Word: wailful
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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When the first sound version of Wuthering Heights was filmed in 1939, that wail seemed to echo back to the grave of Emily Brontë herself. The latest remake seems to echo back to 1939. The comparison is seldom flattering. In the earlier film Laurence Olivier constructed the role of Heathcliff like a man building a castle. Timothy Dalton, who played the foppish Prince Rupert in Cromwell, now seems less landlord than tenant. He self-consciously melts and struts, breathing hard to signify passion, curling his lip to show contempt...
...Wail like a happy earthworm...
...just about the most beautiful woman in show biz. She's an earthy singer and a phenomenal dancer. The quality of her voice is unexceptional, in comparison to Aretha's, but her intensely emotional delivery is fully equal to Janis Joplin's; both have a raw-edged wail of pain that really cuts through you. Like Janis, she makes the transition from one extreme-show blues-to the other-hard rock-with utmost agility. She is a Sex Goddess and plays the role to the hilt, managing to infuse as much nuance into every line as the audience cares...
...song of the road for truckers has become a terrifying wail to the motorist, as the former "knights of the road" cut off other vehicles, fail to yield the right of way, exceed even passenger-car speed limits and generally add to the hazards of expressway driving...
...Greg stands stripped down, physically and spiritually naked. Humiliated in body and spirit, he takes out his self-contempt on Kee-the nagging mirror of his own human weakness-and kills him. Thus the log that began as a military record ends as a near-mad confession, a wild wail addressed to the Rescue God ("We cannot save ourselves...