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By Owen Sizemore
As summer break for students officially passes its halfway mark, many are in good spirits. New reported COVID-19 cases across both the nation and the state of North Carolina are at some of their lowest numbers since March 2020. Mask mandates, gathering limits, social distancing guidelines, and other precautionary measures that had been in place for nearly a year-and-a-half are, for all intents and purposes, completely gone. Students have a lot to look forward to with their eyes on an in-person fall semester complete with face-to-face instruction, full-capacity sporting events and an overall bustling campus of new and returning students.
Our nation’s return to a “normal” way of living is unquestionably the result of mass vaccination throughout the past six months. As of this article’s publishing, The New York Times reports that 55% of Americans have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, with 48% fully vaccinated. And while the rate at which unvaccinated people get their shot is dwindling, there are nonetheless 160 million fully vaccinated Americans that have slowed the spread of COVID-19 dramatically. For many, myself included, this summer has felt like the most “normal” time in what seems like an eternity. I have had the privilege of spending close time with friends, family and co-workers wherever and however I please because I got my shot. The science is abundantly clear: if you are fully vaccinated, you can go almost anywhere and do almost anything without risk of severe sickness or hospitalization. For unvaccinated Americans, however, enjoying their summer without fear of sickness is ignorant at best – and deadly at worst. According to the CDC, more than 99% of COVID-related deaths in June were among unvaccinated people. Personal feelings and political beliefs aside, the facts speak for themselves: if you choose to go unvaccinated, you are putting yourself at immense risk of severe illness, particularly as the highly transmissible delta variant of COVID-19 now represents the majority of new cases across the country. The delta variant brings with it new challenges that vaccinated and unvaccinated Americans alike will face. As a result of its highly transmissible nature, combined with the fact that millions of Americans still haven’t received their shot, both The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal report a 94% COVID-19 case increase nationally over the past 2 weeks. As sad as it may be, we are not done dealing with COVID-19 anytime soon. As long as Americans are still getting sick by the thousands and dying by the hundreds each day, with the potential for these numbers to grow, COVID-19 will continue to be at the forefront of our personal and social lives. So, what does this mean for college communities? It means that until schools and their surrounding counties can keep new COVID-19 case numbers low and vaccination numbers high, this fall will likely look a lot like the last one, with strict limits on in-person classes, gatherings and events. Colleges and universities simply cannot take the risk of fully “re-opening” their campuses if students are going to be sick; it hurts their bottom line immensely as they pay for routine testing for unvaccinated people, provide personal and medical services to those infected or in quarantine, and miss out on ticket sales and revenue from sports games that are now forced to reduce their capacity for fans. The condition for colleges and universities to manage the fall semester in a “normal” way is a simple one: members of the school community, particularly students, must be protected from COVID-19 through vaccination. I have spoken with many friends and family members who tell me that they’re “waiting for the right time” to get the vaccine. Maybe in their minds, that time is the end of the summer, or perhaps the end of this year. If you're one of those people, I deeply hope you understand that there is no better time than right now to get vaccinated. I am aware that many are anxious of potential adverse health effects that may come from receiving a vaccine. It’s true: COVID-19 vaccines, like many other forms of preventative medicine, come with risks. However, this risk is microscopic compared to the threat of infection or hospitalization from COVID-19 should you choose to go unvaccinated. Bloomberg reported that for every million people vaccinated in the United States, just 2 to 5 of them will have a severe allergic reaction to the vaccine. And even if you aren’t concerned about your personal health, colleges and universities are waiting to make critical decisions on how their schools will be operating based on student vaccination numbers. It doesn’t make sense to remove social distancing and mask-wearing policies if administrators have no idea whether their student body can safely navigate such an environment. But with enough students fully vaccinated, schools can remove these precautions without worry. The summer is almost over, and in a matter of weeks thousands of college students across North Carolina will be back in the classroom. Right now, we have the power to choose what we want that classroom to look like. If we enter the fall semester with a majority of students fully vaccinated, I am confident that we will be happily sitting in classrooms and lecture halls across campus, engaged in personal and meaningful learning that we have missed out on for nearly two years. However, if we fail to step up to the challenge and vaccination numbers remain low, I expect another grueling semester behind the webcams of our laptops. Let’s make the right decision: get vaccinated as soon as you can and encourage your friends and classmates to do the same. ● The Recommended Content Widget will appear here on the published site.
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By Thomas Gessner
Okay, I’ll admit it. I watch the Oscars.
Okay, not only do I watch the Oscars, I go through the whole embarrassing process. I print out a sheet where I fill out my predicted winners and force people around me to do the same so I can beat them, and the reason I beat them is pretty simple. I watch most or all of the Best Picture nominated films each year, and that can be quite difficult, since the Oscars are hit-or-miss when nominating the movies that are supposed to be the “best” of each year. That point brings up a problem with the Academy Awards: They are often wrong, even at the nomination level. Now, the Oscars can’t technically be “wrong”, their decisions are not facts of life that everyone must live by, but they are undoubtedly important to the careers of many people in the film industry, and they have a significant impact on popular culture. But, as time passes, that impact and influence on popular culture has waned greatly. Viewership continues to decline, hitting its lowest point ever this past Sunday when less than ten million households watched the 93rd Academy Awards. The previous low was a bit under twenty-four million households, a number significantly larger than ten million. Movies are not as popular as they once were, but does that mean this awards show that is a staple of film and television should decline so rapidly? A lot of people are blaming COVID-19 for the underwhelming viewership, but streaming numbers have still been excellent during the pandemic, and most of the nominated films were readily available to stream for a long period before the awards show. Not only that, five of the eight films nominated for Best Picture were included free with subscription-based services. Four of those films took home Oscars, and Nomadland, which is available on Hulu, won Best Picture. The films nominated were more accessible to viewers than ever before, but for some reason, people chose not to watch them, which leads to my next question: why is no one watching the Oscar-nominated movies? When I look at the Best Picture winners of years past, I see dollar signs. A lot of these movies were certified hits, and they had long-term control over the public consciousness. Ben-Hur made almost two billion dollars (adjusted for inflation), The Godfather is considered one of the greatest movies ever and is endlessly referenced, Rocky basically invented sports movies, Titanic turned a historical tragedy into the most famous romance films of all time, and Gladiator quotes are played over the speakers during Lakers games. I can only imagine how many finals the Lakers would have lost if scenes from The Artist were used instead. Briefly disregarding the quality of the films nominated for the major Oscars, the box office does not lie; it represents interest in movies, and that translates to Oscar viewership. Of the twenty highest grossing films of all time (adjusted for inflation), eleven were nominated for best picture. Only one of those twenty movies is from the 21st century. This is a bad sign, and it signifies the Oscars’ problems. The academy no longer nominates movies that are popular, the kind of movies that casual fans and diehard kinophiles alike can root for. But maybe the problem is not that the academy isn’t nominating the right films, but that the right films no longer exist. It’s well known that franchise films are the bedrock of blockbuster cinema, but of those eleven movies I mentioned earlier, ten are original movies, not sequels and not remakes. Return of The King is technically the exception, but the two prior films were nominated for Best Picture, so there is a case of a continuation of quality. Original films aren’t made at the same level that they used to be, and that’s because they don’t make the same money as movies like Avengers: Endgame, which is the 22nd installment in Marvel’s superhero franchise. At some point, people decided they wanted to watch a 22nd movie in a series, and I’ve decided that I'm complicit too in this matter. Look, the Marvel movies are fine, and one was even nominated for Best Picture (Black Panther in 2019), but they are not films that should be reasonably considered for the biggest Oscar awards. They are the type of movies that are creating the academy’s big dilemma, because people will choose to watch them over original, mid-to-high budget studio films. Because of this, movie studios are not willing to spend money on original films that they think people won’t want to see. I’m at a crossroads on who to truly blame for the downturn in the Oscars. It’s either Hollywood’s fault for not making expensive films with artistic integrity that can appeal to a wide range of moviegoers (while also pleasing critics and members of the old guard), or the viewers’ fault for not choosing to see those movies and forcing Hollywood’s hand. It doesn’t really matter, because whichever one is the case, the Oscars’ problem is the same. The only thing they can really do to try to increase their numbers is to nominate lower quality movies, and for that to happen, over 9,000 members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences must agree to make that decision, the same academy members that chose lesser-seen films like Birdman and Moonlight for Best Picture. At the end of the day, there is not much the Academy can really do to save their award show if they are not going to change their artistic habits. The quality of films is declining and the academy won’t stoop to the level of recognizing them, so the Academy Awards are not as much of a litmus test of popular culture and art as they used to be, and that’s alright. People no longer need the Oscars to tell them what movies to see. We live in an age where movies are at everyone’s fingertips constantly, and if someone wants to find out if a movie is “good”, there’s sites like Rottentomatoes, IMDB, and Letterboxd to sort through hundreds of amateur film reviews. Now, I don’t necessarily think this is a great method of gaging the quality of a movie, but like I’ve already established, neither are the Oscars, so it doesn’t make much of a difference, at least to me. ● The Recommended Content Widget will appear here on the published site.
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NCCB2021 Advanced Topics in College Podcast, Episode 1: Social Media, University Tuition and Fees4/27/2021 Featuring Owen Sizemore and Rory Klink
NC College Beat Co-founder and Webmaster Owen Sizemore joins Staff Writer Rory Klink to kick of the NCCB2021 Advanced Topics in College Podcast, investigating philosophy, research, technology and politics and its effect on college students.
This episode takes a deep dive into the role that social media plays in college applications, social media's privacy and security concerns, and its role in creating social change. Additionally, this episode discusses the rising cost of tuition and fees across colleges and universities and compares how public and private universities seek to draw in students through academics, amenities and research opportunities. Topics Covered: - In 2016 it was reported that about one-third of colleges checked applicants’ social media as part of their application process (ConsumerReports). - The North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics - Laura Tierney and The Social Institute - Privacy concerns with TikTok: "“Its U.S. privacy policy also says it gathers your country location, Internet address and the type of device you’re using. If you give it permission, it will also grab your exact location, your phone’s contacts and other social network connections, as well as your age and phone number" (The Washington Post). - TikTok formerly had the capability to monitor your phone’s clipboard and copy that information every few seconds, but this was removed after it was discovered by app developers at a company called Mysk (Mysk). - Opinion piece from a student at Brigham Young University says social media can help create future collective action and social justice habits in the long-term (The Daily Universe). - Rising costs of college are not keeping up with wages or inflation (CNBC). - NC Promise Tuition Plan - UNC Charlotte's University Recreation Center - UNC Charlotte opens Mariott Hotel and Conference Center (Inside UNCC) ● The Recommended Content Widget will appear here on the published site.
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By Thomas Gessner
In 2002, in a shocking upset, the Chris Webber-led Sacramento Kings defeated Kobe and Shaq’s Los Angeles Lakers dynasty to move forward to the NBA finals and capture an NBA title as a small market… wait, that didn’t happen, did it? If there is one person to name for why the well balanced Kings did not win the series against the tumultuous Lakers, it wouldn’t be a player, but by a scumbag: disgraced referee Tim Donaghy, who was revealed to have illegally placed bets on the those games and intentionally made calls to affect the outcome.
Because of Donaghy, there is a constant nagging fear that his illegal actions persisted into the modern league, and because of that, there will always be a belief that the NBA is rigged. Donaghy is not the only example of mistrust of the NBA. Many people claim that the 1985 draft was set up to guarantee the Knicks the first overall pick, and there’s evena whole podcast dedicated to the Donaghy scandal and a comprehensive history of alleged NBA rigging. At least we have the MLB, a league known for its good and honest stars like Barry Bonds and Alex Rodriguez. Okay, I’ll stop, but even without bringing up the rampant cheating and PED use in baseball, the league’s salary caps — the subject of the 2011 film Moneyball — is comparable to a rigged system, where the richest teams get the most advantages. Just last year the Tampa Bay Rays made headlines by reaching the World Series on a payroll of just 68 million dollars, but they ultimately lost to a Dodgers team that paid almost 108 million for their collection of superstars, which is unfair to an extreme level. The salary cap issue is present in just about every major sport too, with teams in larger markets like New York and Los Angeles having much more money to spend than teams in cities like Charlotte or the godforsaken Detroit. In addition to that, there is an undeniable vested interest in teams that generate the most TV revenue, with former NBA commissioner David Stern once stating that his dream finals match-up would be “Lakers versus Lakers”. It’s hard to care about a sport when it feels like the outcome is predetermined, and maybe that sentiment is partly why there has been a continuous decline in interest in sports over the past few years. The problem though, is that people who have vested interests in national sports are billionaires that like making obscene amounts of money, and the best way to do that is to have the teams that print greenbacks succeed. And yeah, there are other sports not affected by the problems associated with big-money sports franchises, but I will not settle for watching a sport like tennis, because it is painfully boring and nothing will change my mind about that. Regardless, this begs the question: is there a sport that is both completely fair and incredibly entertaining to watch on television? Well, the answer is yes. This sport is one that brings together physical, mental, and social elements to foster some of the greatest competitors of all time, and if you’ve spent any time around me in the past few months, you will already know that I’m talking about Survivor. For those who have never seen the show, here's the gist: 16 to 20 people from all walks of life are split into “tribes” and dropped off in a remote location where they have to make shelter, find food... i.e., survive. Every few days, those tribes compete in “immunity challenges” where the losing tribe must attend “tribal council”, essentially a big group therapy session, and vote one of their own out of the game. Midway through the season, those tribes merge into one and the remaining contestants compete for individual immunity and vote each other out until there are three people remaining. Those three advance to a final tribal council, where the "Sole Survivor", and winner of one million dollars, is chosen by a jury of contestants that have already been voted out. Now, I must address the unfair and unjust criticisms that Survivor is faked. I’m not going to waste a lot of energy discussing just how hard it would be to script a show like this, and how a lot of the editing and camera work allows for the series to display a clear narrative arc without compromising the legitimacy of the game. Instead, I am going to discuss the three aspects of Survivor and how they work together to reach a higher plane of sports entertainment: Outwit (Strategic), Outplay (Physical), and Outlast (Social). They are not weighted equally, but each one finds a way to make the game engaging on multiple levels. Outplay Outplay is the most simple of the three points, and it is the ability to succeed at the diverse array of challenges that Survivor has, varying from pure physical strength, brainteasers, balance, endurance, or in some cases, a combination of all four. Early on in the game when there are still multiple tribes, the challenges involve teamwork and communication, then later in the season they focus on just the individual. What makes these challenges so interesting is that there are a variety of skills that people must possess to propel them forward; giant, strong meatheads might suck at puzzles and balance challenges while a small yoga instructor could last for hours balancing on a small structure out in the middle of the ocean. There’s not much more to say about the Outplay category, so I’m just going to list two of the best challenges, both team and individual, ever seen on the show. Battle Dig: This is easily my favorite Survivor challenge, and it is quite simple: two members from each tribe race to a designated spot on a beach, where they dig for a heavy bag in the sand. The first team to get that bag back to their mat wins. What makes this challenge so much fun is its physicality; the contestants can do everything short of striking and choking to stop their opponents. Watching people fight in the sand is undeniably awesome, and it also allows for negative feelings between the tribes to ferment into something tangible. When It Rains, It Pours: This is an oft-used individual challenge, and its success lies in its simplicity. The contestants stand under a barrel filled with water, with one of their arms attached to a rope connected to the barrel. The contestants must keep their arms held up in the air to prevent the barrel from being pulled down and pouring water on them. This challenge can go on for hours, and Jeff Probst, the host of the show, only makes things more difficult for the participants by offering food to contestants if they step down. Outwit The strategic aspect of Survivor has many levels to it, and in my opinion it’s the most crucial to winning it all. Strategy in Survivor is constant in all aspects of the game, but the nucleus for Outwit is tribal council. In most of the major sports, whatever team or player scores the most points wins the game, but in Survivor, being terrible at the challenges doesn’t matter as long as you can prevent yourself from being voted out by your tribe mates. It makes sense to first vote out the weakest players who contribute the least to the tribe, and then later to get rid of the players that are the biggest threats to win the game, but this doesn’t always happen, typically because of voting alliances. Having a numbers advantage for voting is quite important, because alliances will form among the players and they will vote as a group to get out players from the opposing alliance. When creating an alliance, strategy-minded players will often surround themselves with people that are not perceived as threats to get jury votes, giving them a better chance of becoming the Sole Survivor. People who watch the show for long enough will know that often there is a pretty defined pecking order in these alliances, and contestants who are on the bottom of their alliance often know when they are in danger of being voted out. Not all hope is lost for these players though, because there are multiple strategic moves that can be made to keep oneself in the game. One of these famous strategic plays is the blindside, which occurs when a player is voted out thinking that they were safe, often being betrayed by their own alliance. Blindsides not only make for excellent TV because of how stressful and exciting they are, they’re also a great strategy for people on the bottom of their alliances, hoping to make a big move to turn the tide of the game. If a player on the bottom is not able to flip the votes in their favor, there is another option in the strategic use of “hidden immunity idols”, small tokens hidden throughout the game that allow the player to be saved from the vote. The catch is, a player must declare that they are playing an idol before the votes are announced. If an idol is played, the person with the next most votes is voted out of the game. What makes idols so powerful — and dangerous — is that they are placed near the tribes on the island, and can be found through clues that are given to contestants for various reasons. The danger comes from the fact that players usually don’t know when another player has found an idol. Knowledge is power, and like before with the discussion of blindsides, idols create opportunity to cause absolute, unbridled chaos. Outlast Viewers of Survivor often have a very limited comprehension of Outlast, and that is completely reasonable, because it is the most abstract gameplay element in the show. Ironically, it also has the greatest influence on the final outcome of Survivor. The social game is comparable to what is referred to in other sports as “intangibles”, moves that don’t show up in a box score but have a great influence on the final outcome. Being likeable, making funny jokes, and being perceived as a good story are all part of the social game. It is very hard to win the game if you are not liked, and it is impossible to win the game if the jury does not think you are deserving of the victory. Both these aspects fall under Outlast, and it takes a lot of work to be likeable and show that you are deserving of one million dollars, something that fans of the show often overlook. One of the most famous players in the history of Survivor is Russell Hantz, a fan favorite that became popular for his incredible strategic plays and villainous style of play, was known to constantly lie and berate his fellow contestants, even bringing some to tears. He made it to the final tribal council twice, but never came close to winning the game because the jury simply hated him. Many fans think he was robbed of a million dollars, but that is an incomplete view of the game. Most Sole Survivors had to lie and blindside at some point to win the game, but there reaches a certain point when the Jury decides that they simply cannot vote for you. Unlike the sports I mentioned at the top of this post, Survivor always has a fair winner, and the best player always wins their season, because to make it to the end and get the most votes at final tribal council definitively makes you a winner; it is not about which player was the greater physical threat or who had the best strategic mind, the game hinges on who the jury thinks should win, and their opinions are going to differ from someone watching the show. Some jury votes might be illogical, or downright stupid, but it does not matter because that's the whole point of Survivor. And that’s why it’s the best sport to watch on television, because the human interactions in other popular sports do not translate to victory on the level they do in Survivor, and that human element makes the show so unpredictable, so exciting, and so original. ● The Recommended Content Widget will appear here on the published site.
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By Thomas Gessner
I once went on a religious retreat through my High School, and like most retreats we had this enigmatic speaker; he played guitar, wore flat-billed hats, and kept trying to hide the fact that he was a smoker. Mr. Smoker had one throughline over this two-day retreat, and it remains terrible advice in my eyes. As I sat in the rec center of a summer camp that was hemorrhaging money, he said to myself and the other unlucky fellows, “If you aren’t going to do something 100 percent, it’s better to do it zero percent.” I do a poor job of hiding my emotions, and my mouth was wide open in a state of complete disbelief. The logic of Mr. Smoker had no place in my brain, and my mouth was acting as a door, letting it leave to return to where it came from. I left the retreat thinking that this guy was a complete jackass, and I still think that. I mean, 99 percent is better than zero percent, even 60-70 percent. Just imagine not turning in an assignment and telling your professor, “I knew I wasn’t going to put in 100 percent effort, so instead of attempting to do it at all, I decided that not doing it at all was the right thing to do.” You’d probably leave the professor’s office with a wad of spit on your face and a scarlet letter stitched on your ass.
While I just spent a fair amount of time ripping this concept apart, as well as this perfectly nice man who happened to say an idiotic thing, there is exactly one instance where this statement is not wrong. Just one. College. And when I say college, I’m not talking about students or even the teachers, I’m talking about choosing to even have college happen during the pandemic. If students can’t be in person, learning in the classroom, getting the opportunities to meet other students to talk and share ideas with, why are we doing this? There’s a lot you can only do once, and being a freshman in college is near the top of the list in terms of importance. All I ever heard in high school was about how college is this unbeatable experience, just pure ecstasy, where not only you have fun, but you grow as a person too. People talk about college the same way they talk about losing their virginity, and for some those events are probably related. I had teachers that acted as though college was the reason that they could become who they are today (which, for me, was a little off-putting because they were mediocre at their jobs which they often criticized and did not get paid well to do). Regardless, college is apparently the best thing ever, and that starts with freshman year. And in my case, I was dying to get to college since my senior year of high school, where I was tired of the lack of control in my life, not having classmates who shared my same motivations, and living with my parents at home, listening to them complain about my presence and asking why I go out so much. Needless to say, I had some pretty big expectations for my first year in college. I was excited about the whole process: I enjoyed filling out the Common App, I had fun answering essay questions and doing research and going on campus tours, and I hadn’t even gotten to the actual college part yet. But, as one could probably figure out, those expectations I had created were forced to adapt to the coronavirus. I think I did a pretty good job mentally preparing for some online classes, wearing a mask, giving up the handshake for the much less germy elbow bump. When I got to campus in August, I felt happy to be in a dorm, have a new bed, a new desk, new dreams, and even one in-person class. I was sure that by next semester I would be in an uncomfortable lecture hall seat, and, mask or not, I’d have an infectious smile from ear to ear. Well, here we are, and I could not have been more wrong. I cannot name a single academic building on campus, and I have no idea what the insides of these buildings look like. The walls could be covered with pictures of me naked and I wouldn’t know. It’s not only that most students at Chapel Hill, including myself, don’t have in-person classes, it’s that people think this is okay. Zoom is the worst way to learn, and the students are being affected by it in a way that society is yet to see. No one learns better online, no one. It is not an effective substitute for in-person instruction, no matter what way you slice it. I have been academically neutered, and I know, in my heart of hearts, that I'm not alone in that feeling. Everyone is becoming progressively dumber from all of this, and this is where my point about only doing things once becomes relevant. Society has decided to push through and educate everyone well below 100 percent of their potential. At this point, if school boards and deans continue to prevent actual learning, why don’t we just call the 2020-21 academic year a wash? No one is going to take this year seriously looking back. It won’t be measurable to the rest of college, or even life, and if we are going to have that attitude, we shouldn’t bother trying to force our way through an inadequate college year. I can’t be a freshman in college twice. Looking back, I think it would have been the right move for whoever is in power to tell all the 18-year-olds to just sit this year out and relax. Let’s wait until we can do this right, instead of having this hobbled school year where no student is happy or given a real opportunity to succeed, academically or socially. Maybe this is a defeatist view, and too much time has already passed for any of this to matter, but in retrospect it might have been better to just coast at zero percent rather than go through with this 45 percent crap that has taken up my freshman year. When everyone inevitably goes back to school for real, it’s going to be a massacre for us. When I’m bored in class, I can’t just pull out my phone because I don’t particularly care about the size of Rasputin’s penis, or mute myself so I can have a conversation with my roommate about the Charlotte Hornets, or cook myself brunch while the professor drones on and on. Instead, I’ll have to sit there and feel absolute pain. Things could be a lot worse for me though, and I especially pity the students who cheat. Life will not be so easy for them when they no longer have the internet and group chats to give them the answers to exam questions. When in-person instruction returns I won't know any of the buildings on campus, so as a sophomore I will have to deal with the soul-crushing embarrassment of walking into the wrong classroom and asking someone where I’m supposed to be. Because of online school, I do not have the strength to do that anymore. It would be far too taxing on me, and I enjoy talking to people! The adjustment period is going to painful, and while an argument can be made that this year has given us Gen Z losers “character”, I can only continue to think of the utopia we’d have if I didn’t have to have a debate with myself every morning about whether or not I will leave my Zoom video on. ● The Recommended Content Widget will appear here on the published site.
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I love North Carolina, and more importantly, I love North Carolina being represented in popular culture. Too many shows are set in New York City or Los Angeles, and since so many filmmakers have covered these two locales, there really isn’t much left to say about them. Why make another movie about LA after Chinatown or Heat? Or make another police procedural about the NYPD? North Carolina is a state rich with history and a variety of different cultures and perspectives that are wholly unique to the region. I’m not saying it’s easy to make a show or movie about North Carolina; Outer Banks is a gross misrepresentation of the Carolina coast and its inhabitants, something I hope to cover later. Even though it was not a high quality work of art, Outer Banks inspired me to look deeper at my home to discover works that honor NC. Over the next couple of weeks, I’m going to go through a list of great films set in the Tar Heel State that exhibit a level of knowledge and comprehension of the area, as well as ones that might miss the mark or almost get to the level I’m searching for. I thought a great way to begin this conversation would be to talk about one of my favorite heist films: Logan Lucky. Also known as Ocean’s 7/11, Logan Lucky follows the Logan family as they attempt to rob a NASCAR event, while fighting a family curse. Directed by Steven Soderbergh, the film gives a stark alternative to the flashy nature and fast-talking suave of Ocean’s 11, instead opting for a tone that is much more fitting for North Carolina. The Logan brothers, played by Channing Tatum and Adam Driver, both have thick Southern accents, dress in hunting camo and trucker hats, and speak about as slow as gravy. Because of this, many people were confused and challenged the story written by Jules Asner, along with the direction, since it did not make sense to them that rednecks could pull off a heist involving intricate timing, scheming, and masterminding. If you are from a Southern state like NC, then this isn’t a problem. Southerners are just as intelligent as anyone else, and heavy accents and bad haircuts don’t change any of that. This is part of why the film is so great for North Carolinians, it gives us non-stereotypical Southern characters that are competent. In addition to all of that, the film highlights NASCAR racing, a sport originating in NC and a great way to integrate Carolina culture into the plot. The pacing of the film is slow and methodical instead of the typical fast-paced flashiness in Soderbergh’s Ocean’s movies, and this structure and presentation of the plot fits the calm and comedic nature of the environment, and is a perfect match for Carolina. Before I continue, I must go on a tangent about a very important character in Logan Lucky. The casting of Daniel Craig as Joe Bang is some of the wildest fence swinging I’ve ever seen. He has quite possibly one of the worst Southern accents, but it just doesn’t matter. He steals every scene he’s in. He cranks it up to 100 and overacts everybody else off the stage, and he does so with a level of undeniable charm. Craig might not sound like a southerner, but he embodies the qualities of one in this film, and to me, that’s far more important than any vocal mistakes. Every time I watch Logan Lucky, I break into a rare laughter when Bang exclaims, “We are dealing with science here!” as he holds a bag full of gummy bears and fake salt. Besides Daniel Craig, the rest of the performances are surprisingly subtle, save for Seth MacFarlane’s energy drink mogul with an equally wacky British accent and hairdo. But that notwithstanding, Channing Tatum and Adam Drive are both very believable as brothers, and they offer the viewers different energy to connect with; Clyde Logan is “the one arm bartender”, and Driver carries this role with a heap of sincerity and tepidness, an ex-marine amputee who is aptly wary of his brother’s grand scheme. And that brother, Jimmy Logan, someone easy to root for, a father trying to look out for his daughter while struggling with a knee injury that ultimately gets him laid off from his job working construction at the Charlotte Motor Speedway. Lastly from the Logan brood, there is Mellie, played by Riley Keough, who works to dispel some of the masculinity and bring an always appreciated feminine touch to a heist movie. She is the Logan’s bubblegum-chewing wheelwoman when she is not working as a hairdresser. With all of the major players introduced, excluding some more minor ones that I will surely bring up later, it’s time to cover the basic plot in relation to our great state. After Jimmy Logan is fired from his construction job because of a failure to report a knee injury that prevented him from having a college football career, he enlists the help of his hapless brother, who just got fired from his bartending gig that he was surprisingly proficient at, all things considered. They begin planning to rob the Charlotte Motor Speedway’s pneumatic tube system, and require a demolitions expert (guess who that is), and must work around Joe Bang’s prison sentence, Clyde’s prosthetic limb, and Hilary Swank in a pantsuit. I do not want to delve into the plot much more, but would like to add that Katie Holmes, Sebastian Stan, and Macon Blair round out the cast, giving the audience a better sense of the world that Soderbergh has invited them into. Now, I have given this film a lot of praise, and while this exercise is meant to mostly be positive, I have to point out my issues with the story and production, in particular, the inaccuracies that fall upon North Carolina. I mentioned him before, but now is the time to add that Seth MacFarlane does not add much to the movie, and he does not add much in the most exasperated way. His performance is both quite similar to Craig’s with a silly accent and great overreacting, but he fails to be fun, and that is what makes overreacting work. He also just stands out; it becomes difficult to not think about MacFarlane the celebrity, instead of MacFarlane the actor. Besides him, the cast fits together like a beautiful mosaic, but he comes across as a big, missing tile. A much smaller issue relating to NC is that the Charlotte Motor Speedway is listed as being in Charlotte. While this may seem obvious, the CMS actually is located in Concord. The last criticism I really have about this film is that the last half hour drags, spending too much time away from the main characters and away from the exciting heist and outcome. With that, I implore everyone to see Logan Lucky while it is available on Amazon Prime, and next time, I will be covering an Oscar-Nominated sports film. ● The Recommended Content Widget will appear here on the published site.
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7/13/2021
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