http://blogcritics.org/ A sinister cabal of superior bloggers on music, books, film, popular culture, politics, and technology - updated continuously. en Copyright 2005-2007 by the authors Sun, 6 Oct 2002 16:38:15 EDT http://backend.userland.com/rss Blogcritics.org custom software http://blogcritics.org/ Phillip WinnSunday, August 26, 2007, marks the switch of all Blogcritics.org article feeds from full-content to short-content. This is the result of several converging factors, and is unfortunately a permanent decision (as permanent as any decision can be on the web, that is). We are aware of all of the reasons that this is a Bad Idea, and we are aware that some of you will be quite upset about having to click on something to read the free content, and we're sorry. Unfortunately, despite great effort, full-content feeds are not currently economically viable. Two other factors are involved: full-content feeds have resulted in an unprecedented level of content theft, with BC content appearing on many websites, usually spam sites, without attribution or permission. This duplicate content causes a cascading set of problems, not the least of which is that search engines generally aren't favorable to duplicate content, and don't always guess correctly. Finally, our RSS advertising partner is strongly in favor of short-content feeds. We hope that you'll continue to subscribe to BC via RSS, and when an article grabs your eye, it's only a click away, still free on the BC website. Thank you for your understanding. Administration0@blogcritics.org Sun, 26 Aug 2007 12:00:00 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2002/10/06/163815.php Russ Fischer(I try not to give too much away, but some things can't be helped. The short, non-spoiler version is "go ahead and see it if you like this sort of thing, but don't blame me for what doesn't work. Everyone else should just rent The Silence Of The Lambs") In 1991 the release of Jonathan Demme's The Silence of the Lambs caused something of a minor cultural revolution. Anthony Hopkins' magnetic performance did what not even Anthony Perkins could manage - it transformed the serial killer into a cultural archetype with positive overtones, despite the fact that the actions of Jeffery Dahmer became public only five months later. A sweep of the Oscars ensued, and the cinematic Cult of Hannibal emerged. Hannibal Lecter had already made one screen appearance in Manhunter, Michael Mann's adaptation of Red Dragon, the first Lecter novel by Thomas Harris. Based on the success of the abysmal Hannibal, producer Dino deLaurentiis put a new version of Red Dragon on the fast track, managing to attract a very good cast with Anthony Hopkins as the lure.I'll get it off my chest first thing. I liked Manhunter. In some ways I liked it more than The Silence of the Lambs, though comparing the two is pointless. Manhunter is dated, an early film for Michael Mann marred by lack of stylistic restraint, choppy editing and the most terrible music imaginable. It pissed off fans of Harris' novel, as it deviates wildly from what Harris put to paper, but that's never bothered me. Brian Cox is my hero; there's something about Cox's greasier Lektor (as he's called in Mann's film) that appealed to me. But the strength of Mann's film is his humane treatment of the central character, murderer Francis Dollarhyde, aka The Tooth Fairy. This Red Dragon's strengths lie in the same area, but Ratner and deLaurentiis are out to make money through Lecter, who's given too much screen time. The film does have an interesting story hidden inside it, but that story is eclipsed by the producer's need to cram more of Hannibal Lecter into the film. Red Dragon works on enough levels that its much more satisfying and ultimately meaningful than Ridley Scott's flashy, insipid Hannibal, but it's a decent film marred by a condescending spirit. I was curious about what ersatz action/comedy director Brett Ratner (Rush Hour and sequel) could do, given a more faithful screenplay (by Ted Tally, screenwriter on Silence) and the strong cast. Ratner was the weak link: "How did this guy get this project?" Watching the film, it's obvious that he struggled through it in many places, carried along (or shoved forward) by his cast and Tally's script. The end result is you've got a director of one successful franchise moving to another highly successful franchise. The franchise treatment is the downfall, as Tally and Ratner spend valuable time pandering rather than getting to the point. In keeping with the franchise design, Tally's script is cut from the Silence mold, with a structure that is laughably similar to that film and a final sequence that insultingly reminds the audience that they're being bled dry by the franchise mentality. I'm surprised the final shot wasn't an ad for the Silence of the Lambs on DVD. As such, Red Dragon is a film that can never stand on its own, endlessly inviting comparisons to The Silence of the Lambs and Manhunter. Ratner uses the latter film as a crutch, in some sequences remaking it shot for shot rather than move into unfamiliar territory, leaning on cinematographer Dante Spinotti, who also shot Manhunter.Let's get the basics out of the way so we can get on to the good stuff. This is a very divided film. On the one hand, Ratner's storytelling is strictly by the numbers, recalling the ungraceful editing of Manhunter, while on the other some of the performances are quite good, focusing on the human aspects of Harris' and Tally's broad characters. Hopkins is solid in Lecter's now-familiar shoes, aided by the perfect replication of sets from Silence. Edward Norton works surprisingly well as investigator Will Graham. His boyishness left me in doubt at first, but Ratner uses it to play into Tally's idea of the vulnerable hero, as previously seen via Jodie Foster in Silence. Philip Seymour Hoffman brings a humanity to the tabloid reporter Freddie Lounds, aka the Persistent Desire to See Bad Things. Hoffman's Lounds is a downtrodden, pathetic character at the lower end of the human spectrum, but he blossoms into a sympathetic, pitiable victim when played into the killer's hands.The film opens with a blocky prologue showing how Will Graham simultaneously caught and was victimized by Lecter. It gets the info across but also sets a workmanlike and inelegant tone. A couple of little things from the prologue: Lecter with a pony tail in the slicked-back 80's yuppie style? No. And a prop thing -- the handwriting that purports to be Lecter's in the book Graham finds is all wrong. Lecter would never need to write in a book and if he did, the writing wouldn't be that unrefined scrawl. Are these trivial details? To some, but they also indicate that Ratner didn't have enough of a handle on a major character to reject a detail like that. But the sequence is useful, because in it Graham and Lecter relate as equals; it's the strongest scene between the two.We move on to a newspaper headline montage that's intended to recall the opening from Seven, but instead more closely resembles the lurid, cartoonish "Hush Hush" montage that leads off LA Confidential. The film follows the now-retired Graham as he's coerced back into the FBI by Jack Crawford (Harvey Keitel, providing key support) to help the Bureau find the Tooth Fairy, a calculating killer of families. In doing so, Graham gets more and more involved with the case, ultimately recruiting the help of Hannibal Lecter before coming to the attention of the Tooth Fairy via the antics of Freddie Lounds. Meanwhile, our killer, Francis Dollarhyde (Ralph Fiennes, fighting being directed into stiffness, saddled with facial applications) is finding love with Reba McClaine (Emily Watson) and questioning whether or not he needs to go on with his process of transformation, enacted through murder.Lets also get this out of the way: Red Dragon is not about Hannibal Lector. Just get over it. All of this Cult of Hannibal crap is occasionally entertaining, but there was a time when he was just a very good way to get across the fact that Will Graham and Clarice Starling have to wallow in the mud in order to do their jobs. Lector is a wonderful image of America coming out of the eighties and in Silence he knows exactly what his audience (Starling, and us) wants and refuses to give it up, something that Ridley Scott and now Brett Ratner should have heeded. Jonathan Demme exercised an incredible restraint when making The Silence of the Lambs, leaving out a lot of the gore that Harris threw around. Brett Ratner falls victim to the Cult of Hannibal when he delivers the gore; he doesn't know when it's useful and when it becomes exploitation. Where Ratner shocks us with flash-frames of mirror-socketed women, Mann had it right. Graham falling asleep on a plane, inadvertently exposing a young girl to the horror of his evidence photos, in one scene telling us everything we need to know about what these crimes look like and describing the differences between our world and Graham's. There's no need to barrage the audience with some of the images in Red Dragon; Dollarhyde is demon enough without the continual reminders Ratner provides. I'm assuming he's giving the audience what he believes they want and he should be smarter than to succumb. In Hannibal it was quickly obvious that there was no story, so the only way to watch it was as a horror equivalent of a Bond picture: just give me Hannibal, being Hannibal. But there is a story in Red Dragon, and the gore obscures it. The core of that story is Francis Dollarhyde and the forces that motivate him to kill. An abused child, he fantasizes about becoming powerful, Blake's Red Dragon imagery an idealization, killing to retroactively act out against a domineering grandmother. Yeah, the domineering grandmother. It's a cinema cliche, and is expressed no better or worse than in any other film, but Red Dragon does manage to create a plausibly motivated creature out of Dollarhyde, so we'll run with it. Dollarhyde is a perfect image of emerging male sexuality. He sees himself as an undesirable misfit, ostracized from society. We've got to assume that he's a virgin, outside the context of whatever impulses he inflicts upon his victims. He uses violence, imagery and the act of seeing to attain a measure of sexual power - all plausible links to pornography and the media depiction of sexuality. When at last he meets a woman willing to take him for who he is, Dollarhyde encounters a dilemma; all this time he's been murdering to attain personal and sexual power, and suddenly, he doesn't have to do it anymore. A woman he's attracted to returns his affections, rendering moot everything he's done up until this point. Yet he watches pornography as he has his first sexual relationship with her. Can these two sexual ideas co-exist, the 'real' and the pornographic? Which does he prefer? This is strong stuff, but Ratner and Tally don't know how to handle it once the ideas are out there. Instead, they take the easy road, cutting back to a funny scene with Lecter, who's been downgraded to comic relief through social assimilation. (For a good example of this refer to the scene in the gym, in which Lecter lunges freely at Graham before being pulled up short by a chain, or puppet string, that extends into the sky.)Ratner tries to force Ralph Fiennes into a stony serial-killer facade, but he breaks through it whenever possible, particularly in scenes with Emily Watson. The two have a disquieting chemistry; one of the liveliest scenes in the film plays in Dollarhyde's living room, as the two tighten their sexual orbits around one another before a series of locked-off camera angles. Their two performances are the best in the film, and it's nothing but a shame that Ratner and Tally choose instead to enact more funny but pointless scenes with Lecter.Further, the film hints at but doesn't explore the idea of a life-cycle of violence. To save his son, Graham uses the same abusive tactics experienced by Dollarhyde. It works, but what is the consequence? His son, verbally abused in the heat of a particularly impressionable moment? Despite any rational assessment of his father's motives, this kid will be forever scarred by the same force that created a murderous deviant in Dollarhyde. This chapter of the film closes with an image that promises little hope: Graham and family on a boat, isolated from the society that's threatened to destroy them more than once. This is not healing, or progress, but an unremittingly dark ending to an already grim tale. That it's followed by a superfluous chapter announcing the arrival of Clarice Starling exemplifies the film's submission to the commandments of franchise.Two other views of the film here and here. Video1123@blogcritics.org Sun, 6 Oct 2002 16:38:15 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2002/10/02/175456.php Russ Fischer Music1040@blogcritics.org Wed, 2 Oct 2002 17:54:56 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2002/10/01/213145.php Russ FischerLots of books have been written about houses of the Damned.Argento's an arsonist, all right. He wants to pour gasoline over every shred of storytelling sense and convention in the world; the guy's got matches and he's ready to use them. The evidence? Inferno, a sequel of sorts to Argento's Suspiria. What passes for a plot in Inferno concerns a book about a trio of witches; one of the witches mentioned is the old girl in Suspiria, one lives in this film and there's a third film nebulously in the offing. People use the term 'dreamlike' to describe Inferno but any hack can string together a bunch of unrelated crap and call it dreamlike. Argento can make this work, but not here. No one watches Argento for his storytelling sense, but most of Inferno is lame because it's just dull. He goes for the look that carried Suspiria; colored lighting and simple, stylized sets are the rule, but it feels like he's imitating himself. Let's get into a little uber-filmgeek terminology for a second. You're got your diogesis, which is everything inside the film, every action that takes place as part of the narrative. A common question in your basic film analysis class is going to revolve around diegetic and non-diegetic sound. Sound effects are almost always the former, while music cues are the latter - the characters don't hear the sudden shrieking of violins just before they die. What you don't hear about is non-diegetic lighting. The general idea goes that, whatever is seen onscreen is can be perceived by the characters in the film as well as the audience. Unless it's an Argento film, where the approach seems to be, "well, I've already thrown out every other rule of common sense, so lets use a lot of red and blue light that the characters can't see." It really works in Suspiria, creating the dreamlike unreality that Inferno tries to repeat, but this time it just feels like a bunch of red and blue gels disguising half-assed sets.The killer in the movie seems to be either the Fastest Witch Guy Ever or a member of some highly-advanced, CIA-type coven, with little ear-bud walkie-talkies and everything. The guy in the robe is everywhere! And instantly; I mean, if he sees you in a stairwell from the other side of a grimy window across the street, you'd better be the Flash 'cause otherwise he's gonna be locking doors ahead of you, trapping you like a rat before you even manage a couple of steps. I mean it -- these witches are dangerous, even if they don't make any sense. The little film geek inside me is rolling his eyes, saying "the guy in the robe is obviously a representation of the pervasiveness of evil in a world ruled by chance," but I just hit that little film geek in the face because, even if he's right, it's still stupid. This is where people try to justify the lack of story and character with the 'dreamlike' trick, but until the last third of the film, this is a seriously boring dream. Watching this, I started to feel like the other half of the audience in Lost Highway. There's a whole lot of characters who wander around before dying a gruesome but visually uninteresting death. Argento really relies on the 'Hand Of Evil' going to work, stabbing and whatnot, but man, it's got nothing on some of his other pictures. Even DePalma does better. We won't get into the fact that, whenever the Hand Of Evil appears, it's played by Argento.People talk a lot about the music in Arento's films, Suspiria in particular. The music actually used in that film is great, crashing, booming pre-industrial stuff that works overtime to throw the audience off balance. But has anyone actually listened to the rest of the Suspiria soundtrack album? It's got some of the dumbest fusion and proto-metal I've ever heard and, believe me, I've heard a lot of dumb proto-metal. There's no cache of ironic humor in it, it's just bad. With that in mind, Argento got Kieth Emerson to score Inferno. Yes, of Emerson Lake and Powell, or Palmer, or whatever. Someone on the IMDB had this to say about it: The music in this film is wonderful to listen to. Its the most overlooked soundtrack in an Argento picture. They're completely right, because, as foolish as this film is, it would only be half as ridiculous without this hamfisted and inappropriate score. I would have laughed only half as much with different music. Argento's unfailing use of the image-based non-sequiter carries over to his use of the score, because I can't figure out why else he would have used these cues as he did. One murder scene features a cue that made me think of what you might hear as Superman was saving Lois Lane's whiny, plummeting ass in the next-to-last reel. I just don't know.But don't take this as a warning to stay away from the film. I laughed through the whole thing, so it's worth it for that at least. The water sequence at the opening is not bad, and once someone dies by fire, opening the third act, the picture finally picks up. From there on, I can see why some people go so far as to compare this to Cocteau, but I really think it's just the guy in the skull mask that generates that. I do have to say that few other films have scenes that can rival the Screaming Attack of the Felines; it's like the Marvel Comics issue of What If where Spiderman goes to see Hitchcock's new film The Cats. Miss this one at your peril, true believers. Video1019@blogcritics.org Tue, 1 Oct 2002 21:31:45 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2002/09/26/022921.php Russ FischerOh, Hannibal. So full of promise. Two characters we love, duelling it out with some sort of unspeakable attraction hovering between them. And more of what's become the most famous performance of Anthony Hopkins' already impressive career. But...no. It's a crap film, with way too much time devoted to flash, kicking aside all of Ridley Scott's talk about image serving the story. It seems that as long as his visual ego is served everything will be fine. True, the film has a couple of points to recommend it, primarily Hopkins' performance. I find him to be much more relaxed in the role here than in Silence of the Lambs; he just seems to inhabit Lecter a lot better, with less work. On DVD, I spent a lot of time with the deleted scenes on the second disc which include a couple of nice little bits of Hopkins as manipulator. It's all material that truly doesn't fit in the film, because of the larger context, but that's a shame, as some of it is quite good. Not that it would help. The one really solid bit in Hannibal is the Venice sequence. The simple cat-and-mouse setup works perfectly, especially since we've been waiting years to see Lecter calmy take someone down. We know what's going to happen, so there's an entertaining amount of suspense involving exactly how it's going to happen. Sadly they're really the only suspenseful scenes in the picture - other potential suspense sequences become instead spots where the audience is scared about how much gore they might see (not much, despite the complaints of many) but I can't really count that as suspense, more like anticipation of revulsion. It's kind of like waiting over the toilet to vomit. There's a better way to do things -- splatter is well and good, but this could have been much more. It may be that I like the Venice scenes only in contrast to the rest of the film; in a better film that sequence wouldn't stand out as much. The problem with the gore is that some of it represents events that would be more frightening verbally relayed -- I'm thinking particularly about Verger's recollection of his maiming at Lecter's hands. Played between Oldman and Moore the scene could be really powerful, but as it appears it's just flash, a shame. Either play it as a tight conversation, or cut to it played straight. None of this funhouse music video crap, thank you. As it stands, the flashback stands to ensure the audience knows it's Oldman playing Verger. While the Maison Verger story might have worked for the book, it just fails in this script as there's never really any threat - it's all just a set of shameless plot devices. Even the pigs generate little fear; given their place in the film's timeline, they just can't pose a real threat to any character we care about. It's a subplot that should have been dropped or radically altered to better augment the FBI plotline.As it is, with the interaction of the Verger plot, the mechanisms of the FBI fall completely flat. I see nothing in those plot elements but writers who couldn't figure any other way to make things happen. I just don't buy the treatment of Starling. Ray Liotta's character serves only one purpose - to unite the audience and Lecter, which should've happened long ago. If, by the end of the film, Liotta needs to be talking about "corn-pone pussy" to get me to cheer for Lecter, failure has already occurred. It's funny to have Lecter -- murderer, cannibal -- be upstaged in the evil department by sexist and power-focused beaurocrats. If that's Scott's point, that the calculating, power-mad side of human nature is more insidiously dangerous than Lector's refined animalism, well...whatever. I'd be happy with a simple suspense film, which I didn't get. Please, just give me Lecter being smarter than everyone but weakened by desire for Starling. That's all we need. It's simple, and that's what I paid to see.Most of the visual bloat of the film is the result of Scott covering his ass while shooting. It's apparent that there were many unmade script decisions regarding the ending and certain (mostly deleted) subplots. Scott had to shoot in such a way that he could add or subtract at will, and that slows the film, watering down what little sense of purpose it has. Despite the title, which indicates we are to see a real portrait of this fascinating figure, there are still too many distracting side-roads, like the studio was too afraid to commit to a full-on take on Lecter. No surprise, but it's kinda fun to see a studio's gutless, ass-covering money-grubbing antics backfire occasionally; the film would have done much better business had it a true sense of purpose. The business Scott relates in the commentary about not explicitly showing Lecter corrupting people is crap. That's what he does. Or, more directly, he shortcuts people to their true nature, which he sees as brutish and debased. He's not compassionate and trying to make him so is studio cowardice. It's probably also worth noting that by the final third of the film, my friends and I would greet every person to walk on-screen with cries of "Eat him! Eat him!". I'd say they'd lost us. [This entry represents a slight revision of an earlier write-up at The Pork Store] Video: Drama920@blogcritics.org Thu, 26 Sep 2002 02:29:21 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2002/09/26/015738.php Russ FischerIn late June, The Nation ran a piece by John Densmore, drummer for The Doors, describing his fight against selling out to advertising companies. Like rats, these companies swarm the three remaining members of the band, offering ever-increasing sums of cash in return for the right to co-opt the emotional cache of the Doors' songs. Hey -- it worked for Moby, it can only help you as a band, right?Well, no. At best the use of emotionally-charged music ironically reveals the limitations of ad execs' awareness, as in the case of the Jaguar ad fueled by The Clash. At worst it can undermine memories and emotions that are, for better or worse, locked to a song. "We Can Build You", indeed -- where's Philip K. Dick when we need him?Continuing this discussion, the current issue of The Nation features a letter by Tom Waits, penned as response and support for Densmore's position. Waits has had his own brushes with advertising; in 1990 he was awarded damages in a suit brought against Frito-Lay, who had used a Waits sound-alike for a radio spot after being repeatedly turned down by the real thing. That trial is a landmark of sorts, establishing, as Waits puts it, "that my voice is my property." That such an essential, obvious truth need be proven in court reveals far too much about our culture, and the price we've put on it. Thank you John, for not taking the cash-laden route and thank you Tom, for an eloquent public expression of support. Culture919@blogcritics.org Thu, 26 Sep 2002 01:57:38 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2002/09/21/132810.php Russ FischerWhen was the last time you really cared about a Disney picture? How about when you were older than thirteen? I thought so. That means you have to go see Spirited Away given half a chance - it's the best thing I've seen all year. Japanese maestro Hayao Miyazaki's new film has just enraptured me so completely that watching it felt like reliving a dream; the two hours certainly passed as quickly as they would during dream-filled sleep. I've always loved Miyazaki's work in the past, but I didn't expect to be so thoroughly caught up in this film.Released in Japan over a year ago, it's received accolades including the Japanese award for Best Picture. (Does that really mean anything? In this case it does.) The story involves a young girl transplanted to a Japanese version of Wonderland populated by characters who seem loosely based on Japanese mythology. (An early scene involves what I've discovered is a God of Daikon Radish.) It's a coming-of-age tale (as are many of Miyazaki's films) and as Chihiro goes about returning home, you may be reminded of Amelie as Chihiro's generous nature speeds her return. As with the rest of Studio Ghibli's films, it's been acquired by Disney for release in the US and other non-asian markets and has been dubbed by an American cast, as was the case with the 1999 US release of Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke, handled by Disney-owned Miramax. I didn't see the dub, instead watching the film via import DVD. I'm very much looking forward to catching this in the theater. Disney's distribution of Spirited Away represents a wonderful irony. The film is everything that Disney animation isn't, and in my opinion has never been. While thousands revere Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs, Fantasia and Pinocchio as benchmark-setting classics, those films have never held any sway for me. Sure, I didn't grow up with them, but even when put into context they don't work for me. Of course, the best Disney films of late have been those produced by Pixar, so it's fortunate that Pixar's Executive Creative Vice President, John Lasseter, is overseeing the Mouse's handling of Miyazaki's work. But while recent Disney output (since their animation revival at the hands of The Little Mermaid in 1989) has occasionally been entertaining, it's never even approached sublime. Miyazaki, on the other hand, seems to approach his work with 'sublime' as the default setting. The range of detail and emotion he presents is incredible, and it's done with an apparent ease that makes each film a true pleasure to watch; in Spirited Away there's so much to admire that I don't know what's best to single out. Chihiro's movements are one; in the beginning as she's walking with her parents, she moves in a jagged rhythm that perfectly captures the way a child walk/runs to keep up with a parent. Miyazaki reveals his mastery in many ways, but his depiction of movement is key among them. See the swarm of paper dolls (in the trailer), the spider-like arms of Kamaji and the sludge-to-life bulk of the Stink God. Every aspect of our world and it's dreamlike neighbor is rendered in a manner that is intuitively right. This is animation as I've always wanted it to be, a medium that uses freedom from physical and technical confines to scrutinize emotion and behavior. Spirited Away has no songs by Elton John and no dominating comedy relief (aka toy commercial) characters. Closest to Disney's paradigm of pointless "aw, shucks" characters are the soot/dust bunnies and even they have an important role. Everything in this picture serves the story and the atmosphere, which are so locked together that there's little point in trying to define one without the other. Color, sound and geometry cooperate to a degree rarely seen in animated film, or in film at all for that matter. And to top it off, it's the most trim 125-minute film I think I've ever seen - compare to the visionary, trend-setting Akira, which at the same length is way too damn long. Spirited Away is simultaneously lean and expansive, with a storyline that bobs and weaves but persistently advances towards a satisfying conclusion.Disney is releasing Spirited Away on a somewhat limited scope - a few major cities to start, then something they're calling a 'wide' release, but it's one that has none of the push given to any Disney-originated film. It's been reported that they didn't mess it up, with only a few small changes to dialogue, fewer additions, and no visual changes to speak of. I pored over the info at the best Miyazaki site on the net -- Nausicaa.net -- and found that among the conditions of the contract between Studio Ghibli and Disney was a stipulation that Disney could not alter the films in any way. They can request that Ghibli make changes, but Disney cannot make the cuts themselves. That's good news for audiences in the US, because it means we get a chance to see Spirited Away in near-unadulterated form. And it should most definitely be seen -- it's the most worthwhile film I've come across this year, an essential one. [I've linked to the DVD release of Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke, a film that is of equal quality but far more serious character. While Spirited Away is suitable for audiences of any age, Princess Mononoke is somewhat intense for kids under 12. Import copies of Miyazaki's films may be obtained through Poker Industries or Cd Japan, but be warned: these discs are region coded for playback in Asia, and will not work on DVD players purchased in the US. If you don't know that your player can accept discs from other regions, do not buy these discs.] Video: Animation729@blogcritics.org Sat, 21 Sep 2002 13:28:10 EDT