8
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 6, 2005
THE QUICK
speed reads for your
entertainment needs
MOVIES
'OLIVER TWIST'
Anew look at a classic tale
tugs at heartstrings, page 7
'IN HER SHOES'
This one actually comes close
to the mark, page 8
'PROOF'
Math at the movies? For some
reason, it works, page 8
ALBUMS ► .
SWORDS
The best of the worst. These
guys are terrible, page 6
PORTASTATIC
Good to hear great stuff from
an old favorite, page 7
SHERYL CROW
There's nothing fun about this
watered-down effort, page 7
WOLF PARADE
Here's one wolf that's soon to
be a pack leader, page 7
NEIL YOUNG
The singer and songwriter
scores another hit. page 8
ORANGER
Going in new directions: not
always so bright, page 8
dive recommends
[ 'SPORTS NIGHT' ]
Before TV producer Aaron
Sorkin showed his political stripes
in “The West Wing,” he donned
pinstripes.
With this short-lived ABC com
edy-drama, Sorkin delved into the
world of a primetime Sportscenter
esque show.
With stars Peter Krause, Felicity
Huffman and a strong supporting
cast, Sorkin delivered a smart, fast
paced series with punchlines that
stuck and clever storylines that
went beyond the box scores.
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Built with a searchable catalogue
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Updated regularly, iDIGIT
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Yes it’s that thorough and
eclectic.
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at hrk@unc.edu.
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Oranger album lends sour sound
BY BETH MECHUM
STAFF WRITER
When a band changes its sound,
it’s usually a call for fans to get
nervous.
With the latest release from
Oranger, New Comes and Goes,
fans all over should be biting their
nails.
The band’s sound has always
been overrun with psychedelic
pop tones, but in its fourth full
length album, the guys seem to
have bought into the slower indie
scene.
Instead of upbeat and cheerful
melodies, listeners are bombarded
with tales of failed relationships
and loneliness.
Still, there are shades of the old
sound to entice listeners.
“Target You by Feel,” “Light
Machine,” and “Garden Party
for the Murder Pride” are good
Neil Young sure to impress
longtime fans on latest LP
BY ALAN HAYES
STAFF WRITER
In the week between being diag
nosed with a brain aneurysm and
undergoing its surgical removal,
Neil Young flew to Nashville, Tenn.,
where he wrote and recorded the
31st album of his career, Prairie
Wind.
That fact alone would make Young
a rare breed among rock stars.
It is difficult to imagine John
Mayer or any of the other also-rans
cluttering today’s rock ’n’ roll scene
as being able to undertake a proj
ect like this under similar circum
stances.
Add to that fact that Young was
an active recording artist as far back
as 1967 and was one of the movers
in the Seattle grunge craze.
That, combined with the fact that
his latest album is quite good, makes
it hard to deny that Neil Young argu
ably can be described, along with the
Rolling Stones and perhaps a few
others, as one of the elder statesmen
of rock ’n’ roll.
It’s true that, throughout the
years, Young has made a fair amount
of music that sounds a lot like the
tracks on Prairie Wind, but it’s also
true that no one else has.
The album is most similar in its
style to Young’s 1972 release Harvest,
and its pseudo-sequel Harvest Moon,
released in 1992.
Prairie Wind, though it is unfor
tunately the weakest of the three,
completes what has turned out to
be a sort of acoustic rock trilogy.
Young’s acoustic albums are a far
cry from the distorted electric sound
of classics such as “Hey Hey, My My”
and “Down by the River,” but they’re
distinctive, classic Neil Young nev
ertheless.
The first single off the latest
album —and its best track is “The
Painter.” The song is a typical ballad
from this Canadian cowboy and
pulls together many of the album’s
Diversions
MUSIC EVii
ORANGER
NEW COMES AND GOES
-kick
enough to make listening to the
album worthwhile.
Other songs are sometimes
painful, but at least most of them
are two- or three-minute quips
that don’t leave you begging for
more.
The general theme of the album
is how girls break guys’ hearts and
leave them sad and alone.
It’s a good album for bemoan
ing the loss of a significant other,
but who does that after high
school?
Instead of trying to advance as
artists, the members of Oranger
are trying to ride the indie wave
into a successful LP.
MUSIC 1
NEIL YOUNG
PRAIRIE WIND
kkkk
themes: remembrances of places,
friends and feelings.
It’s not surprising that Young
chose to sing about memories of
such things as his Canadian boyhood
home and his father on this album
given the circumstances under
which it was written and recorded.
Even since Harvest, Young has
had a fondness for reminiscence,
and the trait is only more noticeable
in his first release since his illness.
Aside from “The Painter,” the
tracks range from average to good.
The one track that might not ring
true for longtime Neil Young fans is
“No Wonder,” a song featuring what
seems to be the requisite left-wing
commentary about Sept. 11 and fat
cat politicians.
Young has been known as a politi
cal activist for much of his career, but
even so it’s somewhat jarring that
one of his songs references Chris
Rock and his political views.
It’s just weird like if Kanye
West were to name-drop Gallagher
on his next album.
The album as a whole has a very
“Nashville” sound: lots of steel guitar
and heavy use of backup vocals that
are equal parts church choir and
doo-wop, though they occasionally
overpower what it is they’re backing
up.
Overall, fans of Young’s earlier
acoustic work won’t regret giving
Prairie Wind a listen.
It features one of the most unique
musical voices of the past 40 years
doing what he does best with a level
of emotion not often found on new
releases.
Contact theA&E Editor
at artsdesk@une.edu.
CENTERING THE SOUTH
THE FIRST
WACO
HORROR
The Lynching of Jesse Washington
and the Rise of the NAACP
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But with all the indie bands
popping out from the woodwork,
Oranger needs to try harder to
stand out.
The band’s lack of creativity
is evident in its use of gimmicks.
Groups resort to these to distract
listeners from the actual music.
Oranger decided to go with odd
names and alternate spellings for
some of its songs.
While these unusual spellings
make for a fun back-album cover,
they don’t help the band.
“Whacha Holden,” “Haeter,”
and “Outtatoch” do nothing to
bolster the album’s bland lyrics.
Such alternate spellings are
reminiscent of some Usher songs
including “U Remind Me” and “U
R the One.”
Oranger and Usher both seem to
be advocates of sounding things out
instead of using proper grammar.
Adaptation fails to fill
acclaimed book’s shoes
BY HARRY KAPLOWITZ
STAFF WRITER
Don’t worry, Hollywood is
going to get it right one of these
days.
Sometime between Woody
Allen getting an Oscar and Will
Smith giving up on his rap career,
the studios will finally learn how
to adapt books to the big screen
perfectly.
Until then, audiences will be
left with films such as Curtis
Hanson’s “In Her Shoes,” a
romantic dramedy with heavy
doses of family dysfunction and
schmaltz.
Playing off Jennifer Weiner’s
best-selling novel, the movie
becomes exactly what it intended
to be: a chick flick sans a saccha
rine-sweet center.
It’s the story of Rose (Toni
Collette), an unflinchingly logical
lawyer whose life is spiraled into
anew direction when her fun
loving sister, Maggie (Cameron
Diaz), moves in with her.
But, no perhaps the film is
about Maggie, the beautiful and
free-spirited sister whose life has
been set awry since she dropped
out of college.
But, see, that’s not quite right,
either.
The movie also could be about
Ella (Shirley MacLaine), Maggie
and Rose’s long-lost grandmother
who Maggie tracks down after
she is kicked out of Rose’s apart
ment.
That is the dilemma “In Her
Shoes” fails to resolve in the span
of its drawn-out, 130-minute
frame.
“Who do you like more?”
screenwriter Susannah Grant
seems to be asking the audience
as the story pans from Rose dat
ing Übermensch Simon Stein
(Mark Feuerstein), to Maggie
Casual music listeners should
be wary of New Comes and Goes.
Most of these songs aren’t radio
friendly and aren’t for easy listen
ing.
Avid music listeners might
have the patience to sift through
the rubbish and find the good.
Oranger should not be judged
by its latest album, which hope
fully is just a minor blip in the
group’s otherwise impressive
career.
The LP might not have received
such a harsh review if Oranger’s
potential wasn’t already known.
After the amazing disc, The
Quiet Vibration Land, Oranger’s
expectations were set high.
This is just a dry effort from an
otherwise juicy band.
Contact theA&E Editor
at artsdesk@unc.edu.
MOVIE SVIEW
'IN HER SHOES'
★★★
buying outfits for senior citizens
to Ella trying to legitimize her
relationship with her estranged
granddaughters.
Coming off a much more suc
cessful run with “Erin Brockovich”
in 2000, Grant is given the bur
densome task of adapting a film
that focuses on three main char
acters and their predicaments
while trying to give each plot the
attention it needs to develop by
itself on screen.
The result is a movie that
spends too much time trying to
figure out what it wants to be and
not enough time exploring the
story’s more interesting human
istic elements.
Hanson, who’s tackled tougher
projects with “L.A. Confidential”
and “8 Mile,” never seems to fig
ure out where he wants to go with
this film.
Part family drama, part roman
tic comedy and part showcasing
of Diaz’s nonemotive assets, the
movie dribbles along from plot
line to plotline with only a small
idea of direction.
The production team did an
admirable job, however.
The story is hard to adapt, and
Weiner’s story does a lot of jump
ing around.
But the literary transitions
appear scattered and frustrating
on screen.
Collette, though not given
top billing, definitely carries the
film and plays the role she’s been
playing on and off since “Muriel’s
Wedding.”
She’s not a floozy like Maggie,
but she’s no old maid either.
Collette has made a career out
of playing the average woman,
and it’s never been more enjoy
able.
Diaz, despite top billing and
a role fit for her, seemed to fall
dramatically short.
Her body, on the other hand,
delivered Oscar-worthy perfor
mances.
It doesn’t avoid the pratfalls
most adaptations encounter, but
“In Her Shoes” still is smart, sexy
and not just your average chick
flick.
Hollywood might struggle to
figure out how to make the per
fect adaptation, but movies like
this almost hit the mark.
Contact theA&E Editor
at artsdesk@unc.edu.
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Question
of minds
hits hard
in ‘Proof’
MUVIE 'VIEW
'PROOF'
kirk
BY BETH DOZIER
STAFF WRITER
Take a look in the mirror. You
may have your dad’s eyes, your
mom’s smile or perhaps your Aunt
Mildred’s unfortunate nose.
But what about below the sur
face? What about the inheritance
you can’t see?
In John Madden’s “Proof,”
Catherine (Gwyneth Paltrow), the
daughter of a recently deceased and
delusional mathematician, wonders
whether her apparent talent for
math means that she has also inher
ited her father’s insanity.
Madden’s adaptation of David
Auburn’s Pulitzer Prize-winning
play blurs the line between past and
present and reality and imagination
to create a mathematical thriller of
sorts.
Paltrow convincingly balances
Catherine’s frigid insecurity with an
understated confidence as she comes
to terms with her father’s death and
the years she lost caring for him,
while simultaneously questioning
her own sanity.
Catherine’s father, Robert
(Anthony Hopkins), apparently rev
olutionized mathematics in his early
twenties before he fell ill, prompting
Catherine to abandon her own math
ematical studies at Northwestern
University to care for him.
After the father’s death, his for
mer student Hal (Jake Gyllenhaal)
arrives to sift through the hundreds
of notebooks that he left, hoping to
find another mathematical discovery
inside Robert’s tortured mind.
Catherine then has to struggle
with her attraction to Hal and her
overriding fear that he just wants to
exploit her father’s work.
To complicate the mix, Catherine’s
estranged sister Claire (Hope Davis)
tries to care for her, but her motherly
ways alienate Catherine, who resents
her sister for not helping to care for
their father.
When Catherine shows Hal a
notebook that contains a proof that
would revolutionize the field, the
question arises: Did Robert write it
or did Catherine? And thus a math
ematical whodunit ensues.
Gyllenhaal does OK by his subtle
portrayal of Hal, but it is Davis’ and
Paltrow’s performances that make
the film believable.
Davis easily could have made
Claire a one-dimensional, detest
able character, but she reveals that
beneath Claire’s Martha Stewart-like
facade, she does care about her sister
and is perhaps jealous of her close
ness toward their father.
Paltrow gives Catherine a sort
of raw anguish in her no-frills per
formance, full of not-so-flattering
close-ups.
“Proof” applies to Catherine’s
three different struggles.
First, there’s the explicit proof
and the quest to discover who wrote
it, then there is Catherine’s need
for proof that Hal’s love for her is
real, and finally whether or not
Catherine’s mathematical genius
is proof that she shares her father’s
insanity.
But don’t expect a Pythagorean
theorem to solve this triangle. The
film suggests that in life, and some
times in math, there are no easy
answers.
Contact theA&E Editor
at artsdesk@unc.edu.