Word: wile
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Like the Spanish master, Jones finds his great subject in obsession, and he understands that finally, all truly memorable comedy results from observing creatures caught helplessly in the grip of irrational, inexplicable passions. Buñuel's obsessives are all sexually motivated; Jones' great creation, Wile E. Coyote, has a loftier theme: the annihilation of that uncannily shrewd nemesis the Road Runner...
...Hardy (to invoke just two other great names), this team specializes in a comedy of severely limited means. There is basically only one gag: the Coyote thinks up ever more elaborate schemes to fell the bird that never wert, and the attempts always backfire. But what makes old Wile E. an immortal figure is what is known in the trade as "character animation"-those marvelously rendered expressions of confidence, cunning, determination, frustration and panic as he finds either the huge rock falling on him or himself falling off the cliff, while the bird scoots off across the desert landscape...
Evita is a spectacular eye-catcher, but it seldom gets a grip on a playgoer's feelings. For one thing, the basic tale has been too oft told. It is the familiar show-biz saga of a nobody from nowhere who, through wile and gumption, achieves wealth, fame and glory as a dazzling superstar. In the case of Evita, this tale has been telescoped and occasionally tampered with. Most of the key events happen offstage. They are described in song and dance and recitative, but not dramatically rendered, so the musical lacks the warming pulse of intimacy...
...sort of decorative frieze of character actors surrounding the main action. The most effective isGregory Sierra as a husband continually cuckolded and perpetually seeking revenge on the prince. Sierra is usually assaulting the wrong man entirely, ending up with his schemes backfiring on him-a sort of Wile E. Coyote in human form. Most of this comedy turns out to be perfunctory, as is Director Quine's handling of the straight action scenes. There is an unnerving feeling that most of the performers would like to do more than they are called on to do, that there...
BAUDELAIRE ONCE SAID that the devil's deepest wile is to persuade humans that he doesn't exist. There is no danger of Malachi Martin making that mistake; he is convinced that Satan and the Pit do and always have existed. Modern Christians who no longer believe in hell or the devil as realities will find in Martin's Hostage to the Devil a well-articulated, and disturbing reaffirmation of traditional doctrines about evil and Lucifer...