The greatest film scenes ever shot

Catchfire
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Smart, diverse, interesting list from the Guardian.

Quote:
Such indelibly iconic moments have been part of moviegoing since the Lumière brothers' first public screening of a dozen short scenes in December 1895. One of them had the audience recoiling from a train entering a station, another had them chuckling when a cheeky boy tricked a gardener into spraying himself with a hosepipe. People judge a movie by the strength of its story and overall impact, but ultimately what they remember are individual moments and sequences. This perhaps reflects the very nature of film, which is a rapid succession of still pictures that provide an illusion of motion. And until the coming of cassettes and DVDs, few of us were able to see a picture over and over again or re-view a sequence. So we had to replay it in our minds, and naturally we'd often get it wrong. Which is how "Play it again, Sam" entered the language instead of: "Play it, Sam, play 'As Time Goes By'."

James Stewart seems to have been thinking of this approach to cinema when he talked to Peter Bogdanovich about his craft: "What you're doing is… you're giving people little… little, tiny pieces of time… that they never forget." This is echoed by Walker Percy in his 1961 novel The Moviegoer. Some people, his narrator says, "treasure memorable moments in their lives: the time one climbed the Parthenon at sunrise", but "what I remember is the time John Wayne killed three men with a carbine as he was falling to the dusty street in Stagecoach, and the time the kitten found Orson Welles in the doorway in The Third Man". Likewise Jean-Dominique Bauby, the paralysed French writer, describes in The Diving Bell and the Butterfly how he'd lie in the hospital recreating favourite scenes from Touch of Evil, Stagecoach, Moonfleet and Pierrot le fou. Canny film-makers have cottoned on to the idea, like James Cameron, who says: "You try to create one or more emotional, epiphanous moments within a film."

These moments come in many forms – simple, complex, lyrical, violent, gentle, witty, romantic, revelatory – and, if they stick, become as real as any other memory. They can range from the split-second close-up of the suave spy's missing half-finger in Hitchcock's The 39 Steps to the protracted pursuit of Cary Grant by the crop-dusting plane in North by Northwest, from the in-your-face eye-slicing in Buñuel's first silent movie, the avant-garde Un Chien Andalou, to the puzzling sequence of the Chinese businessman's mysterious box in the same director's mainstream success Belle de Jour 40 years later. Like your favourite jokes, your cherished movie moments reveal something about you and, if shared, they can be the beginning of a beautiful friendship, especially if one of them is the final sequence in Casablanca that features that line.

What are yours?


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Catchfire
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al-Qa'bong
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The scene right after the horse head scene in the Godfather.  Marlon Brando arches his eyebrows in an impish manner that's entirely at odds with the horror of what we've just seen.

The restaurant scene in the same picture right before Al Pacino bumps off the Police Captain and Sollozzo.  You could watch Mikey's moral anguish - through such clues as his shifting eyes and constant swallowing - as he is about to take the leap from All-American Hero to gangster.

 

The shots of the gunslingers' eyes in the three-way draw in Il Buono, Il Cattivo, Il Brutto (Hey, I watch furrin' movies too).  The music makes the scene special.

 



Fidel
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Movie scenes that stand out for me? To Kill a Mockingbird, the whole movie. I consider it a film museum of sorts of the way blacks were treated in the South. I know America has museums dedicated to the Holocaust and wars. What about black history or indigenous history telling of events as actually happened since European contact?

Dr Zhivago. That scene where Yuri is running along the tracks and yelling, Tonya! Tonya! I've always thought Julie Christie and Geraldine Chaplin were pleasant looking women on screen. And the ice house scene.

The Godfather?  I liked the scene where the mob is in Cuba, and Michael Corleone says to Roth, "I saw a strange thing today" Roth tries to downplay the issue of rebels but can't help but look a little worried jts.

Star Wars. I saw the first one at a small movie house in Bridlington, a seaside town on the east coast of England. It was magical.

 


al-Qa'bong
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Quote:

The Godfather?  I liked the scene where the mob is in Cuba...

 

You would.


Fidel
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Moral anguish? Mobsters? Are you kidding? What did you think to Scarface at the beginning of the movie when the Colombians used a chainsaw to sever the arm of Pacino's Cuban comrade in the bathroom scene? Were they apprehensive newbies or seasoned veterans? Some parts of that scene are said to have come from true FBI files for Florida in the 1980s. Ruthless mofos is more like it.

Al-Qa'bong wrote:
You could watch Mikey's moral anguish - through such clues as his shifting eyes and constant swallowing - as he is about to take the leap from All-American Hero to gangster.

It was Michael's plan all along. He commited murder as a war he-ro, and then the hit on Solozzo and Sterling Hayden was premeditated murder one. His only anguish was from fear that he'd be slain himself in an ensuing gun battle. He was already a cold blooded killer well beforehand. Remind me not to go to the movies with you. Sheesh! Ya think ya know someone.


al-Qa'bong
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Quote:

Moral anguish? Mobsters? Are you kidding? What did you think to Scarface at the beginning of the movie when the Colombians used a chainsaw to sever the arm of Pacino's Cuban comrade in the bathroom scene?

 

Why should I have to make a comparison between a scene I like in The Godfather and this scene?

 

Have another Cuba Libre amigo.


Kaspar Hauser
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Fidel
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al-Qa'bong wrote:
Have another Cuba Libre amigo.

It was just a moral anguish check, consigliere Qa'bong. Here is another great scene from that movie about a group of ruthless psychopaths.

The Godfather wrote:
Fredo Corleone: How do you say "banana daiquiri"? 
Michael Corleone: "Banana daiquiri."

Aha! Ya see? Deep and meaningful realism Hollywood style.


Catchfire
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Fidel, you are aware that the film is deliberately drawing links between capitalism and organized crime, right? I'd a thunk that would be right in your line.

And that is a damned beaut, M.N. I don't know if I'd call it best ever, but you can't account for taste...


Lou Arab
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Fidel
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And, YA! The Federation left Kahn and company to die on that godforsaken planet. Real nice guys those Starship Private Enterprisers.

Catchfire wrote:
Fidel, you are aware that the film is deliberately drawing links between capitalism and organized crime, right? I'd a thunk that would be right in your line.

This is news to me?? I always thought the mob was an autonomous collective. Like a fascist version of Robin Hood and his merry men helping out the Sherrif of Nottingham with enforcing England's exclusive private property laws kinda thing, no?

The higher I go, the crookeder it becomes. - Michael,  Godfather III


al-Qa'bong
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Quote:
Fidel, you are aware that the film is deliberately drawing links between capitalism and organized crime, right? I'd a thunk that would be right in your line.

 

Dat's right. Da foist scene in da pikshah, where ya can't even see anybody, it's just a guy talkin, is da best.

 

"I believe in America."

 


WillC
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Catchfire
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Superb, Banjo!


ebodyknows
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkxuPxdsZ58 - this movie really depends of the juxtopositioning of scenes but what clued out north american kid from the suburbs is not going to be marked by this one in particular the first time he sees it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1DhjFKNT0Q - token gangster movie scene.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lz1MpQ0n_ag - Can't forget this one, I taught myself to dance using this movie as reference.

oh fork, where's the canadian content? this is very unlike me.

http://www.coopvideo.ca/videos/yes-sir-madame.en - I'd probably choose the drive-in theater in winter, the asking for change on the street or perhaps the stapler scene but this is the only one online.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Lzl0yEx5TU - I taught myself about war using this movie....does anybody else remember this as an english movie?  Incidently it is also the movie which my cuban rommie says is the only thing he knew about canada before he came here.

speaking of war: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTlGpKkWthI

and speaking of flowers: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSb4UMeomGg the part starting at 1:11. Though what I really remember is meeting this guy one night in a tent before I knew he was semi-famous. He was wearing nothing but a diaper and speaking poetry the way ordinary people breath.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUPDRnUWeBA  maybe not the greatest, but it's the BEST!

 


Croghan27
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Sparticus is a very good film - not because of anything that the main-man star Kirk Douglas does. Written by Dalton Trumbo (who used a 'nom de plume' because he had been McCarthy black listed),

or even because of Stanley Kubrick's direction - but because of the 'character' actors. It is easy to look at the film and decide who is a good and who is a bad actor ... yet watch Laurence Olivier - you cannot but be impressed by his acting because he is so very good he does not seem to act. He IS Marcus Licinius Crassus. Still the best scene in the film is not the much promoted "I am Sparticus."ending ... but of the two masters, Charles Laughton and Peter Ustinov sitting in a hot bath. YouTube is not available on this computer - but that scene can be had. Watch it and be impressed.


Fidel
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al-Qa'bong wrote:

Quote:
Fidel, you are aware that the film is deliberately drawing links between capitalism and organized crime, right? I'd a thunk that would be right in your line.

 

Dat's right. Da foist scene in da pikshah, where ya can't even see anybody, it's just a guy talkin, is da best.

 "I believe in America."

Look how they massac'd my boy's grammar and spelling?

 


David Young
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When John Travolta takes over the dance floor to 'You Should Be Dancing' in 'Saturday Night Fever'.

When Keir Dullea goes through the portal in '2001: A Space Oddesey'.


Tommy_Paine
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Hmm.   Youtube has it in ten minute chunks, not terribly convenient for posting here.

 

But one scene that always stands out in my mind is one from "Bridge on the River Kwai".  The scene begins with Alec Guiness the bedraggled prisoner of war, with Sessue Hayakawa as Colonel and very much in charge, but ends the other way around.  What I like is how Lean told that moment not just with dialogue, but subtle body language between the two.  

Another David Lean film one could take a few scenes from is, obviously, Lawrence of Arabia.  But the one of the better scenes is when Lawrence comes in from the trek across the Sinai into the officer's club, and gets a lemonaide for his companion.

A movie I find somewhat uneven in sound and score, and the animation seems.... Yellow Submarine influenced, but never the less well written and performed is the Tony Richardson 1968 version of "Charge of the Light Brigade"   The scene where the battle ravage trooper limps out of the dust, having survived the infamous charge, and says to Lord Cardigan " Gowe agin, sah?"   is one of those rare moments.

 

Casablanca, for me, is perhaps my all time favorite movie, and almost all the scenes are memorable.  In fact, I think that's what makes the movie works so well for me.  Every time I watch it,  I come away with a new favorite or epiphanous scene.   What's also so very unusual about the film is that no one involved in it thought it more than a studio crank 'em out at the time.    One wonders if as much as a grain of sand was different in the Ordovician epoch, Casablanca would never be the film it is.   Wierd confluence of events.

There's a few seconds in Buster Keaton's movie, "The General"   when, during a train chase, Keaton's love interest is stoking the firebox with wood, comes across a piece with a hole in it-- and you can see her thinking-- then she throws it off the train.    I think that scene, if not the whole movie,  elevated humour in the silent era from the usual purile slapstick into something that engaged the audience's minds.

 

Every time I finish posting, I remember another scene, from another movie.  Edit edit edit.

 

The scene where Steve McQueen shoots his apprentice/friend in "The Sand Pebbles", and then throws his rifle into the river.

 


Left Turn
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Six of my favourite great movie scenes (there are others, but this will suffice for now)

Star Wars (A New Hope) -- Obi-Wan talks to Luke

Star Wars (A New Hope) -- Battle of Yavin (Part 2)

Empire Strikes Back -- "No, I am your father!"

Reds -- John Reed's Speech/Internationale

Gone With the Wind -- Final Scene

Back to the Future -- Johnny B. Goode Scene (not available on Youtube)


Boom Boom
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Casablanca is on my list of favourite movies, but my list changes often.


DaveW
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more European content:

Breathless, where Belmondo is studying a Bogart poster and glibly imitating him; or when Jean Seberg is reading the paper and peaking;

The Conformist, when the wave of fascists descends on the guy in the woods

the butter scene in Last Tango -- not in the script! (she could have sued, she says now)

Jules and Jim, the trio cycling and laughing

 

 

 

 


al-Qa'bong
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You know how to whistle don't you, Steve?  To Have and Have Not

 

The Big Sleep

Bogey: "What do you know about this; Mr. Geiger, here on the floor?" 

Carmen Sherwood (Martha Vickers): "He's cute too."

 

 

"I'd like a plain omlette"  Five Easy Pieces

 

 

 

 


skdadl
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Took me so long to get here through all those wonderful selections.

 

To me, every scene in The Third Man is unforgettable. The kitten discovering Harry in the shadows is great, but there are also the fingers through the manhole, the ferris wheel scene, Holly's wild ride in the taxi, the moment right at the beginning when Holly walks under a ladder just as he reaches Harry's apartment building, and Valli's long walk centre-screen right into the camera at the end. I could watch that movie forever.

 

The titles sequence to High Noon is an amazing piece of choreography, I think. There's a moment when the first two guys meet, then briefly turn away from one another on a rotation towards and away from the camera that puts their hats at a perfect angle -- beautiful.

 


Catchfire
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Love the Bogart and Bacall suggestions. And you know I love High Noon, skdadl. Leone references the train station of Hadleyville in the first scene I cited.

I could probably fill this thread with film noir beauties, in addition to the Double Indemnity one I cited above: the opening scene to Touch of Evil, Orson Welles's emergence (and beautiful zithering of Anton Karas) in The Third Man, the insane, right-wing fantasy conclusion of Kiss Me, Deadly, or this one, in one of my favourite movies ever, Night of the Hunter, with noir star Robert Mitchum:

"Would you like me to tell you the little story of right hand, left hand?"

One of my favourite recent films is Alfonso Cuaron's Children of Men. This scene, a single tracking shot, is emblematic of the movie's breathless pace, dynamism, contrast and warmth.

As for Canadian content, what about this beautiful, mythical, evocative scene from Atanarjuat, as the Fast Runner runs for his life, naked, across the tundra of the Canadian Arctic.


skdadl
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Oh, just off the top of my head: Raising Arizona: the Huggies robbery

 

I laughed so hard all the way through that movie.


Fidel
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Youtube don't go for me for some reason. Anyway, I really-really liked scenes from a silly 2000 movie entitled, The Beach, with DiCaprio and scences filmed on an island somewhere off the coast of Thailand. I was dissappointed to know that the movie crew was accused by the locals of having messed up the natural flora and fauna of the beach in order to make it appear as if a paradise. But the movie music by New York musician Moby, Porcelain, and the young people discovering the beach at the lagoon scene is breathtaking for me. The scene is awesome.


Tommy_Paine
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Never wuz mucha one fer oaters.   But, I have to admit that I think the scenes between Gene Hackman (Little Bill) and Richard Harris (English Bob) in The Unforgiven were more than memorable.   In fact, as I've rewatched that movie a number of times, they have come to be my favorite parts.

Still with Eastwood, the very, very end of the shootout in "Pale Rider", when John Dennis Johnston, long time character actor, looks up and says "YOU!"


al-Qa'bong
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I don't know how great the scenes are, but "Deservin's got nuthin' to do with it," and "Dyin' ain't much of a living" are a couple of great Clint Eastwood lines. 

There are two kinds of film dialogue my friend...


ebodyknows
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Nice, and all this time I thought spike lee made that up.

Catchfire wrote:
As for Canadian content, what about this beautiful, mythical, evocative scene from Atanarjuat, as the Fast Runner runs for his life, naked, across the tundra of the Canadian Arctic.
Definetly one I have stuck in my mind!

I forget the details of this scene but remember the concept pretty much every time I walk into a diner.

 


Tommy_Paine
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al-Qa'bong wrote:

I don't know how great the scenes are, but "Deservin's got nuthin' to do with it," and "Dyin' ain't much of a living" are a couple of great Clint Eastwood lines. 

There are two kinds of film dialogue my friend...

 

Yes, I particularly like "Deserve's got nuthin to do withit" too, but that, while a scene, is too close to "Make My Day", and maybe is better off in a thread about bestest ever lines.   

 

-------

Once at last break on night shift, I joined a bunch of guys at a table, with a discussion about whatever inexplicable murder had taken place at that time already in progress, with them trying to figure out the unfathomable.  I interupted:

"Killin a man is a helluva thing.  You take away all he's got, and all he's ever gonna have."    And, I did it with a straight face, deadpan.

And, they all went silent and inside themselves, fer a right spell.

 

Laughing

 

 


Catchfire
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"You just shot an unarmed man!"
"Well he should'a armed himself..."


Fidel
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I was going to drive from Mountain View to Carmel by the Sea and see Clint's town. I think Play Misty for Me was filmed there. But I changed my mind and drove the rented car to Monterey, and Salinas to the John Steinbeck museum. It was worth it.


ebodyknows
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Well I think I already established in the ghostbusters thread the greatest line ever is "I collect spores, molds and fungus."

But if I'm going to offer another it would be:

"E"

"b"

hmmm....it doesn't look like much on the screen, guess it's all in the delivery.


Farmpunk
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Big Trouble In Little China... too many scenes\lines to write out. 


VanGoghs Ear
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Any fans of poetic Russian cinema

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-2oUxYHdu8

 

or cheesy 80's movies

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfltRJxLeIE

 

I might seem weird to non cineophiles but I equally love both


Papal Bull
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The tattoo scene from 'Dude, Where's My Car'. The amazing acting of Sean William Scott and Ashton Kutcher made the scene believable, yet humorous. Potentially one of the most powerful scenes in all of cinema.


al-Qa'bong
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Fidel
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Farmpunk wrote:

Big Trouble In Little China... too many scenes\lines to write out.

That's one of my Jackie faves. Legend of the Drunken Master is the best kung fu movie of all time bar none! Yes, I think it's even better than Enter the Dragon and Return of the Dragon. And if anyone disagrees, I will fight you!!


Bookish Agrarian
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Ha Tommy, I should have known.  As soon as I saw this thread I thought of the Bridge on the River Kwai, but you beat me too it.

My other favourite is the funeral scene in Cry Freedom.  If you can watch it for the first time and not weep at the loss and all it represents you are a harder person than me.


Fidel
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Ho-ho ho! The Dragon vs Chuck Norris! from Way of the Dragon(YouTube) Thank me later fooeys. Smile


Fotheringay-Phipps
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Malcolm Macdowell's screen test at the end of O Lucky Man! Dazed and crazed after a Pilgrim's Progress through a Britain falling  through its own rotten seams, he stumbles onto a shoot for a movie called, yes, O Lucky Man. The director, Lindsay Anderson, picks him from the crowd and has him pose looking scholarly, fierce, and winsome. "Now smile," Anderson says.

Macdowell is troubled. He's been through prison, savage beatings, betrayal and disillusion. "Beg pardon?"

"Smile."

Macdowell's latent anger starts to simmer. "Why?"

"Just smile."

"No. Why should I smile?"

And at that point, Anderson reaches over and swats him in the head with a binder. Cut to black. Cut to Macdowell's face, hurt and confused. Cut to black. Cut to Macdowell's face, and we may just see the beginnings of a smile at the corner of his eyes. Cut to the great Alan Price singing O Lucky Man, at once joyous, cynical, and determined. Pure magic.

And to Tommy Paine: Casablanca is as central to our civilization as the Psalms. Aside from Hamlet, it's the greatest repository of over-used quotations you didn't even recognize till you saw it the first time. How I envy first-timers as they hear; "I was shocked --shocked; round up the usual suspects; we'll always have Paris; out of all the lousy bars in the world etc.; play it, Sam; this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship," and a dozen others.


conrad yablonski
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Fidel
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al-Qa'bong
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Merowe
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Antonioni's The Passenger, the lonnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn zoom at the end, over Jack Nicholson's inert form and out the window...


Cueball
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al-Qa'bong
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Catchfire's reference to Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin in the "Internet Archives" thread reminded me of the famous pram on the stairs scene.


al-Qa'bong
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I always liked this scene:

"With or without?"

Kenny Baker and Miss Humanity in The Goldwyn Follies

 

OK, fine.  I'm a sappy sentimentalist; the truth's out.


6079_Smith_W
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The last scene in von Stroheim's "Greed"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ECZW9R16EY

The last scene in "The Third Man"

http://vimeo.com/5310562

The scene in "M" where Peter Lorre's character is trying to open the door in the attic.

 

 


6079_Smith_W
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Not talking about greatest scenes of all time, but here is a great ending to a great movie.... best seen from the beginning, of course:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUcTvhyof8I&feature=related


Catchfire
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I just saw a laundry commercial where a kid in a princess costume or something says in that creepy, precocious way kids in commercials have "I'm ready for my close-up!" I don't think it has the effect they were going for if you've seen Sunset Blvd.


Sky Captain
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Fidel wrote:

And, YA! The Federation left Kahn and company to die on that godforsaken planet. Real nice guys those Starship Private Enterprisers

Hey rube, apparently you didn't see the episode that this movie's a sequel to, otherwise you'd know that:

  1. Khan was a ruthless genetically engineered dictator who once ruled half of Earth along with others like him (their race is called 'Augments')
  2. The people of Earth waged a war against him and his contemporaries (The Eugenics War) to get rid of him; Khan and 84 of his followers (other Augments) left Earth in a experimental spacecraft in suspended animation
  3.  Khan's ship, the Botany Bay, is discovered by the U.S.S. Enterprise in 2266: Khan and his fellow Augments repay Captain Kirk's hospitality by trying to steal the Enterprise and use it to conquer the rest of the galaxy-but Khan is defeated and exiled to Ceti Alpha V (mostly because if he was taken to the nearest Starbase or to a rehabilitation colony, he would simply take over those with the same results[as told in the 1967 episode 'Space Seed'])

Captain Kirk's fault? Not really, more like Khan's for being what he is ('Superior abillity breeds superior ambition.')


6079_Smith_W
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Um... maybe the opening scenes in "Wings of Desire":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4gFy-DJikA&playnext=1&list=PLE6E2CBE84D5...


bagkitty
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Ah the universe of "film" (or if we want to be pretentious, "CINEMA") - a universe where men outnumber women by some factor that is, at least, in the double digits. Forgive me for mistaking it for yet another hockey thread.


6079_Smith_W
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Hey, come one.... some of us had chickens!


bagkitty
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@6079_Smith_W:

If I wanted to nit pick, I would ask if that was a hen or a rooster. But back to my original point, lists like the one linked to in the OP (and discussions like the one is this thread) do tend to reflect the "film" universe, they are all awash in testosterone, or in the case of the first "scene" discussed in the linked article, awash in blood. I think there is a message there.


6079_Smith_W
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Except that the film world actually does cover a lot of ground, and if you wanted to introduce something that has not been presented, there is plenty of material , and the floor is open.

Calling it a boys club and leaving it at that is neither productive, nor instructive.

And why so down on team sports? Not that I am usually a fan, but this wouldn't be because the stamps lost last night, would it?

(sorry, I couldn't resist)

 


al-Qa'bong
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I liked this whole picture, I can't pick just one scene.

 

Lord of the Flies


6079_Smith_W
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I feel the same way about Donald Cammell and Nicholas Roeg's  "Performance"

Any film that makes a studio executive physically grab a shovel and threaten to bury it must be pushing the right buttons.

I don't care that the shoot was waist-deep in real gangsters.


Cueball
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bagkitty
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6079_Smith_W wrote:

And why so down on team sports? Not that I am usually a fan, but this wouldn't be because the stamps lost last night, would it?

That would be mega thread drift, but if you want to go ahead and start one, I will make sure I join in.


al-Qa'bong
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Now there's a typically "progressive" response: kvetch, kvetch, kvetch, but when the challenge to start something new - even a measly interweb thread - comes along, you pass, and say you'll join in once someone else has done the groundwork.


6079_Smith_W
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*laugh*

Nah, it was just a joke, really.

I think that Saskatoon can get away with teasing Calgary, since we're probably half the population there (says the Winnipeg-born import)

If you're into it though, I wouldn't mind finding out what some of your favourite film scenes are. And by saying that I don't mean to put you on the spot, and I thank you for bringing up the issue of inequality.


Polunatic2
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al-Qa'bong wrote:
Catchfire's reference to Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin in the "Internet Archives" thread reminded me of the famous pram on the stairs scene.

Now I understand the context for the pram on the stairs scene in The Trotsky. 


Cueball
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The same pram shot sequence appears in  Terry Gilliam's Brazil, with a an old cleaning lady with a vacuum cleaner filling in for the old lady with the Pram.


al-Qa'bong
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There was a pram scene in The Untouchables, too.


Pope Teddywang
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Cueball
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Brian White
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Eli Walach blessed himself a few times in the good, the bad and it was something special. It was like he was giving GOD a nasty look and a nasty finger as he made the sign. But so quick, even God could not be sure. Cracks me up.

There were a few scenes of the landscape and people working in days of heaven that just go with the music,  absolutely blow me away  beautiful.

A dutch film called "character" with the dutch spelling is worth seeing, a bunch of ugly people in the film some as good people  but it makes it look real.

Some stuff from deleketessen, (the guy sneaking away in the barrel) (the butchers orgasms) special weird!  and  in the closet,   and diva  (france)  are special

as is the opening scene with the music of tie me up tie me down. (Spain) special weird again!

Indochina has its moments too.

Bruce dern did a space movie and the last scene of it with the plant ship drifting away into space. Forget what it is called.

 


Cueball
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bagkitty
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Whereas I was entirely serious... you want to start a thread why someone might be "down" on team sports, and I will defintely be dancing there in big old boots.

As to scenes I really like from movies.

1) The night driving/dawn breaking in the desert scene from Thelma & Louise (couldn't find an actual link from the movie, but most of the footage is in this video).

2) Emma Thompson as the title character in Carrington watching her house guests from the front lawn. Watch here (although I hate that they titled the clip the way they did on youtube, the whole reason I like the scene is that it is so emotionally ambiguous, and the title they have tacked onto it does it a disservice)

3) A number of scenes from the 1977/79's Alan Clarke film SCUM, precisely because of the way they depict violence (unlike the choreographed violence we are conditioned to expect in most movies) - essentially someone gets hit, they go down, they get the boot put to them... not that I like this depiction of violence, just that it is so much more realistic than then the violence normally found in movies - it actually makes the violence more repellent, always a good thing.

4) The opening sequence (running from the security guards) and walk in the countryside talking about being colonized scene in Trainspotting.

 

 


Cueball
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Stargazer
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orPMI2G2SVI&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71W0qaZga-M&feature=related

 

Bitter Moon, one of the best films ever made (IMO). I have watched this movie over 30 times and I still adore it. Such a heartbreaking tale of love.In the clip below she begs him to let her stay on any terms. I have known love that powerful and abusive. This film is intense. I adore it.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0VBnBxSx_w&feature=related


Kloch
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Two of my favourite scenes:

All Train Compartments Smell Vaguely of Shit

 

The Commode Story

 

Edited to add:

Fuck You


6079_Smith_W
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Speaking of sports, one of the opening scenes from the original "Rollerball" has always stuck with me:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhwdkvfxlCY&feature=related

and @ Cueball

ditto on Catch22 and Burnt by the Sun. Great films.

And Bitter Moon... that reminds me of the great scene in Last Tango in Paris where Paul is talking to his dead wife. You can find it on YouTube.


Cueball
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al-Qa'bong
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Krago
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Catchfire by way of Unforgiven wrote:

"You just shot an unarmed man!"
"Well he should'a armed himself..."

When the definitive story of how Harper won his majority is written, that quote should start the chapter on Ignatieff.


Catchfire
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Top 10 Film Character Introductions

Quote:
This list is complied of some of the most creative and complex character introductions in film. The fact that the characters on this list are all recognizable serves as an example of the importance of the character introduction. If done correctly, the character introduction can begin the transformation of a character into an icon.

Sore omission: Harry Lime

 


Fidel
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Bourne Identity - best car chase scene ever with an Austin Mini Cooper. 

"Last chance, Marie"...


milo204
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the problem with all these types of lists is that it's primarily "the greatest scenes from movies you've already heard of" not "all time"

and also primarily english language movies.

yes, we know about jules and jim,  but what of the epic safe cracking scene from RIFFIFI?


Fidel
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Oh I will have to watch that one 'afore the internet feds crackdown on torrent sites. Which reminds me, The Bank Job (2008), based on the 1971 Baker Street Robbery in London, was rilly good imo. I like foreign movies and film scenes from around the world in general. 


Glenl
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Every scene that Ingrid Bergman was ever in. I watched a lot of movies with my mother when I was young, Ms Bergman was my first love.


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