Word: subtexts
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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What prevents The January Man from turning into a downscale Dangerous Liaisons is the movie's refusal to let the characters acknowledge this edgy subtext. Shanley instead provides a funny, melodramatic hubbub to distract our attention. His busy plotting may require a suspension of incredulity, but he is well served by good actors; by a director, Pat O'Connor, with a taste for the acrid flavors of big-city life; and by his own delight in human eccentricity...
From there the battle was joined in a reprise of many of the social issues that have provided an emotional subtext of American politics for the past 20 years. The fiercest conflict emerged over abortion. While Bush seemed discomfited by a question about what punishment would be appropriate if abortions, as he urged, were made illegal, Dukakis immediately jumped on the issue to declare, "I think that what the Vice President is saying is that he is prepared to brand a woman a criminal for making this decision." The now shopworn controversies over the Pledge of Allegiance and Dukakis' membership...
...required to lead our children in the Pledge of Allegiance?" Bush asked his audience at the Republican Convention. "My opponent says no -- but I say yes." Then he led the crowd in reciting the pledge, a gesture he repeated at a flag-bedecked political rally last week. The subtext of Bush's profligate pledging was simple: "I'm more patriotic than the other...
...Dukakis likened Bush's stance on the pledge to the wanton disregard for law revealed in the Iran-contra affair: "We've had a series of incidents in this Administration where laws were broken or ignored, and I don't know if this is part of a pattern." Dukakis' subtext: "I'm more responsible than the other...
...BOSTON Church of Christ makes Harvard nervous. This semester the United Ministries issued an anti-cult handbook to protect students from the church, which aggressively recruits those eating by themselves in the dining halls. Despite the church's tactics, though, there is a disturbing subtext underlying Harvard's response...