The White Stripes: Under Great White Northern Lights

Next time Canada wants to promote nationalism, skip the bloody Olympics and hire The White Stripes instead. Even though, as Jack White points out in the concert film Under Great White Northern Lights (also playing at Park Lane on Friday and Saturday), his northern neighbour is the only country that charged the band a fee to play and the only country to turn them away at the border, The White Stripes still decided to tour every province and territory. Director Emmett Malloy followed the two-piece, with predictably beautiful and slick black, white and red gloss, as they met cousins in Glace Bay, shot the Halifax noon cannon and hit a single note on St. John's George Street. There's little new insight into the enigmatic band, who are as tightly packaged as the special DVD box set, with its super-fan bonuses. Welcome to a new set of Heritage Minutes: White showing genuine interest in a group of elderly Iqaluit women and their folklore (expect black raven imagery in a future song, I predict). The accompanying live CD, with 16 tracks from unnamed locations, stands alone as a testament to the band's noisy greatness. White ripping through "Jolene" like he's being chased by the devil will take you right back to that hot day in Halifax, July 2007. But perhaps if you weren't running around Citadel Hill, this film or CD won't mean as much---honestly, will they care in Kansas? Still, a must for every hardcore lover of one of the world's most charismatic bands.