6A — Monday, November 21, 2016
Arts
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

KENDALL JENNER

In the words of Paris Hilton, “that’s hot.”

Somewhere, on the night 

of 
Kendall 
Jenner’s 
21st 

birthday, Paris Hilton laughed. 
Not because she was denied 
access to a club — although 
her track record is not clean of 
such incidents. No, that brisk 
November 
evening, 
Hilton 

laughed for all that she once 
loved.

The outfit Jenner donned 

for her special day was a direct 
reference 
to 
everything 
the 

fashion world has worked to 
forget: the first ten years of the 
21st century. She found a photo 
of Hilton in a racy crystal slip, 
and redid it in the form of a nine 
thousand dollar imitation.

2006 was back, if only for a 

night.

This is not me urging you 

resurrect your shutter shades and 
Livestrong wristbands. Please do 
not. Rather, I’m here to address 
what 
most 
industry 
experts 

have long since stuffed in a junk 
drawer alongside their Neopets. 
No, not their Hannah Montana 
Fan Club memorabilia (which 
I definitely do not have). I’m 
talking about early 2000s fashion 
in the United States of America.

The fashion of this 
first 

decade was, above all, fun. Color 
coordination was a must. If you 
didn’t have pink clip-in hair 
extensions, you could probably 
say goodbye to your Pictochat 
group. Using a scarf as a belt? 
Congratulations on your street 
cred. Not even the popularity of 
TV programs like “The Fashion 
Police” (may Queen Rivers rest 
in peace) could stop Ashley 
Tisdale from wearing a pleated 
skirt over her gauchos. I can’t 
really pretend to know what 
sparked this ten-year wave of 
rampant eccentricism, but I sure 
am glad I was here to see it wash 
over an entire country.

Though some of the most 

poignant 
examples 
of 
this 

movement 
involve 
women’s 

fashion, men, too, made their 
fair share of bold clothing 
choices. Baggy jeans for the hip-
hop set, fedoras for the scholarly 

types. Before he became the 
poster child of the modern-day 
streetwear movement, Kanye 
West was a 2000s fashion icon, 
advocating for neon sweaters 
and unnecessary scarves simply 
by wearing them in public.

Perhaps such quirkiness was 

merely an outgrowth of the 
slightly-more-punk yet slightly-
less-everything-else fashion of 
the nineties. It’s probable. But 
perhaps it stood for something 
more, a form of release for a 
nation in grieving. The early 
aughts of America were the 
perfect breeding ground for a 
strange form of nuanced sadness, 
one that still perpetrates our 
lives today. It cannot be a 
coincidence that some of the 
most 
iconic 
movies, 
books 

and clothing trends American 
popular culture has ever set 
forth came to light in a time 
of tragedy. I’m not saying that 
nationalism was on the forefront 
of every woman’s mind when 
she put on a tie-dye poncho, but 
there may have been something 
subconscious involved, a desire 
bubbling beneath that crocheted 
surface.

As is historically the case, 

this Western-derived movement 
rippled across the world in no 
time. In 2002, Versace debuted 
a couture collection full of 
gem-covered gowns in hues of 
lime green, hot pink and, on 
several occasions, rainbow. At 
the same time, commonplace 
stores 
like 
Target 
boasted 

brightly 
patterned 
dresses 

that 
were 
supposed 
to 
be 

worn over leggings. By 2005, 
nearly everyone in the clothing 
industry had both feet in the 
fun-loving 
bandwagon, 
from 

high-end designers to bargain 
brands. Even Abercrombie, the 
most subdued (and overpriced) 
of every mall’s mega-retailers, 
offered up their fair share of 
bubble skirts and lace-trimmed 
camis (both of which were, 
indeed, overpriced).

We 
can’t 
talk 
2000s-era 

fashion without making mention 
of celebrity clothing lines. Jay 
Z and Damon Dash’s Rocawear, 
Avril Lavigne’s Abbey Dawn, 
Miley Cyrus’s collaboration with 

Max Azria for Walmart. For 
many of the decade’s rich and 
famous, the notion of creating 
a personal brand appeared to 
mean more than the clothes 
themselves. In other words, 
we may never have seen Miley 
wearing 
the 
cheetah 
print 

pants from her own collection, 
but it didn’t matter. The charm 
brought about by a big name, 
coupled with an adherence to 
the style of the decade, was 
enough 
to 
make 
celebrity-

curated clothes a “thing” for a 
brief moment in time.

But why should we care about 

any of this in 2016? We have 
iPhones and a celebrity as our 
president-elect. Why does it 
matter what we were doing ten 
years ago?

It’s common knowledge that 

the trends of the past shape what 
we wear in the present, so it only 
makes sense that elements of ’00s 
fashion have made a resurgence. 
I was going to say that they “have 
come back to haunt us,” but I 
am wearing a tattoo choker as I 
write this, so I’m not one to talk. 
All kidding aside, look around. 
Tracksuits are back for both 
men and women. “Bellybutton 
shirts” have been reincarnated 
in through the modern crop top. 
Rapper Tyler, The Creator is at 
the helm of a successful, color-
happy clothing label, Golf Wang. 
I don’t speak French, but I can 
confidently say that 2016 has 
given me a sense of fashion déjà 
vu that I have yet to experience 
at any other time.

No, Kendall Jenner’s 21st 

birthday 
number 
was 
not 

groundbreaking. 
It 
was 
a 

friendly reminder of fashion’s 
blinged-out, bubbly past, one 
that we so often forget in lieu of 
the stone-cold seriousness that 
plagues the industry today.

I hope Paris Hilton is still 

laughing. 
Her 
Cavalli-meets-

Juicy Couture sense of style once 
meant the world to an entire 
industry. Who knows? Perhaps 
this form of fashion will come 
back in full force, hair crimped, 
denim miniskirt riding up just a 
bit too high.

Thank you, 2006. I’m sure we 

haven’t seen the last of you.

TESS GARCIA
Daily Arts Writer

An ode to the fashion of the aughts 

Remembering a time where Paris Hilton and Pictochat reigned

Thrillers have one job, and it’s 

in the name: they need to thrill 
their 
audience. 
Everything, 

be it the performances, the 

direction or the editing, is 
in the service of aiding and 
abetting the adrenaline junkies 
in the theater in getting their 
high. When it works, as it did 
with last year’s spectacularly 
unnerving “The Gift,” the result 
is a movie that stays with the 

viewer long after the credits 
have rolled. When it doesn’t, as 
is the unfortunate case of “Shut 
In,” the outcome is nothing 
more than an hour and a half of 
wasted time.

The premise, to be fair, is 

an innately creepy one. Mary 

JEREMIAH VANDERHELM

Daily Arts Writer

Cheap jump scares ruin the potential 
of vaguely scary thriller ‘Shut In’

Disappointing ghost story starring Naomi Watts is no ‘The Ring’

(Naomi Watts, “King Kong”) 
is a child psychologist who 
has to split her time between 
her practice and caring for her 
catatonic son, Stephen (Charlie 
Heaton, “Stranger 
Things”). After a 
young boy (Jacob 
Tremblay, “Room”) 
goes missing and 
is presumed dead, 
she begins to think 
that his spirit is 
haunting her. As 
a massive winter 
storm bears down 
on them, Mary and the spirit 
— or whatever is causing the 
disturbances — are trapped 
indoors.

That synopsis has a few things 

going for it: a claustrophobic 
setting, a fear of the unknown 
and a bit of a man (or woman, 
as the case may be) vs. nature 
theme. Somewhat stunningly, 
director 
Farren 
Blackburn 

(“Marvel’s 
Daredevil”) 

manages to take that promise 
and do absolutely nothing with 
it, instead choosing to focus 
on the same hackneyed jump 
scares that plague every two-bit 
horror or thriller flick.

Mary 
hears 
something 

outside. A raccoon jumps out 
at her. She hears something 
upstairs. The kindly gentleman 
who has taken a liking to her 

jumps out at her, as one does. 
Something supernatural jumps 
out at her. It’s a dream. It’s the 
same fake-out nonsense that 
has become the bane of these 

types of movies, 
put in by writers 
who have realized 
that they don’t 
have 
anything 

interesting 
in 

their 
film 
to 

keep 
audiences 

invested.

“Shut In” fits 

that 
profile 
to 

a T. The constant fake-out 
jump scares are tedious, but 
at least predicting how the 
overwrought 
build-up 
will 

amount to nothing can become 
a game in and of itself. Beyond 
that, the movie offers nothing. 
The performances, beyond a 
sadly 
underused 
Tremblay, 

range between disinterested 
and hammy to the point of 
hilarity. 
After 
the 
initial 

eeriness of the premise wears 
itself out, there’s no tension 
at all, just scene after scene of 
jump scares and Mary worrying 
about jump scares.

With all that in mind, the 

first two acts of “Shut In” are 
bad, but they’re forgettably bad. 
They’re inoffensively bad, more 
flat-out boring than anything 
else. Then the third act begins, 

and it begins with a twist 
so ill-advised and laughably 
ridiculous that it genuinely 
boggles the mind. There’s no 
build-up to it, no foreshadowing. 
It’s just a sudden left turn for the 
story to take for no other reason 
than, “Hey, other thrillers have 
twists. We should have a twist, 
too.”

What follows is a solid five 

minutes of exposition, so the 
audience 
understands 
that 

the subject of this twist is 
singlehandedly 
responsible 

for everything bad that has 
happened in the movie. What it 
amounts to is an extended game 
of hide-and-seek, with Mary 
hiding in a closet for what feels 
like a small eternity. Once again, 
there’s no tension, because 
not only does the audience 
not care about the characters, 
they’re still recovering from the 
hilarious shock to the system 
that was that twist.

“Shut In” could have been a 

tense, claustrophobic thriller 
with a talented cast. Instead, it 
never fails to treat itself with the 
utmost seriousness, even in its 
silliest moments, and it settles 
for something lesser. It’s boring 
and lazy in its storytelling, and 
outside of some genuinely well-
shot moments, there’s little 
above average or even plainly 
average to the rest of it.

EUROPACORP

“Where’s Barb?!”

D

“Shut in”

Rave & Quality 16

EuropaCorp

COLUMBIA RECORDS

Actually, the ‘Shrek’ soundtrack is his lasting legacy.

A cult-favorite poet from 

Quebec 
who 
wrote 
the 

most 
ubiquitous 
song 
of 

his 
generation, 
who 
didn’t 

command the largest audiences 
of his career until he was in his 
70s, who had limited vocal range 
but an endless vocabulary — 
Leonard Cohen looms as such a 
large figure in music because he 
never followed expectations or 
conventional wisdom, building 
the kind of career and biography 
that will never be replicated. 
His acclaimed catalog of music 
and writing, coupled with that 
transfixing voice, strong sense of 
style and Zen disposition, make 
you want to hang onto his every 
word, to try and use all he says a 
guide for living. He’s a musician 
second and a philosopher — 
lover of wisdom — first.

Songs of Leonard Cohen, 

the singer-songwriter’s nearly 
50-year-old debut record, still 
holds up as perhaps his most 
essential work. It’s not the 
album with “Hallelujah,” but it 
contains many of Cohen’s most 
beloved and oft-covered songs. 
It’s an ideal entry point into 
a lengthy, impressive career 
that never followed any kind 
of straightforward path. It was 
released in the ’60s, when folk 
music dominated the charts, but 
even now that its style feels of a 
different era, the idiosyncratic 
work of Songs remains an 
important, easy-to-obsess-over 
work of art.

Cohen announced himself 

in the most unbelievable way 
with “Suzanne,” the immortal 
opening track of Songs. The song 
is an out-of-body experience, as 
Cohen narrates an encounter 
by a river with a dream-like 
vision of a woman, with whom 
he draws explicit parallels to 

Jesus Christ. It’s barely a pop 
song, but rather a search for 
enlightenment — one man trying 
to understand life with just an 
acoustic guitar and a desire for 
connection.

Cohen positions himself as 

an old-school troubadour on 
Songs, a timeless artist looking 
for meaning through his muses 
and stories. Many of these tracks 
are about people he has crossed 
paths with, especially women 
who have inspired him, and 
they’re all poetic ballads and 
epics in the folk and storytelling 
tradition. “Suzanne” may as 
well be Athena. “Marianne” 
is Eurydice. These songs are 
worldly, detailed and multi-
faceted 
— 
understandable, 

considering Cohen was already 
an accomplished writer before 
his music career and didn’t 
release this album until he was 
33.

Unlike 
many 
other 
folk 

singers of his era, Leonard 
Cohen was never known for 
acidic wit or complexly funny 
turns of phrase, and he stays 
remarkably 
clear-headed 

throughout Songs. While Dylan 
would tell a departing lover, 
“You just kind of wasted my 
precious time,” Cohen offers 
only, “Hey, that’s no way to say 
goodbye.” While Van Morrison 
would collapse into a puddle of 
ecstasy upon meeting a woman 
who seems like Jesus, Cohen 
stays calm, letting the listener 
absorb all he has to say without 
embellishment.

But despite Cohen’s quite-

earned reputation for deep-
thought 
seriousness, 
his 

warmth and sense of humor are 
consistently underrated. “Sisters 
of Mercy,” which closes side one, 
is one of the album’s true joys. 
Written about two hitchhikers 
Cohen 
met 
in 
Edmonton 

and scored with celebratory 
percussion, “Sisters” is a simple 

ode to human interaction and 
spontaneous gifts, as Cohen 
thanks the two women for 
inspiring this song. It’s music 
that shows how one can be 
occupied with the meaning 
of life while still appreciating 
the everyday wonders. A lot of 
people characterize Leonard 
Cohen 
as 
“depressing,” 
but 

that deep voice belies a warm 
romantic, one who’s always 
hopeful for a better world even 
in his lowest moments.

Undeniably, Cohen’s legacy 

will be “Hallelujah” in the way 
Frost’s is “The Road Not Taken” 
and Da Vinci’s is the Mona 
Lisa. It’s a brilliant piece of art 
that has earned an unlikely 
place in the mainstream public 
consciousness. For as long as 
people sing, that song — in forms 
both transcendent and awful — 
will always be.

But it’s more than worth it to 

explore Leonard Cohen beyond 
just “Hallelujah.” As Songs of 
Leonard Cohen and his entire 
body of work demonstrates, he 
was an immensely intelligent 
artist 
with 
empathy 
for 

everyone. To listen to Leonard 
Cohen sing in that uniquely 
transfixing voice was to learn 
and to live, to dream of and to 
believe in a vision of the world 
only someone as strange and 
thoughtful and beautiful as him 
could truly understand.

Goodbyes 
and 
hellos, 

adventures and failures, the 
holy and the broken — he 
sang about them all. Leonard 
Cohen helped put us in better 
touch with the world, and he 
connected his listeners to the 
wonders of living. Cohen could 
take emotions that you couldn’t 
quite describe yourself and 
spin them into grand tales that 
explored the mysteries of love 
and life while never losing touch 
with the basic humanity these 
feelings came from.

Remembering Leonard 
Cohen by his debut album

ADAM THEISEN
Managing Arts Editor

It takes a deeper cut than ‘Hallelujah’ to understand the 
importance and legacy of the late, great musician

FILM REVIEW

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