Pwd.

Too many thumbs up for Pixar’s Up

By Siavash Emamzadeh

ecently, I went to watch Pixar’s new
Risse Up, to see what the big
hullabaloo surrounding the movie

was about. After all, it garnered a rating of
8.8/10 on imdb.com and came in at number
22 on the website’s list of the 250 greatest
movies—not to mention the plethora of
other positive reviews it has been receiving.

The movie is about an elderly man,
Carl Fredrickson, who discovers that
his house is about to be demolished.
He attempts to relocate his home far
away, somewhere in South America. His
endeavour is prompted by the memory of
his deceased wife and is primarily a tribute
to their childhood idol, an explorer who
travels by airship. Just before being evicted
and moved into a retirement home, Carl
manages to elevate his house with the help
of thousands of balloons. Along the way,
he encounters new and exciting adventures
and quickly learns that he is not alone in his
airborne journey.

After taking in the movie, I had mixed
feelings. On one hand, | felt the movie
was worth my time and money; the quality

of the computer-generated graphics was
exceptional and a “Disney feel” was present
throughout it. On the other hand, the plot of
the movie led me to question the outburst of
praise it has drawn.

The two things that really had me
uneasy about the film were the up-and-down
emotional traits of the plot and the movie’s
inability to engage me. The frequent shifts
between a bright tone and discouraging
scene made it hard to really sink into my
seat, if you will. If these shifts were rather
irrelevant or insignificant to the plot, then
there would be no problem, but on the
contrary, they were key to the film.

For example, in one of the part of the
story, Carl meets the explorer he and his
deceased wife idolized as kids However,
soon thereafter, this “hero” is revealed as
a self-centered man who’s out to capture
Carl’s pet bird.

Furthermore, the story is regularly
interspersed with the old man’s grumpiness,
dashing the enthusiasm the child stowaway
on his flying house has in spades and once
again fiddles with the tone. Personality
conflicts can add an attractive dimension to
a movie, but it all depends on how they are

   

worked into the course of the film.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m fine with a
solemn context to a movie, especially in
animation—I think it adds a needed touch
of reality. So, it’s not so much the emotional
variations in the movie that bothers me but
rather the frequency of these variations.
Had this movie been a thriller, I’d be fine
with regular shifts in mood, but frankly, a

Disney production isn’t supposed to be so
unpredictable.

Overall, I was content with the film,
but the strong acclaim it received by critics
and viewers alike had me expecting an
animation along the lines of Disney classics
like Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, or The
Lion King. On that front, Up did not deliver.

 

Prog Rock hits Douglas College

Prog Fest rocks the Muir Theatre June 13"

By Jay Schreiber, Arts Editor

omewhere around ‘67 or ‘68, a group
S of British musicians mesh elements of

classical music into this new thing called
rock and roll. Little did they know that they
would start the musically experimental genre of
progressive rock.

So what is progressive rock? Progressive
rock, or prog rock for short, is a style of art-rock
that expands the boundaries of conventional rock
music. To put it in perspective, prog is a classical
approach to rock and roll, the outcome if you
rock out with your Bach out.

Prog rock got its start in the late 1960s with
the release of British band Yes’ debut cut The
Yes Album. Following shortly after was the debut
release from Emerson Lake and Palmer (ELP),
King Crimson and Genesis, all key groups to the
formation of the genre. Since the music was the
newest style in the genre, it was given the title of
progressive rock.

Often people consider Pink Floyd to be
under progressive rock because they’re British
and have 15 minute songs. Pink Floyd came from
a the psychedelic scene in London, But after
Syd Barrett left the group in ‘69 they have had a
similar style to other progressive bands and in the
‘70s they were quite essential in the introduction
of synthesizers to rock music... just so ya know...

So what happened to prog rock? It
essentially died out or “moved on” after the ‘70s
but by that time rock and roll had competition
with a new thing called disco. Prog bands are still
touring today but they don’t have the hype of the
earlier years when they used to fill arenas.

Today, the influence of prog rock is mainly
seen in heavy metal music since progressive
melodies are easy to do double bass drum over
and adding distortion makes it sound wicked!
Heavy metal group Meshuggah’s album Catch 33
is one giant song with 13 subtitles and returning
eerie throughout the disk. Opeth is a band that

is known to be “light and dark” when it comes
to their music, meaning that it goes from being
intensely loud and distorted to being subtle with
acoustic guitars and synths. Even Dream Theater
is very synth heavy and flows through long
composed sections melodically.

In Victoria back in the 1970’s, A couple of
high school students, not unlike those in Britain
only a few years before, got together to form
a prog rock group. Paul Seale, John Larson
and Bob Caldwell joined together and called
themselves Earthbound. They played together
and toured during the height of the prog years
until 1976. They went on hiatus after the peak of

prog died down and each member moved on with

their life.

The band reunited back in ‘95, and has
done occasional gigs but like other prog bands
have found there’s just not a scene like there was
back when it was fresh. Prog Fest was the first
gig for Earthbound in two years, and the show
was set up by Bob Caldwell as the year’s annual
fundraiser for the College.

“] thought to myself, we’ve had classical
concerts, and faculty performances before, but
we haven’t had a rock show here in a while,”
Bob mentioned in an interview. “It was about six
months of planning, and four months of weekly
rehearsals for the one night.”

Joining the Earthbound crew was Chris
Lawly, a local guitarist, and Jason Dionne and
Joel Noftle on the keys. The bands played two
sets with rotating line-ups as to accommodate the

 

Earthbound in 2004

started it all.

The house was fairly filled at the Muir
Theatre on June 13" with prog heads coming to
see the show, talk prog, trade concert DVDs and
pins, bid on silent auctions and enjoy the show.

“Most of the people there were my age, but a lot of younger people showed up
too, it’s good to see the younger generations getting into this kind of music.”
-Bob Caldwell

years of shifting and cover songs being played.
Edwin Dolinski joined the group for a two song
set of ELP before the grand finale of earthbound
playing Yes songs from that first album that

“People seemed to enjoy it” Bob continued
to say, “Most of the people there were my age,
but a lot of younger people showed up too. It’s
good to see the younger generations getting into

this kind of music.”

In the end, the concert went off without
a hitch, and everyone had fun. The fan base is
still there but the demand is not high. It’s good
to see events like this still going on to keep the
memories of recent years still fresh and enjoyed
by a completely new crowd. Younger people are
taking to it in some way, shape or form, whether
in their parents old vinyl collections, or through
the distorted squeal from a prog metal group.
Prog still lives, the intellectual will survive.