input: This doesn't quite plumb the depths of Creepshow 3, but it comes close. It also uses the same technique of using some of the same actors in multiple roles throughout the anthology, which is distracting to say the least.

It also rather irritating rips off The Twilight Zone (with the bookshop being comparable to Serling's later Night Gallery). Unfortunately, the producers & writers forgot that Serling would build up sympathy for his characters before messing them over. None of the characters are particularly sympathetic or interesting until the last segment.

Framing story: Adam West is... well, himself. He doesn't go the Bruce Wayne/Batman campy 60s route, but he rarely does. He simply plays the not-particularly-enigmatic "Jay" (there's an ominous spine-chilling name to compare to the likes of Dr. Terror, Eramus, and The Cryptkeeper), and makes some mildly awkward/creepy statements.

Abernathy: Seen Rod Serling's "A Stop in Willoughby"? Then you've seen this. The red herring of the nutso wife is introduced to no purpose, but even the main character's friend identifies him as a wimp. As well directed as can be expected, but basically incoherent.

Nex's Diner: Reminiscent of various Serling time travel stories, mixed with Steve Allen's "A Meeting of Minds." Most of the actors aren't too bad (except for Josh Astin as Cassius, who manages to walk, talk and even breathe awkwardly), and the idea is mildly interesting. But like Abernathy, it doesn't go anywhere. The main character raises some relatively reasonable questions, bugs out a bit (who wouldn't?), and for some reason he ends up banished to a nuclear wasteland.

Life Replay: Not a bad little piece, and manages to predate both Click and Creepshow 3. I suppose it says something that people are fascinated by the magical properties of remote controls. The main character is mildly sympathetic. Nothing substantially innovative here, but it's okay.

Fighting Spirit: You see the twist coming a mile away but like the main character, it has some heart and it's a decent story of defeat and redemption.

Finale: So... why do people end up in cold storage in silver lame suits? Don't know. And doesn't make sense. So... all the protagonists wandered into the bookstore and became trapped? Kinda undermines the happy ending with the boxer (thanks, guys!), and the guy in the first segment died. So how did he get trapped? Did he visit the bookstore before he died, got trapped and... didn't die? What? Huh? I supposer this isn't expected to make sense because it's supernatural. But still...

Overall: basically not dissimilar from the two newer Twilight Zone series, or some episodes of Tales From the Darkside or Monsters. The last two stories and part of the second are probably worth your time. But there's nothing really spectacular here.

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pos/neg ans: negative

input: Barbara Stanwyck gives this early Douglas Sirk-directed, Universal-produced soap just the kick that it needs. Not nearly as memorable as Sirk's later melodramas, it's easy to see by watching "All I Desire" where Sirk would be heading artistically in the next few years. Stanwyck is a showgirl who returns to her family in smalltown, U.S.A, after deserting them a decade earlier. Her family and community have mixed emotions in dealing with her shocking return. Some of the cinematography is amazing, and Stanwyck is tough-as-nails and really gives this film a shot of energy. Overall, a fairly good show.

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pos/neg ans: positive

input: I am glad being able to say almost only positive things about the movie with Karas and the Tasuiev sisters, RENAISSANCE.

And firstly, that it looks as it ought to look; a boys' adventure, RENAISSANCE is the tale of a cop's investigation in search of a missing young scientistIlona Tasuiev, the geneticist and researcher for the Avalon company.

The tale of Karas, Ilona and Bislane is, though much less known than SIN CITY, the better movie, and the one more appreciated by the connoisseurs. To the French comics aficionados it will be even more meaningful (I have enriched my French comics collection last week, though I'm not so uptodate). The atmosphere, the music, the characters, their lines, the plot are all nice and endearing. A Parisian top cop, Karas, is displayed to find a young woman who was a rising star of medicalgenetic research, Ilona Tasuieva mildly hot blonde, whose rebel sister Bislane was erotically preferable, I guess.

For me, an oldie aficionado of comics and TV series, RENAISSANCE, a marvelously beautiful cartoon, was like a replay of a WILD WILD WEST episodehere, a mythological past replaced with an equally mythological futuremore jaded and blase but, in a sense, as thrilling. RENAISSANCE is not suspenseful; nor does it look especially wellpaced; but it's seducing and hypnotic. Moreover, it achieves sketching, albeit briefly, a world, a true worldand we will think about the Avalon, Nakata, Jonas Mueller, the Tasuiev sisters, and Goran, Farfella, and Karas telling of his distant childhood in Kasbah . I liked RENAISSANCE's feel, of a certain gentleness and affability and adventurousness, and also the professional, assured look; among these new cartoons, this one and Linklater's Dick adaptation (--the only and first Dick adaptation ever--) stood out for me as works of beauty and genuine excitement.

I thought the futuristic devices were appropriate and, when not conventional, vividly eerie (like the invisibility costumes).

As advisable, the characters have exotic names, like Bislane and Farfella, mostly gathered from the arts and entertainment's world (Goran and Ilona and Naghib ).

None seems to have noticed that RENAISSANCE's poster features a Rourke look-alikethat guy is Marv; which doesn't make it a SIN CITY rip--off, but not a paragon of originality either, and in fact there's more resemblance to the Miller talenamely, the bleak futuristic look of a decayed society, the brio of the hero (in fact a cross of Willis' character and Rourke's persona in the previous movie )on the other hand, this cartoon breathes a more public air, a brim of straight adventurousness, and, in a word, it's like SIN CITY for kidswell, naughtier kids I mean, 'cause there's a bit of nudity on display. To what I have said one might retort that the traits mentioned are characteristic, even as cliches and common places of the futuristic more adult comics' look; true enough, and it was oldie Miller to have brought that things on screen and RENAISSANCE bears some resemblances here and there. Now it's also fair that every RING ought to have its ERAGORN, so to each sin city, its renaissance. I admit being quite partial to these bleak futuristic tales, a rather undemanding specialty.

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pos/neg ans:
positive