This is not a single, nor even a song from the 60s or 70s, but a recent tune by one of our most gifted living songwriters that evokes without a moment of cheap sentiment the hopeful trauma of adolescent life.
For her, the American wedding is an exercise in cheap sentiment and pricey self-indulgence, orchestrated by an industry that cunningly plays on the romantic delusions of the betrothed.
But now, more than half a century into Simon's career, it is much easier to see his determination to try hard as an asset, a weapon against complacency and cheap sentiment.
Most notoriously, he denounced its cheap sentiment in an interview with Reader's Digest and called the second season "atrocious," preceded by an adverb that cannot be written here.
We get hugely emotional about tragic events in the past, from the sinking of the Titanic to – can it really be? – the "sacrifice" of all those Regency dandies at Waterloo, and we mistake this cheap sentiment for an interest in history.
Tom Long, of The Detroit News, wrote that " 'The Last Samurai' pretends to honor a culture, but all it's really interested in is cheap sentiment, big fights and, above all, star worship.
It's a fine job of acting, heartfelt and true, short on cheap sentiment, long on honesty.
"If there's one thing I despise, it's cheap sentiment," he says.
And those hard-nosed realists who are immune to its siren call dismiss it -- wrongly, of course -- as cheap sentiment.
It's obviously inspired by Mr. Fox's own experiences, and celebrates fatherhood while trying to demystify the disease and defuse cheap sentiment or pity.
I wonder what Scott would have done with the hideously cheap sentiment that makes "Falsettos" (at the Walter Kerr) one of the most dishonest musicals I have ever seen.
