# Book/movie/whatever that completely blew you away and left you in awe **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 4, 2009, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657 "2009-06-04T02:56:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![BetsQ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/fbc32d/32.png) [@BetsQ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BetsQ)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/61 "2009-06-05T22:33:29Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > **Star Wars**. Summer of '77, in the theater, I was 12. I wanted to **be** in that universe. Still do, even after what Uncle George did to it with the prequels. 😛 Absolutely nothing surprising about this user name/post combo… ---
**Author:** ![TheVioletCreep](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eb8c5e/32.png) [@TheVioletCreep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheVioletCreep)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/62 "2009-06-05T22:58:01Z")
> [@Mosier](#): > > After the final scene in Memento, I sat in silence by myself in my bedroom, unaware the credits had already finished rolling and it was pitch black. It took me at least ten minutes to come back to my senses and realize it was just a movie and I was now back in the real world. Really don’t want to be a fly in the ointment, but could you explain why? I saw the movie, understood it. Rewatched, and still I am completely unphased. Everyone else, not so much, is it me? and to add to the party Books: American Psycho by Ellis House of Leaves by Danielewski Cuckoo’s Nest many many more, but I haven’t the time to go through the list. ---
**Author:** ![Estilicon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/848f3c/32.png) [@Estilicon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Estilicon)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/63 "2009-06-06T00:23:35Z")
Movies: Requiem for a Dream, I watched it once and I’ll never watch it again but that movie blew my head away. Literature: The secret miracle by Jorge Luis Borges and The Last question by Isaac Asimov. ---
**Author:** ![chique](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@chique](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chique)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/64 "2009-06-06T00:53:28Z")
Haven’t read most of the posts. Just want to say that I just (finally) saw _Children of Men_ just now. Completely in awe. Not a sad movie; not a happy movie. But the end - the bit just when the screen went dark but before the credits, with the sound effects… - it gave me actual fucking goosebumps. Never in my life has a dark, depressing film given me hope. Incredible film. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/65 "2009-06-06T00:58:21Z")
Film: Pasqualino Settebellezze The Butcher Boy and another +1 for Breaker Morant Books: Amongst Women by John McGahern I Married A Communist by Phillip Roth Europe: A History by Norman Davies Armageddon by Max Hastings ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/66 "2009-06-06T01:27:07Z")
> [@An\_Gadai](#): > > …and another +1 for Breaker Morant… Yes! Yet another reason to say you’re a helluva guy. ---
**Author:** ![Ferd\_Burfel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecccb3/32.png) [@Ferd\_Burfel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferd_Burfel)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/67 "2009-06-06T02:14:39Z")
Literature it was: **Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas** **The World According To Garp** **Replay** **One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest** **PS, Your Cat Is Dead** **Johnny Got His Gun** Films: **Play It Again Sam** (This was my first exposure to Woody Allen, and I had never seen \*\*Casablanca \*\*either.) **The Big Chill** **Hellfighters** (Especially the opening sequence when the oil worker sparks a well fire when his hard hat pops an incandescent bulb.) ---
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/68 "2009-06-06T02:32:52Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > I agree with some that have been mentioned like Breaker Morant and Gallipolli. Another ending that left me stunned was _Brazil_. This film, more than any other. I saw it in the theater during it’s very limited run, and at the end of the film, I was _gutted_. I literally was still sitting there when the lights came up could barely stand up. The first time I remember being impacted so deeply by a film. That year saw three great films that began with the letter B and were five letters - _[Brazil](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088846/)_, _[Birdy](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086969/)_ and _[Bliss](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088821/)_. The last is the most obscure, but it had nearly the same level of impact as _Brazil_. Another is Terry Zwigoff’s documentary _[Crumb](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0109508/)_. The part that tore me up: Finding out about Charles Crumb’s suicide when the credits started. I was in tears in the lobby and I’m not ashamed to admit it. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/69 "2009-06-06T03:36:31Z")
Recently, Neal Stephenson’s **Cryptonomicon/Baroque Cycle.** The shear scope of it, and the wit, blew me away. ---
**Author:** ![Jamaika\_a\_jamaikaiake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/7993a0/32.png) [@Jamaika\_a\_jamaikaiake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jamaika_a_jamaikaiake)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/70 "2009-06-06T04:36:47Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > OTOH, the first two clauses of the first sentence of **One Hundred Years of Solitude** blew me away: "Many years later, when he faced the firing squad . . . " It is the greatest hook in literature. I don’t think the openg lines got me, but the whole book did. The whole time I was reading it, I was thinking, “I have no idea what is going on, but it is amazing!” Maybe I wasn’t affected by the first lines because one of my favorite books starts out similarly: [QUOTE=The Abyssinian Chronicles] Three final images flashed across Serenity’s mind as he disappeared into the jaws of the colossal crocodile… [/QUOTE] As for movies, it is **Dancer in the Dark**. I had no idea what the movie was about going in. She dies at the end. That’s it. But half the cinema was in tears. Me and my two companions just went outside and sat silently like we were at a funeral for 10 minutes. As for youtube fun, this left my mouth agape: [Smearballs](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=if2RJggrjPo) ([Similar](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2yYactvhshg)) ---
**Author:** ![3trew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/3/13edae/32.png) [@3trew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/3trew)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/71 "2009-06-06T04:41:31Z")
\*\*The Vanishing. \*\* European title was **Spoorloos**. [The Vanishing (1988) - IMDb](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096163/) That one stuck with me for quite a while. The H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society’s version of **The Call of Cthulhu**. The acting style is dead on (if you’re not familiar with period conventions I’d watch **Nosferatu** first) and some of the no budget special effects are amazingly evocative of the strangeness Lovecraft’s prose invokes. When I first read **Neuromancer** in 1985 I remember getting to the end and saying aloud “Wow! That was fucking amazing! I wonder what it was about!” and re-reading it the same night, so I’d have to give a nod to William Gibson’s prose style and timing, back in the day. Back when “The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel” meant grey rather than screen of death blue. ---
**Author:** ![Frostillicus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Frostillicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frostillicus)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 5:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/72 "2009-06-06T05:09:22Z")
As far as performances go, I just watched \*\*Doubt \*\*and was absolutely floored by the performance of Meryl Streep as Sister Alouyious. I think that she is so universially admired as a “great” actress that people do not appreciate just how dazzling she can actually be . The way she delivers the line, “Thank god we are not living in ancient Sparta” with a slight pause between “ancient” and “Sparta” is just brilliant. ---
**Author:** ![Mosier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ea924/32.png) [@Mosier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mosier)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/73 "2009-06-06T06:35:47Z")
> [@TheVioletCreep](#): > > Really don’t want to be a fly in the ointment, but could you explain why? > I saw the movie, understood it. Rewatched, and still I am completely unphased. Everyone else, not so much, is it me? I’m not sure what the last sentence means. Are you saying you’re the only person you know who was unphased by the movie? Spoilers for the movie Memento follow. What got me was the sheer power of all the betrayals in the movie. Every single person Leonard encountered underestimated him, and tried to take advantage of him. I was deeply troubled in the scene where we learn Natalie’s true feelings. Everything about that movie came together so powerfully for me. We see a flashback in the last scene of him in bed with his wife, with the “I did it!” tattoo finally complete. We’re not really sure whether what we just saw for the past two hours was what really happened, or whether what we saw was Leonard’s brain-damaged version of reality. No other film has sucker punched me so hard. Every time you think you know what’s happening, something directly contradicts your assumptions. Beyond that I can’t really explain specifically what worked so well, or how I managed to get taken by surprise, and why I kept twisting the plot over in my mind, doubting the conclusions I was so certain of moments earlier. It just worked for me. ---
**Author:** ![RogueAOV](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecb155/32.png) [@RogueAOV](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RogueAOV)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/74 "2009-06-06T08:01:47Z")
> [@Aesiron](#): > > Pan’s Labyrinth I personally didnt think much of this movie but my wife loved it, however the reason i am posting is because our 2 year old baby watched the movie with us, she was transfixed the whole way thru, obviously by the images and not the subtitles etc. At the end of the movie, she started to sob uncontrollably. No one was near her, nothing touched her, it was just the power of the ending, she seemed to understand it. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/75 "2009-06-06T14:41:15Z")
Tabitha King’s _Small World_. It turned me into a huge fan of hers, and in my opinion she deserves to be as famous as her husband. If you find her book _Pearl_, read it. I just love it. ---
**Author:** ![Barking\_Dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Barking\_Dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barking_Dog)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/76 "2009-06-06T16:10:08Z")
LOTR: Return of the King. The scene (in the book) in the end at the Grey Havens; that was the first time a book, movie, song, what-have-you moved me. To tears no less. Every time I’ve read that scene I’ve wept like a schoolgirl. As for flat out, jaw-dropping awe, ‘Giant Bones’, by Peter S. Beagle, really does the trick. I’m a sucker for sad stories/endings. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/77 "2009-06-06T16:57:55Z")
I saw Saving Private Ryan with two other ex soldiers and we were very subdued afterwards. Usually film audiences are quite chattery when leaving but you could have heard a pin drop even though the place was packed out. The Long Good Friday with Bob Hoskins,a British gangster film,the ending is …disturbing. Point Blank. Bound,a gangsters girl and her lesbian lover plan to rip off the mob of a lot of money and go away. There are no lucky breaks,no coincidences and the bad guys are clever and very quick on the uptake. You are on the edge of your seat virtually every moment of the film and will most likely be a nervous wreck at the end of it. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/78 "2009-06-06T17:50:30Z")
3trew writes: \> Back when “The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead \> channel” meant grey rather than screen of death blue. Even in 1984 when Neuromancer came out, the image was long out of date. See this thread where we discussed it: > **[Is cyberpunk a dead genre?](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=303238)** > > I’ve been interested in reading some cyberpunk stuff lately, but have balked because I can’t find a used copy of Snow Crash. I was fairly into cyberpunk when I was in Jr. High/early high school (1990ish), basically when the genre was coming to an... ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2009, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657/79 "2009-06-06T22:54:09Z")
**Music** _A Day in the Life_ & _Tomorrow Never Knows_ by the Beatles Bach’s _Great Fugue in G-Minor_ - not the Fantasia, but the Fugue. Especially as played by E. Power Biggs on the Flentrop organ at Harvard. Bach’s _Little Fugue in G-Minor_. Mozart’s _41st Symphony in C-Maj_, 4th movement Mozart’s _20th Piano Concerto in D-Minor_, 1st movement (especially after the piano comes in - it kind of plays around a bit, but when the main theme starts up again in the strings, the piano takes a hold of the piece and just _rocks_ it out). **Movies** _Moulin Rouge!_, especially the first 30 minutes or so, up to “Spectacular Spectacular”. _Pulp Fiction_, and _Kill Bill vol. 1_. The final two scenes in _Godfather pt 2_, where Michael tells his brothers that he enlisted in the marines, and the final shot. _Titanic_, especially two scenes: When the camera pulls out right after the ship goes down and you see all those people in the water yelling for help, knowing that they will be dead in about 15 minutes or so, also, when a rocket is launched and the shot goes extremely wide, giving the viewer a sense of the futility of it all - from the ship the rocket seems impressive, but in the vastness of the ocean, you realize they might as well be shooting bottle rockets. **TV** The “Fuck” scene in season 1 of _The Wire_. “Once More With Feeling” from _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/book-movie-whatever-that-completely-blew-you-away-and-left-you-in-awe/498657.md?page=3)