high conceptadj.n.

1971 Seattle Times 27 June 15/3 ‘Fundamentally, we make movies with high-concept, high-drama value,’ Epstein said. ‘We go for encapsulated concepts that are easy to promote with brief ads.’

1979 Washington Post 14 Oct. (TV section) 34/2 A high concept show has something that somebody could recognize in the title and would want to see... Elvis Presley and pills are the highest concept you could get.

1991 C. Paglia in Arion Spring 191 Coke was responsible for the plot incoherence of fifteen years of TV sit-coms and glitzy ‘high-concept’ Hollywood films.

1994 Vanity Fair (N.Y.) July 78/1 They overcame a certain amount of cynicism about their romance—how too impossibly high-concept it was—by actually getting married last Thanksgiving.

2003 Independent 30 Apr. i. 3/1 The so-called ‘high concept’ pitch has long been considered a byword for crass commercialism in the film world.

2010 Daily Tel. 25 Mar. 34/2 The Americans have been forging ahead with high-concept, big budget mind-benders such as Lost and FlashForward.

1985 Washington Post 14 Nov. (Home section) 7/2 Canton Express, a high-concept collection of blue and white tableware, offers ‘a fast and authentic way to turn Chinese take-out from a favorite restaurant into a banquet at home’.

1988 Los Angeles Times (Nexis) 2 Sept. vi. 24 The restaurant is a high concept operation and it pushes all the right buttons: a stunningly designed open kitchen, post-modern vastness and a decibel level even Philip Glass would object to.

1996 Independent 18 Dec. ii. 2/1 A store with such haute pretension could never have sullied its display windows by a regular Father Christmas... Barneys has to have high-concept windows.

2001 M. Azerrad Our Band could be your Life i. 51 The fact that Black Flag, caricatured as a mindlessly aggressive punk band, could ally themselves with high-concept artwork was a tip-off that there was greater intelligence at work here than most outsiders suspected.

1972 Chicago Tribune 1 Mar. c7/2 Spelling explained that a high concept is one that tells the potential audience exactly what the movie is about.

1980 N.Y. Times 14 Dec. d36/2 In order for a mini-series to be successful in today's market,..it has to have a high concept and a high theme.

1992 Spy (N.Y.) Oct. 18/1 In the Hollywood of high concepts, the idea behind Bob Roberts..seemed..esoteric.

2011 G. Morrison Supergods x. 125 Kirby could throw away in one single panel a high concept that would keep others busy for years.

1973 A. Spelling in Kingsport (Tennessee) Times 20 Nov. 11/2 If a Movie of the Week doesn't catch the viewer's attention in the first five minutes, he simply flicks the dial... High concept grabs them early.

1988 M. Hauge Writing Screenplays that Sell ii. 25 High concept is becoming a much greater issue in feature films.

1999 E. Sternberg Econ. Icons v. 87 The first Star Wars movie series, one of the most commercially successful ever made and an example of ‘high-concept’.

2007 Canberra Times (Nexis) 17 Mar. a10 Berry cut his novelist teeth on the thrillers of Clive Cussler, whom he describes as ‘the grand master of high concept’.