Arts
michigandaily.com — The Michigan Daily
12 — Wednesday, November 18, 2020
Contrary to popular belief, the
multi-cam sitcom isn’t dead.
Several cameras centered around
one set to simultaneously record a
scene. It’s an easy, painless setup
that was popularized in 1951, when
“I Love Lucy” won the hearts of
the American public and left a
permanent imprint on our
digital culture. Since then,
the multi-camera setup has
given birth to some of the
most iconic moments of
our country’s history. From
“Seinfeld” to “Friends” to
“The Big Bang Theory,” it
is impossible to discuss the
story of television without
it.
Yet,
throughout
the
last decade, the cultural
relevance of this production
style
has
undeniably
dwindled.
Single-camera
comedies like “Community”
and “The Office” have
ushered in a new norm for
television humor, without
laugh tracks or flat visual
styles. It’s a medium that
has fared far better among younger
audiences. I hadn’t introduced
myself to a new multi-cam sitcom
in years.
Nevertheless, pressing play on
the pilot for CBS’s latest “B Positive”
felt strangely comforting. There’s
a sentimentality in the style. It can
be argued that it exists purely on
nostalgia, but the palatable format
just makes starting a new show so …
effortless.
It’s ironic, then, that a series
so
seemingly
lighthearted
is built around such a dark,
dramatic premise. Drew (Thomas
Middleditch, “Solar Opposites”)
is a divorced father in need of a
new kidney. Facing his potential
death, he struggles to find someone
supportive enough to give him their
own. That is, until he runs into Gina
(Annaleigh
Ashford,
“American
Crime
Story”),
an
airheaded
substance abuser with a heart of
gold. At a mutual friend’s wedding,
Gina drunkenly re-connects with
Drew over a vague high school
friendship and spontaneously offers
him her own kidney.
Thus, an odd couple is formed.
If Drew wants to live, he must help
Gina stay sober. If Gina wants to do
good, she must defeat her addiction
to drugs and alcohol.
Along with a heavy setup, the
pilot teases at jokes that stray far
from where its peers are often
comfortable going. When the doctor
recommends a family member
for the kidney transplant, Drew
remarks, “Oh great, a Republican
kidney.” There are references to
Xanax use, visible bongs and even
cocaine dust. The show’s opening
credit sequence, most notably of all,
is fantastically disturbing and gory.
(Seriously, check it out).
Politics, gore and drug abuse are
all things that you don’t often find
directly in multi-cam sitcoms. In no
way would I call the first episode a
failure (I am certainly intrigued to
see where they take it), but I’d have
to imagine it’s not going to be easy
to strike a working groove with the
medium chosen. Even so,
I’m glad to see risks taken
and
envelopes
pushed
in a format that so many
consider outdated.
“B Positive” exists in a
weird space of time where
the future of multi-cam
comedies
is
uncertain.
Though “The Big Bang
Theory” put up numbers as
high as “Game of Thrones”
last year, there is most
definitely a feeling in the
air that the style has lost its
vigor.
While I’m not overly
optimistic that “B Positive”
will
be
the
show
to
change that stigma, some
genuinely
interesting
seeds were planted. I hope
they continue to take risks and
find their foothold in the Golden
Age of Television. To say that
this past week was stressful is an
understatement. I found it difficult
to focus on anything, whether it was
homework or watching a lecture for
more than 30 minutes. But recently
I’ve rediscovered something very
special: the Charlie Brown holiday
specials. I know these are important
parts of the holidays, but for
whatever reason I had completely
forgotten about them — until now.
Daily Arts Writer Ben Servetah
can be reached at bserve@umich.edu.
Netflix’s ‘Jingle Jangle’
makes Xmas exhausting
Christmas
comes
earlier
every year. The day after
Halloween, nowadays,
plastic
trees
and
twinkle lights fill store
shelves,
DJs
across
the world queue up
Mariah Carey’s classic
Yuletide
anthem
and
Starbucks
puts
gingerbread in their
coffee. In 2020, this
seemed like a welcome
distraction.
The
Holiday Season began
as a warm, colorful
respite
from
the
pandemic and election
uncertainty.
Then
came
the
Netflix
film
“Jingle
Jangle.”
Watching
“Jingle
Jangle” is like being
dragged
behind
the
Polar Express, curb-
stomped by Ebenezer
Scrooge and, finally,
run down by Santa’s
sleigh, all while the
shrill laughter of elves
fills your ears.
Forest
Whitaker
(“Rogue One: A Star Wars
Story”)
plays
an
inventor
named
Jeronicus
Jangle,
who has lost the Christmas
spirit and turned his once
wonderful
toyshop
into
a
dilapidated
pawn
shop.
It
is up to his granddaughter,
Journey, played by Madalen
Mills
(“Reality
Cupcakes”),
to breathe festive life into his
dusty heart and even dustier
store.
They live in a place called
“Cobbleton,”
which
is
appropriate, as the story is
completely cobbled together
from other Christmas films.
The power of belief
from
“The
Polar
Express,”
Santa’s
toyshop and a barely
remixed version of “A
Christmas Carol” are
thrown into a faux-
iron pot with a large
helping of steampunk
flavor
and
musical
numbers a step below
even the worst made-
for-TV movies.
Whenever the music
swells, one braces for
it. Every song goes on
at least a minute too
long, and the lyrics
and
instrumentation
are
the
kind
one
hears waiting in line
at a crowded, sweaty
department
store,
last-minute
gifts
in
hand,
wondering
if
this whole Christmas
thing is really just an
expensive
waste
of
time.
It could’ve worked.
Whitakter
is
great
in the film, as are Madalen,
Keegan Michael Key (“Key and
Peele”) and the rest of the cast.
The set design, costumes and
visual effects are immaculate.
The movie’s snowy, clockwork
Victorian aesthetic is unique,
and quite beautiful. There’s a
robot named Buddy 3000 who,
even if he skews a little too
close to WALL-E, is absolutely
adorable.
Still,
“Jingle
Jangle”
is
almost sickening, like a pile of
over-iced Christmas cookies
shoved right in your face.
The film is devoid of any
sort of bite. There is not one
scene in “Jingle Jangle” where
one wonders, even just for a
moment, if things will turn out
alright. There’s just smiling,
and singing, and smiling and
singing, and more smiling and
more singing. It’s exhausting.
“Jingle
Jangle”
may
be
marketed
for
a
younger
audience, but that doesn’t mean
there shouldn’t be conflict.
Christmas classics like “Frosty
The Snowman” and “Rudolph
the Red Nosed Reindeer” still
have active antagonists, and
moments of threat or peril, to
give a hint of winter chill that
makes the Yuletide warmth of
Christmas so comforting. In
November 2020, sugary sweet
won’t cut it.
Additionally,
the
sci-fi
element of the movie ranges
from silly to disturbing. The
magic
system
of
Jangle’s
word is a mixture of math
and
mysticism:
Characters
draw glowing equations in
the air (a la “Doctor Strange”)
and perform equations like
the “Square root of possible.”
That’s the silly bit.
More upsetting is a sentient
toy named Don Juan, bizarrely
played
by
Ricky
Martin
(“American
Crime
Story”),
who is created, and (spoiler
alert)
shut
off,
essentially
“killed,” by Jangle at the end
of the film. Jangle says Don
Juan will be reprogrammed to
be more obedient. A life with
agency, emotion and sentience
is extinguished, and everyone
smiles away. Whenever I watch
“A Christmas Story,” the last
thing I say is “This needs just a
bit more existentialist horror.”
If one is looking for a Holiday
escape, stay far, far away from
Cobbleton.
Daily Arts Writer Andrew
Warrick can be reached at
warricka@umich.edu.
ANDREW WARRICK
Daily Arts Writer
NETFLIX
Highlights from this year’s
virtual Polish film festival
In its 27th year, the Ann
Arbor Polish Film Festival has
been virtualized as a result of
COVID-19. The slate of shorts,
feature films and documentaries
are streaming on the Michigan
Theatre website in lieu of live
screenings. One of this year’s
feature films is “Jak Najdalej Std,”
or “I Never Cry” in English.
Written and directed by
Piotr Domalewski (“Silent
Night”), the film explores
the cruelly ubiquitous loss
of a parent through the eyes
of a young woman. “I Never
Cry” prompts the viewer to
reconsider their role in the
lives of others.
Ola (Zofia Stafiej, “25
Years of Innocence”) is
seventeen years old, and
desperately wants a car. She
has failed her driving test
three times (though the last
failure was definitely not
her fault), and can’t afford
to take the test a fourth
time. She wouldn’t be able
to afford a car, either, but
her father promised to send
her the money as soon as she gets
her license. Ola’s dad is in Dublin,
working for a shipping company
and sending money home to
Poland where Ola lives with her
mother (Kinga Preis, “53 Wars”)
and brother (Dawid Tulej) who
has a disability. Coincidentally,
Ola misses a call from her father
during driving test number three,
and finds out later that same
day that there was an accident
involving a shipping container.
Her father had been crushed.
Thus begins Ola’s journey.
Since her mother does not speak
English, Ola must be the one to
fly to Ireland and retrieve her
father’s body. At 17, Ola must
rescue a man she hardly knew
from the purgatorial bureaucracy
of death. Confronted by long lines,
expensive cigarettes and unfeeling
doctors, the Polish teenager must
grapple with the life lived by her
father, independent of his role as
absent patriarch. Through such a
struggle, Ola gains perspective on
herself in relation to others.
“I Never Cry” is a poignant
meditation
on
loss
and
the
sometimes
strange
distance
between kin. As she meets the
people who knew him, Ola seeks
to reconcile the father she knew
with the man she did not, but
comes away with little more
than limp placation: “He did his
best.” Despite the mundanity of
this remark, uttered first by the
foreman of the shipping company
where her father worked, it
becomes something of an anchor
for Ola as she faces her father’s
flaws, flaws which help Ola
come to terms with her father’s
interiority and selfhood. A life
only appreciated in death is the
film’s sad irony.
As a coming of age tale, the
film
has
an
unconventional
rawness. The challenges faced
by
the
protagonist
are
not
contrived, rather all too real. Ola’s
growth culminates in a moving
catharsis at the film’s end, as her
relationship with her
father is grounded in
personal
significance.
As a criticism of a very-
contrived
bureaucracy,
the film lands precise
blows.
Investigating
all of the gratuitous
processes
surrounding
death, civid, sacred and
social,
Domalewski
recenters the emotional.
Watching
Ola
endure the death of her
father in international
isolation, those of us in
some degree of COVID
isolation may be able
to
empathize.
Those
who have lost a parent
can
empathize
with
Ola on another level.
No matter one’s situation, the
viewer is encouraged to pause
and appreciate the lives of others,
especially the lives of our parents.
As we tumble through even the
most quotidian bureaucracies of
modern life, seeing the interiority
and humanity in one another
demands a concerted effort, one
we all ought to eagerly make.
Contrary to popular belief, the
multi-cam sitcom isn’t dead.
Daily Arts Writer Ross London
can be reached at rhorg@umich.
edu.
ROSS LONDON
Daily Arts Writer
CBS
‘B Positive’ puts a darker
spin on multi-cam sitcoms
BEN SERVETAH
Daily Arts Writer
Watching “Jingle
Jangle” is like being
dragged behind the
Polar Express, curb-
stomped by Ebenezer
Scrooge and, finally,
run down by Santa’s
sleigh, all while the
shrill laughter of elves
fills your ears.
One of this year’s
feature films is “Jak
Najdalej Std,” or
“I Never Cry” in
English.
“B Positive” exists
in a weird space
of time where the
future of multi-
cam comedies is
uncertain.
ADREV PUBLISHING