darkflounder

There are certain movie scenes that everybody knows, that are the scenes they show on highlight reels and at the Oscars. Any ideas to make them better??

Here's mine...

End of Sunset Boulevard, when Norma Desmond is coming down the staircase, reporters on either side. I found that the narration by William Holden's character is un-needed. That panning shot of her coming down the staircase, the only sounds you hear would be her footsteps and the newsreel cameras running. Kind of a reflection of her delusion about being back in the movies.

That's about the only thing I would change in that movie.

inVectiVe

I've been bashing this movie entirely too much as of late, but here I go again...

That scene in Magnolia. You know. That one.

It, uh, shouldn't have happened.

Seriously though, this is an interesting topic, and I hope I can come up with something better later on.

Jackskeleton

"Bashing" and "FROGS" in the same post quaid.. becareful you don't make a political statement.

inVectiVe

That never even dawned on me! (I must have done it subconsciously.)

While I'm here, I think I'll suggest a few tweaks that could have been made to Armageddon:

The Ben / Liv / Animal Crackers scene might be the most universally hated few minutes of film ever. Maybe they should drop it.

The following one-liners fell flat: "Let's chew this iron bitch up!" and "This place is like Dr. Seuss's worst nightmare!" (?!)

Now that I think of it, *everything* Steve Buscemi did on the asteroid was obnoxious.


Also the shower scene in Wild Things - did I REALLY need to see the Six Inches of Kevin Bacon?!


The Salma Hayek "snake dance scene" in From Dusk Till Dawn should have gone on for an additional 10-15 minutes.


On a more serious note, I've always felt the ending of Batman was pretty weak. The Joker's hanging from the edge, then he reaches up and touches Batman, and before you can say "contrived!" it's suddenly Joker standing on the edge and Batman and Vicki hanging on for dear life! Also hated how after they fell, B & V stopped *instantly* with that wire on the utility belt. Couldn't it have been more like a bungee cord - y'know, with that extra bit of elasticity that might prevent them from breaking their backs? Blah, it's been a while since I've seen Batman; maybe I'm remembering it worse than it actually was?

aa-dvd

How when Kirsten Dunst kisses Spiderman for the first time when he is hanging upside down. That is ok, but when spidey goes up Dunst does this stupid oh I should be suprised that you are going up thing. She SUCKS!!! I know some of you love her, but that is just my $.02.

Fok

Star Trek 7. The way Kirk died. The character was/is a legend and he died in a pansy way. The writers did screw up there. At least the book made it better.

El-Kabong

I think they should have just left them out of the movie all together. Trek 6 ended with them riding off into the sunset like a hero should - exploiting the old school cast further cheapens that ending.

Not that the Star Trek franchise has EVER exploited anything well beyond the shelf life had expired. Oh no. . . .

glassdragon

While i totally agree with you on that (not wanting to see that at all) i'm a firm believer that the women should get something every now and then. There's plenty of naked women on movies, why not let the women see something every now and again and just cringe and bear it. only fair thing to do imo

Groucho

The ending of Casablanca. If it were up to me, I would make the following minor tweaks: have Rick give Laslo a "Matrix" style kick, and then have Louis shoot the plane with a rocket launcher. The ending would be Rick, Elsa, and Louis walking calmly towards the camera in slow motion while the airport hanger exploded behind them. Last line of the film: "Let us go hunt some Nazi!"

renaldow

In Jaws when the shark jumps out of the water I would have it belch. Other than that, the movie's a classic.

tktktk

I would change the bar scene in Star Wars where Han and Greedo are talking and Han shoots first and...

oh wait...

Rypro 525

For some reason, I don't remeber that part. I do remeber however the scene that most men love and the women hate.

meharry2003

The Dennis Hopper/Christopher Walken scene in True Romance. I loved the speech and the scene as a whole, but I hate the use of the "N" word. Nobody uses that these days, unless they mean to hurt someone. I always hated how Tarantino would put the "N" word in his movies and then justify it by saying that it's how people talk. Black people do talk like that, but white people don't. Any black character using it is ok, but white people using isn't.

I would also change the ending to Batman. The Joker shouldn't have died.

Pants

Are you joking? Hopper was trying to hurt and offend Walken, that was the point. That and the sicilians really did **** ******s

Kal-El

[generic fanboy post]
Greedo doesn't shoot first
No Jabba in ANH
Luke doesn't scream in ESB
Ewok Celebration ending for ROTJ
[/generic fanboy post]

cultshock

I'm not sure, but maybe Hoppers's character was using the word for effect, to piss off Walken's character even more. Afterall, he was just trying to get Walken so mad, he would just kill him fast, without torturing him for info.

Oops, just noticed that Pants beat me to it.

Five Cent Deposit

Hopper is definitely using that word to get Walked riled up enough to kill him fast. Hopper knows that Walken will torture him and that eventually he'll give his son up- everyone has a breaking point. He's also smart enough to know that after he gives his son up, he'll be killed anyway. Take a look at his face when he changes his mind about the Chesterfield and smokes it. It's pretty obvious.

Another thing- white people *do* use the N word. If you haven't heard it, well, you've been living under a rock. Tarantino is bold enough to have his characters say distasteful things, to make them less than totally sympathetic. He doesn't have to justify it.

Finally, I love the scene... but it stands apart, almost as a short film of its own. It takes you out of the larger story too much. I might have changed it by shortening it and making it less of a showcase for two great actors.

Ginwen

I know everyone else posted this too, but I still want to chime in. That is exactly the reason he is using the word.

He knows he's going to die, and wants to make it sooner, instead of just getting broken up into little bits. His whole point is to get Christopher Walken to angry to think straight , so that he'll get killed, and not tell where his son his.

meharry2003

I am white and I don't know anybody that uses that word. I know that he was trying to piss Walken off, but what about all the other times Tarantino has put it in his movies? I have a lot of black friends and they get offended by how Tarantino uses the word. (and yes I know someone will say "they don't have to watch it, but you get my point). I'm just not sure that that the word is that common, unless the person using it is a racist.

Five Cent Deposit

That you don't know any white people who use the N-word doesn't mean that there aren't any. What about all the other times that Tarantino has his characters say it? What about them? I have black friends, too. Hooray for me. Some of them understand it, some of them don't.

Explain what you mean by "how Tarantino uses the word". Give examples from the dialogue he has written. The N-word is common, believe it or not. Yeah, the white people who use it are usually racist. That is the point. If you want to take offense that some writer, actor and director have teamed up to portray a racist character, go right ahead and be offended. What blows my mind is that you can watch a movie where people kill others with zero compassion, takes loads of drugs, do all kinds of messed up stuff, and then... "Oh, boy. One of them just used the N-word. How totally uncool. Suddenly these professional criminals and low-lifes don't seem like such nice guys anymore."

Do you understand what I'm getting at? Tarantino's characters are not all nice people. Having one of them say the N-word is no more offensive than any of the things that bad people do in all kinds of movies. If it makes you like the *character* less, good. You aren't supposed to think of these characters as role models- Tarantino is a better writer than that. If it makes you think less of the *movie* (because it portrays something that makes you or your black friends are uncomfortable with), then that is your problem.

Many great films have racist characters in them. Should artists avoid making movies with racist characters? Only if they also stop making movies about criminals, misogynists, and every other kind of messed up person.

sundog

I'm not one to speculate too often on what a movie should have been. But reading the Gangs of New York thread got me thinking about a certain part. Namely, the draft riots. I think the narration was excessive and distracting. Pulling it would have vastly improved the whole sequence.

Azazoth

In Clerks, after the necro-rape scene in the bathroom, Randal asks the policewoman about the strangest death she'd seen. Her answer is funny, but she's reading her lines off a clipboard so the timing and inflection is off.