Word: clever
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...Bruce Lee) is the invincible master of Oriental martial arts. "What's your style?" inquires an admirer. After a moment of reflection, Lee says: "You can call it the art of fighting without fighting." That seems a clever enough description, if hardly adequate for the bone-crushing yet graceful combat that erupts with virtually every new scene in Enter the Dragon. Lee dispatches his antagonists nimbly, with the kind of Kung Fu acrobatics that make every maneuver, no matter how elaborate, seem effortless...
...Anyone finding surcease of sorrow within the context of Mr. Nixon's news conference is one who, in my opinion, desires only to feel better and be calmed, preferring to ignore Nixon's clever political sem-anticisms by which he avoids any clear answers to questions addressed...
THEY WERE CLEVER, though. The normal Clever Caller would follow up a polite introduction with a catch-her-off-balance fast jab, "What are you doing now?" And I'd be stupid and fumble for excuses, "I'm studying." "Great, then you'll need a coffee break." Panicked, "Well, actually, I was going to sleep." His oh-so-cool and patient laugh, "Oh come on now. At 10 p.m.?" "Yeah, well, I got bored." "Great. I'm downstairs" (the dorm was guarded by a switchboard) "I'll come right up and entertain you." At which point, having let myself...
Then there were the not so clever but persistent ones. "You can't make it tonight, huh? What about tomorrow?...the night after? after that?...Well, what about Sunday morning?" And I, oh innocent me, would try to explain, "Look, I'd love to meet you. But this happens fifty times a day, and I just can't come through on every one, see? I mean, I'm sorry. I really am. Maybe I'll run into you and it will be love at first sight. Let's put our money on that, OK?" And he'd laugh...
Because it focuses on perspectives as much as on facts, it documents without escaping into documental neutrality. In this respect, Chase and film makers like him, may have more to offer than even the great Ophuls or the clever Godard...