A Town Called Panic'

This stop-motion animated film based on a Belgian TV series is filled with strange and wonderful talking people and animals who, yes, panic at the drop of a hat.

I could tell you about the parachuting cows, the giant automated penguin, the mad scientists doing serious snowball research. I could even tell you about Cowboy, Indian and Horse, three amigos who share a two-story house way out in the sticks. But to really understand the zany and surreal comic madness of "A Town Called Panic," you're going to have to see it for yourself.

The first stop-motion animated feature to be an official Cannes selection, "Panic" is the offshoot of a French-language Belgian TV series whose creators, Stéphane Aubier and Vincent Patar, have quite the following all across Europe. Made with an anarchic, anything-goes spirit, this is truly a film, not to mention a town, where you never know what's going to happen next.

It's also a town populated by people and animals who are no more than stiff and immobile plastic toys whose facial expressions never change and who move in fits and starts across a simple, almost primitive landscape. We never find out how the three housemates got together, but their psychological relationship is clear. Horse, often glimpsed sitting on the sofa reading the newspaper, is obviously the adult of the crew, while the juvenile Cowboy and Indian share a bedroom, spar with each other, fight for the shower (Indian's headdress displays like a peacock's tail when it gets wet) and vie for Horse's favor.

'Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel' soundtrack scores

The film has just hit theaters but its CD -- featuring high-pitched cover versions of hit songs -- is already on the charts.

In the years since an aspiring small-time actor named Ross Bagdasarian bought a variable-speed tape recorder and sang "The Chipmunk Song" into its embedded microphone in 1958, his mischief-making rodents have sold 47 million copies of their 31 albums and amassed a worldwide fan base.

In fact, though "Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel" only opened in theaters today, the soundtrack to the sequel to 2007's breakout animated hit is already a bona fide success.

Released on Rhino Records Dec. 1 and featuring hits by the Kinks, Katy Perry and Beyoncé, the album sold 77,000 copies in its first two weeks of release, compared with just 7,000 for the first two weeks of sales for the 2007 film's soundtrack, which went on to move more than 1 million copies.

"It's hard to be miserable when you hear those voices," said Ross Bagdasarian Jr., 60, speculating on the enduring appeal of furry critters chirping out cover songs.

Bagdasarian Sr. voiced the original Chipmunks and pioneered the "vari-speed" recording technique that transformed his adult voice into the higher-pitched, kid-i-fied sound so associated with the group. After his death in 1972, his son Ross and Ross' wife Janice kept the franchise alive, voicing 16 more Chipmunks records and an animated television show for NBC.

While actors including Justin Long and Christina Applegate voice the Chipmunk characters in the "Squeakquel," the songs in the film were performed by New York producer Ali Dee and four of his studio singers, who employed the same vari-speed technique Bagdasarian used.

There are two things that go into producing a Chipmunks record, Dee said.

"The first step is to recognize that we're working with one of the biggest groups out there," he said. "I know I sound out of my mind when I say that, but the Chipmunks have sold [a ton of] records.

"Once you recognize the brand as being legitimate, then you can hit the production and make the Chipmunks sound competitive against Jay-Z or Alicia Keys," he added. "That's the mind-set: You're not making a kids record. You're making a legitimate album."

More than 100 tracks were licensed and recorded by Dee's Chipmunks and Chipettes for the new movie, most of which ended up on the cutting-room floor.

"You don't know if a song will work until you record it," said Dee, who estimates there's enough leftover material for a triple album of B-sides.

Why 3D Movies Represent Everything Wrong With Our Country

Like Battlestar Galactica creator Glen Larson and certain bonnet-wearing prudes in Upper Pennsylvania, I am skeptical of most new technologies. Oh, I try practically all of them, even smuggle a few into my bag of tricks (like Tivo), but I can’t shake the feeling that maybe, just maybe pizza delivery in under thirty minutes isn’t the brightest idea. Maybe strength training with BowFlex three days a week for a half hour isn’t a real workout. Maybe ten year old boys seeing their first pair of boobies on the internet isn’t better than mistakenly stumbling on their father’s cache of smutty magazines. Perhaps I’m out of touch; perhaps I’m that old guy in Finding Forrester. I can’t really be sure, but when Matt Damon openly wonders in Good Will Hunting whether there’s more value in working construction than solving equations, I sympathize with his moral predicament. We’re not in a recession right now because a few banks made a slew of high risk loans; we’re in a recession right now because the average American is no longer willing to work hard for his keep. And why should he when all his friends take the easy way out? You should have to work when you go to the movies, work to understand why the characters are behaving as they are. And that’s why I can’t get behind any movie made in 3D.

It’s not that I have any axe to grind with the third dimension itself. I appreciate its right to exist and even endorse Hollywood’s right to explore new mediums of entertainment. But I see where all of this is going. I’ve uncovered the ten year plan, and it’s stained with lowest common denominator bullshit. You know why the Miss American Pageant isn’t even on Network Television anymore? Because our idea of beauty is so far out of wack in this country, we secretly hate ourselves for it. The curvy girl next door with pigtails and dreams of being a nurse has been benched for the hungry slut with fake boobs trying to seduce her way into Malibu. Well, fuck that noise. Shiny things usually lack depth, and right now, the third dimension lacks purpose.

Some might argue, one day all forms of entertainment will be in 3D. Television sets will beam George Costanza and Marcia Brady right next to your couch, and CD players, which will no longer be called CD players, will let you watch Jimi Hendrix and Frank Sinatra sing you to sleep. Hell, Ed Asner might actually yell at you and Janis Joplin might ask for a duet. I haven’t the slightest idea where technology is headed, but that stuff would only be cool because Marcia Brady is the sexiest teenager of all-time and Jimi Hendrix plays the guitar like a motherfucker. But that’s not where we’re headed. Right now, 3D movies are on pace to be just like goddamn fireworks, worth their salt on July 4th, but much more than that and they come off as hokey, stupid--forced entertainment. I’m not ready to get on board with Joe Jonas tucking me in every night. Not because I don’t want 3D representations telling me yesterday, there troubles were so far away but because I don’t want just any 3D representation telling me they’ve got me, babe.

3D movies should be awesome. We should want them more than Montag’s wife wanted that third television wall. But I can’t want it because its repercussions scare the shit out of me. I’m not here to hate on Michael Bay because this is an article about 3D movies, but he provides the perfect analogy for why I want nothing to do with this new-fangled brainstorm. I hate most Michael Bay movies because they’re just shiny things. An hour and a half of visually stimulating nothingness followed by ten minute conversations consisting of, “Were you watching when that guy got impaled on the rusty pole?”. But most of you goddamn idiots, most of you goddamn members of Ritalin Generation love Michael Bay movies because, to you, visually stimulating nothingness is everything. Well, going to the movies shouldn’t be vapid, mindless entertainment. You should cry; you should laugh; you should fall in love with the characters; you should fall out of love with the characters; you should think; you should question; you should ponder; you should, flat out, be alive. I’ve never felt any of those things because glasses tricked me into thinking actors were stepping down off the screen.

Maybe Monsters Vs Aliens will prove to me why the third dimension is, right now, more than just a daffy, eye-catching gimmick. I seriously doubt it will bring anything to the table beyond novelty. We’ll see on Friday. But just because you were visually stimulated by nothingness once doesn’t mean you want that to be your only option. If there was some sort or referendum on the ballot, I’d vote to bring Coke II back--but not at the expense of Coke.

For some, 3D movies a pain in the head

The growing popularity of three-dimensional movies such as James Cameron's "Avatar" -- now a $1 billion box office hit -- has inspired a crop of 3D TV sets, unveiled this week at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

And while new digital 3D technology has made the experience more comfortable for many, for some people with eye problems, a prolonged 3D session may result in an aching head, they said.

"There are a lot of people walking around with very minor eye problems, for example a minor muscle imbalance, which under normal circumstances, the brain deals with naturally," said Dr Michael Rosenberg, an ophthalmology professor at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago.

He said in a 3D movie, these people are confronted with an entirely new sensory experience.

"That translates into greater mental effort, making it easier to get a headache," Rosenberg said in a telephone interview.

In normal vision, each eye sees things at a slightly different angle.

"When that gets processed in the brain, that creates the perception of depth," Dr Deborah Friedman, a professor of ophthalmology and neurology at the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York.

"The illusions that you see in three dimensions in the movies is not exactly calibrated the same way that your eyes and your brain are. If your eyes are a little off to begin with, then it's really throwing a whole degree of effort that your brain now needs to exert.

"This disparity for some people will give them a headache," she said.

DIGITAL 3D TECHNOLOGY

Dr John Hagan, ophthalmologist in Kansas City, Missouri, and a fellow with the American Academy of Ophthalmology, said some people who do not have normal depth perception cannot see in 3D at all.

He said people with eye muscle problems, in which the eyes are not pointed at the same object, have trouble processing 3D images.

Experts say there are no studies tracking how common it is to get a headache after watching a 3D movie, but Rick Heineman, a spokesman for RealD, a provider of 3D equipment to theaters, said headaches and nausea were the chief reasons 3D technology never took off.

The company, which provides 3D equipment to 90 percent of U.S. movie theaters with 3D capability and has cut deals with Sony Corp, Panasonic, JVC, Toshiba Corp and with Direct TV, said its newer digital technology addresses many of the problems that typically caused 3D moviegoers discomfort.

Heineman said older 3D technology involved the use of two film projectors, one that projected a left eye image and one that projected a right eye image. Three-D glasses would allow viewers to see a different image in each eye.

"People often complained of headaches and it was really because the projectors weren't lined up," Heineman said.

Heineman's company uses a single digital projector, which switches between the left and the right eye image 144 times a second, to help overcome some of the old problems.

"By going to a single digital projector, those issues were solved," he said.

Friedman said she thinks most people will do fine with 3D movies and with 3D TVs, but Rosenberg said people may quickly tire of the novelty.

"I think it will be a gimmick. I suspect there will be a lot of people who say it's sort of neat, but it's not really comfortable," he said.