The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com Monday, January 22. 2007 - 5A Photos courtesyof Sidecho They cut a striking silhouette, but Stars of Track and Field offers little more than that. 'Stars' stumble on the starting block Through another lens SISTER FILM TO 'FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS' REFLECTS ON OTHER SIDE OF WAR By IMRAN SYED Daily Arts Writer Dropped into the year-end schedule as qui- etly as his "Million Dollar Baby" was two years ago and inspiring a simi- larly forceful reception from critics, Clint East- * wood's "Letters From Letters From Iwo Jima" went from an Iwo Jima obscure passion project to a forerunner in the At the awards race. But while Showcase and its deft direction and Quality 16 Oscar-bait source mate- W rial prove more than a match for that turnaround, can a man, even one as peerless as Eastwood, sell a film that dares to humanize America's fiercest enemy in its deadliest international war - and do it while war again holds sway over the nation? Oh. And there are subtitles, too. Like most films that seek precision and tact in their depiction of war, "Iwo Jima" is a char- acter-rich story in which the war serves as both backdrop and driving force. As the Allies bring Germany to the brink of capitulation on the European front ofWorld War II, American forces inch closer to Tokyo, encounteringthe vehement resistance of a cultural philosophy they could never hope to understand. Perhaps the grittiest battle of all was fought on the eight square miles of sulfur from which the movie takes its name - Iwo Jima, a crucial foothold for the American invasion of the Japanese mainland. Just months ago, "Flags of Our Fathers," Eastwood's sister film to "Iwo Jima," told the American side of this same struggle, and the two films are tied together by more than just Eastwood's direction. Both explore the incom- By ANNA ASH Daily Arts Writer The band is named after a Belle and Sebastian tune. They're from Portland, Ore. The ** cover of their debut album The Stars has flowers of Track and a dove and Field on it. Perhaps it's expected Centuries Before that there are even more Sidecho flowers and birds when you open up the case. Unfortunately for Stars of Track and Field, Centuries Before Love and War confirms the suspicions one might have about the group's role in the indie-music scene: a repackaging of recognizably indie motifs. Oddly, Stars of Track and Field almost acknowledges its own banality. "We called the CD Cen- turies Before Lave and War due to the fact that all the lyrics deal with maligned memory and love loss," bandmember Kevin Calaba said in the group's press release. One of the group's (self-pro- claimed) unconventional charac- teristics is its lack of bass. When bass player Moxley Stratton left a few years ago, the band replaced him with a faceless, digital fourth member, making this, their first full-length album, also their first attempt at the com- bination of analog and digital. The results are sub- par. The album's first track, "Centuries," begins with a quiet blend of digital drum and keyboard samples. It crescendos with electric guitar and simplistic vocals rhyming "face" and "space," and then - getthis - fadeswith a blend of quiet digital drum and keyboard samples, perfectly adhering to the pre-packaged definition of indie rock Many of their songs also con- tain lyrics with strangely graphic undertones. Take, for example, the chorus in "Movies of Antarctica": "Faded prints and sample times / Novas thrashing in your eyes" and in "Fantastic," the lyrics "You'll light on fire / I'll be outside / Last one to'notice / Run for your life / I watched you suffer from the first floor." Though these lines are prob- ably metaphorical, this scopophili- ac behavior is one of the creepier, more novel aspects of the album. They need more sliced tomatoes on the front lines. prehensible despair of war, the kind that envel- ops soldiers even as they struggle to bring it upon their enemy. While "Flags" pointed out that even "the right war" may have been fought with indelible wrongs that linger decades later, "Iwo Jima" allows an even more personal por- trayal of the Japanese war front, seen through the eyes of Lt. Gen. Tadamichi Kuribayashi (Ken Watanabe, "The Last Samurai") and a motley handful of his doomed division. A young soldier named Saigo (Kazunari Ninomiya) serves as our guide to the private insecurities of the Japanese infantry, and the film takes great care to portray him and the rest of his unit as drafted civilians whose reluctance and uncertainty define the audience's view of them. Raised in an empire that touts giving one's life for the emperor as the greatest of all duties, it's inconceivable for these soldiers to privilege their own lives, or even those of their families. Kuribayashi puts the mentality best in his solemn farewell to one young soldier: Though he swore to fight till death to protect his family, just the thought of his family makes that a difficult task. The film explores in great detail the Japa- nese army's strict code of honor, particularly the belief that suicide is better than capture. While American audiences may recoil at the thought of entire regiments killing themselves, it's fascinating to note that we're not nearly as repulsed by hundreds of thousands of young men killing each other. Besides its endearing young soldiers (whom no audience could mistake for enemies), the film's portrait of Kuribayashi is what makes the film a worthy character piece. In reality, Lt. Gen. Kuribayashi was among the most daring and brilliant officers on the Japanese side, and Watanabe brings sufficient honor and rever- ence to the role while still humanizing him to non-Japanese audiences. Having lived and studied in America, Kurib- ayashi considered the country to be the world's foremost armory and thus opposed Japan's course of provocation. His time in America also put him in the unenviable position of under- standing, and perhaps even pitying, the young marines who stormed the beach he was com- missioned to protect, and the diligent officer was then seen by his peers as weak and, even worse, an enemy sympathizer. One of this film's harshest wartime cruelties is simply that its bravest minds end up its most dismissed. Much like "Flags," "Iwo Jima" isn't perfect - it lacks thematic coherence, which leads it periodically to fall back on war-movie cliches, like the too-curtly-cut flashback sequences between Saigo and his pregnant wife. But East- wood's dedication to the delicate story is clear. Will critical acclaim nudge Middle America into seeing a film about the people who killed thousands of its own soldiers? Time will tell, but like last year's "Brokeback Mountain," the most thematically challenging American films may remain largerly unseen. An elaborate rehashing of all Shapiro goes 'Disco' s e. A lack of musical ability is not what makes the album disappoint- ing. Band members Jason Bell, Kevin Calaba and Daniel Orvik all know how to play their instru- ments and manipulate sounds, and both Calaba's vocals and Bell's har- monies are pleasing to the ear. What doesn't work is the bleak absence of remotely creative, which makes the album downright pathetic. Stars of Track and Field is so bent on fitting the indie mold that their music teeters danger- ously on the fence between emu- lation and imitation - and the comparisons, or sources of inspira- tion, are extensive. The guitar on "Movies in Antarctica" sounds like Coldplay, the digital drum beat on "With You" like The Postal Service and the intro to "Fantastic" like Stereolab. If this album were released 10 years ago, Stars of Track and Field might deserve some praise for its efforts. But it wasn't. And it doesn't. )BEL LAUREATES: SS MEETING IS . 29,7:30 P.M. IURON ST. to little effect Disc uct ofi duced dancea hazyr tion o frantic scene c late '70 movem( de-emp sized s songwr By MATT KIVEL arrangements of the '70s. Electronic Daily Arts Writer beats and synths pervade the eight songs on the Shapiro/Agebjorn con- o music was a distinct prod- coctionDisco Romance's. Agebjorn's its time - easily mass-pro- arrangements are lush and roomy, and using minimal instrumentation to ble, a heighten the tension before and reflec- ** N A during the soaring choruses. if the Shapiro's performance is sweet club Sally and unassuming. She doesn't proj- of the Shapiro ect her voice like a typical pop diva s. The Disco Romance but rather lets the words roll off in ent Wind-Up a restrained and breathy croon. Her ha- obvious contemporary is Annie, the inger- singer who covered similar Euro- iters and championed the pop territory on 2005'sAnniemal. Sally Shapiro has disco chops: glitzy singles with little substance. I'll be by your side tonight / When the world is falling all apart / I'll be by your side tonight." There's an effortless familiarity to the melo- dies, as if these songs were written in some bygone era. WhereAnniemal was captivating and unpredictable, Disco Romance falters as a full-length album, with the revelatory singles frontloaded on the tracklist and the rest of the record homogeneous and overlong. Agebjorn repeatedly reaches into the same bag of production tricks with diminishing returns. Individually, the songs are club- worthy forays into electro-disco, suggesting the genre may be better relegated to EP and single releases rather than full length LPs. Disco was sustained by singles, and Disco Romance is a case in point. dynamic of producer-performer, a throwback to the early years of pop music when producers controlled nearly every aspect of composing and recording while artists were left to deliver precise performances (the Bee Gees being a notable excep- tion). The music was ornate and kitschy, self-consciously disposable with strong hooks and flimsy lyrical content." Disco's high period was relative- ly brief, but its impact carries on to present day. Producer John Ageb- jorn and his reluctant disco queen, Sally Shapiro, still make songs that reflect the ideals of the disco era; they're romantic and groove-based, with steady dance beats and memo- rable choruses. But although the music is solidly disco in its construction, the instru- mental textures are a far cry from the horns and overblown string Do we really need to bring back disco? But while there are many paral- lels between the two, Annie's more innovative and domineering musi- cal persona lead to a more mature and debut record. That said, Shapiro's lead singles "I know" and "I'll be by your side" are instantly catchy and rival the best of Anniemal. Both songs are led by Agebjorn's oscillating mix of synths and bass drum, which precisely compliment the straight- forward lyrical phrases, "When you feel so lonely in your heart / SPRINGBREAK INFORMATION 800-488-8828 www.sandpiperbeacon.com FREE SPRING BREAK MODEL SEARCH CALENDAR 'VALI FOR FIRST1 000 RESERVATIONS. I U Sample Roundtrip Airfares From Detroit to: New York $151 Amsterdam $298 Philadelphia $151 London $302 Tallahassee $202 Paris $312 "Innovation Challenges for the 21 Century" Dr. Eugene S. Meieran Senior Intel Fellow Intel Corporation Wednesday, January 24, 2007 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm Ross School of Business, Room E1540 www.tmi.umich.edu I a. StudentUniverse.com I