Word: amateurish
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Once in the unfamiliar setting of Los Angeles, the S.L.A.-so coolly professional on their own turf-began to make amateurish errors. The day before the Shootout, a couple believed to be William and Emily Harris, both suspected S.L.A. members, bought $31.50 worth of heavy outdoor clothing at a sporting-goods store. As they left, a clerk noticed that the man had stuffed a pair of 490 socks up his sleeve. He followed the pilferer outside, where the two began to struggle. Suddenly, a woman sitting in a Volkswagen van across the street sprayed the store with machine-gun fire...
...Catholic Church has recognized for centuries what power there is in a monopoly of information. By her standards, therefore, the Nixon administration must appear hopelessly amateurish in its desperate attempts to deal with the Watergate scandals...
...probably as unfair to expect Blazing Saddles to be a straight Western as it is to expect that it be a normal, professional comedy. Mel Brooks is incapable of making either kind of movie. His comedies will probably always be ragged at the edges and amateurish at the core...
...GRANDE DE Coca-Cola's attempts at humor draw on the ignorance of the Hondurans and the amateurish awkwardness of their performances. It is a series of malapropisms, mispronunciations, and slapstick--little of which is much above the level of a skit at an expensive summer camp. One of the biggest laughs comes when the emcee says "Mahsahss'-ah-shits" for Massachusetts. Unfortunately he repeats it another two times. The slapstick is on the same level. A blind blues singer walks into a wall. A drummer bangs his head on a cymbal while taking a bow. A favorite laugh-getter...
Sharper Focus. Never seriously shaken in the courtroom was the implication that someone had deliberately, although crudely, manipulated Miss Woods' recorder until satisfied that the 18.5-minute Watergate segment of the Haldeman-Nixon conversation was obliterated. The multiple short erasures were amateurish: a single long erasure would be far more likely to have been interpreted as an accident. Even after making all of the short starts and stops ?apparently listening to a portion, then erasing it, then moving on to another part?a shrewder operator would have activated a final continuous sweep of the tape past the erase head...