Phantom-43

I was pleasantly surprised by this little anthology film. It's not half-bad. A little bit Twilight Zone, a little bit Urban Legends, a little bit...well, VH1. It takes a lot of legends and conventions about rock starts, the music business, and the effect of music on our lives and does some pretty cool things with it. But as is the case with most anthology films, not all are created equal. There's one story that's very good, a couple of cute ones, and one bad one. But even the bad one isn't THAT bad. The first story, "Disco Inferno" is that one. It's not so much bad as it is very predictable. A couple of stoners who don't have much going for them except that they're rabid rock fans get into an accident driving home from a concert, and find themselves at a mysterious club where disco lives all night long. I'm probably spoiling the ending, but it's pretty obvious that they've died and gone to hell...and for them, hell is disco. I can relate. The best thing about this tale is that it features Danny Masterson putting a spin on his "That 70's Show" character. The second tale, "My Generation" is weird and darkly funny. It's about two music-loving, philosophically-minded serial killers who meet up and square off in the Pacific Northwest. If you can get over Eric Roberts as the psychotic Deadhead, you're in for a rather humorous satirical statement on music of this generation and the one before, how they compare and, perhaps, how the statement of the music of the 60's was lost on both generations involved. The third, "Room Service," is pretty straightforward. The story of the constantly-escalating battle of wills between an excess-loving, hotel-room trashing rock star (Geez, they still do that?), and the ultra-efficient housekeeping matron who manages to clean up all his messes with superhuman skill. It's fun to watch because it's so contrived, so based on legend that the tale seems familiar (and check it out, the guy from Duran Duran! An actual excess-loving rock star playing himself!). Not great, but fun. The final tale, "More than a Feeling" is the darkest and the best. It's the story of a recording company exec with a conscience (and no, that's not the fantasy part), who has a talent for picking the next rising star. Unfortunately, every one of his charges rises fast and crashes and burns even faster. This leaves him with guilt beyond all measure, and leaves him ultra-protective of his latest - and last surviving - artist, a young and talented female vocalist played with big-eyed innocence by Marla Sokoloff. I was a little thrown by this one, it being so dark and having Judd Nelson playing a character that wasn't a total sleaze, but in the end I was impressed - especially by the ultra-chilling final scene. Not a mast

My God but this was the most dismal and slow-moving thing to come out of England since Margaret Thatcher. There were a few bright spots as the series tried to add a new modern spin on the vampire legend and add modern technology and explanations for them, but that's really all it's got going for it. Let's face it, it's very hard to make a good modern vampire movie or TV series. John Carpenter tried and failed, and Quentin Tarantino's attempt is virtually unwatchable. Well, they tried at least.

All in all, the series seems like a imitation of the short-lived American series "Prey", which dealt with a similar theme of cutting-edge technology used by and against clandestine subhumans. But "Prey" dealt with the themes of paranoia and underground conspiracies (both human and not) a lot better than this one. And had more likeable characters. The good guys here aren't very good; even our purported hero doesn't make much of an impression. Every character has about as much personality as a gray Brixton afternoon. And maybe it's just that I'm not British, but I couldn't understand word one of what they were saying. The performances were so low in key and low in volume, and their acting so wooden, that I was rooting for the vampires.

The only reason to watch this is to see the lovely Colette Brown, who plays the longsuffering Kirstie. She's easily one of the most beautiful British actresses I've ever seen. Apparently she does a lot of British television, TV movies and the like. Too bad; I think she'd be great in feature films.

Yes, the story of the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal needs to be told so that it's never forgotten. Yes, this miniseries provides a dignified and multifaceted retelling. But it isn't quite the masterpiece it should have been. Alec Baldwin is adequate as white knight Bob Jackson, Brian Cox is impressive as king-in-exile Hermann Goering, but neither are particularly compelling. What could have been a powerful character study and an exploration of the nature of evil ends up becoming a rote-by-rote reenactment of the events.

The story itself is powerful enough, but the screenplay doesn't try to take it in any new directions. It too-quickly dismisses Nazism as mere lies and propaganda, only hinting at the darker implication that it might have been the horrific yet inevitable end-product of a century of Eurocentrism, of which all Western nations were guilty to some degree. Only half-heartedly in the last quarter or so does it question whether the Allies pushed for the trials to assuage their own guilt. The still-lingering question about the motivations for the trials in the first place - to establish justice for the world at large or to mask the hypocrisy of the victors? - is barely explored. The film is content to draw the lines of good and bad with bold strokes.

The biggest impacts are made by two supporting characters. The first is the Jewish army psychologist, who struggles with rage at what the Nazis did to his people and the clinical desire to understand them. His analysis of their motivations provides no easy answers (were there any?). The other is the young American soldier who befriends Goering. Drawn to his magnetic personality, he listens to his words and begins to believe them, providing a chilling lesson that evil doesn't die with the man who preaches it.

The film also makes pivotal use of actual concentration camp footage. After fifty years those grainy haunting images are still just as horrifying. They serve as reminders of what happened there and what the Nuremberg trials attempted to ensure would never happen again. It's a lesson that's too-often overlooked. * - 3.5 of 5