I was walking down the street yesterday heading to a store. I came to a stop at the crosswalk. As I waited for the light to change, I noticed a poster on the side of a city bus announcing an upcoming movie. I immediately recognized Bruce Willis in the picture so I looked more closely. I really like Bruce Willis. The other actor on the poster is Tracy Morgan. Do you remember Bruce in Moonlighting… mind you he has more famous and notable films but I loved him them and I got a lot of him every week. The Sixth Sense was also a kicker. Anyway, back to the point of this post. This movie is called Cop Out. As I saw the title, I thought wow! Cop Out! Cop-out! hmmm! Semantics, schemantics.
As I walked away about my business, the whole thing resonated with me and I started to recount the various words and phrases that we use and in the various ways, willy-nilly, just because. With that, another favorite actor came to mind, Fran Dresser from The Nanny. Fran coined the phrase 'cancer schmancer' when she was dealing with her illness. This was a way to demystify, or reduce the concern or the seriousness of the effect of the illness. I miss Fran, even though I see the re-runs, I would love an update.
I came up with semantics schemantics for the fun of it. Cop Out, Cop-out! On the poster for the movie Cop Out, the actors have police badges and guns. Cop-out is weaseling out, changing mind, backing out of a plan. It is all in the utterance, I guess. Check this out; Cop Stop! Stop, Cop! I guess 'they' don't say 'Cop' but you know what I mean. I also wonder how folks, from different places keep up with us. I really get the “how do you say that, um…” or “how do you call it eh…” thing from non-native English speakers, or maybe I should say non-American language speakers, who are trying to communicate with us and wanting to be ‘correct’.
This is interesting and I am sure there is a whole web of stories, and instances where we are very confused or confuse others with the play on words we often do. I guess others in their various languages may, or have a similar play on words. I would love to hear about them. Interesting, right?! Maybe this could be the start of a meme.
So should you go see the move? I don’t know. I have no idea; I haven’t read the reviews or seen any previews or any other promo stuff. I don't have any plans yet about seeing it either. It just got my attention.
What about you? Have you seen the move or have plans to go see it soon?
