Friday October 23,1998
Entertainment
9A
Manson show draws little fire
Marilyn Manson is playing Sunday night at the Granada, 1020 Massachusetts St. Last weekend, a poster of Manson was vandalized at Vibes Music, 911 Massachusetts St. The rock star has drawn controversy nationwide from religious groups, but some KU religious organizations have taken a more laid-back stance on the issue. Photo by Graham K. Johnson/KANSAN
Groups not offended by sold-out concert
By Augustus Anthony
Plazza
Kanson staff writer
Kanson staff writer
The difficulty purchasing tickets has been the only controversy that Marilyn Manson has triggered so far in Lawrence.
Manson, who will perform Sunday night at the Granada, has been criticized by many religious groups across the nation and some cities, such as Syracuse, N.Y., have been trying to ban him from performing.
I don't agree with his message, but I don't think it's my right to say that he can't come to Lawrence," said Josh Madden, Overland Park senior and president of the Chi Alpha Christian Fellowship organization.
Unlike the negative opinion expressed by some religious groups, organizations at the University of Kansas have taken a more relaxed stance on the issue.
Mike Markley, president of the Campus Crusade for Christ, said he wasn't upset that Manson was coming to Lawrence.
"I'm not offended by him," Markley said. "I think God loves him as much as he does the rest of us."
The announcement of the show, which sold out in 12 minutes after 650 tickets went on sale Wednesday evening, hasn't caused the Lawrence Police Department to worry, either.
Lawrence police Sgt. George Wheeler said that the police department wasn't going to increase its downtown security Sunday night. Wheeler said that there had not been any problems during the last two shows — 1996 at the Granada and 1997 at Liberty Hall — and that he didn't expect any problems this year.
Unlike the Lawrence Police Department, the Granada will be tightening its security with the use of metal detectors.
Jeff Fortier of Avalanche Productions said that he didn't want to increase security too much because it could create an antagonistic atmosphere for the show.
The doors will open at 7 p.m. Sunday, but the exact time and the length of the show has not been determined.
"I don't know if they will play for 20
Buyers find niche on Internet
Students join trend in online browsing
By Sarah Hansen Special to the Kansan
KU students are starting to buy into the convenience and simplicity of shopping on the Internet. It is all part of a national trend, experts say.
Today, shoppers can buy almost anything on the Internet with less hassle than busy malls or even catalog orders, said Dave McClure, executive director of the Association of Online Professionals.
"Generally, things that do well in mail order do well on the Internet," he said. "The most common products purchased are CDs, books, travel arrangements, stocks and bonds and computer parts."
Rob Gill, Spring Hill junior, said that he had shopped online for computer parts.
"Computer parts are cheaper and easier to find on the Internet," he said. "The whole thing is fast and simple."
Jatime Keeler, Iola senior, said she
shopped on the Web for her wedding.
"I found my wedding dress on the Watters and Watters web site," she said. "I was able to print a picture of it, and then the site directed me to a store where I could try it on. It was pretty easy."
But not everything offered on the Internet turns out to be a good seller.
"Touchy-feely products like cars or food are not common products to be purchased on the Internet," McClure said. "The consumer generally prefers to see and feel these items hands-on before buying them. They like the smell of a new car and the way it drives and that is something that just can't be felt from a computer screen. Other products just aren't available, like cappuccino or other foodstuffs, because they can't be delivered."
Some students such as Mindy Sigle, Wichita sophomore, still are uncomfortable with using the Internet to shop.
"I don't trust giving my credit card number or even my address on the Internet," she said. "I'd be scared that some freak would get ahold of it."
In the past few years, as online shopping has become more and more popular, systems have been developed to protect the consumer and their personal information.
It's funny. People are more comfortable giving their credit card number to a waiter or cashier they don't even know rather than making private purchases on the Internet," McClure said.
Review
Whale tries to be fun, but goes a bit overboard
Kansan music critic
By T.R. Miller
Whale All Disco Dance Must End
In Broken Bones
★★ out of ★★★★
If you are one of the other two people in the world who recognize Whale from their early 1990's single Hobo Humbin Slobo Babe, then you understand the shame that comes with liking a band like Whale. So when I decided to review their latest release, I took it as an opportunity to avenge myself.
I have a new train of thought that I used while reviewing this album. There is a certain beauty in bands that don't take themselves seriously. Provocative lyrics and impressive guitar techniques are wonderful, but sometimes music should just be fun. And then there's
Whale.
Take Smoke. It's a funny track that switches from dance electronica to heavy punk while vocalist Cia sings, "Smoke I know I smoke too much/Got one foot in the ashtray." I was dancing in the kitchen until I realized just what they were singing about.
The first track, Crying at Airports,
features a sample from Nenah Cherry's Buffalo Stance. I honor the band who will pay reverence to the late '80s, but I can't explain this sample. The song switches dance beats behind prose about a fear of flying.
"I kept my headphone set/ideria totelette/to keep me fresh and wet/in case I would forget." The meaning of words is inconsequential, only their sounds are needed.
My favorite line is at the end of the
album. Unsung but typed on the CD cover, Whale encourages its listeners to make up their own lyrics to describe American pop culture history and lists some guitar chords that are deemed appropriate for the topic.
But back to my above-mentioned theory. I maintain that music should be fun. But I also have added another element to the theory. One should also actually be able to listen to it. This is an album that should be bought by a listener with a large sense of humor.
Ha. I get it.
Reviews
ian McKellen stars as a Nezi war criminal who's blackmailed by his young neighbor (Brad Renfro) in the drama Apt Pulp. The movie is director Bryan Singer's follow-up to his Oscar-winning film *The Usual Suspect*. Contributed art
Nazi war criminal gives eerie lesson to Apt Pupil
By Jeremy M. Doherty
Kansas movie critic
The Nazis always made the best movie villains.
They were the all-purpose bad guys. Whether serving as target practice in Raiders of the Lost Ark or figures of evil in Schindler's List, they never lacked in diabolical motivation or genuine terror.
*Apt Pupil*, based on the Stephen King novella of the same title, mines a different vein of the Third Reich's dark realm.
The movie tells the story of Todd Bowden (Brad Renfro), a bright teen whose fascination with the Holocaust strives away from mere historical curiosity.
Todd becomes obsessed with his next-door neighbor, Arthur Denker (Ian McKellen), a Germanborn immigrant who bears a striking resemblance to the never-captured SS officer Kurt Dussander.
After comparing photographs of Denker with those of a youthful
APT PUPIL
Kansan rating: *\*\*\* up of \*\*\*\*\*
Running time: 2 hours
Rated: "R" for profinity and cruelty
to fuzzy cats
Dussander, Todd corners his neighbor and threatens to expose him to the Israeli authorities. For his silence, Todd forces the old man to reveal the horrific details of his many war crimes.
And the boy receives an earful. With Aryan pride still gleaming in his eye, Dussander recalls that it sometimes took the Jewish victims at least an hour to die in the gas chambers. As their motor functions began to weaken, the last few survivors would clamor on top of the dead, desperate for the oxygen that they would never find.
It's during these scenes that McKellen finds the perfect balance between malevolence and frailty. In one disturbing sequence, Dus
sander tries on an old US uniform and gives Todd a lesson in goose stepping — complete with the infamous "sig hell" salute.
But the audience never forgets that they're watching a feeble old man who loves his garden and hates door-to-door salesmen. It's a testament to McKellen's talent that Dussander remains despicable yet curiously intriguing.
Apt Pupil also makes it clear that those who dabble in perversity can never reclaim their purity. After a while, Todd attempts to sever his connections to Dussander, but his efforts fail. He's seen and heard too much, and the information now dwelling in his mind excites him.
The relationship between these two souls provides most of Apt Pupil's chills, but the movie's pacing slips in the last 20 minutes. Movies of this breed need to keep adding on the intensity. However, Singer is content to let the pieces fall where they may.
Soldier offers only laughable action
Kansan movie critic
Movie has appeal despite mindless plot
By Jeremy M. Doherty Kansan movie critic
It's not a good sign when Kurt Russell's latest action flask flicks more laughter than the new Eddie Murphy comedy.
Badly photographed and stacked with dialogue that seems to have been written by a 4-year-old, Soldier strikes a new low in the field of post-apocalyptic thrillers.
What's sad is that Soldier was written by David Webb Peoples, the writer who revolutionized science fiction with Blade Runner in 1982 and scripted the Clint Eastwood western *Unforgiven*. How the mighty have fallen, no?
This is one of those movies in which over-muscular guys pound on each other and the audience is supposed to get caught up in this battle of behemoths. When the bones
Russell stars as Todd, a blank-faced, robotic fellow who has been fighting in the military since birth. However, Soldier never precisely explains who the military is fighting against or why we should care.
crack, it sounds as though bowling balls were being dropped on a marble floor, and the brutes just keep on swiming.
Todd, after an honored lifetime of shooting and maiming on behalf of his faceless government, has been rewarded with retirement. It seems that his mustachioed superior (Jason Isaacs) is eager to put him out to pasture so that the army can begin exploiting the talents of a fresher breed of troops, notably the pumped-up Caine 607 (Jason Scott Lee).
Todd ends up on a waste-disposal planet populated by some raygag setters who look like refugees from Les Misérables. When they're not fighting off killer sandstorms or evil garter snakes, these folks are foraging. What are they foraging for? Beats me, and I doubt that Peoples or director Paul Anderson knows
SOLDIER
Kansan rating: **out of ******
Running time: 90 minutes
Rated: "R" for nasty garter snakes
and goured eyeballs
either.
Then, for reasons that are never explained, the troops return to the waste planet to sweep and clear. And guess what? Todd is waiting for them, not too pleased about being kicked out of his beloved unit. Needless to say, his former comrades, including Caine, suffer much butt-kicking, severed limbs and gouged eveballs.
Oddly, it's hard to dislike Soldier. Russell barely speaks more than eight lines of dialogue, which allows the people in the audience to supply their own snide commentary to the proceedings.
And when Russell plays these kinds of macho characters who can scare lesser men into fits of urination, it gives the sarcasm lobe in the brain a decent workout.
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