Do You Scene What I Scene?

I was having a debate with some friends the other day about the difference between a good movie and a movie with a few good scenes.  Sometimes a great scene will make a movie memorable, even if the rest of it wasn't so hot.  My favorite example is A Few Good Men, which I personally think is an average and highly overrated movie with one absolutely riveting scene.  "You can't handle the truth!"

That's not to say great scenes and great movies are mutually exclusive.  It's no coincidence that the best movies often have the best scenes.  But for every "I know it was you, Fredo" or ripple of water in a plastic cup, there's a corresponding scene in Harley Davidson & the Marlboro Man or Billy Madison that elevates the surrounding material.  Think of John Belushi on the ladder in Animal House, or the crop duster scene in North by Northwest, or Bill Duke emptying his mini-gun into the jungle in Predator, moments which stick in your mind that you always wait for if you happen to catch it on HBO.

Anyway, it got me thinking, and I decided I'd throw together a list of my 25 favorite movie scenes ('cause the last time I did a list of 100 it took me all summer).  They are in no particular order, in no way reflect my all-time favorite movies (which I won't bore you with) and are hardly a comprehensive or permanent list. 

• "Adios, Sapito." - The theft of the idol at the beginning of Raiders of the Lost Ark 
• "I'm sorry, did I break your concentration?" - Jules and Vincent interrogate Brett and friends in Pulp Fiction
• "Head!  Move!" - Charlie's father explains the Pentavirate and mocks a boys head-size in So I Married an Axe Murderer
• "I am not left-handed." - The sword fight in The Princess Bride
• "You got him?" "Yeah, I got him" - Showdown in the train station in The Untouchables
• "Hi, it's Mike..." - The most painful phone call in history from Swingers
• "I'll be takin' the Huggies and whatever cash you got." - The chase scene from Raising Arizona
• "Time's Up" - Everything blows up real good in Independence Day
• "Cuz you're gay, and you can tell who other gay people are?" - The "you know how I know you're gay" scene from The 40 Year-Old Virgin
• "Your skill is extraordinary" - Bruce Lee beats up about a thousand lackeys in Enter the Dragon
• "Stay away from the cans!" - Navin R. Johnson gets shot at in The Jerk
• "Oh, he was a little guy.  Kinda funny lookin'" - A random interview with a bar owner in Fargo
• "Redrum.  Redrum" - 'Tony' scares the bejesus out of me in The Shining
• "Oh man, how'd you get the beans above the franks?" - The worst prom night ever from There's Something About Mary
• "Yak dung!... hope tastes good - like a cigarette should!" - The brainwashing of the soldiers in the original Manchurian Candidate
• "You can come and play now!" - Danny invites some visitors to play in Close Encounters of the Third Kind  
• "My childhood was typical.  Summers in Rangoon...luge lessons" - Dr. Evil's support group from Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery
• "I think that the problem *may* have been, that there was a Stonehenge monument on the stage that was in danger of being *crushed* by a *dwarf*." - The band plays Stonehenge in This is Spinal Tap
• "You're gonna need a bigger boat" - Jaws.  Duh.
• "Any men don't wanna get killed better clear on out the back" - Bill Munny seeks vengeance at the end of Unforgiven
• "How would he know where we're going?" - Going the wrong way on the highway in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles
• "Fly you fools!" - The fellowship flees the Balrog in The Fellowship of the Ring
• "Hey Dad?  You wanna have a catch" - the scene that always always always makes me cry in Field of Dreams

And my three all time favorites:

• "What I want - what's most important to me - is that I have a guarantee: No more attempts on my father's life." - McCluskey & the Turk meet their end in The Godfather
• "'Domus'? Nominative? 'Go home' is motion towards, isn't it?" - A centurion corrects Brian's Latin grammar in Monty Python's Life of Brian
• "I am your father" - Vader?  Skywalker?  No.  Way!

Like I said, this is a highly subjective and incomplete list.  Consider this a mini-meme...what are your favorite scenes?

Comments

[Hygiene Dad]

"Oh Captain, My Captain" from Dead Poets Society. That one totally chokes me up.

LOVED the Stonehenge one as well. I laugh at that one each and everytime.

(PS Love the new banner. Less psychedelic than the last one.)

[Sarah, Goon Squad Sarah]

I'd have to go with:

The Ezekiel 25:17 scene in "Pulp Fiction".

The scene in "Amadeus" where Mozart is dictating the Requiem to Salieri.

The Shit Sandwich scene in "This is Spinal Tap".

I'm sure I'll be back with more later today. I need another cup of coffee first.

[Sarah, Goon Squad Sarah]

How could I have forgotten these?

The interrogation scene from "The Usual Suspects" (really well edited and hilarious) and the lineup scene - "Hand me the keys you fucking cocksucker."

[Arwen]

I am with Sarah on the Amadeus scene.
I also love:
The ending of Three Colors: White (it's a french film) when Julie Delpy looks down from her prison cell lovingly.

Samuel Jackson in The Long Kiss Goodnight: 'I don't smoke, I don't drink and I don't swear. Oh shit, I DO smoke and drink!'

DiNiro in Ronin when someone asks what broke him when he was being tortured:
'They gave me a grasshopper'

Better Off Dead - about 10 different scenes.

[CroutonBoy]

That scene from Amadeus almost made my list....I think it came in at #26. And with Spinal Tap (as with the Godfather, Better Off Dead, and virtually any Monty Python or Coen brothers movie) the hard part is picking out WHICH scene, because they're all brilliant.

[Kemp]

Nice scenes C-Boy... I guess I have to do a post like this now...

God help me if it's anything like the Top 100 albums...

[Peter]

Eleven, that's one higher than ten.

[Chris]

I wouldn't know where to start. There are quite a few scenes from North by Northwest and all of Hitchcock's films that would be on my list. And Spinal Tap...and The Life of Brian. You caught some good ones there!

[ECG]

"Frankly, Scarlet, I don't give a damm."

(Clark Gable in Gone With the Wind, for those who are too young to remember)

Oh yes, and from Little Shop of Horrors, just before the plant blew up it said, "Oh Shit."

I like your new banner, as well.

[WCG]

Oops. That previous one was from WCG, not ECG. Sorry. What was I thinking.

[Mrs. Chicky]

I'm not a witch, I'm your wife! - Valerie, The Princess Bride

I rule! - Lester Burnham, American Beauty

Hey, battah, hey, battah, hey battah, saah-wing battah - Cameron, Ferris Bueller's Day Off

So I got that goin' for me, which is nice - Carl, Caddyshack

Oh, it's twue! It's twue! - Lili Von Shtupp, Blazing Saddles

Yeah, I like this post waaay too much.

[Mrs. Chicky]

I'm not a witch, I'm your wife! - Valerie, The Princess Bride

I rule! - Lester Burnham, American Beauty

Hey, battah, hey, battah, hey battah, saah-wing battah - Cameron, Ferris Bueller's Day Off

So I got that goin' for me, which is nice - Carl, Caddyshack

Oh, it's twue! It's twue! - Lili Von Shtupp, Blazing Saddles

Yeah, I like this post waaay too much.

[Jason]

"Ah, I'll ask eem, but I don't think he'll be very keen...ee's already got one, you see?"

"What? Behind the rabbit?"

"That must be the king." "How do you know?" "He hasn't got shit all over him."

...and, completely different...

"Oh, we got a steel rod, with hinges on it. We'll shove it up and make air holes as we go along. 'Night, sir."

"Smells like...victory."

"I'm funny how, I mean funny like a clown? I amuse you? I make you laugh? What do you mean funny, funny how? How am I funny?"

Best scene ever has no dialogue, just Indy giving the guy with a scimitar a weary glance before pulling out his pistol and shooting him.

[mo-wo]

The toilet paper -- Peter Sellers in the Party
Without lamps there would be no light -- The Breakfast Club
Making time -- Withnail and I

Oooh.. this is good; I will think about a full post on this infant/toddler permitting.

[Wendy Boucher]

I would add one of the several dialogue-less scenes in the original Alien movie. Horror doesn't get much better.

[p-man]

Slim Pickins (sp?) riding a nuclear bomb in Dr. Strangelove.

Withnail: I feel like a pig shat in my head! (or words to that effect.)

The Party. All of it. Ok, not the bit after the party.

The scene in City of God where one child is compelled to murder another.

The weapon-selection scene in Pulp Fiction, or the breakfast scene in Reservoir Dogs.

And based on the rule of recency, the footrace in Brick.

[Emily]

Why was Steve Martin's *The Jerk* forgotten?
"All I need is the ashtray, the remote control, this paddle game..."

Any dang moment from Pulp Fiction or Spinal Tap.

I know that this movie got panned, but I like this part from the Three Amigos:
"Do you want to kiss me on the veranda?"
"Lips would be fine."

Annie Hall--I Lurv you and the lobster scene. VPL 'visible panty line' "Jew eat?" also Alvie asks of Annie's black soap: "what--are you joining a minstrel show?"
Great movie.

About 20 scenes from "Heathers," particularly, the funerals: "I love my dead, gay son!"

Too many in "Animal House" to count, but the meeting with the Dean is memorable: "Zero point two... fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son."

The scene at Alcatraz with Mike Meyers and Phil Hartmann in, "So I Married and Axe Murderer."

The final scene in, "The Constant Gardner."

[IFLYG]

Absolutely anything from "The Jerk" ("..next week I should be able to send more money - my friend Patty promised me a blow job");
And "The Three Amigos": "Are you the Singing Bush? Hello? Hello!? Alright, let's just assume that this is the singing bush..."