The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Wednesday, February 20, 2019 — 5A

In 1978, the acclaimed novelist 
Yuko Tsushima published “Territory 
Of Light” a chapter at a time in the 
Japanese monthly literary magazine 
Gunzo, each chapter representing 
one month in a year. Tsushima 
is well-known in Japan, but is 
relatively unknown to Anglophone 
readers. The small amount of her 
work that has been translated 
into 
English 
is 
her 
most 
autobiographical 
component, 
and 
it’s 
autobiographical in way 
that might be unfamiliar 
to Anglophone audiences. 
Long before the word 
“autofiction” was coined 
in French or English, 
Japanese 
authors 
had 
been 
writing 
gently 
fictionalized 
accounts 
of their lives in what is 
known as shishosetsu, or 
“I-fiction.” These works 
are written as reflections 
or examinations of the 
author’s life, and the 
strikingly clear realism 
of the genre has no 
real analog in Western 
literature. 
Tsushima’s 
work frequently deals 
with the experiences of single 
mothers in 20th-century Japan’s 
intensely patriarchal and work-
obsessed society, and “Territory 
Of Light” follows this model — the 
story is told from the perspective of 
an unnamed woman, who recently 
divorced her husband and is tasked 
with raising their young daughter 
alone.
The novel closely follows the 
minutiae of day-to-day life in Tokyo 
— the protagonist takes her daughter 
to daycare, holds down a desk job 
and embarks on endless strings of 
errands and chores, often dragging 
her unwilling daughter along. The 
incessant pace of life gives the 
story a sense of constant motion, 
even as the protagonist’s loneliness 
presses in from all sides. Very few 
other characters receive as much 
development — they just flit in and 

out of the protagonist’s attention 
and are occasionally the subject of 
tentative, quietly desperate acts. 
She has an ill-advised one-night 
stand with an acquaintance, she 
gets excessively drunk at a bar with 
strangers, she invites one of her 
ex-husband’s pathetic students over 
for lack of any other real friends. 
Many of the side characters are 
beautifully 
sketched 
in 
outline, 
and the reader is painfully aware 
of the social barriers between the 
protagonist and the rest of the 

world. She is reminded again and 
again that divorced mothers are at a 
decisive disadvantage — one of her 
acquaintances from the daycare go 
as far as to tell her she would be “at 
the bottom of the heap.” Even as we 
see the protagonist begin to spiral 
without support — drinking heavily 
to stay asleep at night, having 
strange visions of death, showing 
up late for work, briefly wishing 
her daughter was dead — nothing 
drastic or cruel happens. There are 
moments where it seems as though 
something absolutely terrible is 
going to happen (it never does) or 
some great juncture in the story is 
going to happen (it never does), but 
life stabilizes itself somehow and 
the protagonist must continue as 
best she can. 
Her loneliness also seems related 
to how intently she focuses on her 

surroundings, and the sensitive and 
somewhat sad way she apprehends 
them. The novel provides a crystal-
clear 
yet 
utterly 
idiosyncratic 
vision of Tokyo, following the 
protagonist’s 
vision 
down 
long 
associative trails and occasionally 
into near-delirium. She describes a 
stand of trees as “some plant species, 
expelled from the sky, which in a 
fit of disgruntlement had stiffened 
into these three brooding pillars 
as it landed.” More often, though, 
experience is just given a luminous 
rinse and left to stand 
on its own, unmarred 
by any self-consciously 
“novelistic” processing. 
When 
her 
daughter 
drops 
origami 
paper 
from their fourth-story 
roof, 
the 
protagonist 
briefly pictures it: “I 
could only conclude that 
every sheet in the pack 
… had floated down, one 
after the other, taking 
its time and enjoying the 
breeze, onto the tiled 
roof 
below.” 
Shortly 
after this scene, she has 
to apologize profusely 
to 
her 
neighbors 
for 
the trash on their roof. 
One gets the sense that 
Tsushima endows her 
character with such a 
powerful sense of perception as a 
way to cope with an existence so 
crushing it threatens to overwhelm 
her. This is an incredibly effective 
combination, 
and 
despite 
the 
understated tone, the novel has an 
unexpected emotional weight.
Since the novel was originally 
published in serial, each chapter 
is relatively self-contained, and its 
compilation into a novel can feel 
awkward at times. Each chapter 
contains a relatively limited and 
yet wholly self-contained arc, and 
the novel has no overall trajectory 
beyond the allotted space of a year. 
With a novelist any less perceptive 
and skilled at making the everyday 
glitter, 
this 
structure 
wouldn’t 
work at all — Tsushima’s airy prose, 
however, makes the recounting of 
small moments prismatic rather 
than static.

‘Territory of Light’ a stunning 
look at empathy and loneliness

To call “High Flying Bird” 
a sports movie would be like 
calling “The Social Network” 
a court drama. Sure, it would 
be true, but would also be a 
fatally narrow interpretation of 
the work. Steven Soderbergh’s 
(“Unsane”) latest project is so 
much more than it appears: It’s a 
microcosm of race and American 
power structures, an electrified 
dive into the nuance of NBA 
labor conflicts and a meditation 
on the evolving information 
age. It’s a seemingly mundane 
concept for a movie transformed 
into a prescient web of ideas by 
“Moonlight” screenwriter Tarell 
Alvin McCraney, and ultimately, 
one of the most intriguing films I 
have seen recently.
The film covers the sneaky, 
perceptive 
maneuvers 
of 
NBA agent Ray Burke (Andre 
Holland, “Moonlight”) as he 
navigates between players and 
team owners during a league 
lockout. While the movie is 
centered around basketball, it 
is far more concerned with the 
gritty and complex backroom 
business of the sport than 
courts and scoreboards. While 
player 
representative 
Myra 
(Sonja Johnson, “The Chi”) and 
team owner David Seton (Kyle 
MacLachlan, 
“Inside 
Out”) 
struggle to compromise and 
end the lockout, Burke hatches 
a plan of his own, equipped 
with charming persuasion and 
discerning foresight.
Holland’s 
performance 
as Burke is one of the film’s 
highlights. His lines are hefty 
soliloquies spoken at nearly 
twice the speed of normal 
conversation, but he carries 

them off with ease and elegance. 
The most challenging aspect of 
the performance is that Holland 
must appear believably one step 
ahead of everyone in the room 
without them knowing it in order 
for the character to work. And 
indeed, Burke’s energetic grace 
embodies this quality perfectly 
to pack a startling punch near 
the film’s end.

Since the film is mostly just 
people talking to each other, 
Soderbergh must get creative 
in how he keeps the scenes 
visually engaging. As both the 
cinematographer and editor he 
employs nearly every tool at his 
disposal. The most palpable of 
these is his decision to shoot 
the entire movie on an iPhone 
8. From the very first frame of 
the movie, it becomes evident 
that this choice plays a key part 
in how Soderbergh stages every 
scene. The iPhone as the camera 
ultimately feels essential to the 
visual language of “Bird” simply 
because of how inimitable the 
film looks.
The many wide shots of 
New York stand out because 
the iPhone lens gives them a 
memorably 
warped 
quality. 
Soderbergh 
also 
places 
the 

camera in normally impossible 
places, 
at 
various 
points 
strapping the iPhone on a ceiling, 
to the back of a car seat and in a 
narrow train aisle. While most 
of these shots were fascinating 
enough to spice up a dialogue 
heavy narrative, there were 
also times when the iPhone’s 
limitations became clear. Every 
time the camera moved from 
natural to studio light, there was 
a visibly distracting filtering of 
light onscreen.
A notable flaw of the film is 
that it might be too smart. I found 
myself having to turn on closed 
captions or rewind frequently to 
comprehend a rapid exchange. 
It’s an intellectually demanding 
process that not everyone will 
relish in. That being said, the 
film did make me engaged in the 
politics of NBA lockouts, a hefty 
feat for someone who hasn’t 
followed the organization for 
years. The movie offers whatever 
you’re willing to put in.
The 
real 
impact 
behind 
McCraney’s script is not simply 
how esoteric it is. He uses the 
backdrop of NBA lockouts to 
comment on far more than 
the nuances of contracts and 
board room meetings. One of 
the film’s lingering questions 
is just what the best platform is 
for professional basketball in an 
era of rising streaming services. 
In this way, “Bird” offers a 
commentary not only on the 
NBA, but on filmmaking itself. 
Where is the best place for the 
content we consume today, on a 
platform as accessible as Netflix 
or a space as traditional as cable 
TV? McCraney’s ability to weave 
these questions into the conflict 
of “Bird” is truly enthralling, 
cementing “Bird” as a powerful 
sports drama with the smarts to 
delve beyond its own premise.

‘High Flying’ is dramatic

ANISH TAMHANEY
Daily Arts Writer

FILM REVIEW

‘High Flying 
Bird’ 

Feb. 8, 2019

Netflix

The RAW Natural Born Artists show 
took place in downtown Detroit at St. 
Andrew’s Hall on Feb.13th. The show, 
which had the goal of empowering local 
artists and providing them with a platform, 
certainly did not fail to impress. All forms 
of art — fashion, textiles, cosmetics, live 
music and photography — came together 
in the eclectic space that is St. Andrew’s 
Hall to represent the diversity of creativity 
that 
lies 
within 
the 
growing 
community 
of 
artists in Detroit. An event 
completely 
by 
and 
for 
artists, RAW holds shows 
all around the country, 
inviting artists to showcase 
and sell their work at 
mandated venues.
Contributing to the sense 
of independence that is 
re-emerging in downtown 
Detroit, the RAW Showcase 
was just a taste of the talent 
and development that is 
occuring in our very own 
backyard. Serving as a 
reminder as to why we 
cannot forget about our dear 
Detroit, the show blended 
all aspects of any and every 
part of design, completely 
catering to independent 
artists personal work and 
business, carving a space 
for a conversation about the 
world of artistic mediums 
and experimentation.
Said first year attendee 
and artist Katherine Cross, 
“It (this show) has exceeded 
my expectations, I’m super 
impressed by the group of people they 
brought together- music, hair, all types of 
artistry, and I think that is so cool.”
The vibrant show truly represented all 
aspects of the art spectrum, all tied together 
through mini concerts played by various 
artists throughout the entire event. The 
show catered to a lifelong dedication and 
love for art and design, as shown by many 
of the artists present, Cross included. A self-
branded surface designer, Cross spoke on 
her own practice as an artist and how she 
arrived at the show.
“It was total serendipity. One day I 
started cutting things out of magazines. 
Then, I started organizing them by color 
and making them into collages. I was 
originally trained as a portrait artist, I have 
a degree in human figure drawing. But 
here I’ve found myself cutting out abstract 

shapes and things out of magazine pages,” 
Cross said.
Cross’s process speaks to the entire 
show and its total encouragement for 
experimentation across all mediums of art 
and design, one growing in the world of 
design as well. In a physical world covered 
in surfaces, from paper to textiles, to 
everything in between, Cross left no stone 
unturned when beginning her business 
founded on color, collage and texture. Said 
Cross, “It started with cards, I was living 
abroad when I started this company, and 
I went around to all the little shops in my 
town asking ‘would you be 
interested in using these for 
your floral arrangements?’ 
And they said yes! My first 
order was a florist shop, so 
I designed small gift cards 
and different things for 
that.”
The versatility of Cross’s 
work aligns itself with a 
conversation occuring all 
across the world of art and 
design about the use of 
textiles, color and pattern in 
fashion and beyond. Cross 
does not limit herself to 
checking one box in design, 
as a surface designer she 
completely plays off the ever 
changing characteristics of 
design, curating her work 
to fit just about any surface. 
A pioneer in self-branding 
and material use, Cross is 
changing the definition of 
what it means to be both 
an artist and designer, 
a 
concept 
the 
RAW 
show catered to. Cross’s 
inspiration 
started 
in 
fashion and has completely 
extended to other mediums 
including paper products and jewelry.
“My favorite designer is Dries Van Noten 
— the way he mixes pattern and color 
and things like that — so I love vintage 
materials, I love textiles that have texture, 
unique patterns, everything — I’ve always 
been a lover of fabric. I love it, I gotta buy 
it. I do love fashion, when I was a kid I had 
a cousin who got Vogue and I would always 
just look through the pages and think it was 
just the most amazing beautiful artwork,” 
Cross said.
Cross and all the artists at the RAW 
Show are completely revolutionizing what 
it means to be immersed in an art form, 
taking initiative and inserting themselves 
into a conversation and effort to blend 
and support all styles of art and design, a 
beautiful balance one really could only find 
in downtown Detroit.

RAW is spectacular

STYLE REVIEW

MARGARET SHERIDAN
Daily Style Editor

BOOK REVIEW

EMILY YANG
Daily Arts Writer

‘Territory of Light’ 

Yuko Tsushima

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Feb. 12, 2019

Though 
varying 
in 
subject 
matter, through their common 
themes of youth, childhood and 
power in a fresh light, the 2019 Oscar 
Short Films perfectly complement 
one another. That said, the sheer 
degree of heaviness and intensity 
that characterizes each film makes 
digesting them all in one sitting a 
challenge, to say the least.
When 
Marta 
(Marta 
Nieto 
“Karabudjan”) 
receives 
an 
unexpected phone call from her 
six-year-old son Iván (Álvaro Balas 
“Bajo la red”), who is on a camping 
trip with his father, she is alarmed 
to find that Iván is stranded on a 
beach alone. In the panic of “Madre” 
that follows, though Marta fights to 
keep her calm and protect her son as 
best she can from thousands of miles 
away, her composure crumbles as her 
worst nightmares come to fruition. 
The beauty of “Madre” is not in what 
it shows, but what it doesn’t. There is 
no advantage given to the audience 
in this film. Though presented with 
panning-shots of an isolated beach, 
presumably the one that Iván refers 
to over the phone, we never see Iván 
and, by consequence, we feel just as 
distraught and bewildered as Marta. 
Mirroring Marta onscreen, over the 
19 minutes of “Madre” our heart 
rates increase minute by minute, 
our anxieties bubble over and, by the 
credits, we feel just as powerless and 
hopeless as Marta. 
Reacquainting viewers with the 
topic of children, “Fauve” presents a 
harrowing depiction of the perils of 
childhood ignorance. Epitomizing 
the image of ‘kids being kids,’ tween 
boys Tyler (Félix Greiner) and 
Benjamin (Alexandre Perreault) are 
messing around outside, playfully 
testing each other’s egos through 
tests of strength and dares. What 
begins as harmless fun soon turns 
hazardous, however, when one 

of their pranks leads to Benjamin 
getting stuck in and sinking into 
the concrete of a surface mine. 
Most intriguing about “Fauve” 
is its exploration of innocence 
lost. In one moment, Tyler and 
Benjamin are boys: innocent, naïve 
and reckless. In the next, Tyler is 
hardened, encompassed by a dark 
cloud severity. “Fauve” indirectly 
poses a question of where the line 
between childhood freedom and a 
need for supervision and protection 
should be drawn. Especially in our 
tech-saturated society, a question 
arises: With digital knowledge that 
far surpasses that of their parents 
and unrestricted access to social 
media, has childhood innocence has 
become an ideal of the past?
A picnic after the upsetting 
plotlines of both “Madre” and 
“Fauve,” 
“Marguerite” 
is 
a 
refreshing 
and 
much-welcomed 
change of pace. Centered around 
the relationship between an elderly 
woman 
Marguerite 
(Béatrice 
Picard “Ma tante Aline”) and her 
younger caregiver Rachel (Sandrine 
Bisson “1981”), the film explores 
the concept of youth, regret and 
repressed sexuality. Unlike the two 
pictures before it, “Marguerite” is 
much quainter, depicting the day 
to day routine of the older woman 
Marguerite and the progressive 
growth of her peculiar friendship 
with Rachel. Through a focus on 
the little things, bath times, pills, 
cups of tea drank in solitude and 
brief, yet heartfelt chats between 
Rachel and Marguerite, the film 
paints a broader picture about the 
loneliness that can accompany old 
age and the ever-present desire for 
companionship within us all.
Believing that the worst of 
the somber and depressing was 
over after “Madre” and “Fauve,” 
“Detainment” functions as the 
rudest 
of 
awakenings. 
Based 
on the horrifying story of the 
abduction and murder of toddler 
James Bulger (Caleb Mason) by 

10-year-old boys Jon and Robert, 
this film offers no silver lining or 
moment of relief for audiences to 
grasp. Through a compilation of 
documentary-esque flashbacks and 
separate interrogation sequences 
of the two boys, the film rehashes 
the day rehashing the day of 
James’s murder. Traumatizing and 
mentally paining enough as a film 
adaptation, the knowledge that 
this film is based on a true story is 
almost too inconceivable to process. 
While successfully debunking the 
stereotype of children as innocents 
on its head, it leaves us all feeling 
sickened in the process. Though well-
made and disturbingly captivating, 
the premise of “Detainment” is 
ultimately too awful to stomach 
and allow for a meaningful viewing 
experience. When the credits do 
finally role, it is mercifully so.
Thankfully, the best of the shorts 
is saved for last. “Skin” illuminates 
the vileness of modern racism 
through a sobering portrayal of the 
influence of a parent’s actions on 
a child’s. In a rural small town, a 
fervid white supremacist brutally 
beats a Black stranger for smiling at 
his son Troy (Jackson Robert Scott 
“It”) in a convenience store parking 
lot, igniting a violent clash between 
the local Black and white gangs. 
Though the plot revolves around 
the brief gang war that ensues over 
the single incident, the essence of 
“Skin” is an unmissable message 
about the learnedness of racism. 
Much of the hate between the two 
gangs is observed and acted upon by 
the sons of the respective members, 
emphasizing the impressionable 
nature of children. While the very 
level of hostility that the film exposes 
makes it nothing short of enraging 
to watch at times, “Skin” delivers a 
much-needed message that deflates 
the illusion of a post-racial society by 
bringing to screen the realities and 
repercussions of racial hatred to an 
audience that otherwise wouldn’t 
see them.

Oscars 2019: Live Shorts

FILM REVIEW

SAMANTHA NELSON
Daily Arts Writer

The vibrant 
show truly 
represented all 
aspects of the 
art spectrum, 
all tied together 
through mini 
concerts played 
by various 
artists

