Word: formula
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...DISNEY kingdom has lost some of its luster lately, with theme-park attendance down and movies like The Marrying Man striking out at the box office. But the Mickey Mouse organization aims to help restore the magic by reviving an old formula: the movie musical. The studio is now filming Newsies, a song-and-dance act based on a 1899 New York City newsboys' strike. The film ! is being directed by choreographer Kenny Ortega, a music-video veteran. Disney moguls believe the MTV generation will readily take to long-form musicals, which don't require Schwarzenegger-size budgets. The studio...
...wealth. That is why innovations are being patented, trademarked and copyrighted in record numbers. It is also why today's clever thief doesn't rob banks, many of which are broke anyway; he makes unauthorized copies of Kevin Costner's latest film, sells bogus Cartier watches and steals the formula for Merck's newest pharmaceutical. That's where the money...
...rigueur: the rip-snorting Thelma & Louise, with first-rate tunes by the likes of Toni Childs, Marianne Faithfull and Glenn Frey, released its sound track even before the movie hit the theaters. This is good for the movie and good for business, but it makes rock part of a formula. When great rock tunes show up as prefab nostalgia on a movie of the week, or when they're used on TV to shill everything from brew to sneakers, the music's devalued. Its history and resonance are depreciated, embalmed in commerce...
...health professionals in Iraq. In hospitals where children lie dying of malnutrition, mothers hovering over cribs hold out a hand when they see a foreign visitor and beg, "Haleeb, haleeb," (Milk, milk). Because the cash-starved government can no longer afford to subsidize the cost of imported baby formula and other staples, prices have skyrocketed. A can of Similac cost half a dinar ($1.50) before the war; now it costs 20 dinars...
...worth of formula for Fadhia's dying five-month-old daughter would cost more than her husband makes in a week. Qadissiya Hospital ran out two months ago, and the mothers are unable to breast-feed because they cannot find enough food for themselves. Fadhia and thousands of other indigents who live in the Baghdad slum known as Saddam City have taken to foraging alongside dogs and sheep, searching for food in the mounting piles of garbage that line every street. There has been no refuse pickup in the neighborhood in five months. Nor is there clean water. Sewage...