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Word: altmans (lookup in dictionary) (lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
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Usage:

...only is Robert Altman's "Short Cuts" a travesty of the Raymond Carver short stories upon which it is based, it is also a completely boring and stupid movie. It is embarassingly tacky, facile and reductionist, and it's also three hours long. As RuPaul says, take me to the vomitorium...

Author: By Erica L. Werner, | Title: Not So Super 'Cuts' | 11/4/1993 | See Source »

...Altman based the film's nine interweaving narratives on his (mis)reading of Carver's ouevre, taking a set of poignant midwestern vignettes and turning them into a heavy-handed Hydra living out its pointless existence under the scorching sun of Los Angeles, the city where dreams die, or whatever. Setting "Short Cuts" in L.A., with all its metaphorical baggage, was a huge mistake on Altman's part, though only one of many. The main one was probably in trying to translate Carver's fragile stories to the screen in the first place...

Author: By Erica L. Werner, | Title: Not So Super 'Cuts' | 11/4/1993 | See Source »

...Altman's characters zig-zag around L.A., crossing paths in a series of coincidences so contrived they are reminiscent of a Thomas Hardy novel, and accumulating moving experiences at a mind-numbing rate. They are united by common experience in the opening and closing sequences of the film: in the former case by the medfly scare, in the latter by an earthquake. (This portrayal of L.A. as a shimmering and perilous mirage is so hackneyed and off-base as to induce nausea...

Author: By Erica L. Werner, | Title: Not So Super 'Cuts' | 11/4/1993 | See Source »

...Altman is juggling so many characters that he can only impress us with their identities by hitting us over the head with their most superficial characteristics. Even so it takes at least an hour and a half to get straight that Ralph and Marian (Matthew Modine and Julianne Moore) are the doctor and painter; Stuart and Claire (Fred Ward and Anne Archer) are the fisherman and professional clown; Ann and Howard (Andie MacDowell and Bruce Davison) are the bereaved parents, and so on, ad nauseum...

Author: By Erica L. Werner, | Title: Not So Super 'Cuts' | 11/4/1993 | See Source »

...Daniel Altman '96 isn't sure whether he can vote in Canada...

Author: By Daniel Altman, | Title: A Model of Democratic Change | 11/1/1993 | See Source »

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