Word: melodrama
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...Greek myths (reinvented off-Broadway), to John Adams (in a new biography), to '70s punk (rekindled by the Strokes). We also look up (at the winged victory of a Milwaukee museum) and, for therapeutic escape, look away (to the canny lunacy of Shrek, to Nike ads and the fierce melodrama of the 2001 World Series). Art can take us out of ourselves or deeper within. In soft times or tough, the Best will endure. And the Worst--well, the Worst is always with...
Like the original, this Brian doesn't stint on the melodrama: there's a wrenching scene of a dying Piccolo kissing his sleeping children goodbye; when he gets the bad news from his doctor, a thunderstorm is raging. The cues are a touch more sophisticated (e.g., the sound track uses Simon and Garfunkel's mournful Bookends Theme, rather than cloying orchestration), but the improved production values have mostly to do with advances in TV. The 1971 film often looks like an episode of Room 222; the 2001 film, like an episode of The Practice...
...Anglo-French Intimacy is a bluntly staged affair between a man and a woman who exchange no names, no life stories, only bodily fluids. Baise-moi (still playing in theaters and due out on DVD next month) is Thelma & Louise torqued up as a relentless feminist-porno melodrama. The two leads endure severe sexual abuse, then mete out revenge as a dish best served scalding...
...Sorcerer's Stone (Philosopher's Stone in the original British version)--is a movie, true Hogwartsians will return to the source and compare written and visual texts with the care of a New Critical scholar. They will find that the book was better--richer in mood, in thrilling melodrama, in joy--than director Chris Columbus' meticulous, stolid film...
...scene outside of Eliot House fed the flames of the growing melodrama. A barrage of at least eight emergency vehicles suddenly appeared on the scene, transforming Eliot House into a giant movie set, and us, its humble denizens, into starring actors watching its demise! Impatient to get as much time on camera as possible, we thronged in mobs around the emergency vehicles as they appeared one after another, elbowing forward to catch a glimpse of a firefighter bravely risking his life to save our poor Eliot...