Word: absurdities
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Although it was another generation's children who promised to be good all week if they could see a Chaplin comedy, the bantam tramp with his flapping shoes, battered derby hat, jaunty bamboo cane, absurd black mustache, shabby, defiant clothes, is not dated. The craftsmanship of his effortless performance-the innocent waddle, the peculiar childlike kick, the desperate elegance, the poignant gallantry-is still high comedy...
With characters such as these, it's not hard to figure out what the plot will be, though this one is slightly more absurd than the others. It involves Don Ameche's attempts to get around the British censor, to cable in the greatest story of his career--the invasion of England. In the great climax, just as the invasion is coming off, he finds himself trapped in a cellar with nothing but a beautiful girl, a time-bomb, and a teletype machine. The question is, what shall she do? Shall he lose the girl (who doesn't want...
...Done. Technologically, the proposal is not absurd. It consists of a hundred or more specific projects, from exploring New York and New Jersey iron-ore deposits to mining chromite and smelting manganese in Montana, all of which have been tested or recommended by engineers of the Bureau of Mines, Reclamation Bureau, Geological Survey or other agencies in recent years. The minerals to be dug or processed are either scarce, getting scarce or imported (and ships are scarce). Ickes outlined his scheme in terms of three bottlenecks it would break...
...afternoon in late May 1940, when the French collapse "was so entire that death itself seemed to us absurd," Pilot Saint-Exupéry, his observer Dutertre and his young gunner were ordered to make a reconnaissance sortie over Arras. They were one of 50 reconnaissance crews in all France. Of the 23 which comprised their group, 17 had already perished. Their chances of survival even on a good day were one in three, and this sortie was an "awkward"' one. The information, even if they brought it back, would be useless, even if it were to reach...
There was evidence last week that the Japs were working hard to overcome Filipino sales resistance. Some of the evidence was dropped by Japanese airmen over Douglas MacArthur's lines. Said the pamphlets, characteristically Japanese in their threatening but absurd lingo: "Newly issued war note is controlling more and more the financial activities of Manila day after day. For this reason the money you are receiving from the American forces as your salary is losing its value and will be waste paper in the near future...