaction likely tanked any publicity push that Miramax might have been considering when the movie made its way overseas. I do vaguely recall seeing a few TV spots, but nothing substantial.

Why It's Worthy of Inclusion

I'm going to get this out of the way right now: this is my only entry that is 100% style over substance. That may seem hypocritical given my hatred for movies like Avatar or The Matrix, but...I guess the reason I give Renaissance more of a pass for being stylistically gorgeous while lacking in complexity is that it's style is so completely unlike anything I have seen before or since. And, while I find a lot of the dialogue painfully stilted and the characters fairly stock (check out Karas' deputy proudly announcing his wife's imminent childbirth! I sure hope nothing happens to that guy!), Renaissance still remains head and shoulders above Avatar or The Matrix in acting talent and basic plotting.

But getting back to style, I think the other thing that puts Renaissance ahead of Avatar or The Matrix is that the style is utilized to define the space. See, the problem I always had with Avatar is that the CGI world felt like little more than background eye candy than anything else. It didn't contribute to the mood, or the characters, or even the plot. It was just...there. As if to say "gee whiz, isn't it cool what a bunch of software engineers can do with technology these days?" That's fine with a visual medium, but movies are also a storytelling medium, and Renaissance at least has the capacity to let the environment drive or even define the story. And it also manages to avoid hilariously offensive ethnic projecting of white man's burden syndrome.

OK, enough railing on Avatar.

What am I talking about when I say Renaissance's bleak, film-noir black and white CG environment defines the space?

It's a bit hard to explain without a visual frame of reference. Here's a screenshot of one of the scenes I think encapsulates this use of space to drive story:

In this scene, one of the characters tries to infiltrate Avalon's corporate office and gets caught snooping. The company starts to kill the lights while their agents don night vision goggles. As the lights go out, we get a real sense of the space closing off, as seen in these screenshots. We see the space around our character grow smaller and smaller, trapping her in a tiny square of light, until BOOM...complete blackness.

It's a wonderful way to utilize the style, and it creates real tension with nothing more than negative space. Renaissance has a number of scenes that are equally fascinating and gorgeous to look at. If nothing else, it's a great lesson in experimentation of format and palette.

Bottom line: kind of a guilty pleasure / eye candy, but definitely worth a look by fans of the genre. The plotline, for what it is, isn't BAD, just don't expect a lot of surprises...except at the very end.