Word: banal
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...collection of late eighteenth to early twentieth century folk art that comprises a broadly categorized melange of everything from cabinets to hunting decoys. About a hundred and twenty years ago, the founders of the Museum of Fine Arts (MFA) would have laughed at the idea of curating something so banal as what could be made by an amateur in the home, whose creation was intended not for display but for utility. The MFA, founded as a institution for the cultural elite, focused its early collection on ancient Egypt and the Middle East, Greece and Rome. Art was strictly European...
Unsurprisingly, most of the other characters are banal or stereotypical, either mocking Dirt or sympathizing with his poor lot in life. Daniel’s and Pressly’s acting performances are poor, as they are confined to portraying blonde babes with inexplicable interests in Joe. The notable exception is Walken’s broom-pushing Clem. Walken, with his unique acting style, gives a brilliant performance in his unfortunately limited screen time. His character has trouble hiding his New York accent and flubs certain details of his suppposedly protected new identity during the best scenes of the movie...
...hands of the Huntington, unfortunately, the play does not get any better. The translation by Pulitzer-prize winning poet Richard Wilbur is surprisingly banal. One might expect more from the leading English translator of Molière’s comedies. But whereas Molière is famous for an elegant wit, Wilbur gives us only broad, limerick-like verse. This is by no means helped by the shortcomings of the production’s actors. There exist plenty of prose translations of Amphitryon; why director Darko Tresnjak didn’t opt for one of these remains a mystery...
...barely has time to recover before the Frenchman delivers the second half of his one-two punch with “Naive Song.” Upbeat and uplifting, the track creates a brand new world of escapist fantasies. Mirwais’ voice, delivering banal yet somehow appropriate lyrics, is filtered through a vocoder to encapsulate an otherworldly effect. Sounding at times like the soundtrack to a car commercial, “Naive Song” nevertheless manages to successfully fuse electronic sensibilities with a more conventional pop motif. Unfortunately, it’s all downhill from here, and though...
...reader is concerned, the fundamental unit of Shaughnessy’s work is the momentarily prickly idea, rather than voice, lines, words, sound, or syntax. She jumps from catchy notion to catchy notion, however banal, and those notions are all the reader can hear. It is not necessary to find the clever spots or dig them up as we contemplate what we enjoy; instead, those spots attack us, offering up all the subtlety and pleasure of a bad trombonist. If it seems like the other aspects of her work (the quirky formalism, for instance, which seems to exist merely...