Shared Darkness

What kind of folks would make a movie titled Harry Knuckles and the Pearl Necklace, you might ask? Well, the same kind whose previous credits would included a movie entitled Jesus Christ: Vampire Hunter, of course.

A
slapdash, silly, low-budget Canadian spy spoof, the film centers around
the titular secret agent (Phil Caracas) and his partner El Santos (Jeff
Moffet), whose quest is to track down a valuable missing necklace. Over
the course of the movie, this means showdowns with a hinterland horror
known as Bionic Bigfoot and a team of Amazonian assassins, among many
other trials and tribulations. Fish nunchakus and copious affected slow
motion are also deployed.

Writer Ian Driscoll and director Lee Demarbre have a deep affinity for kung-fu shenanigans, and Harry Knuckles and the Pearl Necklace is full of the same type of marginally choreographed rows. Caracas — returning from Jesus Christ: Vampire Hunter
as well — gives his character a certain goofy charm, but execution and
tonal consistency are the big bugaboos here. What glues the movie
together more than any sense of slapdash style is its breathlessly
anarchic tone. In Driscoll and Demarbre’s DIY world, continuity
problems are best incorporated and made fun of within the flow of
things, rather than painstakingly ironed out. This works a few times,
but eventually drags things down, because it just seems lazy.

Harry Knuckles and the Pearl Necklace is at its best — a
term loosely applied — when dashing mindlessly over and around all
obstacles, but the movie’s running time, at just under two hours,
belies this model of brevity-as-virtue, and the “action” herein is far
too large a piece of the pie. People don’t want to sit through
low-budget films for more than a scene or two of inadequately staged
action; you have to woo them with ideas. This film has some, but
they’re not as entertainingly explored as in the filmmakers’ previous
work.

Housed in a regular Amray case, Harry Knuckles and the Pearl Necklace
is presented on a region-free disc in a full-screen transfer that
preserves the imperfections of the movie’s 16mm production alongside a
Dolby digital 5.1 English track that’s a definite step up from the
visual plane of the movie. Cast and crew alike sit for an
audio-commentary track, and a 23-minute making-of documentary graces
the roster of supplemental material, along with a 25-minute 1999 short
film, Harry Knuckles and the Treasure of the Aztec Mummy, that
serves as this feature’s predecessor. There’s also nine minutes of
footage from the film’s Ottawa premiere, meaning plenty of comical
pronunciations of the word “aboot,” as well as interviews with on-queue
fans and Demarbre’s mother. Alas, even proud mothers of those involved
might have some problems looking past the unevenness and wan double
entendres of Harry Knuckles and the Pearl Necklace. D (Movie) B- (Disc)

Billed as an animated comic epic, Broken Saints
summons to mind myriad questions about form and entertainment. What
constitutes a movie or series? In the ongoing dialogue between the
comics and graphic novel industry and their Hollywood suitors, what
unique structural elements are inherent to each format? And where, too,
does original Web content fit into all of this?

Running over 10 hours and spanning two dozen episodes, Broken Saints
got its start on the Internet, where it was an original and independent
serial effort on an eponymous Web site. Fusing anime style and
comic-book text with more traditional cinematic effects and production
technique, the hypnotic and surreal fantasy/horror epic here gets a
full-blown DVD treatment, one that may hook new fans who appreciate
being able to enjoy in larger, discrete segments episodes, ranging in
length from nine minutes to a finale that, at 83 minutes, touches
feature length.

Written and overseen by creator Brooke Burgess, the story centers
around four strangers who each receive a sequence of chilling
apocalyptic visions. Drawn together from the corners of the Earth to a
single city, they come to find their fates are inexorably tied to one
another, and to a conspiracy involving a global satellite network and a
mysterious orphan girl with a terrifying secret. Their fates in turn
inform that of the world at large. Will they stand up to face the
encroaching darkness? And if so, at what individual price?

Broken Saints is reminiscent at least on some level of the old Aeon Flux
animated series on MTV, in that its conspiracy-dipped and
paranoia-tinged narrative is married to a style at once florid and
gracefully simple. The full breadth of innovative artistic effort on
display here is certainly impressive, and sometimes quite mesmerizing.
But the series as a whole is waterlogged by emotionally distant
metaphor and an obdurate devotion to flowery, cryptic prose that
prevents much accrued downhill momentum. (A mercifully succinct sample:
“I hear the ocean serenading the soft white sand and feel the warm sun
cradle its children. The trees beckon with gifts of fragrance, fruit
and shelter.”) The combination, too, of voiceover narration (The X-Files’
William B. Davis and Michael Dobson are among the voice talent) and
comic-book-style thought and spoken-word bubbles, is just a strange one
to get used to, at least for the length of the project here. The purred
meta-physical and philosophical musings herein swallow the story, and
the series’ running time kills off any sense of lasting wonderment.

Regardless of what one might think of the program, Broken Saints
is packaged and presented in an undeniably groundbreaking and
interesting fashion, one that definitely feeds its cutting-edge image.
With 24 episodes presented in 1.66:1 widescreen and over five hours of
supplemental material spread out over four discs, the series is a
mini-marvel of technical savvy and prowess — clean, clear and
streamlined. The set’s packaging unerringly continues this theme, with
an inch-thick binder housing four glued-in plastic trays, and in turn
slipping (topside) into a clear plastic case that features four
attached, double-sided, cardboard corner sleeves featuring characters
from the series.

The disc’s menu screen cheekily boasts of “tasty trailers and a
bounty of BS featurettes,” and it’s not kidding. Creator Burgess sits
for full series audio commentary, while a 19-minute production
featurette includes chats with camera-shy technical director Ian Kirby
and many others. Fan films, other behind-the-scenes featurettes,
documentaries and interviews only extend the immersive experience. On
the downside, so dense and crammed with content are the discs that the
menu screens are sometimes a bit slow, particularly when toggling
between episodic selections, which are replete with description. C (Show) A (Disc)