Live forever or die trying
In 2054, Paris is a labyrinth where all movement is monitored and recorded. Cut off from the world for its own protection, the city has nonetheless continued to expand. Now, 21st century skyscrapers overlay centuries old architectural masterpieces. And below street level, a sophisticated network of streamlined plazas push up against the city's ancient, deteriorating tunnel systems. Casting a shadow over everything is the city's largest company, Avalon, which insinuates itself into every aspect of contemporary life to sell its primary export- eternal youth and beauty.
When 22-year-old Ilona (Romola Garai), one of Avalon's most promising scientists, is abruptly kidnapped, Avalon calls on Barthélémy Karas (Daniel Craig), a Paris cop with a hard-fought reputation for finding anyone, no matter what sacrifices he has to make along the way. As the trail gets hot, Karas senses he's not the only one looking for the beautiful enigma, and every witness he digs up seems to turn up dead.
Ilona and Bislane were orphans rescued from the brutal, war-torn Caucasia region so that the prodigal younger sister would eventually work at Avalon, where she was mentored by the great geneticist, Jonas Muller (Ian Holm). The sisters separated as Ilona became deeply immersed in her work; Bislane fell into a life in the underworld; and Muller gave up his brilliant career to open a clinic for the city's poor.
If Avalon vice president Paul Dellenbach (Jonathan Pryce) knows anything about the mysterious project Ilona may have been involved in - something called the Renaissance Protocol - he isn't talking.
To find Ilona and unlock the secrets of her disappearance, Karas must plunge deep into the parallel worlds of corporate espionage, organized crime and genetic research where the truth imprisons whomever finds it first and miracles can either save the world, or end it.
From Miramax Films comes Renaissance, a bold vision of a stark near future drenched in hidden secrets and technological frontiers. Directed by Christian Volckman, Renaissance takes film noir to its most stylized edge, utilizing live action motion capture, animated in 3D and rendered in high contrast black and white to create a graphic novel come-to-life.
Voiced by such acclaimed talent as Daniel Craig (Munich, Casino Royale), Catherine McCormack (Spy Game, Braveheart), Jonathan Pryce (The New World, Brazil) and Ian Holm (The Lord of the Rings trilogy), Renaissance follows a hard-boiled Paris detective whose case - finding a kidnapped girl - takes him deep into a labyrinthine world of genetic research, corporate espionage and the criminal underworld.
A striking vision that neither purely live action nor animation, Renaissance bears touchstones of both futuristic cyberpunk and classic 1950s noir. "Those were often dark stories that lifted up the genre," says screenwriter Alexandre Patellière. "They were crime films but they mirrored the era in which they were made. The characters in our film are archetypes of that genre but they are of their own time and are now obsessed with things like security, ethnic conflicts, terrorism, world globalization."
In 2054 Paris, the Metro is still running, the Eiffel Tower and Sacre Coeur are still standing, but new layers of architecture have been grafted onto the city's ancient edifice. Bridges have been altered, and a glass-like floor now covers a subterranean commercial center at the base of Notre Dame Cathedral. Equally imposing is the Avalon Corporation. Everywhere in the city, talking billboards soothe the populace with an uninterrupted message selling "ageless beauty." "Aging and physical corruption has increasingly become an obsession," says director Christian Volckman. "The people of Paris want youth and Avalon wants to sell it to them. Do they have that product? Do they not have that product? The answer to that question is part of the crime Karas is sent to solve."
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