Hey folks, Harry here with a great look at NIGHT WATCH. Now watch out for spoilers - Ishmael gives away the ending. I love this crazy Russian flick, here ya go...

Dear Harry,

I went to three great movie events here in NYC recently and wondered if you?d be interested in any of them: Tribeca screening of "Night Watch," discussion with Howard Shore, and discussion/screening of Moolaade with the director, Ousmane Sembene.

Night Watch screening, Tribeca Film Festival, April 28, 2005

What makes "Night Watch" so great is an aspect in which nearly every fantasy/sci-fi movie is deficient: emotions. Who honestly LIKES Neo? Even in the first Matrix? Anyone want to be friends with Legolas? Who?s NOT female? If you want to see what happens when great drama meets great genre film-making, see this movie.

I really liked Anton Gorodetsky, the hero of this movie. He?s not a badass, he?s a normal guy like you and me who happens to find out that he?s an Other. Others are either Light or Dark, and co-exist warily in a fragile truce that has existed for centuries. The Dark ones are Vampires, basically.

MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD

I wanted Anton to succeed. When he?s trying to free that little boy from vampires, but he?s not quite up to the task, I was out there rooting for him. When he finds out who that boy really is, my heart went out to him.

This ain?t Matrix or LOTR, where Good has a pretty decent chance. This is only the first movie in a trilogy, so I?m not spoiling anything to tell you that at the end, the chances for the forces of Light are looking as good as a snowball?s chances of getting laid in hell. The Light Others have average looks and intelligence and are disorganized. The Dark Others are sexy, even that girl with the half-burned face parading around the whole movie in a lace slip (just don?t look at the face). They?re also smart, cunning, and interesting. Their leader, Zavulon, is a total badass with far too little screen time. There?s a scene where Anton is facing him, holding an oblong light fixture in a feeble attempt to defend himself (this is a brilliant parody of lightsabers). Zavulon reaches behind his head, grabs the top of his spine, pulls his spinal column OUT OF HIS BODY, and turns it into a sword. Holy fucking squirrel shit, man! I spent the whole subway ride home trying to pull my spine out of my back. Amazingly, nobody called the white-coated men on me.

Another area where Night Watch annihilates the court with the competition is humor. There?s a scene where Anton is all bloody and the leader of the Light Others offers him a partner, then throws a stuffed owl at him. He stares at it and says, "What the fuck is this?" Not all the characters in the movie take the conflict seriously all the time and because of that, we DO take it seriously, because we could see them as real people.

What?s bad? They do an arty thing with the subtitles (it?s like the subtitles participate in the action of the movie sometimes) which is distracting. There were too many superfluous extreme close-ups for my taste. A close-up that makes a cup look like a water tower should have some sort of meaning; these close-ups exist just to jerk us around. A few shots seemed to be a bit out-of-focus not for any intentional reason, but perhaps because that was the best shot they found.

The most important test of any fantasy is: does the fantasy-world work? Do its rules make sense? Does it suggest a vast world in the timeframe of one movie without being hopelessly confusing or hitting you over the head? The world of "Night Watch" is original and engrossing. You can believe that if the world were like that, you would know people like the ones on screen, and they might act they way those people acted. Most importantly, you want to know what happens next. I can?t wait for Nochnoy dozor 2: Mel sudby and Sumerechniy dozor !

By the way, don?t call me a plant, and while you?re at it, don?t call me late for dinner either. I?ve always hated that.

Ishmael