Princess (****)
review by Jon
Waterman
After leaving his monastery, August becomes the legal guardian
to a five year old niece he’s never met before. Mia was
recently orphaned when her mother Christina suddenly died.
Instantly upon arrival, August learns that not only does he
have to deal with the struggle of raising a child with resentment
and all kinds of other problems, but he must also confront
his sister’s legacy as the porn star named Princess.
Determined to prevent his sister’s name from being tarnished
forever, he sets out to destroy the people that manipulated
and profited off of his poor sister’s tragic double life.
This first feature effort by Danish animator/director Anders
Morgenthaler is probably one of the best movies I’ll
see all year. The film is just constant quality entertainment
from the clever, flashy pop-art title sequence to the nearly
perfect ending. There’s plenty of action to be had mixed
in with the interesting, but very straightforward storyline.
If I have one complaint, it’s that there isn’t
a whole lot of depth within the narrative, nor are there any
real surprises. But that’s fine because the subject matter
is still good enough as it is. It’s just a straight-up
revenge story starring a priest and his accomplice niece.
And it’s also probably the best combination of live
action and animated elements since “Who Framed Roger
Rabbit.” Granted the live stuff doesn’t interact
with the animation, but it certainly still works and feels
very natural. August acquires a large collection of home videos
which help to provide the various key moments in understanding
Christina’s back story. The non-animated home video is
the only time we ever see Christina, thus turning her into
a metaphorical and physical real person amongst the present
day surreal fantasy or nightmare-like situations the animation
presents. The video is also much more disturbing because it
involves the live actors. It looks very real and plays out
so naturally that it’s very easy to immerse yourself.
It almost feels like Morgenthaler found this footage himself
and decided to animate a story around the shocking scenes he
uncovered from some unknown source.
The animation for the most part is very solid. If anything
will turn people off from watching this movie (besides the
taboo subject matter), it’ll be the very crude character
design. They remind me of a cross between something you would
have seen on “Liquid Television” and a Bill Plympton
(“I Married a Strange Person!”) cartoon. That’s
pretty easy to get over and actually aids the tone of the film.
Do you really want to see attractive looking scum of the earth?
Other than that, the animation works very well, fully utilizing
the tiniest bit of computer manipulation (I can’t imagine
they animated those dust particles by hand). I was quite impressed
with the use of rack focus and layers as well as the shot compositions
and emotional range of the drawings. There are times when I
felt the animation should have been smoother, but the rest
of the picture more than makes up for those little grievances.
Simply put, this film is amazing. Not only is the animation
great (watch it just for the awesome, very creative gun shoot-out
scene), but the live action sequences are equally amazing and
perfectly integrated within the storyline. It’s been
a while since I’ve seen a worthwhile revenge picture
and this one delivers with some great, horrifyingly brutal
scenes. You’ll be riveted from start to finish, and don’t
be surprised if you want to watch it again immediately.
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