Rube Goldberg invention

“It’s also been compared to a Rube Goldberg invention,” he remarked.

He lasted months — months — while oil was spewing out of a Rube Goldberg invention at the bottom of the Gulf, while he was whining about wanting his life back.

Those who pursue this detective story to its finish may be reminded of a Rube Goldberg invention, not because it is comically ingenious but because the elaborate machinery of its plot does not justify the picayune results.

The success, in short, is plain to see; but the secret of it, like the motive force in a Rube Goldberg invention, is hidden in the depths of an astonishing psychological contraption.

In Chevalier's 7,000-word translation, the phrase "as complicated as a Rube Goldberg invention" became "more complicated than existentialism."