The FilmNerds Blog

The Movie: Superman III (1983)

Spoiler Level: High (But it’s Superman III, so who cares?)

The Setup: You have three options here, in regards to what you need to know before watching the scene. You can take my plot summary, which will follow below. You could also watch Superman III. Or, you could go listen to Earwolf’s Superman III episode of “How Did This Get Made“, guest-hosted by Damon Lindelof. I’d highly recommend this podcast, and especially this episode. They sum up the folly of this movie, which was the humorous Richard Lester deconstructionist Superman take-down that nobody on planet Earth was asking for.

Basically, up to this point, the film has been a Richard Pryor comedy vehicle that takes place in Superman’s Metropolis. Being some sort of idiot savant computer genius, Pryor’s Gus is helping a megalomaniac corner the world’s coffee markets, and has discovered a way to keep Superman from meddling. By creating a synthetic black kryptonite and HANDING IT to Superman, they give the Man of Steel a kind of viral schizophrenia, as he begins to exhibit signs of a dark side. Succumbing to his evil side, Superman not only makes inappropriate sexual advances towards Lana Lang, but he successfully beds the villain’s girlfriend and gets hammered in a dingy bar.

In this scene, the evil and unshaven Dark Superman is having mental agitation, and escapes to a solitary junk yard to hash it out with… himself?!?

The Scene:  Click Here for Youtube (No Embedding Allowed)

Why It’s Great: Somehow, despite all attempts at letting broad comedy reign supreme in what is ostensibly a children’s film, Richard Lester managed to craft the most weighty, dark, and dramatic fight scene in the entire Superman  movie franchise. That’s right, I find this to be a more harrowing and high-stakes fight than the super-brawl at the end of Superman II. First off, the tone here is deadly serious. Dark Superman lands and gives a primal scream that empties the facility. A minimal score follows, never getting in the way of the creepy conflict at the center of the scene: Clark Kent materializes out from Dark Superman, and the fight begins immediately, with Dark Superman scoffing and beating the snot out of Clark. This might be Christopher Reeve’s high point in the series as well, as he gets the chance to play a cocky maniac and a scrappy underdog all in the same scene. Reeve evokes Michael Keaton’s “You wanna get nuts” freak-out from Batman, and his Dark Superman is unrelenting in his cruelty and malice here.

Full disclosure: I have watched Superman III more than any other Superman film. I suspect my dad got a kick out of the Richard Pryor stuff when I was a kid, so this was the Superman movie he rented most often. That, or it must have been super cheap to syndicate and was on television a lot. Regardless, the rest of the movie always confused and disturbed me, especially the aforementioned super-villainess tryst and a later moment in which a woman is violently turned into a cyborg.

This scene, however, was pure Superman goodness. About four minutes in, after using some creative practical effects and stuntwork to convey Clark’s beat-down, Lester brings things to a head as Clark is horribly crushed in a trash compactor. Everything is silent for a moment as the victorious Dark Superman stumbles away in a drunken haze, before the trash compactor BURSTS open as Clark bench presses the damn thing apart. This is only one of two great moments in which Clark bursts out of a trash compactor. Eventually, Clark overpowers Dark Superman and eventually CHOKES HIM TO DEATH WITH HIS BARE HANDS. The scene culminates at seven minutes as Dark Superman disappears and Clark reclaims his true identity: He stands up, the John Williams score begins, and he rips open his shirt, revealing a pristine Superman logo. With the theme soaring, Superman flies off to save the world.

Too bad everything after that is baffling. However, for one scene, Superman was at his very best: Fighting not only the injustices of the world around him, but his own demons and identity issues. I’m sure Lester was trying to get at some deeper truth here, but assumedly the script, the intent of the producers, and his own disinterest in the material were working against the film. Let’s hope that some day, we’ll get a cinematic Superman that matches the grit and gravitas that Reeves showed us here.

The Movie: Mulholland Drive (2001)

Spoiler Level: Low

The Setup: Two guys are sitting in a café.  With great trepidation, Guy #1 recounts to Guy #2 the details of a horrific, recurring nightmare that has haunted him.  This nightmare not only occurs at the very café where the scene takes place, but stars both individuals.  Guy #1, unable to shake the horrible feeling he’s had from the nightmare, has brought Guy #2 to help alleviate his fears.  Guy #2 is slightly humored by the retelling of the nightmare as well as by Guy #1’s actual fear of it coming to fruition.  After Guy #1’s account of his nightmare it indeed begins to play out as he described.  Guy #2 pays the bill and they leave the café; all in accordance with the dream.  However, Guy #1, as he stated earlier, knows that there is something or someone very horrible behind the building.  Both individuals make a slow walk outside toward the back of the café even though Guy #1 knows it is hidden there looming.  Everything else has gone according to the nightmare, yet they make their slow death march in the direction where the evil resides.  You can see the hesitance and dread in Guy #1’s manner, but determined he treads on.  All the while the eerie score of Angelo Badalamenti helps to set the mood and the occasional first-person camera angle adds to the effect.  The editing cuts from Guys to dumpster seem to lengthen the scene and strengthen the suspense.

The Scene:

Why It’s Great: The scene as a whole comes out of nowhere and has very little to do with the rest of the film.  Mulholland Drive is an enigma in and of itself and this particular scene only adds to the mystery.  It comes a few minutes into the film and has absolutely nothing to do with anything that has happened up to that point.  It takes you completely by surprise.  The audience is not expecting a scary scene at this point.

David Lynch takes Hitchcock’s “Bomb-Under-the-Table” theory and merges both the surprise and suspense elements.  The audience is experiencing the effects of both aspects of this theory.

• Suspense: We know what’s going to happen because Guy #1 told us.  The viewer can either believe it, like Guy #1 or can be skeptical, like Guy #2.  Either way, you’ve got some idea of what may or may not happen.  The description of the nightmare and the long walk to the back perfectly captures the suspense.
• Surprise: The fact that we have been told what is about to happen in no way weakens the scare.  In fact, I wager that it increases the scenes potency.  The suspense is true, but when the time comes for the payoff, no matter how ready we think we are, it still takes us completely by surprise.

The great acting by Patrick Fischler, the creepy, ambient score and editing of the walk to the back make this an incredible scene and one that I will never forget.

The Movie: Swingers (1996)

Spoiler Level: High

The Setup: After a night of barhopping in Hollywood, three friends end up at a diner for some late-night breakfast. Throughout the film, the hero Mike (Jon Favreau) struggles to hit his stride with the ladies. However, on this particular night, Mike managed to make a connection with a ‘beautiful baby’ (Heather Graham) he met and danced with at the storied Brown Derby nightclub. When Mike’s friends Sue (Patrick Van Horn) and the drunken Trent (Vince Vaughn) attempt to offer him additional advice on how to handle the new situation, Mike refuses it, confidently declaring “I have it under control.” This ignites a wild burst of emotion in Trent, who explodes into a rowdy exaltation of his friend who, until this point, needed all the help he could get.

Why It’s Great: Like many scenes in Swingers, this one initially seems to be about Mike… but soon becomes (thanks to Trent) all about TRENT… at least that’s how it may superficially appear.

While Trent does, thanks to his state of inebriation, become the center of attention, his attention happens to be solely focused on Mike. Throughout the movie, Trent takes numerous opportunities to offer Mike romantic advice and urges him to be more confident in his romantic endeavors. At times his efforts seem futile, but that doesn’t deter him from believing in Mike and continuing to encourage him.

In this scene, When Mike says (and means) that he has things “under control,” Trent believes him, and his overflowing sense of joy bursts out in a display of unadulterated emotion. I might liken it to how a little-league baseball coach feels when, after weeks or perhaps months of frustrating instruction, a player who might have seemed hopeless finally figures out how to correctly throw the ball.

Men are, at their core, competitive beings. This scene illustrates the fact that men are also capable of deriving joy not only from their own success, but also from the success of others. Trent is genuinely happy for Mike; so much so that the only way he can think of to express it is via the borderline-primal act of jumping on top of a table, yelling, and discarding items of his clothing.

When I saw this scene for the first time, I got so caught up in its intense, comedic spontaneity that I failed to recognize how it movingly defines the relationship between the movie’s two heroes. In a broader sense, it illustrates a basic human trait that defines the progress that the human race managed to make between the eras of pre-civilization and civilization itself: the ability to root for one another.

“Yeahhh! Dig that!”

The Movie: The Jerk (1979)

Spoiler Level: Moderate

The Setup:  While working a kiddie ride at a carnival, the imbecilic Navin Johnson (Steve Martin) meets Marie (Bernadette Peters), a charming and attractive woman with whom he’d fall in love. After the two hit it off on a couple of dates, they take a moonlit stroll across a beach while singing a due t, called “Tonight, You Belong to Me, together before sitting at a campfire, finishing their song and sharing their first kiss.

Why It’s Great: Martin and director Carl Reiner’s ridiculously absurd R-rated comedy rarely gives us a genuine moment that isn’t meant to just make us laugh or shake our heads, but we’re offered a few that at least provoked another emotional response from me. The first is during Navin’s birthday when his adoptive father gives him his Zippo lighter he’s had since the war, and the second is this sweet moment shared between Navin and Marie on the beach that I still find genuinely romantic.

Up to and after this point, we get a straight broad (but brilliant) comedy about this man born a poor black child without any hint of humanity or tenderness, but for whatever reason, Reiner takes a break from the lunacy for a moment that rivals any of what we consider film’s greatest love stories.

Navin might be a jerk, but he isn’t capable of a disingenuous act or feeling. As he plays his ukelele and walks along the shore with the woman of his dreams, we see this film stripped down to its core, losing its inane and often crude tone. We get to watch our hero, a nice guy, enjoy an evening with his girl. It’s the only honest moment of the film, one where Martin seems out of character, but this is exactly who Navin is.

With that, we’re also treated to a beautiful song sung by Martin and Peters, two talented musicians in their own right, softly punctuated with Martin’s ukelele. Of course, Reiner can’t help himself, letting Peters whip out a trumpet for a quick solo to finish the song. Once they finish their duet, Martin tells Peters he wanted to go through end of her horn and through every last tunnel in it until he found the other end and kissed her.

When Navin makes his move, there’s another silly moment as Peters attempts to avoid the smooch at all costs, fearing she will fall in love with him if they share the embrace. But she gives in, and seals their perfect evening with something Navin deserves for just being a nice guy.

The Movie: The Transformers: The Movie (1986)

Spoiler Level: Moderate to High

The Setup: After a deadly attack on the Autobots’ base on Earth and a fateful showdown with Optimus Prime, the mortally wounded Deception leader Megatron drifts through empty abyss of deep space to die along with his fallen minions. Soon, Megatron floats into the path of the colossal and all-powerful planet-eating Unicron (voiced by Orson Welles in his final film role; yes, THAT Orson Welles!), who tells the Transformer he’s been summoned for “a purpose.” Unicron offers him and his cronies new bodies and weapons and commands them to help him destroy the Autobot Matrix of Leadership, the one thing that can stand in the planet-gorger’s way. After some resistance, the ego-maniacal Megatron accepts Unicron’s proposition and undergoes his final transformation into the Autobot nemesis Galvatron.

Why It’s Great: My fellow Film Nerds understand, and in some cases share, my deep affinity for Nelson Shin’s TRANSFORMERS: THE MOVIE, the 1986 film adaptation of the beloved television series (ahem, and toy line), which I personally feel has stood the test of time and remained a masterpiece.

My film nerd compadres should also know I’m a basketball nut, and I recently noticed the oddest parallel while reflecting on the 2010-11 NBA season. As many know, two-time MVP LeBron James opted for free agency last summer and joined his buddy Dwyane Wade at the Miami Heat, who subsequently reached the finals and lost to the Dallas Mavericks (go Mavs).

Looking back, the pairing got me thinking about this scene from Transformers, and I’ll tell you why. The basketball world was curious about James’ decision to join the Heat, forming what many considered a “super-team” with the likes of Wade and all-star free agent Chris Bosh. Most thought James might stay in Cleveland or join squads that just made more sense from a basketball and financial standpoint, like Chicago or New York.

But it turns out the guy wanted to take his talents to South Beach and play with his buddies.

Lurking in the shadows in all this is Wade, the former finals MVP turned recruiter. Somehow, Wade managed to convince one all-star and arguably the best player alive to join him to win not five, not six, not even…you get the point. The critics tore into LeBron, calling him a quitter, a guy who couldn’t lead a team to glory on his own. He had to take the easy way out and join a cold-blooded killer on the court like Wade to get it done.

So that got me thinking about the conversation that took place between Wade and James and whatever methods the Miami superstar used to sway the “king.” All I could think about was Unicron and Megatron’s first meeting. LeBron, the self-proclaimed “chosen one,” was the new savior of the NBA, a Michael Jordan/Magic Johnson hybrid that would dominate for years to come. Nobody ever doubted LeBron’s talent and sheer physical domination of his opponents. But he lacked a key ingredient that makes champions of these men: the killer instinct. Jordan had it. Magic had it. Larry Bird had it. Kobe Bryant has it. And Wade has it.

From my perspective, Wade played the best psychological game in this free agency free-for-all period and recruited LeBron like no one else could. He convinced LeBron the Heat would be his team and that he would the credit as the player who led them to the promise land. But Wade is an evil genius. Already an NBA champ, he new the media would perceive whatever success LeBron and the Heat achieved as a result of pairing with a winner like Wade who could take over when LeBron couldn’t. What kind of sway, or control, does Wade have over LeBron? Should we believe this idea that these guys are really good friends and wanted to win together? Why didn’t LeBron want to win it on his own?

Either way, that got me thinking about this scene and how that meeting might have gone down. Below is a little dialogue that I think might have prefaced Wade’s final pitch/command to LeBron, which finally convinced him to take his talents to South Beach.

Unicron/Wade: I have summoned you here for a purpose…

Megatron/LeBron: Nobody summons Megatron!

Unicron/Wade: Then it pleases me to be the first.

Megatron/LeBron: State your business…

Unicron/Wade: This is my command…

…And lo, the Miami Heat as we know it were born.

Beyond whatever went down in the NBA, let us praise Shin, writer Ron Friedman and composer Vince DiCola for creating an unforgettably ominous mood that has stuck with me since early childhood.

The moments between Megatron and Unicron are appropriately menacing, these quips between dueling cybertronic archvillains. But what sells this whole sequence is the actual transformation from Megatron into Galvatron, this birth of a new Autobot enemy. DiCola absolutely murders it, along with the animators, as we see a villain we’ve grown so familiar with find a way to unfairly extend his life after our hero has lost his and become even younger and more powerful.

Call me crazy (and I know plenty of you will for this), but this scene brings rich and sophisticated dialogue complete with high stakes that I feel like Orson Welles was proud to deliver, albeit in a kitschy way. The man never really sat out on a performance, not even this one. And I’m sure he’s as pleased as I am that he book-ended his career with Citizen Kane and Transformers: The Movie.

The Movie: Back to the Future (1985)

Spoiler Level: VERY High

The Setup: Marty McFly’s (Michael J. Fox) carefully laid plans to stage a romantic meet cute for his future parents, thereby assuring his own existence, have gone awry thanks to über-bully Biff (Thomas F. Wilson). Now instead of finding a play-acting Marty in the car with Lorraine (Lea Thompson), George McFly (Crispin Glover) swings open the door to find his much-larger and very hostile archnemesis waiting for him.

Why It’s Great: As the scene begins, George is already dealing with frayed nerves and isn’t sure if he’s going to be able to pull off his mock-heroics. But something happens on George’s face right around the 30 second mark of the clip. His fear washes away and the genuine courage that’s always been hiding within him starts to come out, as such things always do in moments of crisis. George’s original destiny was to fall into Lorraine’s lap, winning her over with sympathy and pity. But Marty’s tampering with the space-time continuum has opened up an opportunity for things to emerge in George that may never have otherwise.

Alan Sylvestri’s horror-esque cue at :51 highlights the incredible danger George has thrust himself into. He is meddling in territory that perhaps destiny never intended for him. But the ideas of destiny and predetermined futures are questioned and challenged throughout Back to the Future and here George takes the ultimate stand not just against Biff but against the cosmic forces of fate that seemed to be conspiring against him his whole life. George’s defiantly clenched fist at 1:25 marks the first time that a character in the film stops intentionally trying to re-create the way things have always been and instead take destiny into their own hands.

Everyone is stunned, Biff, Marty, Lorraine, even George. Everything we’ve been told by Doc Brown, Principle Strickland and our experience in the original 1985 has just been thrown out the window. We know from Doc Brown’s expository speeches that with that punch, George has not just changed the course of his life. He has changed, in some small way, the entirety of the space-time continuum. Sylvestri’s musical cue at 1:58 reflects that this moment is both a crucial personal moment for the two characters but also a seismic, cosmically relevant event. Similar themes were explored recently by no less than Terrence Malick in the sometimes impenetrable Tree of Life, but here Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale’s beautiful, economical screenplay are able to convey that theme in an action entertainment film. The idea that everyone and everything we do matters at least in a tiny way on a grand scale is a comforting thought. It reassures us that we are more than dots on a rock floating through the universe. We each have a purpose in life and what Back to the Future suggests is that while our destiny may appear set in stone, we have it within us all to determine our own purpose.

The Movie: Notorious

Spoiler Level: VERY High

The Setup: Devlin (Cary Grant) has recruited Alicia (Ingrid Bergman) as a subversive seductress in a plot to find weapons hidden by a gang of escaped Nazis, led by Alex Sebastian (Claude Raines). Suspecting her true allegiance, Sebastian and his mother (Leopoldine Konstantin) begin to quietly poison Alicia. In the final scene of the film, Devlin overcomes his distaste for Alicia’s past and the obligations of his job to save her from the den of vipers… all during a meeting with Sebastian’s associates. Please, please, PLEASE do not watch this scene if you haven’t seen Notorious. Go watch the movie TONIGHT if you haven’t seen it. I’m even okay with you watching the YouTube bootleg, if you promise to pick up the eventual blu-ray.

Why It’s Great: Like all great suspense directors, Alfred Hitchcock seems to have a single goal with his entire visual approach to this story: Get us to the final shot. The final shot of Notorious is one of the most loaded in all of cinema – it starts close on Alex, hearing the Nazis call him back to the house. He turns, the camera remains still, looking at the silhouetted monsters in the mansion door. As Alex schleps to his ultimate fate, the camera slowly starts pushing in, not resting until Alex is in the house, and the door closes. The score seals the deal, rushing to a climax on the fade to black after the door closes. What a lingering image!

Imagine if the movie had closed with Hitchcock cutting to Devlin and Alicia in the car. Yes, it would have kept our perspective with the heroes, and would have assured us that Alicia would be okay, but it would completely undermine the cyclical drama necessary to bring Alex’s story to a close. All that’s important is that Alicia is safe, and Alex is about to be dealt with. End of story.

While this shot is an absolute work-horse, I don’t want to short-change the shot selection in the rest of the scene, which starts with a dreamy, long dolly move mimicking Grant’s return to the fevered Bergman. That shot continues until we leave the bedroom, all in a close single or a close two-shot, on a long lens. I wring my hands with empathy for the production’s worn-out focus puller. In fact, the long close-up is a staple of Notorious, which is famous for one of cinema’s most extended kisses, all shot in an intimate CU. Once the characters leave the bedroom, we get what is one of the most marvelous series of moving close-ups I can recall. How the camera glides down those steps, always effortlessly cutting between the characters, is beyond me. Despite the technical proficiency of his shot series, Hitchcock never once loses grip on the scene itself. He sticks to strict perspective, setting up a new perspective only when absolutely necessary, and with a strong cut-in (for example, the close-up on the apparent lead Nazi).

A lot of my affection for the scene is for its technical merits, but I really shouldn’t forget about the performances. Grant is steely as always, but the real stars here are Bergman and Rains. Bergman spends much of the film as a proud, aggressive wild child, flaunting her party girl past and locking up her feelings. Here she is to be pitied, but also admired, allowing her salvation to happen gracefully. It’s hard not to fall in love with Ingrid Bergman in general, but this one of her most dynamic mainstream performances. Rains, from the moment his Alex sees Devlin extracting Alicia, clearly communicates his motivation – “Get me the flip away from all those Nazis.” The aforementioned look on his face at the start of the film’s final shot is the linchpin of the scene, and therefore, the movie.

Again, I would be remiss not to repeatedly point out that the entire movie drives toward this scene, in which all the wistful character trajectories intersect and resolve. Rarely do we get that kind of efficiency in movies anymore, least of all spy thrillers. The final scene (and shot) of any suspense movie should be the spire of the palace, its absence completely invalidating the foundation set beneath it.

The Movie: Husbands and Wives

Spoiler Level: Medium

The Setup: It’s movie gossip history at this point, but the fallout between Woody Allen and Mia Farrow in the early 90′s was quite a hot topic, and went a long way in alienating the general public from the respected auteur. Much of the publicized tension pointed to this film, their last creative endeavor after a series of classics that include Hannah and Her Sisters, Crimes and Misdemeanors, and Purple Rose of Cairo. The 80′s were a creative high water mark for Woody Allen, culminating in Husbands and Wives, a stripped-down, hand-held faux documentary that watches two relationships crumble. The film boasts several fantastic scenes and at least two great ones, including the opening sequence, in which married couple Gabe (Allen) and Judy (Farrow) are shocked by an announcement by friends Jack (Sydney Pollack) and Sally (Judy Davis).

Why It’s Great: Allen begins the film with a close up on a TV interview, in which nuclear physicist Nicholas Metropolis quotes Einstein: “God doesn’t play dice with the universe.” Allen’s Gabe quickly retorts, “No- He just plays hide and seek.”

With that the game kicks off, as we meet Gabe and his wife Judy, the camera bouncing between them. They are, from the start, separated by their scattered New York flat, and the camera struggles to place them together. Allen’s writing in the scene is phenomenal, as almost every line is a set-up for the rest of the story.  Gabe reveals his attention has been nabbed by a sexually alert student of his. Judy dismisses his comments as typical and reverts to minutiae.  The film starts in earnest when Jack and Sally enter and clinically reveal that they are splitting up. They position that this isn’t a tragedy, that “this is positive for us”.  It doesn’t take long for the news to take its toll on Judy.  She quickly turns from swearing privacy and respect to lashing out against the apparently transgressing couple, their “closest friends”.  For Judy, Jack and Sally’s relationship is a reflection of her own, and the cracks soon appear.

Every performance in this scene is perfect, which is absolutely necessary when the traditional rules of cinema are disregarded. This is proof that great performances can, and must, lead a film. My personal favorite performer in the whole film is Pollack’s Jack, whose romantic fate is the centerpiece of the other great scene of the film. Let’s not discount technical merit, however. Director of Photography Carlo DiPalma uses a selective set and practical lighting perfectly to make sure his camera never casts a shadow, and isn’t afraid to let things wander. At several points in the scene, the camera is visibly lost, holding on a column or an empty frame for a moment before finding an elusive character. The erratic focus pulls are marvelous as well; notice that Judy is left soft several times throughout the scene, before she physically exits the whole affair.

Husbands and Wives is a game of hide and seek, between people and their feelings, and between people and other people. For more, check out Roger Ebert’s great review from the time of the film’s release.

The Movie: Kill Bill, Volume I

Spoiler Level: High

The Setup: The Bride (Uma Thurman) is hell-bent on a mission to kill the five assassins who ruined her life and nearly killed her and after acquiring a samurai sword from the legendary sword maker Hattori Hanso, The Bride sets off to take out perhaps her most powerful enemy, Japanese-Chinese-American gang leader O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu). In an astonishingly and perhaps unprecedentedly violent sequence (perhaps the subject of another Great Scenes post one day), we have just watched The Bride hack her way through 88 members of O-Ren’s gang and with the remaining survivors screaming in pain in the background, The Bride makes her way onto O-Ren’s rooftop garden for a final showdown.

Why It’s Great: Like so much of Kill Bill, the showdown with O-Ren is a scene that both works in perfect harmony with the rest of the film and stands alone and apart from everything else that comes before and after it. Tarantino is almost taking us through a door into another movie when The Bride slides back the doorway to reveal the snow-covered gardens on the roof of the House of Blue Leaves (indeed the visual effect very much makes it appear as though she is walking into a movie screen).

At the 1:46 mark, Santa Esmerelda’s “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood” takes over on the soundtrack, a curious musical choice considering that in its entirety, it’s a rather cheesy, Latin-tinted disco-pop hit. Tarantino though is able to see through the context of the song itself and pick out the admittedly dramatic instrumental break in the middle of the song and turn it into the perfect musical accompaniment to his Sergio Leone-esque moment of dramatic tension that serves as the climax of Volume I (and some would say, the climax of the entire two-part story).

The posturing and tension-building continues in almost unbearable fashion and at the 2:56 mark, a quick slash from The Bride hacks off a piece of O-Ren’s sheath and as the horn section fades in on the soundtrack, the look of terror crawls across O-Ren’s face as she realizes for the first time that she may not win this fight. It’s not until almost a minute later that the tension is finally broken and while the rest of the scene is far less about stylized tension and more about resolution and payoff, I believe that solid minute of anticipation is perhaps the high point of Quentin Tarantino’s career as a filmmaker. It’s a representation of everything he’s about as a filmmaker, a post-modern mash-up of genres (kung fu, spaghetti western, exploitation) set to a soundtrack that would be entirely out of place in any of those genres and somehow it not only all works together but it manages to create a sincere, nail-biting moment of emotional tension that rivals even those great showdown scenes that came before it (like the end of “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly” discussed earlier here on The Great Scenes).

I’d also be remiss not to mention the performances of Lucy Liu and Uma Thurman, who are both the unquestionable stars of the entire Kill Bill saga (As a villain, David Carradine’s Bill doesn’t hold a candle to O-Ren). They both do a nice bit of acting in this scene that has a lot of emotion going on without a lot of words being spoken to spell it all out for us. These women were both friends and perhaps still feel a little of that friendship towards one another. At the same time, there is no denying the situation they are in. The Bride is there to kill O-Ren or die trying. Despite the fact that she has already dispatched with the first name on her “Death List”, there’s a real sense that in this epic tale of revenge, O-Ren is the first and biggest step on the road to vengeance for The Bride. Unlike the other foes we meet in Volume II, O-Ren is given a rich backstory and is shown as not just a pesky villain to be eliminated but a worthy anti-heroine in her own right. The meeting of these two characters couldn’t be preceded with any more anticipation and although the ending is satisfying, the anticipation is the real star of the show here.

The Movie: Network (1976)

Spoiler Level: Low

The Setup: Howard Beale (Peter Finch) is a veteran anchor for the UBS Evening News.  Due to a combination of declined ratings and a hint of depression, Beale announces on national TV that he will kill himself live on air the following evening.  This prompts his resignation followed by a reinstatement by the network when the corporate heads realize that this altered personality of Howard Beale is actually improving their ratings.  They set Beale up as modern-day prophet; someone to tell it like it is in a very harsh way.  The network assumes the shock value of this side-show gimmick will increase the ratings, but Beale has a real impact on the people of America.  Upon learning that CCA, the UBS parent company, will be bought out by another even larger company in Saudi Arabia, Beale goes off on a rant on live television and demands that his audience send telegrams to the White House in protest of this deal.  Up to this point, the big dogs at the top have both benefited from and gotten a kick out of Beale’s depressed and manic state of mind.  However, Beale has gained enough support and influence from his viewers that his most recent tirade could seriously put a hold on this Saudi Arabia deal.  In an effort to put a stop to Howard Beale, he has been summoned by the CCA chairman, Arthur Jensen (Ned Beatty), who dramatically and fiercely lays it out for Beale in this brilliantly executed monologue.

(Click image to view scene)

Why It’s Great: This monologue alone earned Ned Beatty a Supporting Actor nomination.  Beatty breaks the world down for us in savagely depressing terms and alleviates all of our hopes, leaving us in despair with his very colorful, very dramatic monologue.

The lighting and framing of Beatty in the shot is suggestive of a vision of God.  The desk lamps are aligned so that it resembles a dream-like tunnel of light leading straight up into the heavens.  It’s reminiscent of a runway to the cosmos as Arthur Jensen gives us a smack down by filling us in on the cold hard truth of “the natural order of things today”.

Peter Finch, the posthumous Best Actor winner, is virtually silent during the entire scene.  This scene is the linchpin of the film.  There’s a decisive and dark turn at this point.  It was suggested earlier in the film that Beale had a vision from God.  Here it is quite literal that Beale is playing the part of a prophet that has been struck by a vision and given a message.  His face is eerily lit and he wears the reaction of one frozen with awe.  He has heard the voice of God and must carry out His message to the world.