2Pac, Bily, Lele Senlis.

Running time: 88 mins . . . .

AMERICAN tourists regularly disembark from cruise liners to sunbathe on Haiti's remote beaches and haggle for handmade souvenirs with mobs of desperate traders, far from the slums of Port-au-Prince where anarchy rules in this dark hole of poverty and neglect, the poorest country in the western world and just a short flight from Miami beach. "How my life gonna be?" asks 2Pac, one of two handsome and doomed young gang leaders whose short lives are briefly captured by Danish film-maker Asger Leth and his Serbian cinematographer Milos Longarevic in extraordinary footage shot at outrageous risk during the turbulent upheaval in 2004 when the country's first democratically-elected President, the ex-priest JeanBertrand Aristide, was forced into exile. "I dunno. Maybe good, maybe bad. God knows. In Cite you never live long, you always die young." The camera tracks the relationship between 2Pac and his mistress, an attractive French aid worker Lele, and his brother Billy, leader of a rival gang, amid the murder and mayhem of which they were part.

It makes no judgements, takes no sides: it just records the nightmare and finds in the degradation a shocking humanity and a sense of wasted lives. "It ain't no Hollywood movie, " says 2Pac. "It's the truth."

CCFirehouse Dog (Todd Holland): Josh Hutcherson, Bruce Greenwood, Dash Mihok, Steven Culp, Bill Nunn.

Running time: 111 mins . . .

ANobnoxious spoiled pooch becomes an unlikely catalyst for change in this goofy boy-meetsdog kids' film. It smartens up eventually into a respectable coming of age story. Star of the show is a mutt called Rexxx . . . a coiffeured filmstar pet with a diamond-studded collar. He falls out of an aeroplane during a stunt and ends up scraggy and homeless. Shane Fahey (Josh Hutcherson) is the son of a fire chef who takes him in. Turns out Rexxx is a superdog of sorts: not only does he tidy the boy's bedroom, teach him about responsibility and help improve relations with his dad, but he is a fire rescue dog par exellence. He also helps solve a mystery involving a series of suspicious city fires. The plot is secondhand smoke from Backdraft. The stunts involve flinging a replacement stuffed dog in the air. But Josh Hutcherson . . . a sincere young actor with a touch of the every-boy about him . . .keeps the picture anchored.

There's plenty going on here to entertain young kids, with moral uplift designed for pre-teens.