The word 无厘头 is formed through a contraction of the Cantonese phrase 无厘头绪, meaning "without a clue" or "lacking order", where 无 means "without", 厘 implies triviality or small measure, and 头绪 means "clue" or "thread". By dropping the character 绪, the truncated form 无厘头 retains the sense of absurdity or nonsensicalness, directly reflecting its etymological origin from a phrase indicating lack of coherence.