Word: contrivedness
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Indeed, the circusy, '70s-style revival meeting that has filled the auditorium might reasonably be taken as a sign that the awareness industry is at last showing its real self. The occasion was contrived by Jerry Rubin, the reformed Yippie who has decided at 40 that his calling is...
As you watch Paradise Alley, with its tried and contrived plot and its painfully obvious and ineffective attempt to manipulate the audience's emotions, you realize that Stallone simply lacks the intelligence to make a good movie. He cannot penetrate beyond cliches.
But the good moments were too few and too far between, and even they were soured by embarrassing sequences such as the White Knight's and the Fawn's, both played by Ben Schatz, when the script, music and acting combined to explore the depths of gooey and contrived sentiment...
Accident, madness and suicide have only one effect on an artist's career: they stop it. But they can do wonders for reputation. We might feel different about Van Gogh if, instead of shooting himself in the gut at 37, he had died full of age and honors in bed...
Altman's naturalistic technique also permits him to parody Hollywood's audio and visual cliches. The imposing shots of the Corelli mansion in A Wedding, and the fanfare that accompanies them, are hilarious precisely because their contrived portentousness contrasts so dramatically with the look and sound of the rest of...