Basketball Mania

How to get the most out of Final Four weekend in Dallas

Around 80,000 people will descend on AT&T Stadium April 5 for the NCAA Men's Final Four. Even if you're not among those masses, there are plenty of other ways to take part in the fun and excitement surrounding the event.

Here's a guide to everything officially associated with the Final Four:

ESPN College Gameday
The still-new Sundance Square Plaza is home to ESPN's coverage of the Final Four. They start broadcasting there every day at 10 am from April 4-7, giving fans a chance to get up close and personal with their favorite ESPN personalities, videobomb a live shot or maybe even play some ball on the court the network built special for their stay.

NCAA Final Four Bracket Town
Bracket Town is one big fan fest, taking over 350,000 square feet of the Dallas Convention Center April 4-7. It's not so much a question of what you can do there as what you can't do there.

Every day features multiple youth clinics; autograph sessions with noteworthy coaches and players (including a few Dallas Cowboys); and the possibility of trying out a number of sports, from basketball to lacrosse to hockey.

Also expect pep rallies with the cheerleaders and bands of the four participating teams, a Kings of the Court 3-on-3 tournament on Saturday and Sunday, and a performance by girl group Fifth Harmony on Sunday.

NCAA Final Four Friday
Even for those with tickets to the Final Four, this might be your best chance to get close to the court as all four teams hold free open practices at AT&T Stadium. Each team, starting with Connecticut at noon, does an hour run-through in preparation for Saturday games.

After the practices are over, two teams of college players face off in a College All-Star Game, followed by a celebration of SLANT, the youth education program designed to get kids involved with their communities. That celebration is hosted by rapper/actor Common and CBS 11's Adrienne Bankert.

NCAA March Madness Music Festival
Unbelievably, this three-day festival featuring some of the biggest names in music is free. Of course, that also means that massive crowds are likely to descend upon the relatively tiny Reunion Park every day April 4-6, so you can decide for yourself whether it's worth it.

Friday's schedule includes performances by The Wild Feathers, Jack Ingram, Eli Young Band and Jason Aldean; Saturday's performances by LL Cool J, Tim McGraw and The Killers are interspersed with live broadcasts of the Final Four games; and Sunday features The Wind and the Wave, Pat Green, Fun and Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, the latter of which perform a three-hour concert if the schedule is to be believed.

And even though Conan O'Brien will have left town, his Cone Zone trailer will stick around at the festival to provide even more entertainment.

Northwestern Mutual Road to the Final Four 5K
This race on April 5 gives participants a chance to get some exercise before overindulging later in day. You can also feel good about yourself because proceeds from the event support the Coaches vs. Cancer program, a collaborative effort between the American Cancer Society and National Association of Basketball Coaches.

Final Four Tip-off Tailgate
For everyone with tickets to the Final Four, there are myriad activities going on outside AT&T Stadium, including autograph and photo sessions with David Robinson and Mark Aguirre, prize giveaways, and concerts by Dierks Bentley on Saturday and Kid Rock on Monday. The tailgate is also open during the free Final Four Friday.

Final Four Dribble
This is exactly what it sounds like: 3,200 kids 18 and under dribble a basketball three-quarters of a mile from Dallas City Hall to the Dallas Convention Center on the morning of April 6. Every participating child gets a free T-shirt, basketball and entry into that day's Bracket Town.

The spotlight is on UConn's Shabazz Napier and other players in the Final Four this weekend, and fans have plenty of opportunities to celebrate.

NCAA March Madness Facebook

The spotlight is on UConn's Shabazz Napier and other players in the Final Four this weekend, and fans have plenty of opportunities to celebrate.

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Movie Review

YouTube horror series Backrooms makes an auspicious big screen debut

Photo courtesy of A24

Chiwetel Ejiofor in Backrooms

YouTube has become such a big part of the culture that it was only a matter of time before content creators started making waves in big screen filmmaking. Interestingly, most of them have made their names in the horror genre, including Danny and Michael Philippou (Talk to Me, Bring Her Back), Mark "Markiplier" Fischbach (the recent Iron Lung), and now Kane Parsons with Backrooms.

Set in 1990, the film centers on Clark (Chiwetel Ejiofor), who owns a rundown furniture store in a nondescript city. He is divorced and seemingly depressed, two things that come up in his multiple sessions with his therapist, Mary (Renate Reinsve). Lately, he has taken to sleeping in the store instead of going home, which allows him to notice strange electrical activity when the lights are supposed to be turned off.

When investigating the issues one night, he discovers a mysterious opening that leads to a completely different structure with a seemingly endless amount of rooms and corridors. Some of them are innocuous and some of them contain strange and creepy elements. With nothing else of interest in his life, Clark returns to the area night after night, eventually drawing in his employee, Kat (Lukita Maxwell), her boyfriend Bobby (Finn Bennett), and Mary.

The 20-year-old Parsons, helped by a number of well-known producers, demonstrates an astonishing level of filmmaking prowess for a first-time feature filmmaker. There is no trace of amateurishness in the progression of the story or the visual style of the film. Whatever confusion arises comes from the plot itself, which is designed to raise way more questions than answers.

Clark’s journey into the bewildering collection of rooms is full of intrigue instead of scares for most of the film, but when Parsons decides to amp things up, he really goes for it. The final third of the film contains some haunting imagery that defies description or explanation. It seems clear that Parsons’ preferred method of storytelling is to keep the audience off-balance, unable to predict what comes next.

What he also seems to understand, however, is that you have to give the audience something to hold on to, and in this case it’s the backstories of Clark and Mary. Both seem to be living differing versions of pathetic, uninteresting lives, but things revealed in their sessions broaden the scope of their stories. The strange world they find seems to reflect their respective traumas, giving a tenuous connection to reality that keeps the film from becoming too frustrating.

Ejiofor and Reinsve, both of whom are Oscar nominees, give the film an air of legitimacy that allows viewers to follow whatever odd roads Parsons wants to go down. Because it’s impossible to tell where the film is heading, the steady acting of Ejiofor and Reinsve is crucial in its success. Maxwell, Bennett, and Mark Duplass are good in brief appearances, but don’t appear enough to have a huge impact.

The ambiguous nature of Backrooms lends it the possibility of becoming a franchise, as Parsons could seemingly take it in any direction he wanted and have it feel part of the larger whole. Given how well done this and other recent films by YouTubers have been, the melding of the two seemingly disparate mediums makes more sense than ever.

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Backrooms opens in theaters on May 29.

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