Get your 'Full' fill
Catch the hilarious comedy "The Full Monty" before it ends its Ann
Arbor run. The film tells the sordid, funny and uplifting tale of uproari-
ous unemployed steel workers as they strip out of desperation, a des-
peration that leads them to take it all off - the full monty. It's win-
ning fans and raves on both sides of the Atlantic, so see "The Full
Monty" tonight at 9:45 p.m. at the Michigan. $5 for students.
Friday
September 19, 1997
8
Moore unveils
'Big One' tonight.
By Jessica Eaton
Daily Books Editor
Who is that masked man? Defending the common
man, saving the damsel in distress, willing to stand up
to any bully, able to leap tall buildings in a single
bound ... all right, maybe not. But extremely cool,
nonetheless.
If you've guessed Michael Moore, you're correct.
TV star, author, director extraordinaire, Moore will
come to Ann Arbor tonight for the premiere of "The
Big One," the documentary based on his 1996
"Downsize This!" book tour.
Moore will appear at the Michigan Theater to
answer questions and sign copies
of "Downsize This!" after the
screening of his film. PR
"Downsize This!", recently
released in paperback, attacks
corporate America with full
force, and Moore used the same
biting humor to prove his point
while on tour.
The book is full of jarring sarcasm, with chapters
such as "So You Want to Kill the President!" and
"Why Doesn't GM Sell Crack?" Hey, it's a good
question.
It seems fitting that Moore is a Michigan native;
only a man from this land of militias and major auto-
mobile manufacturers could see the humor in
America today. Moore recently spoke with The
Michigan Daily about his work and his views.
The composition of "Downsize This!" took on a
highly personal and political tone for Moore.
"It was last year," Moore recounts, "an election
1
A
year, and I had the sense that the majority of people
were not going to vote. They had pretty much had it
with the candidates and with these two groups that
were trying to pose as two separate parties, when in
fact they were really just one party. Two different par.
ties - the Republicans and the Democrats - but
they're both the party of the wealthy people and
wealthy interests, and the majority of the people don't
really have a party that supports their interests, and so
they don't vote.
"I thought that I should write a book to encourage
people to think about some of these issues, not let this
happen again, and maybe have a good laugh along the
way."
"The Big One" Moore hopes,
EU V I E W will make people, namely college
The Big One students, laugh and perhaps
instill a seed of political interest,
Tonight at 6:30 if one isn't there already.
Michigan Theater "I think (college students) need
Free
to get involved politically, on
campus and in their communities,
and get the government back in the hands of the peo-
ple and out of the hands of corporate America. It's
only going to happen with your generation; the baby
boomers have really lost it."
Moore temporarily lost it himself, almost becom-
ing part of the government he so eagerly hopes to
change while running for office when he was 18. His
fan base in America wants to know, would this
beloved uncoverer of truths run with a pack of liars
again?
"No, but I think of other 18-year-olds running, or
19- or 20-year-olds. People at that age should think
about running for office, to give it a breath of fresh
air."
In Moore's opinion, America definitely needs a
breath of fresh air to remedy the stale ideal of the
"American dream."
"I think that the 'American Dream' has gone up in
smoke for a lot of people. And if you're able to get a
job, you're working longer hours and for less pay and
benefits, no job security, and that's not the way it was
supposed to be. It was supposed to be that if yo
worked hard and your company prospered, you woul
prosper. Now you work hard, your company prospers,
you lose your job."
That disillusionment with the American dream is
precisely where "Downsize This," and its cinematic
counterpart "The Big One, " stems from; magnifying
further as Moore toured the United States in support
of the book.
"As I started traveling across the country, I was
beginning to see this level of despair, and also how
much other cities were starting to resemble my home
town of Flint, and so I decided to make a movie about
that. I called together a crew and put it together real-
ly quick and shot it over a 3-week period."
Hopefully, for him and his audience, Moore will
remain an active spontaneous author and filmmaker
for quite some time; instead of just being a question
on Jeopardy - though he already has been.
"Who made the 1989 documentary on General
Motors?" Moore remembers, laughing. "A good
question, though, would have been 'Who's that guy
that only shops at KMart?' But I'll tell you, when
Vanna turned my letters on Wheel of Fortune, that
was a better experience:'
Michael Moore returns to Ann Arbor to premiere his new documentary, "The Big
One," tonight at the Michigan Theater.
Cecilia the diva returns
Confident 'L.A.' swaggers into greatness
By Emily Lambert
Daily Arts Writer
When the reigning princess of opera,
Cecilia Bartoli, canceled several perfor-
mances last March, rumors flew. The
Italian sweetheart with the golden voice
Y backed out of a week's worth of appear-
ances, including one in Ann Arbor, and
:blamed it on a bronchial infection. The
:circumstances were suspicious: An inter-
national broadcast
with theR
F Metropolitan Opera
was on the calendar C
T nd the conductor,
ames Levine, was
IL Cecilia has
become a diva, wor-
ried music-lovers the world over.
But Ken Fischer, director of the
University Musical Society, said this
week that Bartoli fans need not fret. The
renowned mezzo-soprano, he said, was
indeed sick.
"She sounded like abaritone," said
Fischer, who received a warning call
from Bartoli's manager just days before
her scheduled Ann Arbor appearance.
The prognosis was bad, her manager
said, so Fischer "went home, grabbed a
change of clothes and drove to Akron,"
where Bartoli had performed that night.
The next day, he and the singer met for
lunch.
"She and I sat at a table drinking tea
and lemon," he recalled. "When Cecilia
said 'Ken, I cannot sing,' I was there -
and absolutely positive this woman was
ill."
REVIEW
'ecilia Bartoli
Sunday at 4 p.m.
Hill Auditorium
$10 for students
Bartoli offered a
written apology to
the crowd and
promised to
reschedule.
This Sunday,
Bartoli will prove
herself a woman of
Cecilia Bartoli performs Sunday at Hill.
But UMS also knows how to court an
opera superstar.
When she arrives in Ann Arbor,
Fischer explained, the letter of greeting
is in her native Italian.
"She knows we love her and we are
understanding," Fischer said. "She does
feel that the arms of the community are
around her."
That may not still be the case. Bartoli's
1993 recital was sold out, and most tick-
ets to her 1995 performance were sold
weeks in advance. This year, empty seats
remain, making $10 student rush tickets
an inexpensive option.
Perhaps Ann Arborites think Bartoli
has lost her charm or are worried she
will cancel again. Fischer called her a
"good friend" and said he doesn't think a
cancellation is likely.
her word at her Hill Auditorium recital.
The program, similar to the one she was
to sing in March, includes Vivaldi,
Schubert, and Rossini.
Not every canceled concert was
rescheduled and Fischer said Ann Arbor
audiences are among the fortunate for
many reasons. The fine acoustics of Hill
Auditorium lured Bartoli back, he said,
as did memories of positive receptions
she received in 1993 and 1995.
By Ryan Posly
Daily Arts Writer
Los Angeles in the early '50s. The
image is of a booming city, ready to
shine in the spotlight of the newest
medium, television. It's the city of
opportunity, full of glamour, fulfilled
dreams and "the best police force in the
nation." That's the image.
The reality - a city full of corrup-
tion at the highest levels and squalor
beneath the gloss - is what "L.A.
Confidential" is concerned with. Based
on the popular hard-boiled crime novel
by James Ellroy, the film retains the
same complex characters and darkly
nostalgic atmosphere that made the
book an international bestseller.
The extremely intricate plot revolves
around three detectives who, though
they don't realize it until much later,
each get tangled up in different aspects
of the same huge conspiracy. What is so
refreshing about this mystery is that the
characters are unique and fully devel-
oped, each bringing his own personal
baggage and detec-
tive style to the story.
What's more, each
must face a major 4/I L.A
moral or character
dilemma before the
show is over, which At AnnI
draws the audience
right into the story with them. But there
is an ingredient here even more power-
ful than the intelligent characteriza-
tions, and that is the strong, soulful and
confident performances of the remark-
able cast.
I
.
iArt
Russell Crowe and Guy Pearce expose a core of corruption in "LA. Confidential."
Kevin Spacey is Jack Vincennes, the
celebrity cop. He is the kind of cool,
suave detective that all boys (and even
most men) want to grow up to be. He is
the technical advisor on the biggest cop
show on television, and he's in cahoots
with Sid Hudgens (Danny DeVito),
who runs the country's first celebrity
gossip tabloid (and narrates our view of
the underbelly of
E V I E W Hollywood).
Our other two
Confidential detectives are Ed
Exley (Guy
** Pearce), an hon-
bor 1&2 and showcase est, moral, by-
the-book rookie,
and Bud White (Russell Crowe), a jus-
tice-obsessed minor player who is
known for his intimidation and strong-
arm style. Pearce and Crowe, both rela-
tively unknown Australians, manage
impeccable American accents and
The University of Michigan
School of Music
Sunday, September 21
Michigan Chamber Players
Andrew Jennings, Paul Kantor, Stephen Shipps, violins
Anthony Elliott, cello; Stuart Sankey, double bass
Fred Ormand, clarinet
* Music by Michael Haydn, R. Strauss and Brahms
Britton Recital Hall, E.V. Moore Bldg., 4 p.m.
All events are free and wheelchair accessible unless
specified otherwise. The E.V. Moore Bldg. is located
at 1100 Baits Drive, North Campus.
superb star-making performances
(especially Crowe, whose eyes just
gleam with intensity). But it is Spacey
who, once again, walks away with the
most memorable performance 'as a man
briefly trying to reclaim his integrity at
great cost.
Because of its enormous complexity
- and the risk of giving anything awa-
- it would be impossible to recount the
plot in any detail. Suffice it to say that it
includes murder, betrayal, corruption,
suspense, romance (with Kim Basinger
in her most glamorous role to date), a
great deal of subtle humor (and some
not-so-subtle humor that will have the
audience in tears) and one of the most
tightly choreographed and surprisingly
thrilling final shoot-outs in years. None
of the characters are who they appear to
be at first, much as the facade of the
whole city is lifted to reveal a darker
underside.
The inevitable comparison that most
people will make is to "Chinatown,"
Roman Polanski's masterpiece about
corruption in Los Angeles and the fail-
ure of a morally ambiguous man des-
perately trying to do the right thing. But
a better comparison would be to a nar-
ratively intricate film like "The Usua*
Suspects." Both are clever, fast-paced
mysteries that play with the conventions
of plot and ask the audience to invest a
lot in the complexities of the story.
The fact that both star Kevin Spacey
is arbitrary, but the fact that "L.A.
Confidential" will confuse the audience
just as much as "The Usual Suspects"
did is not, because the payoff here,
though perfectly satisfying, cannot even
compete with the raw thrill that was the
finale of the latter film. What sets "L.A.0
Confidential" apart from that film is its
focus not on likable criminals, but on
often unlikable cops. While the film
drags at times, it quickly picks up again
and never loses sight of its center: these
three morally ambiguous men desper-
ately trying to do the right thing, and
the absorbing performances that make
up their intricately compelling story.
F-
Happy Hour 4pm -7 pm
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