Kaena: The Prophecy (DVD)

Kaena: The Prophecy, or as the French say Kaena: La prophétie, one thing I did not realize about this film before watching the special features was that it was French made. Not like that is a big deal, but when you check out the Virtual Interview feature and the lead character, which has been voiced by Kirsten Dunst in the film, starts speaking French it takes you a little of guard.

Made entirely with software developed for creating video games the film really has that type of feel. I would have to describe it as a high-end look to all the cinematics that have been added to video games as of late, whereas they look great you really can't imagine an entire feature film being developed in such a manner.

Now, obviously, the look of the film is far better than just your average Playstation 2 game, but the feel is there nonetheless as you are introduced to Kaena (Dunst) who finds herself and her tribe living in quite the odd situation inside a tree-like structure called Axis. Unfortunately, for Kaena's tribe the sap of the plantlike domain is drying up therefore relieving the inhabitants of the precious necessity they use to satisfy their "gods".

Kaena is firm in her belief that there is more to the universe than just this plant they have been living in and against the will of the High Priest she sets out to prove it.

While you can't expect much more of a story than what I just described you can expect something other than dried up sap to be the catalyst to the whole thing. At times the movie looks great and that is all fine and dandy, but if you all think back to 2001 and Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within we remember that it takes a little more than just cool animation to make an animated feature film work.

As far as special features go there is the previously mentioned "Virtual Interview" with Kaena plus a making-of feature, which gives you a look at just how much work went into the making of this film considering they weren't exactly using the standard in CGI graphics equipment.

Overall this is a movie that you really should steer clear of, I fell asleep twice while screening it and the second time was while I was trying to just finish the last 20 minutes, and this is a 90 minute film people.

I do think there is a satisfying animated sci-fi/fantasy flick out there, I am just not sure who is going to bring it to the table.