You're Making a Collection of Your Favorite Movie Scenes-List Five You Would Include

Cafe Society
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The barfight scene in Indiana Jones and the Lost Ark when Indy and one of the bad guys are fighting over a gun. The Evil Guy in Black says “Shoot them. Shoot them both.” Indy and the other guy look at him, glance at each other and shoot the gunman without either letting go of the gun.

Also in Indiana Jones and the Lost Ark, the scene where the Nazi salutes and says “Heil Hitler !”; the monkey imitates the salute with a “squeak SQUEAK !”, and the Nazi gives the monkey a startled glance and return’s the monkey’s salute with another “Heil Hitler !”

The scene where the Evil Guy in Black approaches the captured girl, pulls out this nasty looking rod, extending it with a snap < cue ominous music > . . . then folds it into a triangle and hangs his coat on it.

The scene in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade where the bad guy drinks from the wrong Grail, withers and dies gruesomely, and the Grail’s guardian says, “He chose . . . poorly.”

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I cant rank them in my mind, but here are five that came to mind

  1. Whenever Salieri is describing Mozart’s music. F. Murray Abraham is just great.

  1. Ash telling Ripley how much he admires the alien

  2. In Apocalypse Now, when Kilgore does his napalm speech. A lot of people focus on the “I love the smell of napalm in the morning”, but my favorite part is “Someday, this war is going to end…”. Robert Duvall just nails it. The soul tearing sadness Kilgore feels. That he cant believe he lives in a world where God would take a beautiful thing like war away from him.

  3. The end of Dangerous Liaison. Madam de Tourvel is booed away from the opera. She’s looking in the mirror removing her makeup.

  4. Azumi. The final test before they become true assassins.

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The scene in Ghost where the bad guy realizes he is dead and gets dragged to hell.

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Mr Jingles resurrection … The Green Mile
Kerr/Lancaster rolling in the surf…From here to Eternity
Keano Reeves shooting himself…The Devils Advocate
The real guy turning up…Finders Fee
Indiana Jones shoots guy with sword
Newman kick guy in nuts…Butch C & TSK

Loads more

125

Alan Arkin’s leap in “Wait Until Dark.”

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Just one more thing…the build-up to the scene involves much use of cross-cutting between the Guns (and G. Peck, D. Niven) and the convoy. And every shot of the convoy is accompanied on the soundtrack by a few bars of “Rule Brittania”. It’s movie soundtrack cliche rule #1 – any shot of a British naval vessel must be accompanied by Rule Brittania.

127

Life is Sweet: Nicola and Natalie in the sitting room. “All men are bastards!” “What?!”

Leningrad Cowboys Go America: The first time the band plays hrock and hroll.

My Best Friend’s Wedding: Cameron Diaz saying to Julia Roberts what everyone always says they would say if they had to take what rivals for the hero/ine of a romcom generally have to take.

Menace II Society: The interrogation scene. “Boy, you done fucked up. You know that, don’t you? You know you done fucked up.” Bill Duke, man.

The English Patient: Yeah, I know, but it was all worth it for the scene with Naveen Andrews showing the murals to Juliette Binoche. Actually, it was worth it for all the scenes they were in. And Willem Dafoe’s. If I could make my own cut of EP, it would be about twenty minutes, but it would be a glorious twenty minutes.

128

“I want my father back you son-of-a-bitch” scene from Princess Bride. Always gives me the chills.

Bridge scene in Fellowship of the Ring. One of the few scenes in the movie that lived up to my own imagnation of what I thought of when I read that part. perfect.

First 15 minutes of Raiders of the Lost Ark. that is what movie making magic is all about!

The “All I want for Christmas” musical number from Love Actually. Always puts me in a holiday mood, even in July.

have to think on some others…

129

Some wonderful ones and some I might have included in my list, but that being said…

Red River with John Wayne, Montgomery Cliff and Walter Brennen. The Yeehaw scene at the beginning of the cattle drive.

The Party with Peter Sellers. The bathroom scene. I am smiling just thinking about it.

Fantasia The dancing hippos. I’m really smiling now.

Arsnic and Old Lace with Cary Grant. Grant’s reaction to finding the first body.

My Darling Clementine with Henry Fonda, Walter Brennen, Ward Bond, Victor Mature and Tim Holt. The scene where Mature as Doc Holiday finishes the frightened actor’s Hamlet soliquoy then goes into a coughing fit.

130

Contact - the discovery of the signal.

Apollo 13 - the “was it the door?” scene between Mrs. Lovell and her son. Also, when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin sit at the TV with Lovell’s mother. “Are you boys in the space program, too?”

Life is Beautiful - the scene where Guido rides in on the vandalized horse.

Good Will Hunting - “My wife used to fart in her sleep” and the entire scene that follows.

As Good As It Gets - the restaurant sequence in Baltimore.

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Glengarry Glen Ross- the scene between Jack Lemmon and Kevin Spacey, when Spacey has his realization after Lemmon says… you know the one.

Leon, the Professional- when Stansfield is hearing Beethoven while they’re tossing the apartment. (" I like these calm little moments before the storm. It reminds me of Beethoven. Can you hear it? It’s like when you put your head to the grass and you can hear the growin’ and you can hear the insects. Do you like Beethoven?")

Sideways- the scene between Miles and Maya, starting in the kitchen, and ending out on the back porch when they each describe why they like pinot. It’s perfect.

Mr. Holland’s Opus- walking into the auditorium at the end, and the symphony.

I’ll think of more…

132

Ooh, I want to add a 6th.

Mr. Holland’s Opus - the Rowena/bus stop scene

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  1. The Ring, when samara crawls OUT OF THE TV!!! shudder
  2. Dumb and Dumber, when Harry uses Mary’s broken toilet.
  3. American Beauty, the plastic bag.
  4. **Final Fantasy Unlimited ** (technically a series, but shrug) when the opening scene’s TRUE meaning is revealed.

And my #1 pick, from my favorite anime…
Metropolis, the Ray Charles sequence.
Great lists, everyone!! Keep 'em coming!! Oh, and another vote for the first look at the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park. That’s actually the most powerful movie moment I’ve ever experienced.

134

I didn’t see it, but I assume it’s in here someplace.

The Indianapolis scene from Jaws.

135

Man, I am bookmarking this thread and I am going to watch all these movies when I get the chance. (again and some for the first time)

Good thread!

136

– Blind man (Gene Hackman) and Monster - Young Frankenstein
– Cellar climax – Psycho
– Mt. Rushmore scene – North by Northwest
– Final shootout – Magnificent Seven
– Horse head – The Godfather

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in no particular order…

  1. Rescuers Down Under or perhaps Harry Potter & the POA - kis flying with aid of giant eagle / Harry flying with the aid of hippogriff

  2. Color Purple: Ceely sees her sister return, they run to each other and embrace

  3. Home at the End of the World: hard to choose… kid and his brother in cemetary little kid floats into the air, adult Bobby and Jonathan dance on the roof

  4. Serenity - either River runs to find the reapers, or the firefly and reaper ships bursting through the static cloud towards the alliance ships

  5. The Big Blue - diver boy dreams of his room filling with water and swims away with the dolphins

138

One of my favorite scenes, not mentioned yet, is the “invention of the hula hoop” montage set to the Khachaturian music in The Hudsucker Proxy.

I also love the whole baseball game scene from The Naked Gun (“Look! It’s Enrico Palazzo!”)

Hospital shootout from **Hard-Boiled ** (basically the last 40 minutes of the film)

The tofu shop scene from Wing Chun

Any of Jet Li’s fight scenes in Fist of Legend

The paparazzi / John Woo send-up from Men Suddenly in Black

“So you think I’m funny?” scene from Goodfellas

Many more (Mexican standoff in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly; cave scene from Raiders, etc.)

139

Ten great scenes that I don’t think have been mentioned yet

Cleavon Little taking himself hostage in Blazing Saddles
Harrison Ford bringing a gun to a knifefight in Raiders of the Lost Arc
The “I Will Go Sailing No More” scene in Toy Story
Cary Grant dealing with Leslie Caron’s snakebite in Father Goose
Lupus catching the ball in The Bad News Bears
The assault on Casanova Frankenstein’s mansion in Mystery Men
Tom Hanks meeting the Thai druglord in Volunteers
James Spader giving his victum “one minute” in 2 Days in the Valley
The bank robbery shootout in The Long Riders
Neve Campbell and Denise Richards drop by Matt Dillon’s place in Wild Things

140

The problem with mine is that I love virtually all the scenes from these films, making it hard to pick just one scene from each. Equally difficult, as others have said, is to pick just five films, but these are some scenes which move me emotionally.

Scent Of A Woman - Colonel Slade’s speech before the Baird student body and disciplinary committee determining Charlie’s fate. I knew there was something about this scene, but the genuine message about being a person of character took several viewings for me to truly appreciate. Really, any scene by Pacino in this film works. It is my favorite performance by any actor, in any film, ever. The tango scene is obviously also a nominee. Pacino is the movie.

Aliens - So many great, tightly executed and technically incredible scenes to choose from here, but I’ll go with Ripley and Newt emerging onto the landing platform of the atmosphere processor only to discover Bishop is not there while the entire complex is becoming the depths of hell. The Queen emerges from the dark shadows of the elevator as Ripley, now essentially Newt’s surrogate mother, tells Newt to close her eyes. Much excitement ensues, with some of the best traditionally produced scenes (by that I mean non-CGI) ever put to film.

Big Fish - Ed Bloom’s son Will, a reluctant pragmatist who resents his father’s outlandish autobiographical tales, creates his own outlandish tale at his father’s side as he lays on his death bed, incorporating all of the characters from his father’s life in a wild romp of fantasy, imagination and heart.

The Iron Giant - The titular character discovering (upon falling off a cliff while fleeing from an unprovoked attack by a paranoid Cold War era U.S. military) that he can fly, just like Superman could in the comics he’d read. This scene always makes me cry, as does the final scene where he stops a nuclear missile in orbit at the apex of its launch trajectory … just like Superman would have done.

The Wrath of Khan - The battle in the Mutara Nebula, all the way through to Kirk’s speech at Spock’s ceremony. The most recent film, Nemesis, also paralleled this, wherein Data’s endeavor to become human comes full circle in his personal sacrifice for for the greater good. This also happens in Terminator 2 to an extent, and even though Ahnult was programmed to protect, the message at the end of an artificial being learning the value of life is essentially the same.

Clearly, I have some kind of thing for non-human characters achieving their endeavor to become human by personally sacrificing themselves. I suppose Bishop counts too, right? :slight_smile: