Sure, there are some amusing elements in Pop Touched Me: The Art of Rob Pruitt (Abrams, $50), like a poem by Mia Fineman on the colorful endpapers and a printed handwritten inscription saying "I'll always love you — Rob Pruitt" on the title page.
The 10-year battle between Schembechler and Hayes is the emotional core of the documentary, but it is played largely for its amusing elements, which can be ascribed to Hayes's snarling, meshuga intensity, his cold war-level paranoia and his loathing for Michigan.
George Grosz inserted an amusing trompe l'oeil element in "Resting," in which a lion-shaped sand dune, complete with grassy mane, looks about to pounce on the plump morsel who sunbathes in an isolated hideaway.
To the contrary, they put on a spectacular show in two elements, amusing as they waddle around on land and impressive as they demonstrate speed and agility in the water.
The amusing and slightly unforeseen element (at least for me) in all the birthday festivities is the house's heavily-promoted birthday series: Penguin Ink, featuring six classic Penguins (From David Foster Wallace's The Broom of the System to Ian Fleming's From Russia with Love) with art by contemporary tattoo artists.
These amusing if obvious parodic elements couldn't be sustained if the production didn't translate them into such thoroughly theatrical terms.
It is always amusing to see the elements invoked in fashion; weather must seem like a distant distraction to people who spend all their time in spaces that are both climate- and reality-controlled.
Lanre Bakare Joss Whedon's superhero spin-off is turning out to contain an odd mix of elements: Marvel geekdom, amusing banter (familiar to viewers of anything Whedon has touched from Buffy onwards), the occasional dark tone and an awkward clunkiness when the script totally misfires.
Lacking a decisive objective or directing ideology, Alloro's practice parades these founding modernistic national elements into an amusing low-tech salad of dysfunctional glitch.
