Why see a movie at a film festival that’s currently playing in theaters everywhere? While at the Palm Springs International Film Festival, I originally intended to attend the showing of Pan’s Labyrinth that included a Q&A with director Guillermo Del Toro, but I wasn’t able to make it. Instead, I was at the film’s second, director-less showing, but what a film it is.

It’s 1944. In a small village in Spain, the local captain (Sergi Lopez) is obsessed with keeping control in the face of various insurgents opposed to the new fascist government. His new wife has just arrived with her young daughter from a previous marriage, Ofelia (Ivana Baquero). The girl lives two lives, one in the harsh and lonely environment of the Captain’s home, where she and her mother are subject to his cruelty, and one in a strange fantasy world located within the nearby labyrinth, where she discovers she is a long-lost princess with a destiny to fulfill.

As of this writing, critics and movie fans all over the world are falling all over themselves in praising this movie, so I’m not sure what I can say that’s any different, except everything you’ve heard is pretty much spot on. The movie is not just visually rich, but it also has a great story, fascinating characters, and moving performances.

Ivana Baquero has received a lot of deserved praise for her years-ahead-of-its-time performance here, but for me the real star is Sergi Lopez as the captain. This guy has jumped right to the top of my all-time favorite movie villains list. He is just a slimy, cold-hearted monster. While watching the movie you want awful, horrible things to happen to him. It’s thanks to Lopez’s spot-on acting here that you get that reaction.

The visuals of Pan’s Labyrinth really shine, as expected. The fantasy sequences are not just eye-popping, but they’re also dark and creepy throughout. If Ofelia is merely imagining her otherworldly journeys, then the poor girl is pretty messed up in her brain. The faun, her guide to this world, is all kinds of creepy, and you’re never quite sure if he’s on her side or not. Another monster, one with bulging eyeballs on his palms, is even ickier, with stretchy skin dangling from his thin frame as he slowly moves toward you.

But as a whole, Pan’s Labyrinth is less about the monsters and more about the characters, and their longings for either control or freedom from control. You’ll see a lot of brutality and violence from beginning to end, from both sides of the conflict. There are some interesting subtleties at work here too -- notice how a knife shows up in both of Ofelia’s two worlds and how they are used later on in important ways.

Given how goofy Del Toro sometimes acts in DVD extras on his other films, it was almost a surprise as to how mature and confident this one is. It’s certainly the best of his work that I’ve seen. Highly recommended.

So I recently spent a week at the Palm Springs International Film Festival, enjoying the desert atmosphere and taking in some cool flicks, and boy did I start off with a good one.

It’s a shame that moviegoers' views of Kazakhstan will forever be associated with the lowbrow yuks of Borat when the actual country has produced Nomad, an action-packed historical epic, with high drama, gorgeous cinematography, and sword-swinging mayhem.

The story is set in the 18th century, at a time when the country was made up of various wandering tribes of Kazaks, always under threat of attack by their enemies, the vicious Jungars. As the film begins, there’s a Moses-like prophecy that says a sultan’s son will someday unite the Kazak tribes and defeat the Jungars, so of course the baddies set out to kill the sultan’s child immediately. Fortunately, the baby is saved by the titular nomad (Jason Scott Lee, Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story), a mystical butt-kicker and occasional advisor to the sultan. The nomad and the sultan agree to let the nomad raise the boy in secret, so the Jungars never learn he survived.

Jump to years later, after the child, Mansur (Kuno Becker), has been trained by the nomad to be one of the most skilled warriors in all the land. Upon learning who his father is, as well as his world-changing destiny, Mansur not only has to deal with fighting the sinister Jungars, but also the strains on his relationships with his father, his best friend, and the girl he loves.

What I’ve covered above is only the first half hour or so of the movie. Not only are there plenty of twists and turns to the plot as Mansur discovers his destiny, but there are all kinds of rousing action scenes along the way as well. The obvious comparisons to make are with recent “epic battle” movies like Lord of the Rings or, more appropriately, Kingdom of Heaven. But in its tone, Nomad is more like 1982’s Conan the Barbarian. Life in the desert is rough and violent, and those who are strongest with their swords are the ones who get to live the nice life. That is, until a hero like Mansur comes along, unites the people, and creates a new peace

The festival’s guide book makes a big deal about how the action scenes in Nomad are “old school.” There are no CGI armies here; instead, whenever you see a wide shot of hundreds of barbarians hacking and slashing away at each other, those are hundreds of bona fide extras all fighting it out for our entertainment. The many swordfights are well choreographed without resorting to outlandish jumping and king fu moves, and some of my favorite scenes include some elaborate chases on horseback.

In short, Nomad is an action-packed epic that thankfully has a great story to go along with its eye-popping battles. I’m guessing a nation-wide release and even a region 1 DVD will probably never happen, but if you somehow get a chance to see this one, go for it.

At first, this was going to be a list of the top five or top ten comics of the year, but with Runaways in the number one spot, there’s no need to bother with anything else. You’ve got Runaways, which is way up here, and then you’ve got all other comics, which are way down there.

Backing up for a sec, Runaways is about a group of unrelated California teens with nothing in common except that their parents are murderous supervillains working together to overthrow the Earth. Each of the kids has inherited some sort of power, item, or dinosaur handed down to them from mom and dad. The kids run away, swearing to right all the wrongs of their parents, as well as any other evil adults they come across. But, in the world of Runaways, the words “evil adult” are redundant.

There’s Nico, a would-be sorceress whose mystical powers involve shedding her own blood, Karolina, an alien with light-based abilities, Chase, who drives the team’s high-tech getaway vehicle, Gert, who fights crime with the help of a telepathic dinosaur, Molly, an 11-year-old mutant with the strength to bench press a bus, and Alex, the brains of the group. As you get farther into the series, some characters depart, while a few new ones join the team.

Marvel Comics’ Runaways is written by the great Brian K. Vaughn with a rotating team of artists consisting of Adrian Alphona, Takeshi Miyazawa, Mike Norton, Skottie Young, and Stefano Caselli, among others. It’s been collected in some handy digest sized graphic novels and in two gorgeous hardcover collections. If you want to “test the waters,” then I suggest seeking out the digests, which shouldn’t be hard to find. That being said, I heartily recommend the hardcovers, which are well worth the money. Not only has all the art been reproduced with glorious color and detail, but the hardcovers have generous extras, such as scripts and concept sketches.

I recently received the Volume Two hardcover for Christmas and reintroduced myself to the stories therein. In this volume, the Runaways have their first encounter with Victor Mancha, who becomes a member of the team, despite the fact that his father is one of the Marvel universe’s most feared villains. Then, Xavin, an alien, arrives with surprising news for Carolina, leading to heartbreak among the group. Finally, our heroes pay a visit to New York City, where they investigate a drug-related mystery and prove they have what it takes to square off against the Avengers.

It’d take months to list everything that makes Runaways so thoroughly awesome. There are complex, twisty-turny plots, where just when you think you’ve got the story figured out, there’s another surprise waiting for you. There’s witty dialogue -- which we’ve come to expect from Vaughn -- that knows when to make with the sarcastic wisecracks, and when to stay serious. Even though the kids are unconventional superheroes, you’ll find plenty of kickass superhero action along the way. What really makes Runaways stand out way, way ahead of all other comics currently on shelves, though, is the character work. These are a group of characters that readers can instantly relate to and care about. Marvel Comics always gets praised for classic heroes like Spider-Man and the Fantastic Four being great characters in addition to being great heroes. The Runaways fit that description nicely, and -- as long as future creators don’t screw them up -- they should achieve “classic” status of their own in years to come.

If you can’t stand superheroes and you hate all comic books with a poisonous rage, you’ll still enjoy Runaways. It’s just that good.

Long story short, I spent Friday night in New York City with some of my co-workers. Awesome, awesome place. I tell you, if you've never been, go. Now.

Anyway, we went into the Virgin Megastore on Times Square, which must be the single largest collection of media anywhere in the world. Okay, maybe except an Amazon.com warehouse, so let's make that the single largest collection of media open to the public. I found the high-def section, and was quite amazed. See, in your garden-variety Best Buys or Circuit Citys, they devote roughly the same amount of shelf space to both HD DVD and to Blu-Ray. Thanks to the cost of the players and the range of films I had seen on both formats, I was pretty much convinced that I'd buy a HD DVD player within the next year (or maybe one of the Xbox 360 attachment drives, which I'd then hook to a HTPC). Well, not I'm not so sure. In this bastion of completeness, there was one ten-foot section of HD titles, comprising just about everything I had ever seen on the format (except they were out of stock on Corpse Bride). Moving down the aisle, there were three or four ten-foot sections of Blu-Ray, and I hadn't heard of half the stuff (and considering the HD sections of our upcoming releases requires a lot of hand-tuning, I see most of the stuff that passes through). Now I better be prepared to tell my wife we'll need to spend a lot more money on that next player...

Has any film arrived with more nonsensical – and non-cinematic – baggage as Apocalypto? Granted, Mel Gibson is a notorious nimrod, using the excuse of alcohol-fueled diarrhea of the mouth to cover for what is probably a deep-seated hatred for people outside his religion/race comfort zone. But what his personal philosophy about his fellow man has to do with a movie about South American tribes at the end of their reign as civilized societies is a mystery made even more untenable by the media. Like any major superstar – and for a while, no one was bigger than the slightly manic Mel – the building of a celebrity is only half the press's process. Dragging them back down the stairway of eminence makes up the second section of fame's cyclical nature. If we are to assume that Gibson is at the bottom – he did go through a real rough patch there, and really hasn't pulled his over the hill ass out of the fire quite yet- then this film is a fine first step back into moviemaking meaningfulness. Will it wipe away the cloud of the lingering Anti-Semitic controversy? No. Does it indicate that some artists can successfully separate their craft from their convictions? You bet!

Unlike the ra-ra ridiculousness of Braveheart, or the subjective snuff film reverence of The Passion of the Christ, Gibson gives the audience a break here, creating what is, in essence, a thriller throwback to the days of simply storytelling and full force physical action. This is not a plodding post-modern blockbuster with all manner of metaphysical miscues messing up the stunt work. No, in a script that is elegant in its stereotypical ease, Gibson creates good guys (Jaguar Paw's jungle dwelling tribe) and unbelievable bad guys (the completely corrupt and de-evolving Mayans) and puts them at odds inside a beautiful, bloody epic. Argue over his skill with narrative or characterization, but no one can doubt Gibson's gift behind the lens. There are shots in Apocalypto that will literally take your breath away, moments where you wonder aloud if this is the natural beauty of a practical location, a purely CGI spectacle, or a clever combination of the two. In particular, there's a moment during Jaguar Paw's last act escape where he winds up in a pit of headless corpses. Colored a dire, dreary gray by the surrounding mud, the bodies form a kind of corrupt canvas, as perfect a painting of pain and horror as the visual medium has to offer.

As for the performances, it is hard to challenge or criticize them. Texan Rudy Youngblood is very good in the leading role, though he tends to have less of the detailed physical maladies (bad teeth, body scars) as given to his equally impressive co-stars. Naturally, there's a villain, and Gibson does a very smart thing when it comes to his bad guys. He divides up the evil, making main leader Zero Wolf (played by Raoul Trujillo) a far more focused heavy. Snake Ink, on the other hand, is like a pre-Columbian Simon LeGree. Face forming a constant snarling smirk, actions always poised on the precipice of outright psychosis, newcomer Rodolfo Palacios seems to be channeling every old fashioned rogue in the action movie manual. He is cruel, sadistic, slimy, sarcastic, uncontrollable and completely without redeeming qualities. At least Zero Wolf has a son that he dotes on, a bit of outside emotion that foreshadows a fatal event that drives the Mayans to make Jaguar Paw public enemy numero uno. It is safe to say that, thanks to the use of an ancient language and subtitles, the personalities all seem to merge and meld into a kind of collective clan. It is only via easily remembered art design elements, and individual idiosyncrasies that we end up with certain specific types.

While it may be bereft of real emotion – as much as we like Jaguar Paw, we don't really feel the connection between he and his pregnant mate – there is no doubting Gibson's ability to showboat and inspire. The entire trip through the mad Mayan city, filled with touches both natural and otherworldly, creates the kind of sociological science fiction that any good period piece can provide. We want to be transported to a world we've never experienced, believe in the validity of the varying little details that make up the magical whole. For all his flaws as a human being, his history as a man both married to and marred by his convictions, Mel Gibson should never be doubted as a moviemaker. Apocalypto may not be one of the best movies of the year, but it surely stands shoulder to shoulder with those exceptional efforts of 2006 – at least from an artistic perspective. Besides, what's the better legacy to have hanging around your neck – an undeniably dense anger toward people of a certain persuasion, or the ability to make startling cinematic statements? Gibson should be happy that, for now, outer vision has overcome inner vileness.

8 ouf ot 10

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