Word: dulles
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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System or chaos, Coppola is never dull. Two years ago, he had New York cinephiles atwitter with his presentation of the seven-hour Our Hitler. Last January he put a refurbished version of Abel Gance's 1927 epic Napoleon into the Music Hall, and played host to not just a celebrity party but an exhilarating film experience. After the Napoleon coup, movie wags were wondering which charismatic dictator Coppola would bring to New York in early 1982. Now they know. Frederic Forrest may be romancing Nastassia Kinski onscreen, but center stage will again be occupied...
...monotonous baby-doll voice uncannily reminscent of a T.V. commercial for an underarm deodorant called "Tickle." Both Martin and Peters approach their roles in a curiously stylized way, staring out of glazed eyes either vapidly (Peters) or with an intense manic glow (Martin). Only Jessica Harper, who plays the dull, frowsy Joan, seems to be able to travel comfortably between the make-believe world of the songs and her unhappy "real life" as Arthur's cuckolded wife. Perhaps if she had been in charge here, the movie--and even Arthur's thing--would have gotten the cutting it needed...
...Second City Televisions started honing in on him. That carefully cluttered desk and contrived homespun drawl make him an almost irresistably easy target for parody. And the subjects he covers on his weekly blurb at the end of the CBS news show "60 Minutes" range from the obvious and dull to the obtuse and dull. People who think Andy Rooney is really funny are the kind of people who read Erma Bombeck, people who subscribe to Good Housekeeping, who still laugh at jokes about the Ayatollah Khomeini and the high price of gasoline...
Most 1981 design was not bad. It was awful. But the few new urban places, buildings, industrial products and graphics that were good, were very, very good. The awfulness was not just a matter of bad taste. A little kitsch in dull surroundings can be as endearing as a whiff of horse manure in the city. The dismaying pollution of the cityscape, like that of the language, stems from illiterate and, worse, semiliterate pretentiousness...
...effects may not be felt for months or even years, realtors and landlords stand to make some very big money from a single city council rollcall. A lot more tenants stand to lose their homes. And the city stands to change dramatically--from an exciting, traditional community into a dull upper-class professional ghetto...