Palookaville en · PROPN
Etymology
From palooka (“a stupid or oafish person”) + -ville. Popularized in On the Waterfront (1954).
Meanings
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(US) An imaginary town, the natural home of the mediocre and incompetent.
Ram’s descent plays out against a backdrop of New York as Palookaville, full of free-floating hostility and natives who spout movie-bred clichés.
2012 September 7, Rachel Saltz, “Living in a Material World”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:But what holds it is the working-class poetry of Derek Ahonen’s script, with the “broken down dreams” and a “gutter full of empty stomachs” of a hard-boiled era of soulful stiffs and dreamers going nowhere. It’s the speeded-up sound of a return trip to Palookaville.
2010 March 15, Jason Zinoman, “Dreams Die Hard, Even in Palookaville”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:
Deriveds
one-way ticket to Palookaville