Word: vulgarism
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Scimitars of Anger. A famous and acclaimed Nabokov was stylistically careful but never shy about expressing his views on the modern world that up rooted him. From Switzerland, where he moved in 1959, he flashed scimitars of anger and loosed heavy-hearted outrage at crudities, vulgar sentimentality and artistic pretensions that he lumped un der the termposhlost. The word, Russian for a kind of middle-class tackiness, applied not only to the shibboleths and dashboard saints of popular culture but also to the works of Sigmund Freud - which he saw as an internal totalitarianism - and to the poetry of Ezra...
...fact-are you ready for this?-Guccione worries about all the hard-core pornography around. He favors licensing movie theaters like bars. If their marquees are too vulgar or the theaters admit children to X-rated movies, their licenses could be revoked. Nor would he object to legislation that skin magazines could be displayed only at adult height and in such a way that anyone could make a 360° visual sweep of a shop and not be assaulted by nude-magazine covers. He obviously fears any movement that would put his kind of magazine back under the counter. Whatever...
...energy crisis [May 2] affords Americans a priceless, if sad opportunity for self-awareness. Priceless, in that we shall find out once and for all whether there is anything in American life stronger than vulgar materialism and mindless hedonism. Sad, in that there are few reasons to trust that in the struggle for energy, justice will prevail over selfish vested interest. But at least we'll all see ourselves for what we really are. Norman Ravitch Grenoble, France
...They're not vulgar or bold-acting," says one Grosse Pointer. "They are mother and grandmother types-and good ones. Take Mrs. Anthony Giacalone [wife of a top Mafia figure in Detroit's ruling family], she's a quiet, lovely lady. Why, she even contributed $20 to the March of Dimes...
...FASSBINDER fails ideologically, he redeems himself through exciting visual effects. It is easy to point out influences in this respect: he places characters in their social setting with the exactitude of Sirk, revelling in the banal and vulgar in terms of taste (flowered wallpaper and knick knacks abound in Mother K.'s apartment); he makes Brechtian use of awkward camera positioning to alienate, shooting not from within the action, but as an observer so that his audience will be responsible for creating its own realism; like Godard, he favors a fade-out to black between shots, allowing his viewer...