shmaltz
- noun
- /ʃmɔlts/
- Informal
- Her songs are known for their deep emotion, often bordering on shmaltz when they talk about lost love.
Examples
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No Spielberg movie would be complete without liberal doses of shmaltz, but I was surprised that he kept it to a minimum. There were only a few cringeworthy scenes for me, the biggest one being having soldiers recite lines back to him from the Gettysburg Address. But there are also some really great moments in the film where you see how he's really mastered his craft as a director.
Blog text (20) -
The film was filled with so much shmaltz that it made many viewers cringe at the overly sentimental moments.
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Critics described the novel as a classic example of shmaltz due to its excessive sentimental themes.
Synonyms
An overly emotional style in art like songs or films
Too much sweetness in writing or music that is not sincere
A tendency to show too much tender or nostalgic feeling about the past
A way of speaking or writing that sounds too sweet and not real
A feeling of too much fake emotion that seems overly sweet
A feeling of too much sweet emotion in songs or films
A feeling that is too emotional in a story or film
A feeling that is too emotional and seems false
A feeling of being too sad and emotional, often after drinking
Antonyms
How Sentimental
Surface Forms
Etymology
Shmaltz comes from Yiddish shmalts and German Schmalz, which mean 'fat' or cooking grease. People began to call music and stories that felt overly rich or sticky 'shmaltz', so today shmaltz means 'too much feeling' or sentimental excess.