This was phase one of a career that increasingly looks as if it will end up dividing into three neat acts.
If you offered even established musicians the Weeknd's story of steady progression, over the next few years, I expect they'd take it: three neat acts in which the shirt-folder and street kid ascends with minimal faff and compromise from hero of the Toronto underground, to Republic Records signee and darling of the critics, then mainstream star.
Set at the turn of the previous century, as imagined through state-of-the-art production values (the film keeps one eye on old-school chopsocky and the other on new-school superproductions), "Fearless" breaks into three neat acts, each of them charmingly anachronistic.
But in building and sustaining a mood of anger and outrage while delivering enough laughs to keep an audience amused, it carries off a neat balancing act.
The Chilean Supreme Court managed a neat balancing act in the charged issue of whether to prosecute Gen. Augusto Pinochet on kidnapping and murder charges.
When he's mistaken for the brains behind the robbery, the film becomes a neat balancing act between the reality of Van Damme's life and a cops-and-robbers hostage drama.
America remains on good terms with Egypt's new military masters without having alienated its youthful pro-democracy demonstrators a neat balancing act whether by luck or design.That said, harder choices may lie ahead.
They make a neat double act: Linney is such a natural, round-the-clock worrier that her beauty seems indivisible from her frowns, whereas Grace has a wide, accepting smile and a voice like Joe Mantegna's.
But in a neat balancing act, the movie gives Lisa a supportive mother, Janis (Cara Buono), who is almost as annoying with her intrusions as Meenu is with her disapproval.
Lots of guys like her so maybe you can add a little makeup and keep your hair neat and act as though you don't care whether they like you.
