Arts ©Entertainment
Wednesday, October 11,1995 Page 9
the glassy eye
Mark Baldridge
‘Space’ TV
blasts into
Trek turf
“Space: Above and Beyond” goes
above and beyond the call of duty —
as in “no, really, you shouldn’t have.”
I mean, who really expected this
show to be anything more than a kind
of queasy flashback: “Battlestar
Galactica: 1995”?
I sure didn’t.
It looked like just one more at
tempt to cash in on the gigantic (and
somewhat undeserved) success of
“Star Trek” and all its dreary spawn
— “Deep Space 90210” and the
weirdly Ethan Allenesque “Voyager”
(Danger, Will Robinson!).
But keeping context in mind
(“Space” doesn’t exist in a vacuum)
this show really has something kind of
cool to offer.
Set some 70 years from now (Does
this make anyone but me just a little
uneasy? The events of this show are
happening a little while after you and
I are dead.) “Space” tells a kind of
“Starship Troopers” tale of menacing
and mostly unseen aliens and the brave
young United Space Marines, or what
ever, that go blasting out in space to
stop them.
Maybe because the times these
crazy kids live in are so like our own,
the show represents a kind of “see?
you can get there from here” fairy tale
about our possible future in space.
This in bold contrast to the “gee
whiz-bang” feel of “Next Gen’s”
technobabble (activate plot device!)
and the kind of whimsical nonsense of
the “just stepped out of a Virtual Re
ality and, boy, are my arms tired”
drivel that comes back every season in
one form or another.
The characters, after three episodes,
already have achieved the sort of built
in complexity that “Next Gen” arrived
at after almost three seasons. And if
it’s hard to tell the players apart with- -
out a program, well, that’s just the
price you pay for trying to do too
much all at once.
Part of that, anyway, is the fact that
the characters are constantly jetting
around in souped up fighter jets, in
space — where it can get dark pretty
quick — and helmets and uniforms
and all that stuff.
Does anyone really believe that
space jet fighters will wear helmets?
What on earth (or above it, or beyond
it, whatever) for? Like you might have
to eject or something?
Yeah right.
Which brings us back to “Battlegas
Trifecta.”
It seems like the people who write
TV shows have no sense of science
fiction, and the directions it’s taking,
or capable of taking.
I can pretty well bet you that, were
al iens going to invade tomorrow, they
would not do so with dog-fights in
space and laser pistols.
They would design a very sophisti
cated virus, maybe a merely concep
tual one, like capitalism or Social
Darwinism (or “give the suckers what
they want” or “Hail to the Chief’) and
introduce it into our meme-pool and
wait.
150 years later the planet is a sear
ing wasteland of carbon monoxide
and stagnant seas.
“Just like home!” the bug-eyed
monsters shout in unison, and slip
beneath the surface of the black, tepid
water*
———————»aa—■—— ^ ,...;.^,v.v,_ ■■———
Travis Heying/DN
Wheeler Dixon, chairman of the Film Studies Program at UNL, has been active in the film industry since the early 1970s and
recently became an editor for the State University of New York Press.
Quality vision
Dixon brings rich cinematic past to UNL
By Gerry Beltz
Senior Reporter
Filmmaker. Author. Teacher. Editor.
Wheeler Winston Dixon, chairman ofthe Film
Studies Program at the University of Nebraska
Lined n, is a man who wears many hats.
And he wears them well.
The most recent addition has been the cap of
editor of The State University of New York Press
Cultural Studies in Cinema/Video Series, some
thing he says he holds in high distinction.
“This is the most important work I’m doing in
the late 1990s,” Dixon said.
Dixon’s path to UNL has led him across the
country, from being immersed in the experimen
tal film community in New York to four years in
Hollywood.
From ’72 to ’76, he worked on and off with the
TVTV company, which Dixon said consisted
mainly ofhimself, Michael Shamberg,and future
“Ghostbusters” stars Harold Ramis, Dan Aykroyd
“/ cut the videotape for Billy’s
‘Saturday Night Live’ audition.
He was on an overpass on the
L A. expressivay, operating the
world’s largest car wash. ”
WHEELER DIXON
Rim Studies Chairman
and Bill Murray, who was Dixon’s roommate at
the time. With Dixon’s help, he would soon join
the cast of “Saturday Night Live.”
“I cut the videotape for Billy’s ‘ Saturday Night
Live’ audition,” he said. “He was on an overpass
on the LA. expressway, operating the world’s
largest car wash.”
But, Dixon said, his relationship with the
group didn’t last. *
“They were only interested in film as a com
mercial medium. They cared about what came
out next week, who was starring in what, and how
much money it would make.”
Dixon eventually left Hollywood because of
differences in philosophies about films and the
film business, he said.
“1 found it to be a very superficial society,” he
said. “They were always focused on the bottom
line. In Hollywood, it’s always cash.
“They wouldn’t let me make the films I wanted
to make. Back in New York, we made films for
love, and everybody worked for nothing.
The skyrocketing cost of producing a film
didn’t help either, he said.
“You used to be able to make a 20-minute
color film with sound for about $300,” he said.
“Now a really low-budget feature costs a mini
mum of $22,000.
See DIXON on 10
Back Doors a true Morrison reawakening
Courtesy of the Back Doors
Jim Hakim and the Back Doors take the stage at Omaha’s
Ranch Bowl Thursday.
By Jeff Randall
Music Critic ~~
Jim Morrison may be two de
cades gone from the face of the
earth, but his popularity and pres
ence have loomed over American
pop culture like a moody ghost for
more than 20 years.
And Jim
Hakim couldn’t
be any happier.
As the lead
singer of the Back
Doors, a cover
8oana witn tne
style of the origi
nal band as much
I as the infatuation
■ of a tribute act,
■ Hakim is keeping
the music and the image of the long
departed Morrison alive and well.
Hakim andhis backingmusicians
have been touring in performances
all over the world since 1980, when
Hakim formed the band.
The Back Doors’ show, Hakim
said, was a straightforward presen
tation of Morrison’s music in the
most accurate and honest way he
knew.
Successful from the very begin
ning, Hakim said the Back Doors
filled a void that he recognized and
wanted filled, so he decided to do it
himself.
“They’re obviously still popular
now, they sell more records now
than any other band from that era,”
Hakim said.
In preparing himself for his role
as Morrison, Hakim watched hours
of live-performance video, listened
to the Doors’ albums, read a multi
tude of books and articles, inter
See DOORS on 10
