District Quarterly asks, “What is student media nostalgic for?”

By Jen Sparkman By Katelan Cunningham

The deadline for District Quarterly’s fall issue is almost here. The theme is nostalgia and the deadline is August 20. Here’s another video in the series where District Quarterly asks, “What is student media nostalgia for?”

SCAD radio DJ Brandon Thompson talks about his nostalgia for childhood. All nostalgic creations can be sent to quarterly@scaddistrict.com. Any media is accepted.

Visual content needs to be 300 dpi
Written content: less than 1700 words
Video and audio submissions: less than 15 minutes

For more information check out the website and check out new videos every week as part of the “What is student media nostalgic for?” series leading up to the submission deadline.

Contact Jennifer Sparkman. Contact Katelan Cunningham.

District Quarterly asks, “What is student media nostalgic for?”

By Jen Sparkman By Katelan Cunningham

The deadline is approaching quickly for District Quarterly’s fall issue. The theme is nostalgia and the deadline is August 20. Here’s another video in the series where District Quarterly asks, “What is student media nostalgia for?”

SCAD alumnus Jon Rushing reminisces about simpler times. All nostalgic creations can be sent to quarterly@scaddistrict.com. Any media is accepted.

Visual content needs to be 300 dpi
Written content: less than 1700 words
Video and audio submissions: less than 15 minutes

For more information check out the website and check out new videos every week as part of the “What is student media nostalgic for?” series leading up to the submission deadline.

Contact Jennifer Sparkman.[Contact fname="Katelan" lname="Cunningham" email="quarterly@scaddistrict.com"]

A new kind of heist: Your mind is their mission

By Katelan Cunningham

You fall into a dream without knowing how you got there. You dream that you’re falling, but not hitting bottom, and then you wake up—that’s called “the kick.” You can also wake up by getting killed in your dream. How do you know that it’s you who’s dreaming? Your totem. It’s a small weighted object that is yours alone so you know when it’s your dream you’re in, and when it’s someone else’s i.e. dream sharing.

You got that?

With only a few exceptions, 2010 summer flicks have been a bit of a snoozefest. Where are the explosions? Where are the mouth-gaping shots of vast foreign places with the heroes emerging over the horizon? Where’s the adventure, the fast cars and the big guns? Leave it to Christopher Nolan to put out just what you’re asking for. But “Inception” is more than an adventure on foreign soil; it’s an adventure on land that we’re all foreign to: the mind.

Leonardo DiCaprio plays Dom Cobb, the best in his profession of extraction. With the technology to enter people’s subconscious through their dreams, extractors go deep into people’s minds and find and steal information. It’s a kind of theft that leaves no fingerprints, only a remnant of something you can’t be sure even happened when you wake up.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is his pointman, Arthur. Gordon-Levitt has been on a spell of indie movies, playing anything from a calloused gay prostitute to a hopelessly romantic greeting card writer, so the only surprise in adding this role his resumé is that it’s not something you can see at the Sundance Film Festival.

Although often playing a quick-witted angsty youth in films like “Juno” and “Whip It,” Ellen Page is the architect on this team of dream pioneers. Her character, Ariadne is hired to work on the next near-impossible assignment: inception.

Instead of stealing an idea, inception is planting an idea. While it sounds simple enough, “no idea is simple when you have to plant it in someone’s mind.” Inception is pure inspiration and therefore must be buried so deeply in the subconscious that it can’t be traced. It needs to look like an original thought or it will not stick. It’s a feat most find impossible, but Cobb (DiCaprio) and his team take on the challenge.

The client: Saito (Ken Watanabe), a major player in the business of energy.

The goal: To implant an idea into the head of Robert Fischer (Cillian Murphy), the leader of an opposing energy corporation. This idea is intended lead to the end of his father’s energy empire, which borderlines that of a world superpower.

While attempting inception, Cobb must battle his own memories, his wife and the guilt of his past in order to make a future for himself and his children. Inception can be his way out of his own tunnel of dissatisfaction with reality.

Big money productions are charted territory for DiCaprio, star of “The Departed,” and more recently “Shutter Island.” Just like in those roles, DiCaprio is entrancing as the lead with a mysterious past and a torturous motivation. Page’s character is more openly compassionate than any other roles we’ve seen her play, and while she was only ten when DiCaprio starred in “Titanic,” she shows no lack of experience acting alongside the blockbuster icon.

It’s no surprise to see Gordon-Levitt in his role as Arthur, or any role, really. He continues to play characters who push him in a different direction than he’s tried before. Marion Cotillard (Oscar winner for Best Actress in 2008 for “La Vie En Rose”), has an elegant, but villainous and disturbing performance as Cobb’s wife.

Other than the paternal, British guidance we expect from Michael Caine, his name on the poster doesn’t seem to be more than a nod to the fact that this is a Christopher Nolan film. But it’s not hard to see that this is written and directed by the same guy who did “The Dark Knight.” The movie is big. Big names, big chase scenes, big explosions, big crime.

The film is, at it’s heart, a heist movie. A team is assembled, each with their own expertise. A plan is devised. Research is done. There are glitches, bad guys and guns along the way. But when nothing in a dream is quite as it seems, the next move is harder to predict.

When you can live in your dream, and build it up or tear it down at will, reality seems foreign and confining. In this place where you acknowledge all of the possibilities of your subconscious, you can create a new reality, but it’s all still in your mind. Five minutes in the real world is an hour in your dream, so you can live for hours, days, even years, and wake up as though you’ve stolen time. So if you had the option of that escape, would you take it? And how far would you let it take you?

It’s a question which I challenge anyone to try and tackle while finding yourself deeper and deeper into the dream realms Nolan has created. “Inception” takes the audience to a world where the subconscious is not a state of mind, but a location more concrete than we can comprehend. “Inception” is complex and imaginative without boundaries. At times, the complexities have you feeling a little perplexed, but you are in the careful hands of the man who brought you “Memento” and “The Prestige” and before you know it, you can take a deep breath, and you’ll surface all the wiser having seen the unreality of a dream.

Contact Katelan Cunningham.

Sex, drugs and Jonah Hill

By Katelan Cunningham

It’s not summer at the cinema without a comedy produced by Judd Apatow. This summer, Jonah Hill plays Aaron: a over-worked 20-something talent scout trying to make it in L.A. He works at Pinnacle Records under the demeaning Sergio, played by Sean “P.Diddy” Combs.

Aaron has an idea for the company to host a comeback tour for rocker Aldous Snow (played by Russel Brand). Aaron’s breakout assignment is to get Snow from London to L.A. in one piece and on time for the first performance at the Greek Theatre.
But Aldous Snow is no poser rock star. He is a lot of sex, does a lot of drugs and plays a lot of rock and roll. For Aaron, these are the instruments for chaos.

Judd Apatow has become something of a familiar name in comedy these past 6 years. While he’s been on the scene longer than that as one of the writers of “Freaks and Geeks,” his brand of comedy has extended from generational classics like “Anchorman: the Legend of Ron Burgundy,” “Superbad,” “Knocked Up,” “The 40-Year Old Virgin” and most recently, “Get Him to the Greek.”
While he does seem to favor a recurring crew of actors, (Seth Rogan, Jonah Hill, Will Farrell and Steve Carrell), you are guaranteed a different story and ultimately, a comedy with some heart and integrity.

It’s a balance of smart comedy and a little guilty, can’t-help-but-laugh humor.

What makes “Get Him to the Greek” such a success is the focus on two characters. It’s two guys’ quest from London to L.A.: trials, tribulations and detours. We know them and none of the characters are half-hearted or penciled in. The character arc is not sacrificed for the outrageous comedy.

Jonah Hill came out of nowhere 6 years ago in “I Heart Huckabees,” and hasn’t laid off since. He’s evolved from the high school kid trying to score in “Superbad” to an adult assigned to get a rockstar to L.A.  Jonah Hill’s career is impressive, and he doesn’t show any sign of slowing down soon.

Even the performance by the peripheral characters played by P.Diddy, Rose Byrne and Elisabeth Moss are not thrown in haphazardly. As expected from the man who produced “Pineapple Express,” situations get to be over-the-top, but characters are always grounded in reality.

P.Diddy is the biggest surprise in the movie. I expected a cameo or guest appearance. A punch line at the beginning in a kind of “P.Diddy as himself role,” and maybe some tie-in at the end. While he does play a music industry big shot, his character is more extreme than we’ve seen him. He’s actually acting, and he’s a riot.

“Get Him to the Greek” gives you a laugh you expect from any movie with Apatow’s name on it and Jonah Hill on the poster. From the subtle underhanded punch line to the in your face fast ball of hilarity, every joke was well-timed and momentum never lagged.

“Get Him to the Greek” is rated R and is playing at Trademark Cinemas Victory Square Stadium 9 at 1:10 p.m., 4:30 p.m., 7:20 p.m. and 9:40 p.m.

Running time: 2 hours

Contact Katelan Cunningham.

Four babies, one year

By Katelan Cunningham

It’s a love or hate thing. You either love babies with their vague noises, gummy smiles and amazement at new discoveries, or you hate their wailing, various waste deposits and inability to make words. If you’re part of the latter, Focus Features’ new documentary “Babies” will be 79 minutes in a torture chamber of pediatric proportions.

The French film crew, Chez Wam followed the lives of four babies during their first year of life. Each baby is in a different location: Opuwo, Nambia; Tokyo, Japan; Bayanchandmani, Mongolia and San Francisco, California.

The first year of life is just a blink in our personal evolution. It’s pieced together through documentation and stories we hear, but we seldom actually remember it. Seeing the lives of these babies in very contrasting environments makes each feat of an infant more celebrated and less trivial.

Is this just a montage of home videos shot with a nicer camera? Yes, but most typical Americans have videos of themselves on their first Halloween and photos of themselves in high chairs with faces covered in spaghetti sauce. But Bayar from Mongolia now has footage of himself walking naked through a field of cattle, and not many Americans can say that.

The film explores the differences and similarities in cultures’ baby rearing, breast feeding and teaching methods.

It might be my familiarity with the American baby, but Hattie (the baby in San Francisco) seems more bored than the other three. Every other scene she is in a class, a baby posse or being read to. Mari from Tokyo has a fit in her room of abundant toys for longer than is tolerable.

It hammers the message of the over-stimulated city baby with a stunted drive for discovery and the rural baby with not much but the smile on his face.

Ponijao from Nambia is always happy with his rocks, dirt and sticks for toys. Bayar from Mongolia is entertained by goats and cattle and the household cat. It’s the naiveté of a child’s small world.

From the clip of the umbilical cord to the first triumphant step, this movie makes a big deal of the little deals. If you’re a mother (or soon-to-be), this movie might be worth the matinee price. If you just love the YouTube videos of babies laughing, get ready to be on cute overload. If you don’t think babies are even real people until they can walk, talk and use a toilet, then this movie will be a reassuring contraceptive.

“Babies” is showing at Sea Turtle Cinemas in Bluffton, S.C., at 11:55 a.m., 1:45 p.m., 3:35 p.m., 5:25 p.m., 7:15 p.m. and 9:05 p.m.

A star-studded finale of fashion

By Katelan Cunningham

From shiny gold blazers, Alexander McQueen-inspired dress shirts and feathered hats that looked like they might take flight, more than the models dressed up for the 2010 SCAD Fashion Show. Photographers lined the sides of Trustees Theater waiting to get pictures of the celebrities about to grace the stage as last-minute guests found their seats.

SCAD President Paula Wallace was the first on the mic. She thanked André Leon Talley, Michael Fink, “the dapper Dean of the School of Fashion,” and Miss J. Alexander, “the leggiest man in television,” who taught the models (all of whom were SCAD students) how to walk with ferocity.

“Thank you, André, for filling our sky with constellations,” Wallace said.

The runway rhythm began with Shirley Bassey’s “History Repeating” as male models showed a collection of tunics designed by the A.L.T Award winners as a tribute to André Leon Talley.

After the collection, Talley came on  stage wearing his own bright green, patterned tunic with a tie underneath and silver chains on top. He was excited to present the 2010 Lifetime Achievement Award to his childhood friend, Diane Von Furstenberg.

He said they “grew up in fashion like twins.”

In her acceptance speech, von Furstenberg, the “super nova” expressed her extreme love and gratitude for the past she and Talley shared.

“Now look, André. Now you are fashion and everyone wants to touch you,” said Von Furstenberg.

Famous for being the designer of the wrap dress during a time when women were still gaining their independence, von Furstenberg said, “Our goal is to make the world a little bit more beautiful. Good luck.”

Twenty eight designers had collections in the show from children in tutus and men in hoods to women in floor-length woven gowns. Each collection was different from the next.

The audience showed high energy with applause and cheers for their favorites.

Olivia Ham, third-year fashion design major liked the first collection.

“I really like the ruffles and I love the body and the way that it moves, but all the collections were really fun this year. I really like them,” Ham said.

When asked what her favorite collection was, Anna Donahue, second-year fashion design major said, “Definitely the last one [Mertet Goetschel]. I thought it was amazing.”

Sebastian Baptiste, fourth-year fashion design major agreed.  “I saw [Goetschel] making the knit balls and everything. By far my favorite out of all of them.”

After the show, the designers came out with their models and continued their catwalk out to the street where they stood on a white runway for photos.

Under the big lights, everyone congratulated the designers on their tremendous efforts and execution. The fashion-filled month ended with a high-profile, seamless show of inspiring work on the runway.

Contact Katelan Cunningham.

District Quarterly gets materialistic

By Amy Paige Condon

SCAD’s student-produced magazine, District Quarterly, will host a launch party for its third issue from 3-5 p.m., April 23 in the Oglethorpe House Ballroom.

This issue marks the first under new editor-in-chief Katelan Cunningham, a third-year writing major from Arlington, Texas. Each quarter’s theme varies and this one—materialism—sparked students’ imaginations.

“It’s more abstract than the previous two and I think that really got people thinking,” she said. “People have different interpretations of materialism, good and bad, and I think the different approaches to the subject made an interesting product.”

District Quarterly publishes original creative works from students, including essays and poetry, short stories, photography, paintings, graphic designs and drawings. All of the artists’ works appearing in the spring issue will be exhibited during the launch party.

Said Cunningham, “I hope everyone will come out and support art of their peers and the publication. It’s exciting to see all of the submissions come in, and I hope we get more and more each quarter.”

Contact Amy Paige Condon.

If this is “Date Night,” I’m going stag

By Katelan Cunningham

I expected uproarious laughter from Tina Fey’s humor of awkward desperation. I expected Steve Carell’s dry humor to leave me uncomfortably giddy. But then I reminded myself, this is not “The Office” or “30 Rock”—unfortunately. Liz Lemon and Michael Scott were replaced by these impostors by the name of Foster.

In the first ten minutes of the movie, we establish that the Phil and Claire Foster have two kids and two successful jobs. Occasionally, they hire a sitter so they can have a date night at the local family restaurant where the waiter knows their name and their order never changes.

However, after the Fosters find out that their married friends are separated, they each decide to liven up their relationship with a night in Manhattan at the VIP restaurant, Claw. After they take someone else’s reservations, you are in for a “this is just a big misunderstanding” comedy.

The married-but-separated friends, played by Mark Ruffalo and Kristen Wiig, are the first evidence of the humor that I felt was lacking from Fey and Carell. I’ll call this third-wheel humor.

The third-wheel humor continues with appearances by Mark Wahlberg, William Fichtner, James Franco and Mila Kunis. These actors, who are all very entertaining, managed to bring the best out of Fey and Carell. I cringe to say, the Fosters are too normal. To act like a couple in a movie the chemistry has to be obvious (perhaps even excessive). The actors were probably having a good time on set, but Carell and Fey act just like what their characters are trying to avoid: “most excellent roommates.”

There were some jokes planted at the beginning that continued to be recycled throughout the film as if to say, “Do you remember this joke? Wasn’t it funny? Let me see if it’s funnier the second time.” It wasn’t funnier the second or third. I didn’t know this duo could run out of jokes, but most of the recurring bits seem like they are just testing our memory.

This movie also falls into the growing industry fad of blurring the line between genres. There is some humor, but there are also guns, car chases and a sentimental ending between the Fosters that sneaks in. I’m not buying it. In “Taxi,” no one tried to make Jimmy Fallon and Queen Latifah fall in love. And while “Bounty Hunter” seems similar, it does not brag two of the biggest comedic legends from iconic shows like “30 Rock” or “The Office”.

I did like the concept, but there was more confusion between “fun for the whole family” humor paired with f-bombs. Maybe this has something to do with the fact that the writer and director are not used to making movies for grown-ups. The writer, John Klausner, wrote “Shrek the Third” and forthcoming “Shrek Forever After”. Director Shawn Levy had some cinematic gems: “Cheaper by the Dozen,” “The Pink Panther,” “Night at the Museum” and “Big Fat Liar.”

It doesn’t seem that Levy knew the talent he was working with. Let go of the reigns—you’re dealing with grown-ups. Admittedly, I would have loved 90 minutes of my NBC Thursday line-up. I was ready to embrace the Fosters, but I only left the theater disappointed. I just wanted to catch up with Liz Lemon and Michael Scott on Hulu.

“Date Night” is showing at Trademark Cinemas Victory Square Stadium 9 at 1:50 p.m., 4:20 p.m., 7:20 p.m. and 9:50 p.m.

Contact Katelan Cunningham.

“Hot Tub Time Machine”: The bro story with a bit of magic

By Katelan Cunningham

My enthusiasm for “Hot Tub Time Machine” was nearly a lone cry. People wondered, “Why is John Cusack lowering his well-established romantic comedy reputation?” “What’s that bald guy doing off ‘The Daily Show’?” and “Why does that kid with the glasses still have that awkward feminine haircut?”

This journey of bonding and bro-dom is a common theme in the past couple years with movies like “Superbad,” “Without a Paddle” and my personal favorite, “The Hangover.”

In every bro movie, friendships are challenged, there is the goal they’re trying to reach, something they are trying to find, the one particular bro who eventually messes it all up and the girl who just gets in the way.

However, in the end, friendship always prevails. So how is “Hot Tub Time Machine” any different? I’m not sure it is, with the obvious exception of a hot tub time machine.

Nick (Craig Robinson), Adam (John Cusack) and Lou (Rob Corddry) are middle-aged friends who have lost touch since their rambunctious days of irresponsible spontaneity. “We were young. We had momentum. We were winning,” Adam reminiscences.

After the near-death/suspected suicide of Lou, they are brought together for a trip to Kodiak Valley. Jacob (Clark Duke) is Adam’s 20-year-old nephew who is living with him because he’d rather sit in the basement and face hard time in Second Life instead of facing his mom’s boyfriend—so he too tags along for the ride.

Kodiak Valley is not the drug-ridden, girl-littered party hub that they remembered. However, they settle in their familiar hot tub (but only after the double doors fly open revealing it has miraculously started boiling and glowing orange). They strip down, hop in, have some drinks, pass out and wake up in 1986. What I wanted was a movie about a hot tub time machine and that’s what I got. The film is focused and consistent and it is hilarious with a moral.

These heartbroken, deceived-by-destiny, substance-reliant men plus nephew Jacob find themselves in a world where their iPhones don’t work, Michael Jackson is still black and MTV still airs music videos. In a frantic state to get out of 1986 and back to 2010, their only clue to a way back to the present is the hot tub maintenance man, aka “mystical time travel guide guy,” played by Chevy Chase.

The humor favors laughing at the failed joke and various crude references to the male anatomy. Admittedly, all of this was expected and still handled with relative taste.

Cusack lovers should have some faith in him. There is no need to fear that this was not a cop-out film for a bit of cash. It may be out of his genre, but he co-produced the film. There is a bit of love and a broken heart or two. Even some questioning of destiny. (“Serendipity” anyone?)

While I didn’t find myself teary-eyed with laughter like in “The Hangover,” “Hot Tub Time Machine” definitely left me with some quotable lines. Nobody woke with Mike Tyson’s tiger, a baby in a closet and lost teeth. However, these guys did wake up to leg warmers, “Miami Vice” T-shirts and cassette players. It is hilarious and just as outrageous as its title implies.

Contact Katelan Cunningham.

Furniture Design Awards winners

By Katelan Cunningham

24e hosted the Furniture Design Awards on March 5. Upstairs, presentation boards were set up around the display floor showing images and information about the designs. “It’s my honor ro work with SCAD,” said 24e owner Ruel Joyner.

The panel of judges was comprised of 15 judges from the industry, press and other community around Savannah. The judging was based on personal taste, creativity and originality.

Graduate students Ryan Osborne and Nicole Sistrunk tied for second and third place. Osborne’s design, Splice, was a bent-wood multifunction side table with metal legs that he is in the process of building.

Sistrunk’s Tin Type Table design was inspired by the South. “I took my inspiration from Southern gliders. I wanted to work with a visual texture that looked good in any setting,” Sistrunk said.

First place winner Katy Skelton’s design was the Gwen Chaise Lounge. “This is a lounge chair made to go indoors or out,” Skelton said. Skelton designed the lounge to be made with either eco-friendly recycled materials or with non-eco-friendly teak.

“It’s completely different but almost real piece of furniture,” said Furniture Design chair Antonio Larosa.

“The design speaks for itself,” Joyner said. He said the winner is sleek and modern, but would still complement a Savannah home.

Contact Katelan Cunningham.
Photos by Jessi Gilbert

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