August 10, 2006
Renaissance September 22 Release Date: Only NY & LA?
It appears as if Cyberpunk Review has reached another milestone - we’re now officially a minute cog in the massive Hollywood movie marketing machine! Yesterday, I was contacted by Jennifer, a Miramax representative who was eager to assist me with hyping Renaissance, a pretty innovative looking animated movie that was released in France back in March and is only now starting to make its way to the US. I’m hoping this change in status to machine cog is at least partially a good thing, in any event I’ll roll with it this time. Jennifer has given me a number of goodies including movie stills, trailers, and a jpeg of this really nifty large scale movie poster (1200×1778).
Also, in case you haven’t seen it, here’s a detailed summary description of the plot:
In 2054, Paris is a labyrinth where all movement is monitored and recorded. Cut off from the world for its own protection, the city has nonetheless continued to expand. Now, 21st century skyscrapers overlay centuries-old architectural masterpieces. And below street level, a sophisticated network of streamlined plazas push up against the city’s ancient, deteriorating tunnel systems. Casting a shadow over everything is the city’s largest company, Avalon, which insinuates itself into every aspect of contemporary life to sell its primary export – eternal youth and beauty.
When 22-year-old Ilona (Romola Garai), one of Avalon’s most promising scientists, is abruptly kidnapped, Avaloncalls on Barthélémy Karas (Daniel Craig), a Paris cop with a hard-fought reputation for finding anyone, no matterwhat sacrifices he has to make along the way. As the trail gets hot, Karas senses he’s not the only one looking for thebeautiful enigma, and every witness he digs up seems to turn up dead.
To find Ilona and unlock the secrets of her disappearance, Karas must plunge deep into the parallel worlds of corporate espionage, organized crime and genetic research – where the truth imprisons whoever finds it first and miracles can be bought but at a great price.
“Renaissance” is a bold never-before-seen vision of a stark near future drenched in hidden secrets and technological frontiers. Directed by Christian Volckman, Renaissance takes film noir to its most stylized edge, utilizing live actionmotion capture, animated in 3D and rendered in high contrast black and white to create a graphic novel come-to-life.
Limited Release on September 22? The sparse marketing sheet I have in my possession seems to indicate that the September 22 release is only for those blessed folks who live in New York and Los Angeles. Then again, considering the rest of the world saw this as long as six months ago, we’re all pretty much last place losers in the US as far as this production goes. Still, it appears that us truly unfortunate souls who aren’t in either NY or LA will have to wait at least a week or more to see Renaissance. I’ve got a query into Jennifer now about this. I’ll let you know any updates assuming she doesn’t comment directly on this.
EDIT: Just an update on the release date: the cities it will be shown in on the 29th will include Philadelphia, DC, Boston and San Francisco. The rest of the country comes after that.
Renaissance Trailers in English: Here’s the Renaissance trailer in English at 480×272 pixels (the largest size I was given). Pick your favorite format:
Comments
August 11, 2006
Blaze one said:
cool stuff.
I was wondering if you could ask her if she know about a Canadian release.
(I’m in Toronto, Ontario)
Thanks.
SFAM said:
Hi Blaze, will do - I’ll email her now about the Canadian release date.
DannyV said:
Sad thing is, knowing Puerto Rico’s horrible standards for bringing movies, I’ll either have to see this pirated or wait for it to come on DVD. Which hurts, cause I REALLY wanna pay to see this movie in a theater.
LOVE the use of blacks and whites, very noirish, reminds me of Sin City, but even more faithful to the comic’s look. And the concept for the story is great, the cyberpunk elements being more a frame for a noirish detective story. Apparently, the dubbing is awesome too, and they actually reworked the movie for lip-synching, ALWAYS a classy move.
SFAM said:
Hi Danny, I think the cast used to do the rotoscoping animation was an international cast, so they ended up speaking in English. So the dubbing that occurs is only for the French Language version. While their are different actors doing the voice than did the actual rotoscoping, I’d imagine the dubbing looks pretty close.
SFAM said:
Just an update from Jennifer on the rest of the release: The cities that Renaissance will be shown in on the following weekend (the 29th) include Philadelphia, DC (Woohoo! I made the second cut!), Boston and San Francisco. The rest of the country will come after that.
Also, she has no word on a Canadian release yet, but Miramax is handling the distribution there as well.
August 12, 2006
Blaze one said:
Thanks SFAM!
Hugo said:
It appears like this film won’t be released in Australia (not even on DVD). How unfortunate. My friend and I really want to see it (2 out of 20 million, ISN’T THAT ENOUGH? :P). It looks great…
SFAM said:
Wow, Hugo. Sounds like you guys get the movie shaft down there.
August 13, 2006
David Steele said:
Shockingly bad UK release too. It was on in Sheffield for just a few days last week at a cinema I’d never even heard of. Other than that it didn’t make it onto the screens in the north of England. “Bums on seats” might count for a lot, but you’ve got to wonder why there isn;t any interest at all in showing something that’s just a LITTLE more challenging than Garfield 2.
SFAM said:
David, this has gotten me wondering if there’s something inherently unprofitable about bringing in foriegn flicks. Even absolutely terrific SciFi movies brought in to the US are often not even given anything but a DVD release. I wonder if there is something that impacts the distributor’s ability to make money off these flicks that makes their marketing such a lower priority than a domestic movie.
August 21, 2006
R. Tim said:
Hmmmm - it appears as though Hugo might be wrong - it’s playing right now in Brisbane I just realised! Which means that it must at least be in Sydney and Melbourne too, maybe even Adelaide and Perth! I’ll aim to see it soon and report back.
August 24, 2006
R. Tim said:
Hey SFAM - I just saw this, and I think I can say with some confidence that you’ll like it lots. The cyberpunk elements are actually fairly minimal - it is more of a straight noir set 50 years from now. But the plot is decent and visually the movie is absolutely stunning!
August 25, 2006
SFAM said:
Hi Tim, thanks! I can’t wait. Hopefully there’s enough here from a cyberpunk standpoint for me to at least consider reviewing it, but moreso, I hope its a movie I enjoy.
September 8, 2006
Ikarus said:
I’ll bet that once the release in America (provided enough people go see it) releases will be pumped up a bit in other countries.
September 12, 2007
Ni said:
SFAM- to let you know, I’ve seen an ad for renaissance a couple of weeks ago in small town BC (ie: Canada) there will be a release here
November 10, 2007
Karen said:
Hello!
I’d give 7 to the plot and 10000 to the visual aspects.
October 21, 2008
virgil said:
cool