And Vin Diesel got shot by a sniper at the first town, long before they met Ryan also. But my point is - the mission of “go hiking into disputed territory, find Ryan, and bring him back” was a bullshit mission that no one was happy about. Vin & Giovanni died while performing that mission, specifically the “go hiking into disputed territory” part. But at the end of the movie, Tom Hanks decided to give up on the Ryan mission, and take on the mission of defending the town with the vital bridge. This was a good, solid, militarily important mission - that bridge was one of the few remaining tank-capable bridges over whatever river it was. Keeping it in friendly hands, or at least destroying it to keep it out of German hands, is militarily worth the deaths of soldiers, while saving a single soldier for PR reasons is not militarily worth the death of other soldiers.
In Oscar, there’s a scene where Oscar’s wife berates him when he’s already having a bad day and he sighs and leans against the fireplace mantle. My sister was the one who noticed (after we’d seen it a few times) that he assumed the crucifixion position when he leaned back. Now I wonder how we missed it the first time!
At the end of Blind Date, (Bruce Willis and Kim Basinger), the wedding is a shambles, with the couple arguing and guests confused, and over all the hubbub is the insistent barking of the family guard dog. The groom’s father is trying to make some sense out of everything and in the process, throws out an order to the butler to “Kill that dog!” Finally the bride (who is drunk), yells for quiet, and in the silence that follows, you hear a gunshot in the background–and no more barking. Took a while for me to pick up on that one!
RikWriter, I get what you’re saying now. They could have bypassed the machine gun nest, but Hanks chose to attack it instead so some other squad didn’t have to take it out. So Giovanni actually got killed by Hanks doing something else outside the mission. Gotcha.
I’m none to good at spotting subtle moments in films.
I did like the reuse of phrases or props in The Big Lebowski, if that counts. From Bush’s speech which is fairly obvious to the scissors in Maude’s studio that the Nihilists use to try and cut off the Dude’s johnson in a drug induced hallucination.
In Poltergeist, near the end, the teenage daughter gets dropped off in front of the house after a date. There is a huge commotion so her bf peels off and she is staring at the house and asks ‘What is going on?!?!’ She has a hicky on her neck from the date.
Your post confuses me and makes my head hurt. Ryan certainly was at Normandy. Normandy is a whole big section of France, not just a beach. Ryan fought on D-Day as part of Operation Overlord. The operation consisted of a nightime airbourne assault followed by an amphibious landing. Ryan was with the 101st Airborne Division. One of the units dropped on Normandy the night before the amphibious assault. The battle for Normandy did not end for weeks after June 6th. The cemetary at Normandy contains the remains of soldiers from the entire battle, not just the beach.
BTW the plot of the movie was based on a real event. Reality wasn’t as interesting as the movie so it was fictionalized. Fritz Niland was found be a chaplain, not a squad of Rangers.
They all died as part of that mission. They wouldn’t have been there at all if it wasn’t for the Ryan mission. Maybe they would have died in some other part of France but they all died because they were sent on the mission, regardless of the decisions that were made later. And part of the reason why they stayed was because Ryan was staying. If they left and he died then their mission would fail. And it’s the 101st not the 82nd.
I apologize for causing the minor Private Ryan hijack with my dopey joke.
Just rewatched Barton Fink last night. I was struck by the scene in which Charlie (John Goodman’s character) first knocks on Barton’s hotel room door and visits him…
While Barton babbles on and on and on, repeatedly interrupting Charlie, there is one particular shot where Charlie grimaces ever so slightly. It is THE moment that Charlie thinks to himself “I am going to fuck this guy over in a big bad way!” or thoughts to that effect.The first time I watched that scene, I thought WTF? Rewatching it is cringe-inducing. I wanted to scream “For God’s sakes, shut the f*** UP!”
Just remembered one, from Monty Python’s Meaning of Life. In one of the sketches, a British in colonial Africa wakes up to discover his leg’s missing. The doctor examines him and pronounces that it was a tiger attack. The other British officers are stunned. “A tiger? In Africa?” is repeated several times. Someone suggests that it escaped from a zoo.
I’ve never been able to quite figure out what level this joke is supposed to work on. When I saw it as a kid, I thought the joke was that there’s nothing surprising about a tiger being in Africa, so the British officers looked like twits for being surprised to find African fauna in Africa. Except, of course, there are no tigers in Africa. Tigers are from India. And the Pythons were all pretty well educated, and would almost certainly know that there are no tigers in Africa. But if whichever Python wrote the sketch knew that, then it’s not actually a joke, is it? He’s reacting precisely as you’d expect a real British officer serving in colonial Africa to have reacted. Unless, of course, the joke is that most people think that there are tigers in Africa. It’s a common mistake, after all. Ask most people where you find tigers, and they’ll probably say, “Africa.” So, the joke in the scene is that people will think it’s funny that the officer is surprised to hear of a tiger attack in Africa, even though there’s not really anything funny about it. Which is what makes it funny.
Subtle? Maybe. Overanalyzed? Definitly.
Ahh, which reminds me of another moment in that movie… I saw it for the first time this year. The parents are driving in the car (or something) and mention that they are going to be staying in a hotel room for a while (or something)
…and from the back seat, the teenage daughter offhandedly comments something like,
‘‘That’s a good hotel.’’
The parents continue fretting without even noticing the implication there.
According to http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Set/8476/quot.html , this is the Poltergeist dialogue:
“Dad said we’re staying at the Holiday Inn on I-95” --Diane
“Oh, yeah. I remember that place” – Dana
“You What?” — Diane
“So what are you going to do about your new greys?” – Dana
“You don’t like them? You don’t think their kind of punk?” – Diane
“Bye, Mom” – Dana
Considering the mother’s reaction, not that subtle, I think.
It’s not super-subtle, but it’s subtle enough for kids to miss. In Toy Story, someone (dinosaur?) is giving a longwinded inspirational speech. Mr. Potato Head rolls his eyes, gives a significant look to someone next to him, takes off his lips, and bumps them against his butt. It’s a wonderfully eloquent way of saying, “Kiss my ass!”
Daniel
I believe it is the dinosaur, and he’s talking about how great a guy Woody is. Mr. Potato Head is implying that Rex is being a kiss-ass, sucking up to Woody.
My favorite subtle moment in *The Godfather * is when Michael is talking to Carlo. He tells Carlo that he knows he betrayed the family and caused Sonny to get killed. He tells him that he is not going to kill him but he needs to hear it from Carlo that he is guilty. Carlo breaks down and says it was Barzeni that came to him. For a second Pacino hesitates. His eyes unfocus for a second. In that moment you realize that he didn’t know that Carlo caused his brother’s death, he only suspected it. Carlo sealed his own fate.
It is probably the last time that Al Pacino was subtle.
Just watched The Fountain for the first time.
Am I the only one who noticed Queen Isabella’s dress makes her look like an elaborate, golden tree?
If I am, then I guess that’s subtle.
Also, my husband had to point out to me in Hot Fuzz that while the main character rants and curses about the obviousness of the murders abounding, there’s some guys in the background dutifully plunking money into the swear jar.
The shot in Ryan where the troops in the landing craft are being slaughtered by the machine gun is virtually identical to a British film from the thirties(I believe) about the Gallipoli landings which shows Brit soldiers being gunned down as they try to leave the boat from the vantage point of the Turkish machine gunner killing them.
It’s TV, and may not have been intended, but the coincidence is tantalizing. In House, Chase wants Cameron but she’s not interested in anything but a shallow “friends with benefits” relationship. He undertakes to keep his desire to himself but allows himself to tell her once a week that he loves her. The final week this happens, he proclaims his love for her, there’s a brief interplay and she concludes with the words, “See you next Tuesday”.
Maybe complete co-incidence but around my group of friends we use the same expression when describing people we don’t like, taking the first phoneme from each word. As in: c, u, n, and t. We say it more or less all the time so when “See you next Tuesday” came up on House my partner and I turned to each other and said, “WHAT!”
Intended? Conicidence? Who’s to know. But subtle, for sure.
Best subtle moment was in the movie Harold and Maude.
Harold had just run off his first date that his mother had setup for him (she is an awful match for Harold of course) by setting himself on fire. His date freaks out and then Harold walks in a-ok. Girl loses it and runs from the house.
The camera has an angle of Harold in front of his mother and Harold is looking at the camera. His mom is giving him this withering look and Harold smiles almost imperceptibly…he knows exactly what he is doing.
Great movie.
Actually if you go for a moment that totally slipped by I would have to add Vanilla Sky.
Early in the movie David (main character) is driving and you can see the car sticker in the front window is dated 02/30/01 (which of course is not an actual date). I missed that on a few watchings then my wife caught it. Some say it is an indication the whole thing is a dream.
Is this that scene?