The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 7A
The Michigan Daily - michigandailycom Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 7A
Sundance shorts shine
The Michigan puts on
new shorts as part of
Park City's festival
By EMILY BOUDREAU
DailyArts Writer
It's easy to lose sight of what the Sun-
dance Film Festival is all about in the
midst of all the fur vests and celebrities
who flock to Salt Lake
City in the wintertime.
But somewhere in those Sundance
hoards of people, the $hots 2010
spirit and potential of
the independent film Atthe
still reigns. The short Michigan
films for the 2011 Fes- Today at 9:30 p.m.
tival have managed to
capture that spirit for
the most part and blend both tragedy and
comedy from a diverse range of cultural
backgrounds.
The first film in the eight-film series
is "The Six Dollar Fifty Man." It tells the
story of a boy who creates a fantasy world
in order to escape bullies at school, as well
as the drone of ordinary life. While cer-
tainly awell-made film, the child actors in
"The Six Dollar Fifty Man" can't hold up
against the vibrant characters portrayed
by more mature actors in other films.
"Birthday" and "Rob and Valentyna
in Scotland" both deal with complex
love relationships between adults in a
harsh reality. The performances of the
actors (particularly Kimi Reichenberg
as Valentyna) infuse their cinematically
striking yet painful worlds with delicate
and often tender emotions. Both films
attempt to tackle challenging and con-
troversial subject matter. "Birthday" is
a Polish film about a lesbian couple and
the strain their relationship undergoes
as they create a family. "Rob and Valen-
tyna in Scotland" is perhaps the most
contentious of the short films as it tells
the story of a somewhat incestuous love
story betweentwo cousins.
The most vibrant of the films is "Mr.
Okra," a documentary about a man who
sells fruits and vegetables from his truck
in New Orleans. Though simple, "Mr.
Okra" successfully captures the per-
sonality of both the man and his city as
he cruises through the streets, singing
about his vegetables and philosophizing
about life.
However, "Mr. Okra" isn't the only
splash of color and lightheartedness.
In fact, the vast majority of these films
attempt to put a lighthearted spin on
matters. "Young Love" is precisely what
its title suggests - a satirical musing on
a relationship - but it's got the added
bonus of having llamas in it. "My Invis-
ible Friend" is actually a very sad story
about isolation and a boy who is too shy
to even ask his own father to pass him
the salt at the dinner table. But director
Pablo Larcuen infuses it with warmth
- and a half-naked man in an Admiral
Ackbar mask. There's also "My Rabbit
Hobby," shot in home-video style that
almost twists into a mockingly terrible
horror movie.
But by far the funniest of the films is
"Drunk History," where booze-infused
comedian Jen Kirkman tells the story
of Frederick Douglass (Don Cheadle,
"Brooklyn's Finest") and Abraham Lin-
coln (Will Ferrell, "The Other Guys").
Though it's part of the website Funny
or Die's "Drunk History" series, the film
could be interpreted as an interesting
take on the way historical narratives can
be manipulated.
There is one animation in the short
film series, called "Wisdom Teeth."
Basically, it's one cartoon guy pulling
out another's wisdom teeth stitches
with calamitous results. It's bizarre and
kind of grotesque, but at the same time,
it's hard to avoid an occasional burst of
laughter - whether that laughter results
from discomfort or some kernel of humor
is hard to discern.
COURTESY OF MERGE
After 10 days with Proactiv, his skin began to clear up.
Destroyer breaks
ground on albu-m
'The Way Back'a step ahead
By IMRAN SYED
Daily Arts Writer
A 4,000-mile walk sure is impressive,
but does it make for a good movie? "The
Way Back" - a beautiful story of Soviet
prisoners who walk
all the way from
Siberia through bit-
ter cold and unfor- The Way Back
giving desert toward
India and freedom At Rave
- shows that the Newmarket
answer is yes.
Based on the book
"The Long Walk," the film is an allegedly
true account - "allegedly" because ques-
tions about the authenticity of the story
have swirled since the book was first pub-
lished more than 50 years ago. Seemingly
confirmed as a fabrication at one point,
"The Long Walk" was recently redeemed
when a former Polish POW living in Eng-
land revealed the account was true, and
thathe in fact was amongthose who made
the journey from Siberia to India.
Truthiness aside, the film is an admi-
rable production that manages to convey
the heartbreaking reality of its charac-
ters' lives without going overboard on
sentiment or theatrics.
Political prisoners being worked to
death in hellish labor camps in the far
reaches of Siberia, eight men hatch a plot
to escape. But breaching the barbed wire
fence is just the first of their challenges:
They must then walk thousands of miles
through blinding snowstorms and frigid
temperatures unimaginable to anyone
who hasn't been to Siberia - all without
adequate food to sustain them.
By JOE DIMUZIO
Daily Arts Writer
Destroyerisunpredictable. FromThe
New Pornos' pop to Dan Bejar's work
as a solo artist, which flirts with and
disregards indie pre-
dilections with a sort
of chaotic panache,*
Bejar's music is like De r
the lemon perched on
your glass of water at Kaputt
a new restaurant. You M
didn't know, ask for Merge
or expect it. And it's a
little fruity.
Kaputt is Destroyer's ninth and fruiti-
est LP yet. Following 2009's Bay of Pigs
and 2010's Archer on the Beach EP's
ambient diary-turned-disco, Kaputt
flaunts sultry saxophone, funky fretless
bass and 4/4 beats without irony. Acous-
tic guitars and keyboards give way to
muted trumpets and flute, smoothly gaz-
ing two-chords-and-reverb - Kenny G
was cool.
It may not be the
new pornography,
but 'Kaputt' rocks.
Chillwave this is not. Bejar's paint-
ing in hip colors with Kaputt, but he
transcends gimmick. "Chinatown"
and "Kaputt," two of his most acces-
sible tunes ever, don't hide behind gauze;
they're not afraid of every piece, note and
riff standing in spit-shine spotlight. Fel-
low Vancouverite Sibel Thrasher plays
back-up vocalistloBejar's sexy, theatri-
cal free-verse, and she's really singing
- chilly white-soul like D.D. Jackson or
any number of disco divas lost in time.
So while Destroyer's Bowie-Bryan
Ferry-Coke-Gil Evans-Lindstrom make-
over is cool, it's looking forward. Here,
Bejar's melodies are given the space
and groove his older work seldom had.
Where manic-pop used to be, deliber-
ate, widescreen-but-intimate jams have
moved in, with room to breathe.
And where past Destroyer had Bejar
breathing heavy, here he's relaxed. His
voice, which for some may be a hur-
dle (get over it), resembles something
between a French Revolution re-enactor
and pillow talk. On Kaputt, he forgoes
his old verbosity for impressionism.
But like the best disco, the voice is
more than just another instrument.
Destroyer's lyrics have often been a
sort of catch-all abstraction, capable
of disorientation and directness all at
once. Kaputt gives those words a new
space, a looser but definite focus. In a
recent interview, Bejar claimed to have
recorded most of the vocals "while fix-
ing ... a sandwich," which sounds about
right. Pair it with a couple of gin and ton-
ics, Thrasher's pipes and arguably the
real vocalist of the album - JP Carter's
trumpet solos -Kaputt has plenty to say.
But dissecting the lyrics would need
another review. Overall, the music
speaks for itself. "Blue Eyes" gazes,
grooves and rips in equal measure.
"Savage Night at the Opera" rides out
a New Order bass pump, unafraid of a
nasty little guitar solo to cry all over
the songs' new-age climb. The title
track and "Suicide Demo For Kara
Walker" are perfect songs for looking
out of car windows, airplane windows,
getting fucked up. And if all of Kaputt
sounds samey to you, you're right. But
it's like a 50-minute tone-poem with
enough detail, purpose and sprawl to
make every listen different. By the time
you get to the album-closing "Bay of
Pigs," you've been places.
So, Destroyer's breaking ground
and it's transportative stuff. It's not
for everyone, which is fine. Unpredict-
able as ever, Kaputt makes it clear that
Destroyer is anything but normal.
"This way to the Shire!"
After overcoming impossible odds to
get out of the tundra and over the Soviet
line, the prisoners learn that Mongolia
is also under communist control, and
they won't be truly safe until they walk
through to China. They brave the Gobi
Dessert, and then traverse the Himalayas
before entering British India to complete
their stunning journey to freedom.
Parts of the film are in Russian (with
subtitles), but the majority is in accented
English. Nevertheless, audiences won't
feel inclined to question its authentic-
ity. Benefiting from a talented cast -
including Hollywood regulars Ed Harris
("Appaloosa"), Jim Sturgess ("21"), Sao-
irse Ronan ("The Lovely Bones") and
Colin Farrell ("In Bruges"), in addition
to lesser-known American and foreign
actors - the film manages to keep its epic
story on a fathomable scale for its viewers.
Never does it get lost in its own grandeur,
and that is more than can be said for most
Hollywood productions.
There are, of course, moments of agony
for the escapees, and several of them die
excruciating deaths along the way. The
suffering is immense, but portrayed on
the small scale and thus kept very person-
al - most readily reminiscent of the hours
spent under the rubble in Oliver Stone's
"World Trade Center."
Hollywood's finest
shipped to Siberia.
Audiences may not exactly leap at the
prospectof 133 minutesofpain and agony,
but "The Way Back" presents its tragedy
in a way that understands the limits of a
viewer. Director Peter Weir could have
presented much more graphic material
and defended it as authentic. He chose
instead to lighten an impossibly sad story
with humor and personality. The result is
a film that is perhaps far more watchable
than something this inhumane should be.
New season of 'Archer'
sharpens its humor
NBC's 'Couples' perfectly boring
By JAMIE BLOCK
Daily Arts Writer
What happens when a couple of
comedic actresses with moderate cult
followings join a bunch of wayward,
relative unknowns
for a campy couples
series that none
of them seem to Perfect Couples
belong in? Nothing
good. Nothing at Pilot
all, really.
Even from it's Thursdays at 8:30 p.m.
name, "Perfect NBC
Couples" seems
like an ill-advised choice for NBC to
throw into its now three-hour Thursday
comedy block. This isn't clever, oddball
ensemble comedy. This is derivative
dysfunctional-couple humor that's been
done a bajillion times before, and often
better. Sometimes it's not even clear
where the jokes are in "Perfect Couples"
- and when one is detectable, it's just
not funny.
First of all, what the hell is Olivia
Munn, geek goddess of former G4 fame
and recent correspondent on "The Daily
Show with Jon Stewart," doing in a ter-
rible romantic comedy like this? She
should be surrounded by cosplay, lasers,
irony and gadgets, not stale lines about
how great her husband is. To make mat-
ters worse, Munn's acting in "Couples"
is pretty awful. She can't get away with
looking like she's trying to be funny any-
more. This isn't "Attack of the Show," and
she doesn't fit here.
Equally strange to find in this campy
crap is Mary Elizabeth Ellis ("It's Always
Sunny in Philadelphia"). She's great at
acting bitchy, and that's what makes her
character so enjoyable on "Sunny." And
while there's something simply off about
watching Ellis in a couple that's sup-
posed to be at least partially functional,
she's still the only actor on "Couples"
who makes the character seem believ-
able in the real world.
Comedy night
done wrong.
Her competition isn't particularly
strong, though. Worst of all is Hayes
MacArthur ("Worst Week"), who always
sounds like he's reading lines off a script
- in the sixth grade. His inflection is all
wrong, his timing is terrible and he can't
even pronounce "jewelry." This is not the
guy who should be playing the worldly
hot-shot, even if that hot-shot is sup-
posed to be kind of a douche.
Then there's David Walton ("Heist"),
who always seems to be on drugs or from
another planet. The character is written
to be a ridiculous caricature of the slov-
enly, weird dude, and Walton's deadpan
delivery only serves to make it unclear
whether he's even supposed to be funny.
Rounding out the cast are Kyle Born-
heimer ("Worst Week") and Christine
Woods ("FlashForward"), who both
manage to look eerily familiar without
having been featured in anything anyone
watched. While they don't suck as much
as MacArthur and Walton, they give
depressingly one-note performances of
the awkward goofball and hyper-sensi-
tive working wife, respectively.
What really sums up "Perfect Cou-
ples" is the feeling you have after watch-
ing it - or rather, the fact that you won't
feel anything at all, or even be sure
you really did watch it. You won't have
laughed, it'll be hard to remember what
the stories were and you probably won't
remember any of the characters' names,
but the clock will still show half an hour
later than it did when you sat down to
watch NBC's brand new comedy. It's
the best possible physical manifestation
of the Platonic idea of a waste of time.
"Perfect Couples" doesn't amuse, enter-
tain, enrage or annoy. It just happens,
and that's one of the worst things a TV
show can do.
By JAMIE BLOCK
DailyArts Writer
After far too long a break, Sterling
Archer is back in the danger zone. The
writers of FX's breakout animated
comedy "Archer"
put their off-time to
good use, crafting a *
second season that, Archer
if its premiere is any
indication, focuses Season Two
on what worked best Premiere
in last year's batch of
episodes. Thursdays at10 p.m.
Right off the bat, FX
that means much
more back-and-forth between Archer
(H. Jon Benjamin, "Important Things
with Demetri Martin") and Lana
(Aisha Tyler, "Ghost Whisperer").
Their swift transitions between per-
fect spy team and dysfunctional couple
are more hilarious than ever, and their
banter is perfectly paced to maximize
laughs. While there may be funnier
individual characters on other shows,
there's no couple on TV right now that
comes close to matching Archer and
Lana's tag-team hilarity.
The refined second season also
means more cultural references cour-
tesy of our dynamic duo. Returning are
Archer's constant self-comparisons to
action heroes, joined by less-expect-
ed cultural nods to "The Lorax" or
"Where the Red Fern Grows." And as
always, "Archer" trusts its audience to
be smart, slipping references into the
middle of conversations without mak-
ing it too obvious. Not only does getting
the reference make viewers laugh, it
also makes them feel smart.
Sadly, "Archer" can't just be the
Archer and Lana show. The rest of
the cast is greatly marginalized in
the season premiere, but even the few
scenes in which they appear just don't
pack much of a comedic punch. While
putting Archer and Lana together is
always a great idea, putting them away
from everyone else leaves the rest of
the cast flailing without a solid come-
dic anchor.
If any other complaint could be
made, it's that the season premiere's
storyline was the show's most anti-cli-
mactic to date. But while the lack of a
shootout ending was a bit of a letdown,
the fact that Archer and Lana went
through explosions, alligators, dry ice
injuries and putting up with each other,
all for nothing, is probably the most fit-
ting possible way to sum up their whole
schtick.
Call Kenny
Loggins: 'Archer'
has returned.
"Archer" is one of the most intel-
ligent comedies currently around. It's
written by smart people, for smart peo-
ple and about smart people (who hap-
pen to do ridiculously dumb things).
And with a second season promising
humor that is more self-referential,
pop cultural and socially unacceptable,
it's only getting smarter from here.