The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Arts & Sports Wednesday, January 10, 2018 — 7A Close and getting closer EVAN AARON /Daily Michigan coach John Beilein said after the game that he was convinced Michigan had a play set up to win the game. Though the Michigan women’s basketball team didn’t come out victorious in its overtime loss to rival Ohio State on Sunday, it did play a closely- fought game full of back-and- forth runs between the two teams. Sunday’s game was a tough loss for the Wolverines, as they had multiple opportunities to win in the last few minutes of the fourth quarter, but just couldn’t capitalize on them. “We had them on the ropes, it was a great game. They jumped on us early but we battled back and kept our composure,” Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico said in a radio interview on WTKA. “Sometimes you get over defeats quickly, but this one is going to take a little bit of time.” Time, however, is a luxury the Wolverines don’t have. Now, they need to turn around quickly and prepare to face Indiana on Wednesday. “Today we have to move on, we have to be focused on Indiana, we have to be focused on our next game,” Barnes Arico said. “That game will be with us for the rest of the year and I think it’s going to help us improve and help us get better.” Though the Hoosiers are just 8-9, they bring young talent to the table for which Michigan must be prepared. “Indiana is a really good team, they’re led by two all-conference players, Tyra Buss and Amanda Cahill, and their other players are inexperienced and young,” Barnes Arico said. “They graduated their other players but they’re a team that has given us a tough game in the past and we know we can’t look past anyone.” The Hoosiers have just two seniors: Cahill and Buss, a forward and guard, respectively. Buss leads the team with 349 points on the season, averages 20.5 points per game and was named to the All-Big Ten First Team. Cahill has 142 rebounds on the season, averages 8.4 rebounds per game, and found a place on the All-Big Ten Second Team. The remainder of Indiana’s team, while talented, lacks experience. The Wolverines hope to take advantage of that with their veteran players. “We had that tough one, but the success of our team, our maturity, our experience (and) our upperclassmen have got to put the young ones on their shoulders and teach them the way,” said Barnes Arico. And on Wednesday, Michigan must not only face the challenges the Hoosiers present, but also prove that it can bounce back after Sunday’s tough loss. WOMEN’S BASKETBALL Wolverines looking to bounce back at home Ahead of his Super Bowl performance, Justin Tim- berlake announced his fourth solo album, Man of the Woods. The album art is Bon Iver-esque, set in the woods with Timberlake donning a flannel under a wool jacket. With his lead single “Filthy,” fans who speculated a return to his Tennessee roots were mis- taken. “Filthy” isn’t country — it’s an attempt for Timber- lake to dip into electro-pop without fully committing. From the same team as “SexyBack” and Britney Spears’s dark-pop masterpiece Blackout, the single leans heavily towards early 2000s electro-pop. However, unlike “SexyBack” or “Gimme More,” which both build into euphoric choruses, “Filthy” lacks momentum. By minute two, I was ready for the song to do something. The same robotic synth throbs endlessly over the song’s unneeded five minutes. When the lackluster chorus finally does arrive, it’s indistinguishable from the verse. Repetitive production can excel with the right lyricism (see Talking Heads’ “Psycho Killer”), but Timberlake’s song- writing is equally disinterest- ing. “Filthy” is a patchwork of one-liners that show Tim- berlake’s disconnect with pop music’s pulse. With lines like “Haters gonna say it’s fake” and “This ain’t the clean version,” Timberlake, now 38, is showing his age with corny “this is how the kids talk” lyricism. With a February 2 release date, I’m hoping the remainder of Man of the Woods leaves this synth-pop behind and commits to Timber- lake’s signature bubblegum pop. — Danny Madi- on, Daily Arts Writer “Filthy” stars out on a high note, with Justin Timberlake call- ing out, “Hey, if you know what’s good!” in his characteristic, high-energy belt. And it keeps climbing from there, but not in the way you’d expect. For over half of its nearly five-minute duration, “Filthy” is jerky and deceptively low-ener- gy, an understated jam with a funky spring. Then the electric guitar kicks in, and suddenly the song reaches the energetic peak it has secretly been build- ing to all along — only to fall back again a few seconds later into its own hypnotic under- current. The song ends amid a weirdly ghostly atmosphere that feels like the exact antith- esis of the place where it started out: A woman whispers, “Do you see me? Can you find me? / Look closer, through the trees / Do you see it?” And then noth- ing. Silence. Upon first listen, “Filthy” is a bit of a slow burn. It takes a while to decide what type of song it wants to be: A dancefloor jam? Five minutes of artsy back- ground noise? To some extent, it never really decides. The lyrics aren’t really anything to turn one’s head at either — they ultimately boil down to a lot of repetitive lines like “Put your filthy hands all over me” and “Your friends, my friends and they ain’t leavin’ ’til six in the morning.” However, the song does suc- ceed in blending a large number of genres — pop, electronica and funk to name a few — into an overall catchy song. “Filthy” doesn’t pretend to be anything it’s not; at one point, Timberlake even sings, “You know this ain’t the clean version.” It’s unpre- tentious and genuinely fun. As far as what direction it’s point- ing in, we may have to wait for Timberlake’s next single — or simply the release of his upcom- ing album, Man of the Woods — to know for sure. — Laura Dzubay, Daily Arts Writer SINGLE REVIEW “Filthy” Justin Timberlake RCA Records RCA RECORDS “We will never surrender!” Winston Churchill shouts in one of his most famous speeches to the House of Commons, recreated in one of the most powerful moments of the thrilling retelling of Churchill’s first few weeks as Prime Minister, “Darkest Hour.” With France on its heels, the United States nowhere to be found and Nazi Germany seemingly on the brink of domination over all of Europe, into the fray stepped Winston Churchill, who would eventually succeed where Neville Chamberlain had so infamously failed. Gary Oldman (“The Hitman’s Bodyguard”), rendered almost unrecognizable, portrays Churchill with a gravitas and force that seems destined to rank among his best performances. The stunning picture also features Ben Mendelsohn (“Rogue One: A Star Wars Story”), Lily James (“Baby Driver”) and Kristin Scott Thomas (“Sarah’s Key”). Written by Anthony McCarten (“The Theory of Everything), directed by Joe Wright (“Pan”) and accompanied by a breathtaking score composed by Dario Marianelli (“Anna Karenina”), “Darkest Hour” reminds us of how, in the midst of the darkest chapter in modern European history, there were still people brave enough to stand up for the light. Oldman’s charisma and energy propel the film, demanding attention every time he is on screen while simultaneously giving viewers a deep look into the confused, conflicted, depressed but never conquered mind of Winston Churchill. The film takes care to paint Churchill as a flawed individual, one whose vices occasionally got the better of him. His relationship with his wife is well established in the first act but does fall off a bit as the movie continues. Churchill’s complex relationships with the King of England and other members of Parliament is portrayed in a fairly unbiased manner, though the benefit of history will clearly lead the audience to fall almost exclusively on one side. The film is visually stunning. It features sweeping overhead shots of the Parliament chambers and limited use of stylized war footage that gives the film a wide spectrum of interesting shots. The overall aesthetic is cold and crisp, fitting for a story about the darkest days in British history. There aren’t enough good things that can be said about the soundtrack in “Darkest Hour.” Few films in 2017 have featured a booming orchestral score so prominently, harkening back to a grander, more narrative- based method of scoring movies that has faded from prominence in today’s era of temp scores and generic action music. With his score for “Darkest Hour,” Marianelli has redefined himself as one of the most promising young composers in the industry. There are only two facets of the film in which it falters. One is the length. The second half of the movie at times feels like it’s spinning its wheels, with Churchill and the remains of Chamberlain’s powerbase fighting a war that feels like it could have been condensed. There also is a subplot that focuses on Churchill’s young aide eventually coming around to him that feels both outdated and out of place, and it seems like that storyline either could’ve been cut or the time would’ve better been spent elsewhere. “Darkest Hour” might be Oscar-bait, but it is also simply an amazing film. It features one of Britain’s finest actors as one of Britain’s finest men in the weeks before what would be one of its finest hours in history. Oldman gives a performance for the ages. IAN HARRIS Daily Arts Writer “Darkest Hour” Focus Features Michigan Theater, Goodrich Quality 16, Rave Cinemas Ann Arbor FILM REVIEW ‘Darkest Hour’ is a tour de force for Gary Oldman The Churchill biopic excels both visually and narratively Oldman’s charisma and energy propel the film SARAH HURST Daily Sports Writer RUCHITA IYER/Daily Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico says her team must move on quickly. A controversial review to give Purdue the ball, a somewhat controversial foul called on an in-bounds play and a half-court shot that missed just short. Those were the lasting moments from the Michigan men’s basketball team’s 70-69 loss to the fifth-ranked Boilermakers. Any of which could have changed the outcome. The review came when redshirt sophomore Charles Matthews seemingly had the ball poked out of his hands by Purdue guard Dakota Mathias. During the replay, Matthews told Beilein the ball didn’t go off his hands, but after an unusually long look at the monitors, the referees disagreed. “I wish we could have got Charles to the rim,” Beilein said. “It looked like he was going to go lay it in, and all of the sudden, you know, with 5.6, or whatever it is on the clock, that’s enough time. I really was convinced that we had a play set up that we were going to win the game. All of the sudden, they’re winning the game.” Considering how the game went, with Michigan crawling back from a 14-point first-half deficit and having the ball in its hands with the game on the line, it’s easy to understand disappointment. This would have been a huge win against a Boilermaker team that has looked as good as any in recent weeks. Yet, taking a step back, it’s hard to ignore how far the Wolverines have come. This isn’t the same team that lost to LSU, looked hapless against North Carolina and blew a huge lead in Columbus. On Tuesday, against a team that looked like it was a terrible matchup for Michigan, the Wolverines hung around. Freshman forward Isaiah Livers and freshman guard Jordan Poole kept the Wolverines alive at times. They were hardly factors early in the season. Freshman guard Zavier Simpson hit two huge 3-pointers to give Michigan its first lead of the game with 4:38 left. He was benched after the loss to the Tigers. Most importantly, perhaps, the Wolverines made halftime adjustments and came back against an elite team when they were punched in the face to start the game. Against the Tar Heels, that seemed an impossibility. It was enough to give senior guard Muhammad-Ali Abdur- Rahkman encouragement. “I was pretty encouraged, but you never like to see your team lose,” said senior guard Muhammad-Ali Abdur- Rahkman. “I mean, a lot of guys showed a lot of great stuff. We’ve just got to continue to grow. It’s a marathon.” Michigan still has plenty of progress to make. The Wolverines still had trouble stopping Boilermaker center Isaac Haas, and if it weren’t for a strong, second-half shooting performance, Michigan might not have been in the game. But the adjustments were made, and if Matthews’ call doesn’t get overturned, or if Wagner doesn’t foul Haas, or if Matthews’ half-court heave goes four inches further the Wolverines come out on top. Steady improvement over the season has nearly become a patented trademark of Beilein’s teams. This one may be another example. Tuesday’s game was just the latest testament to how far Michigan has come this season. It’s why Beilein seemed so disappointed after the game. Saturday’s matchup with No. 4 Michigan State – possibly the best team in the country – will be the next opportunity to show it. The Wolverines might not get the lucky bounces in that game, either. They may lose again. Yet it seems they are approaching where they want to be. “I wish we could have got Charles to the rim.” MIKE PERSAK