Word: witting
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...when they're young. So when school's out, studios push their cinematic Happy Meals: cartoon fare like last summer's Shrek 2, which proved to be the top-grossing film of 2004. And since the wee ones don't buy their own tickets, filmmakers try to insert enough wit and sass and retro references to keep the grownups amused. A children's movie, never forget, is an all-family baby-sitting device...
...them, because they come to the theater, they've got dough, they probably live a pretty good life. They need a good whack now and then." Audiences may come for the abuse, but they stay for the words. LaBute's sharp lines ride along on natural rhythm and casual wit. His pointed dialogue regularly inspires comparisons between the 42-year-old writer and two long-established masters of acerbic, dysfunctional exchanges, Harold Pinter and David Mamet. As a nod to their influence on him, LaBute has dedicated plays to both. It's the acid-tipped everydayness, both devastating and dangerously...
...pain feels real in A Long Way Down, although not at the price of Hornby's pleasantly bitter wit. But what makes the book work is Hornby's refusal to give an inch to sentimentality or cheap inspirational guff. "I didn't want a book where they loved each other," he says. "That seemed like a kind of bad, Hollywood way to go. They are frank with each other, but mostly so that they can abuse each other." Spoken like a true heavyweight. -By Lev Grossman
...tale of a woman approaching middle age who doesn't know exactly what she wants (because she secretly knows that what she wants is irresponsibility) sounds like familiar stuff. But Grunwald tells the story with a wit-a bride wears an "expression of tranquilized charm"-that never quite conceals the sting of wisdom just below. Perhaps it's no surprise that by the end of her well-turned and winning tale, we see and feel, as Farber does, that the pursuit of happiness is really nothing more than a recipe for misery. -By Pico Iyer
Coulters's quick wit is the slap in the face that awakens us from the stupor of liberalism. Go girl, go! TIME'S story focused on her throwaway statements and missteps to the exclusion of her brilliant recovery in debate and the dazzling and unflinching acumen she displays as a guest television commentator...