Hitchcock’s ‘To Catch a Thief’ is worth rewatching

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JULY 28, 2015 THENORTHERNLIGHT.ORGUNIVERSITY OF ALASKA ANCHORAGE

‘Werkmeister Harmonies’ is simply poetic

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To see process photos of the lion while it was being sculpted, visit Meg White’s blog at

http://rockpaperscissorsncalay.blogspot.com.

The line to get into H&M wrapped around the entire ground floor of the Dimond Center twice.

PHOTOS BY KJERSTI ANDREASSEN

An hour after H&M’s noon opening at the Dimond Center on July 16, the line was still very long — and growing — outside.

Hugh Ashlock, the owner of Dimond Center, takes a photo of the store opening fom the second floor. Brenda Stiel, who does marketing for the mall, stands behind him.

The massive feline looks star-tled as if rudely awakened from an afternoon snooze from com-motion outside the UAA Natu-ral Sciences Building — fortu-nately for UAA students, staff, faculty and visitors, an escape should be no trouble. The beast, after all, is made out of several tons of limestone.

Last Friday, a small group of students and faculty gathered outside the Natural Sciences Building to celebrate the arrival of the newest, and fiercest, ten-ant to the UAA Rock Garden: a sculpture of the extinct Ameri-can lion.

The creature, which roamed the continent several hundred thousand years ago, was part of the Natural Sciences Build-ing renovations that wrapped up more than two years ago.

“I wanted something to draw students in,” Summer Sauve said, a project manager with UAA’s Facilities Services who coordinated the lion’s arrival to campus.

The piece of art comes from the handiwork of Kentucky stone and bronze sculptor Meg White.

White explained part of her sculpture method for this piece.

“I wanted have something where it’s protected, where freezing and thawing would be less of an issue,” White said.

White, who is based in Ste-phensport, Kentucky, was cho-sen from over 100 applicants to carry out the work by the Alaska State Council on the Arts.

The ASCA facilitates the “Percent for Art Program,” state legislation passed in 1975 that allocates 1 percent of all capi-tol construction costs of public building to go toward the acqui-sition and installation of public artwork, which was what paid the lion’s way to Alaska.

Andrea Noble-Pelant, who helps select the artwork for the program, was also on hand.

“It’s a good example of what’s possible,” Noble-Pelant said, pointing out that despite Alaska’s abundance of stone, there are few stone sculptors and bronze artists in the state.

Stone lion guards UAA Rock Garden

H&M store opening draws more than 1,000 visitors

By Nolin Ainsworthsports@thenorthernlight.org

The statue is made to represent the American Lion, the largest cat animal known to man.

PHOTO BY KJERSTI ANDREASSEN

youtube.com/tnlnewstwitter.com/tnl_updatesfacebook.com/northernlightuaa thenorthernlight.org

If you’ve been bored enough to read these columns year after year (or are oth-erwise socially obligated to follow along) you’ll know that my girlfriend and I have an affinity for Homer. Maybe it’s artsy vibe or the fact that we love to play a rous-ing game of “hipster or hobo?” with the bearded gentlemen of the area. So after work we made a late-night run down to the coast to take advantage of our 2.5-day weekend.

Almost immediately we ran into an obstacle in the form of a bad driver that nearly caused six wrecks before attempt-ing to pass me. Being the sage arbiter of social justice that I am, I took up the man-tle of traffic coordinator for the next 200 miles. In what my girlfriend referred to as an extraordinary display of misguid-ed testosterone, I managed to success-fully out-pilot the competing car in every passing lane, only to immediately cut my speed to maintain safety for the benefit of all others on the road. Needless to say, my message was received; some way past Soldotna, the car came screaming by us in the shoulder with what seemed like a colorful tirade erupting from the cockpit. Some people.

Around midnight we finally made it to the spit and started the arduous process of setting up the tent in the waning light in the middle of a sand pit. Or at least we would have, had we not been interrupted by a sandy hippie accompanied by an old guitar and a sad dog with a cone on its head. As a general rule, strangers ask-ing for drugs never a fun experience, but when a guy that looks like he wandered out of Jack Johnson music video asked us for some “pot reefers,” we just had to laugh.

Unfortunately he then chose to play his guitar (poorly) until the wee hours of the morning, prompting a very serious dis-cussion about how socially acceptable it would be to move out tent 100 feet down the beach. In the end we settled for camp-ing without fire (mainly due to a profound lack of supplies) and called it a night. The next morning we began an expedition to get a fix for our longstanding addiction to Two Sisters Bakery as our withdrawals had become too much to bear in the last few months.

As an aside, I rarely advocate on behalf of businesses. I view business the way that any free market-fearing red-blooded American should: as a Darwin-

ian struggle between competing lions that will invariably end in the best con-tender surviving and the inferior lion fil-ing for bankruptcy. However, Two Sisters Bakery has the amazing ability to some-how infuse their soups with a crack-like substance that induces instant dependen-cy, while their coffee seems to be capable of overcoming my sky-high caffeine tol-erance.

After wandering town for a bit and exploring the spit for new and creative places to slam coffee, we got dinner and headed down to the local landmark bar for a drink. The only time I’d ever been to the Salty Dawg was in the win-ter — which resulted in me drinking with two bartenders, only one of which was being paid to be there at the time. This go-around the place was packed with an eclectic bundle of fishermen, tourists and disgruntled locals. The experience was a blast, mainly in that we were able to peo-ple watch and give the bartender a break from horrible patrons.

As a general tip in life, it’s okay if you don’t know how to drink in a bar. It’s okay to ask for help, to quietly observe and mimic strangers or to even have a friend order for you. What is not accept-able as a grown man is to order scotch as a poorly disguised status symbol, be entirely ignorant of what constitutes good scotch and then when asked if you want it “neat” to drunkenly ask everyone at the bar what that means. Just order your vodka Redbull like the rest of the basic 20-something crowd and move on down the line.

Moving on. The rest of the trip was a standard Alaska coastal town camping experience. We built a raging fire, forgot to buy anything to roast over it, sat with our growler of local beer and blissfully avoided the sandy hippie who apparent-ly had booked a gig with his band at a local establishment we had gone to great lengths to avoid.

We made one last trip to Two Sisters — who really should be paying me mar-keting fees at this point — and hit the road to ensure that there would be enough time to cook a feast’s worth of breakfast food back at home.

Was it the most glamorous trip I’ve taken? No. But with so few free weekends and a full week’s worth of land to scape, it was the ideal brief vacation for a hectic summer.

A well-meaning column rife with clunky metaphors and horrible advice, Orange Rhymes With is the go-to place to break the monotony of classes and laugh at someone else’s misfortune.

By Evan DoddContributor

MEET THE SEAWOLF

FEATURES THENORTHERNLIGHTTUESDAY, JULY 28, 2015 | 02

The last time I traveled outside of Anchorage, it turned my host off to the idea of heading anywhere else in the world ever again. For those of you who aren’t extreme Klax Zlubzecon fans, we traveled to Montoursville, Pennsyl-vania, this spring. It’s the hometown of George’s mother, and we found that the town embodied everything George stood against spiritually, politically and cultur-ally.

Don’t get me wrong, his folks were great. In fact, I quite enjoyed the trip. It was a unique thrill watching my host slowly lose his mind as he realized that everyone around him disagreed with every aspect of his being. I mean, he didn’t enjoy it, but his opinion didn’t mat-ter at the time, did it?

So, this last weekend, we traveled to Seattle. Both my host and I have actually been here before — I briefly visited the place on my world tour last winter, and George has family he used to visit back in his childhood days. George’s uncle, a metalhead like just about everyone else on his father’s side of the family, invited the family to a Rush concert.

Now, admitting that you like the band Rush anywhere is bound to turn heads. They’re a very divisive band with no middle ground; you either love the band and swear by it, or you think they’re too weird and pretentious. A newspaper is certainly no place to admit that you love one of the most divisive bands in rock history, which is why I mention it here to embarrass my host further.

Anyway, we used the concert as a launching pad for several excuses, most obviously not having to review “Min-ions.” Like the Montoursville trip, there are many stories to tell.

We arrived at about 6 a.m. Seattle time. George is never able to sleep in the air, and he didn’t fall asleep until some-thing like 12 hours after arrival. Every-one else was able to nap earlier than that, so since George’s summer sleep sched-ule is always so screwed up, he decided to grab the house’s Wi-Fi password, hop on Netflix and finally finish watching “Attack on Titan” while everyone else got some much needed sleep. The opportuni-ties were clearly endless.

Since I am a brain slug and thus don’t need sleep, I wandered outside that night and rediscovered that the city was simul-taneously warm and dark. It’s funny; both George and I have lived in Alaska for so long that we find the idea of warm, dark nights to be preposterous. It didn’t unnerve me so much, but George had a

lot of trouble sleeping because of the con-tradiction, which I naturally found amus-ing.

The next day, George’s family visited Starbucks HQ. George doesn’t consume much caffeine, and of course, neither do I, so we didn’t find much to get excited about. But since the rest of the family is hooked on the stuff, they were enthralled. This left my host and I feeling rather alienated — not that I usually don’t feel alienated, anyway — but of all the corpo-rations to be given the tour of, I’d rather it be Starbucks. They at least do a lot of good things for their employees and con-sumers, even if their drinks aren’t really that great.

On day three, we visited a museum for old computer technology. Here, we saw the inverse of the whole alienation problem we had yesterday: George was enthralled by all the old tech, while his family was left merely a little nostalgic, if not thankful that technology is a lot faster than it was in the ‘80s. But George got to play “The Oregon Trail” on an old Apple IIe, which was fun enough.

The penultimate day was the busi-est of them all: a day at the Experience Music Project Museum, followed by the Rush concert later that night. The museum featured tons of props and cos-tumes from old movies, as well as instru-ments and outfits used by musical stars like Jimi Hendrix and Nirvana. Again, George was in ecstasy, seeing the actual costumes used in the Star Wars trilogy and other such stuff. I looked at the alien props and model ships and laughed — no wonder the protagonists from “Alien” were so screwed, just look at the way they designed their ship! Amateurs!

George and I have never been to an actual rock concert before, so the sheer volume of Rush was overwhelming, almost deafening us both within mere seconds. It was worth it, though; it was a respectful show that acknowledged both the new stuff they’re still trying to sell, and the classics that drew people like my host to the band in the first place. Good times.

I’m running out of space to write about the Seattle experience, which is conve-nient because we left soon after the con-cert. But it was a much more enjoyable experience for George than Montours-ville was. It wasn’t as much fun for me because George wasn’t going as insane as he was this spring, but I guess I still had a good time.

Seattle seems nice and impregnable. The fleet will like this city after it con-quers Anchorage, I think.

RESISTANCE IS FUTILE. EMBRACE THE SEAWOLF SLUG.

By Klax ZlubzeconTranslated by George Hyde

In the year 2013, an alien brain slug from one of the galaxy’s most feared empires crash-landed on Earth and assumed control of a lowly reporter at this newspaper.

These are his stories.

Adventures in Seattle

Weekend trip to Homer delivers just enough weird

AE THENORTHERNLIGHTTUESDAY, JULY 28, 2015 | 04&

GAME REVIEW

Kirby’s a moderately popular gaming hero today. He’s known for platform-ers that are somewhat easier than most of the typical indie hardcore platforming fare, with cutesy visuals and simplistic stories. It’s a great series for kids, pre-senting them with a moderate challenge and some decent, wholesome humor, along with some interesting platforming ideas.

However, I have never played a “Kirby” game, and since many people view “Super Star” as the best one, it seemed a good enough place to start. Like many “Kirby” games, it’s not very difficult — it took me about five hours to see the whole thing – but it’s also wholesomely entertaining.

Rather than just one adventure, “Kirby Super Star” is split into eight differ-ent sub-games. Six of them are very similar, and many consider this to be the main single-player “adventure” of “Super Star.” The other two are simple mul-tiplayer minigames added as small bonuses.

For the few who don’t know, Kirby is a malleable pink ball who’s able to swallow enemies and copy their abilities. He’s so light that he can puff up and fly pretty much anywhere; because of this, the game’s challenge comes from finding the right ability for the job at hand. Sometimes players will need a fire ability to light nearby fuses, or they’ll need something else, like a wheel ability to ride along the map “Excitebike” style.

Because of this, “Super Star” has a great variety of different challenges, and each of the different sub-games offers a slight twist to the formula. Some games focus on finding secrets, some focus on a more straightforward set of levels, and two feature a concrete narrative complete with cut scenes. One of them doesn’t

even really have a narrative at all — it’s a large, expansive maze with treasure strewn about, and the challenge comes from seeing how much of it can be found before returning to the beginning.

It’s a perfectly paced jack-of-all-trades, but that unfortunately makes it a master of none. It can’t offer the insanely difficult platforming of “Super Meat Boy,” nor can it offer the atmosphere of “Donkey Kong Country,” or the brilliant level design of “Super Mario World.” There’s nothing wrong with this — for the $8 asking price, you get a lot of differing content, and you definitely won’t get bored. If anything, this makes “Super Star” a fantastic gateway drug into the world of platforming; those who like one sub-game over another can then be offered a wealth of different games with a tighter focus.

And that reinforces the notion that this is indeed a game made more for kids than for adults. But if I had to pick one game for my kids, I’d much rather pick this one than a sleazy mobile game. It’s a great, kid-friendly and easy introduc-tion to the world of platformers, and “Super Star” deserves commendation for that. If you have kids and a Wii U, this is an easy $8 to spend.

By George Hydegchyde@thenorthernlight.org

TITLE“Kirby Super Star”

DEVELOPERHAL Laboratory

PLATFORMSSNES, DS, Wii,

Wii U

GENREPlatformer

RELEASE DATESep. 19, 1996

The 10-Week Initiative: ‘Kirby Super Star’ is lighthearted fun

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10 years of Campus Kickoff comedians

BJ Novak Eddie Gossling Nick Thune

TJ Miller

Johnny Cardinale

Joel Mchale Nick Offerman

Horatio Sanz Riggie Watts

This year’s Campus Kickoff comedian is TJ Miller, star of HBO’s “Silicon Valley.” Through-out the years, UAA has rallied up a number of tasteful and unique comedians. We’re going to take a little trip down memory lane and recollect the past 10 years of Campus Kickoff comedians.

2006Amy AndersonBest known for: “Mom Squad” and “Chop-

Schtick Comedy.” Her daughter, Aubrey Ander-son plays Lily Tucker-Pritchett on “Modern Family.”

Johnny CardinaleBest known for: “Bobby Kahn Goes to Holly-

wood.” Has been on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and “Chelsea Lately.”

Eddie GosslingBest known for: Feature on “Comedy Central

Presents.” Made his television debut on “Jimmy Kimmel Live.”

2007BJ NovakBest known for: Stand-up comedian and

screenwriter. Executive producer and character Ryan Howard in NBC’s “The Office.”

2008 Joel McHaleBest known for: Hosting “The Soup” and his

portrayal of Jeff Winger in “Community.”

2009Judah FriedlanderBest known for: Portraying Frank Rossitano

on “30 Rock” and a smaller role as Scott Brum-berg in “The Wrester.”

2010Donald GloverBest known for: His rap career under the

name Childish Gambino. He was a writer for “30 Rock” and portrayed Troy Barnes in “Com-munity.”

2011Nick ThuneBest known for: His comedic album “Thick

Noon.” He was also featured in his comedy spe-cial titled “Folk Hero.”

Rory ScovelBest known for: Stand-up featured on “Late

Night with Jimmy Fallon,” “Conan” and “The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson.”

Jen KirkmanBest known for: Her comedy albums “Self

Help” and “Hail to the Freaks.” She has also

written a book titled “I Can Barely Take Care of Myself: Tales From a Happy Life Without Kids,” which became a New York Times best seller.

2012Horatio SanzBest known for: His role on the “Satur-

day Night Live” cast from 1998-2006. He was a member of the skit “I Wish it was Christmas Today,” an act featured on every “Saturday Night Live” special.

2013Nick OffermanBest known for: His role as Ron Swanson in

“Parks and Recreation.” He also played Deputy Chief Hardy in “21 Jump Street” and “22 Jump Street.”

2014Reggie WattsBest known for: His role on “Comedy Bang!

Bang!” Currently, he is the bandleader on “The Late Late Show with James Corden.”

2015TJ MillerBest known for: His portrayal as Erlich Bach-

man in “Silicon Valley.” He was the voice for Tuffnut Thorson in “How to Train Your Dragon” and “How to Train Your Dragon 2.” He also had a voiceover role in “Big Hero 6” as Fred.

By Samantha Davenportarts@thenorthernlight.org

MOVIE REVIEW

THENORTHERNLIGHTTUESDAY, JULY 28, 201506 | A&E

It’s a weird time to be reviewing Alfred Hitchcock’s “To Catch a Thief.” The heist film is seemingly making a comeback with “Ant-Man,” and while there are newer movies that are certainly deserving of reviewing, we’re coming up on the 50th anniversary of Hitchcock’s cat-burglaring masterpiece. Bear Tooth Theatrepub seems to be in a celebratory mood as well, with a special screening 50 years later, almost to the day.

So how well does “To Catch a Thief” hold up?

Cary Grant, in one of his best roles, plays John Robie — or as the populace knows him, “The Cat.” He is infamous for quietly stealing valuables from the rich with little to no trace. But when he decides to quit his job in favor of some-thing more honest, another mysterious burglar takes his place, and the public blames him for this new burglar’s high jinks. It’s master thief vs. master thief as John investigates the new burglar, all while the authorities remain suspicious.

The new thief is always kept in the shadows, and Hitchcock leaves just enough clues sprinkled throughout the story to keep the audience guessing. Even John himself is not a reliable pro-

tagonist, as he must rely on his thieving ways to follow the new “Cat.”

All of this is helped by the film’s atmosphere. Eighty percent of the time, it looks like a typical film — and a gor-geous one at that. But as either burglar makes their move, the lighting shifts to a dark green, giving the audience only shadows to rely on when watching the action. It can be a surprisingly moody film when it wants to be.

The writing definitely doesn’t hurt, either. John meets several characters on his path to catch the thief, and the dia-logue is downright delicious. John must keep one step ahead of everyone he talks to, both physically and with his words. One can tell he’s a master thief because he’s got a silver tongue to match it. A lot of it is humorous, and it’s definitely more charming than it is heavy.

It’s by no means as serious as other Hitchcock films like “Rear Window” or “Psycho,” but if you can accept Hitch-cock’s lighter side, there’s a great, sus-penseful ride in it for you. Like any great Hitchcock film, it keeps audiences guess-ing at every turn with entertainingly sly dialogue and beautiful cinematography to match the suspense.

Whether you’re a seasoned Hitchcock fan, or you’re looking for a good first film with which to jump in, “To Catch a Thief” is definitely a good one.

‘To Catch a Thief’ is classic HitchcockBy George Hydegchyde@thenorthernlight.org

TITLE“To Catch a Thief”

DIRECTORSAlfred Hitchcok

RELEASE DATEAug. 28, 1955

(Original); Aug. 3, 2015 (Bear Tooth)

GENRESuspense

STARRINGCary Grant, Grace Kelly, Jessie Royce

Landis

“To Catch a Thief” will show for one night only at the Bear Tooth Theatrepub 1t 8 p.m. Aug. 3.

In the opening 10-minute shot of Bela Tarr’s beautiful “Werckmeister Harmo-nies,” Janos Valuska (Lars Rudolph, “Therapy for a Vampire”) arranges the town drunks into the solar system, just as the local bar is closing. Immediately, the name-less town where the movie is set becomes a microcosm. Here, God and the devil come in the form of a whale and a deformed Slavic prince, and occupation isn’t something forced, but something earned.

“Werckmeister Harmonies” follows the life of Valuska in a freezing provincial Hungarian town during World War II. One day, a mysterious circus moves into town, and the ravings of the man behind it all, “The Prince,” drives the citizenry to violent uprising, and caught in the middle is Valuska.

Abandoning the typical shot-countershot pattern of modern movies, the now retired director Bela Tarr translates the dense run-on sentences of its source mate-rial, “The Melancholy of Resistance” by Tarr’s frequent collaborator László Krasz-nahorkai, into long, complex tracking shots. In just 39 shots over two and a half hours, Tarr and cinematographer Patrick de Ranter paint a monochrome picture: a brutalized society under the influence of a mysterious, dominating force, pushed to violent uprising.

While muted, the violence is disquieting. In one of many bravura sequences, a mob of townies raid a hospital, beating the elderly and infirm with clubs. The hits

are dampened, but the grunts and wails of those beating and beaten overtake the scene. It’s a primal exemplification of Tarr’s cinematic mastery, leading to a pro-found final image that’s guaranteed to haunt viewers in sympathy with it.

Movies with such an uncompromising atmosphere, like “Harmonies,” will either pull viewers in by the first scene or not at all. Those not pulled in won’t likely stay until the end. Those pulled in, however, will find a psychological drama unlike any other. More than narrative, the focus here is on feeling. Everything, including the people, morally and physically, is decaying. The question is not so much if things will go wrong, but how and when. A strange tension, not easily forgotten, arises from this. In this way, the movie sometimes feels more like literature than a film.

Equal parts film and poem, “Werckmeister Harmonies” speaks in mystical syn-tax. Its language is obscure but intoxicating in its rhythm. Under the tense direction of Tarr, the real becomes hyperreal, and the job of the viewer is not to parse out reality from fantasy, but to get lost in all of it. With surrealism of this depth, getting lost isn’t just easy, it’s a pleasure.

TITLE“Wercrakmeister

Harmonies”

DIRECTORSBela Tarr

RELEASE DATEOct. 10, 2001

GENREDrama

COUNTRYHungary

By Jacob Holley-KlineContributor

‘Werckmeister Harmonies’ is intoxicating

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LETTERS AND CORRECTIONS POLICY

THE NORTHERN LIGHT CONTACTS

By now the NBA’s free agency frenzy has mostly quelled. Journalists, fans, and team front offices can finally get some rest.

Some have called this off season’s NBA free agency one of the most event-ful ever.

Scores of players were either re-signed with their current franchise — like Kawhi Leonard, Jimmy Butler and DeAndre Jordan — or were signed with a

new team, like Wes Matthews, Roy Hib-bert and LaMarcus Aldridge.

While both the Lakers and Knicks did nothing to boost fans’ optimism for next season, other teams’ fans do have reason to be merry.

The Milwaukee Bucks, Minnesota Timberwolves and San Antonio Spurs all added some interesting pieces and will put more skilled teams on the floor next season.

But what made this free agency so eventful was not so much the relocation of any one superstar as it was the man-ufacturing of new ones — through the

granting of additional superstar-like sala-ries.

More players these days are being compensated like NBA superstars than ever before. Here are three examples of non-superstars who signed mega-con-tracts during free agency.

Khris Middleton of the Milwaukee Bucks signed a five-year, $70 million deal.

Reggie Jackson of the Detroit Pistons signed a five-year, $80 million deal.

And finally what I consider to be the most overpaid contract of them all: For-mer Trailblazer Wes Matthews signed on with Mavericks in a four-year, $70 mil-lion contract agreement.

Middleton, Jackson and Matthews are all respectable players and each certainly has the potential to make a future all-star team. However, the impact they can have on any particular game is nowhere near the likes of a Chris Paul or Russell West-brook, who I deem both superstars.

But before looking at the implications of this trend in the NBA, it might help to back up a little bit.

Last October, the NBA renewed its media rights agreement with its three current television partners: ABC, ESPN and TNT. The deal is worth $24 billion and is good for nine seasons, beginning the season after next (2016-17) and end-ing the 2024-25 season. It is about triple the amount these networks will pay this

year for broadcasting professional bas-ketball all across the globe.

Now zoom ahead nine months to the start of this month, the league announced the new salary cap for the 2015-16 sea-son would be $70 million. This is the limit on the amount of money individual teams can spend on players’ contracts for the upcoming season. It’s an 11 percent growth from last season’s cap of $63.1 million but will likely be outgrown once again next season, when the television monies begin to flood in.

It is clear there is a high demand to keep this game of television. Basketball has reached most of the corners of the earth, thanks to the popularization of the NBA over the last couple decades.

We must be careful when we scruti-nize players who make seven-figure sal-aries. After all, is it not you and I that determine what kind of demand is placed on sports entertainment by the choices we make? Would TV pay $24 billion to keep a show on the air that wasn’t well received? In the world of professional basketball, as is the case in most profes-sional sports, the demand profusely out-weighs the supply.

Each year there are only 300-odd men with the aptitude to play at the highest level of basketball. As long as we cele-brate the successes and failures of them to the level we do, it is foolish to think a pay cut will come anytime soon.

There is nothing free about NBA free agency

Just one hoopster’s well-meaning take on sports and sportsculture.

By Nolin Ainsworthsports@thenorthernlight.org

SPORTS THENORTHERNLIGHTTUESDAY, JULY 28, 2015 | 07