Word: motifs
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...where did all of this desperation come from? New York, you say? Good answer, but desperation goes too far back and strays too far afield from New York. For all its Newest Wave, mod feel, Susan traces its anxious female motif back to the gangster melodrama films of the 30's, with one twist. Like the vapid blonds in film noir, our housewife seeks her thrills in a more happening world, but there the comparison must end. Her idol is not a man, but Susan; her goal not to grab her idol's pants, but to wear them...
Which ties it to THE GRADUATE (Harvard Square). Mike Nichols' masterwork whips the desperation motif into full-fledged obsession with a strong 60's tinge. It's Dustin Hoffman's first film role and arguably his best as the boy next door seduced by the mother next door who falls for the girl next door. For freshmen, at least one screening is as perfunctory as first-year writing class--not to be practiced on vacations, but for collegiate literacy the next time someone mumbles, "Just like The Graduate...
...female fashion model in a leather outfit struts down a makeshift runway in the auditorium at Roscoe Pound Hall. She sports a Russian-style cap terned with sparkles that spell out the afternoon's motif: "trendy...
Another interesting strategy in nicknaming is the you're-always-better-off-with-God-on-your-side motif. Colleges hoping for divine intervention have taken to naming their teams the Battling Bishops (Ohio Wesleyan), and the Cardinals (several teams), and the Saints (St. Lawrence...
...pleasures (a stereotypical Marxist?), by recounting scenes from a Nazi propaganda film. These sepia-toned passages tell the preposterous tale of a French nightclub singer (Sonia Braga) meeting and loving a ranking SS commandant and are intended to showcase the salvation that is the movie theater--a promising motif. Unfortunately, the film-within-the-film is a let-down, unamusing...