8A - The Michigan Daily - Monday, November 25, 2002 r- ART S * * Have you made your list yet? * * r iBook Special Student Price: $1215 You Save: $271 12 in.Display / 800 MHz / 128MB SDRAM / 30G / Ethernet / DVD-ROM, CD-RW Combo drive / 3 year warranty & phone support Courtesy of New Line It's kinda like a frame within a frame. 'Friday After Next' retains appeal of series thanks to clever writing By Josh Neldus For the Daily Mac Special Student Price: $1739 You Save: $352 m If it ain't broke, don't fix it. That was the intention of producer Ice Cube when making "Friday After Next," the third installment in the "Friday" series. Ice Cube reuses many of the plotlines, types of humor and even exact lines that made "Fri- day" and "Next Friday" so success- ful. But "Friday After Next" also brings in its own original elements, and it is these new twists combined with the old, familiar essentials that make this movie worthwhile. Like its predecessors, "Friday After Next" finds Chris Jones (Ice Cube, "All About the Benjamins") trying to make it through another Friday. The movie opens in the apartment where Chris now resides with his cousin Day-Day (Mike Epps, "All About the Benjamins"). It's the night before Christmas, and the only creature stir- ring is a sneaky Santa Claus. This crooked Claus steals all of the boys' presents and their rent money, setting up the money problems that Chris always seems to fall into on Fridays. Just like the first two, the minimal plot consists of how Craig can get enough money to avoid another dis- ,tfou Fiday. The majority dlf the day is spent following Craig and Day-Day at their new jobs as security guards at an outdoor shopping center. There's no doubt that this somewhat ironic employment will provide the interactions that this movie needs to keep alive the "Friday" traditions. Like the last two Fridays, Craig and his helpless sidekick get into physical danger. It is not Deebo that threatens Craig's safety this time, but his landlord's son, Damon (Terry Crews), who has recently been released from jail. The jail time has brought about some changes in FRIDAY Damon's sexual prefer- Ni ence, and neither Craig nor Day-Day wish to be At Shov his welcoming home Quali gift. Amidst all of the New Lin conflicts and problems. that seem to character- ize Craig's Fridays, he always seems to find time to kick back; relax and forget about his problems with the help of a little marijuana. A Friday wouldn't be complete without getting high, after all. Of course, someone does take a beating at the end of the movie, because Friday also wouldn't be complete unless someone "got knocked the fuck out!" Other than Craig and Day-Day, "Friday After $ext" brings back some of the other classic characters from the first twM iiIsfllments. John With- erspoon is back as Willie, Craig's dad. However, the bathroom humor that made him so funny in the first two is subdued to a short stint near the end wca litys le C of the film. Don "D.C." Curry returns as Uncle Elroy, creating competition with his brother Willie throughout the movie. Anna Maria Horsford comes back as Mrs. Jones, Craig's mother, and making a crowd pleasing return appearance at the end of the movie party is Pinky, played by Clifton Powell. But "Fri- day After Next" also sees some new actors making their "Friday" debuts. ELFTER Following in the foot- :T steps of Nia Long and Lisa Rodriguez comes ase and the stunning K.D. y 16 Aubert ("The Scorpion 'inema King"), who plays Donna, the new apple of Craig's eye. Like his past two interests, there are obstacles I 17 in. Display / 800MHz / 256MB SDRAM / 80G / Ethernet/ DVD-ROM, CD-RW superdrive / 3 year warranty & phone support Craig must overcome to win over Donna. The biggest, or actually smallest, obstacle is Donna's current boyfriend, a short wannabe-pimp by the name of Money Mike, portrayed by comedian Katt Williams. Williams' "Friday" debut is also his film debut, and he has signed with NBC to create and star in his own family sitcom. Ice tubemakes the necessary changes to produce another "Friday" so that the connections ate d 0-- but the movie still has originality. "Friday After Next" keeps its focus on Friday but it's downright funny any day of the week. ; PowerBook Special Student Price: $1999 You Save: $494 Nelson's 'Grey Zone' focuses on shock instead of characters 15.2 in. Display / 867MHz / 256MB SDRAM / 40G / Ethernet / DVD-ROM, CD-RW Combo drive / 3 year warranty & phone support _ ri)Pa iWod 5GB Special Student Price: $249 You Save: $20 10GB Special Student Price: $319 You Save: $50 20GB Special Student Price: $394 You Save: $75 By Stephanie Kapera Daily Arts Writer "The Grey Zone" is being promoted as "The story you haven't heard" which - besides being a self-conscious reference to our culture's fascination with the Holocaust, and to the staggering number of.Holocaust stories we have accumulated - is an ironic way to promote a film in which it is difficult to actually hear anyone at all. Shooting for some outrageous level of gruesomeness, dialogue in "The Grey Zone" is whispered, muffled and eventually rendered somewhat irrelevant in the face of the film's grim and often unbearable visuals. This film does, on some levels, hold true to its tagline. It is undeniably a departure from Holocaust narratives as we have come to know them. Instead of focusing on the Nazis as monsters, "The Grey Zone" tells the story of one of Auschwitz's 13 Son- THE GR derkommandos. The Sonderkommandos were special squads of Jewish prisoners who At Ma took care of a lot of the Nazis' dirty work in Lion exchange for a few extra months to live. In theory, this issue is riddled with moral complexity. These Jews - played by David Arquette and Steve Buscemi, among others - were responsible for telling prisoners that, once they left the "showers," they would be fed and reunited with their families. Their tasks also included throwing dead bodies - sometimes the bodies of their own relatives - into the furnaces and dealing with the ashes that remained. The film wants desperately to ask: What are we capable of doing? How much are we willing to betray in order to stay alive? Director Tim Blake Nelson ("O") adapted the true story of Dr. Miklos Nyiszli and turned it into the centerpiece of his screenplay. Nyiszli was a Hungarian Jew chosen by Dr. Joseph Mengele to be one of the physicians who per- formed medical experiments on Jews at Auschwitz. Along- side Nyiszli lived the 13 Sonderkommandos, the 12th of which organized the only armed uprising ever to take place as Auschwitz, which serves as the film's climax. Towards the end of the war, these men succeeded in partially destroying the camp's crematoriums. There is a sense that narrative arc is a foreign concept to Nelson. The first half-hour of the film is a blur of con- fusion because, try as we might, it is difficult to differen- tiate between the half-dozen ash-smeared male faces that make up the cast. The film dives right into its subject mattr wh1ich is nerhans an attemnt hby Nelson to nortraiv Although this scene is affecting, the film's lack of plot development or an even tone takes away from the emotion- al punch it should deliver. The other subplot involves a fourteen year-old Hungarian girl who survived the gas chamber because her face was in a wet pocket of air. The men organizing the revolt, along with Dr. Nyiszli, take it upon themselves to make her a sort of personal crusade: they want to see her live. This is a futile plot move in many ways, since the motivation these men feel to save this one child is never fully explained. It too lacks emotional force. All of the performances are admirable, as is the film itself. It is difficult to be harsh on a film that undoubted- ly has good intentions. "The Grey Zone" does a lot of interesting things. It does show us things we haven't seen before, and it is a fairly intriguing moral trap to spend a few hours inside. Yet something about it just doesn't work. Maybe the truth is that good inten- ;Y ZONE tions don't necessarily result in a good movie. The film closes with the Hungarian stone girl, narrating from her death, speaking Gate briefly about being burned and turning into the ash that covers the men's faces. This should bring us to a certain emotional height, but because of the film's messy plot, and lack of character development, we are left unsure of how to feel. "The Grey Zone" has, as far as quality and watchability is con- cerned, landed in a sort of Grey Zone of its own. IF ad 's C Choose your size: 5GB, 10GB or 20 GB Available for both Mac and Windows * * Special UM Holiday Pricing * U-M Computer Showcase 64-SALES * '$' ,. AW