Word: payoff
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...strife. So this year two things were striking: that Blair came in for something of a rough ride, and that old-fashioned oratory, from Blair and then his special guest Bill Clinton, mesmerized the dissenters. Like any good two-man performance, it had its own careful rhythm: setup and payoff, stern and then sunny. The serious bit came early in the session, after delegates, by a 2-to-1 margin, rebuked Blair for his plans to deliver more public services with private contractors. Chastened he was not. The Prime Minister promised even more privatization, in a keynote speech that confirmed...
...movies than the arrival at the bathhouse of a huge, amorphous river-god, encased in centuries' worth of stink and sludge, whom Chihiro has the daunting task of giving a sturdy wash and scrub. It's a visual aria, whose suspense is topped only by the scene's surprise payoff...
What is a president's life worth? In Afghanistan it may prove to be as little as a pair of secondhand Toyota Corolla hatchbacks. That's the payoff Afghan intelligence officials believe was offered to Abdur Rehman, the man who attempted to assassinate president Hamid Karzai almost three weeks ago. The cars are said to have been waiting for Rehman across the border in Pakistan should he have succeeded and survived his bid to kill Karzai. He did neither. Instead, Rehman was gunned down after opening fire on the president's car on September 5, missing his target but wounding...
What makes it worth it for Sheehan is the thought that, ultimately, there may be a future payoff...
...precise," says Martha Klein (Martina Gedeck), chef of a ritzy Hamburg restaurant. Precise, sure, but her loveless life still needs a bit of leavening. That comes in two packages: her balky 8-year-old niece (Maxime Foerste) and a lavishly charming Italian sous-chef (Sergio Castellitto). The setup and payoff of this German export couldn't be more conventional, but Nettelbeck is a sharp observer of life's surprises, and Gedeck has an appraising, intelligent beauty. Her Martha is like the film: tart on the outside, sweet on the inside, with a delectable aftertaste. --By Richard Corliss