What is the Most Famous Movie Scene?

[Abby Normal]

Pontius 2000 wrote:
Choosing not to show the shark was not really Speilberg's idea. the mechanical shark didn't work half the time so he basically said, "we'll just go most of the movie without showing it."
Wow, serendipitous genius then...

Hi maria
Yup. i just saw a great documentary on the making of Jaws and Speilberg said originally the movie was going to be "Like Godzilla" but with a shark. They were planning on showing the shark from the very first attack (skinny dipping) scene but because of the mechanical problems they had to shoot the movie and attack scenes without showing the shark. i think this is one of the reasons it is such a great film because it really ratchets up the tension and when you finally do see the shark near the end it is more of a shock.

[mariab]

Hi Abby,
Before Pontius mentioned this, I had no idea that not showing the shark was not Spielberg's initial decision! Almost makes him appear like less of a skilled or genius director, doesn't it? Hmmm... And actually Jaws is rather a qualitative exception in Spielberg's oeuvre. Did that qualitative exception came to terms simply due to technical problems with the mechanical shark?

[mariab]

The Good Michael wrote:
I did like when the two drunks were singing, "Show me the way to go home." The acting was good and I especially liked Shaw as stereotypical as he was.
Yeah, the male bonding was shown very realistically. And yeah, the Shaw character was stereotypical, and even as a kid when I first saw the movie, I wasn't surprised that he was the one to go. I liked best the Scheider character.

[sleekviper]

Val Kilmer finding Micheal Douglas has been attacked in The Ghost and the Darkness. Reminded me of being a kid, and going the wrong way to the bathroom at the Field Museum, and walking up on the real lions of Tsavo.

[Errata]

Well, even in the original there was one instant where the shark rises out of the water and makes this very breathy roar for just a second before Shaw fires a harpoon into its "throat" area, and sharks just do not vocalize in real life. But you're right- Jaws 4 was pretty much a catastrophe.

I know sharks dont vocalize, but they do make a sound out of the water. its the air vibrating the gills. its more like a cat hiss than a roar. its an odd sound. its nothing like jaws though. its not loud, and its sound more like a raspy breath... or the lungs of someone who has a bad chest cold. if its thrashing around you can't hear it, but if you're straddling it trying to get it off the boat it just jumped onto, then you can.

12 Day of Terror is a good shark book.

as for memorable scenes, i forgot one. "Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Sex (But Were Afraid to Ask)"
the giant breast cresting the hill in slo-mo towards the waiting giant bra. its the only scene anyone ever remembers visually, and the only thing that pops in your head when someone even mentions the movie title.

[kensei]

Val Kilmer finding Micheal Douglas has been attacked in The Ghost and the Darkness. Reminded me of being a kid, and going the wrong way to the bathroom at the Field Museum, and walking up on the real lions of Tsavo.

OMG, "The Ghost and the Darkness," another of my favorite movies! I'm well aware that it is a mixture of fact and fiction, and that its tagline "Even the most impossible parts really happened" must be taken in stride. The body count of those two lions really was appallingly high, and certain scenes like the one with the lion escaping the boxcar trap really did happen. But the way the movie plays itself out is largely fiction. Val Kilmer's character is real, Michael Douglas' is not. The producers seemed to have wanted to make it a "buddy picture." In real life, Col. John Patterson (Kilmer) killed both lions. Having the first one killed by "Remmington" (Douglas) in the movie was an invention, as his character in real life did not exist. Also, as anyone who has seen the stuffed bodies of these two maneaters in Chicago's Field Museum knows, they were a rare product of the Tsavo region that produced male lions without manes. The movie neglected this fact and gave them the usual regal manes.

A favorite line of mine, spoken early on by Patterson's wife: "You build bridges, John. You have to go where the rivers are."

[mariab]

Errata wrote:
I know sharks dont vocalize, but they do make a sound out of the water. its the air vibrating the gills. its more like a cat hiss than a roar. its an odd sound. its nothing like jaws though. its not loud, and its sound more like a raspy breath... or the lungs of someone who has a bad chest cold. if its thrashing around you can't hear it, but if you're straddling it trying to get it off the boat it just jumped onto, then you can.
I'd be very interested to hear how you know about this. Have you ever encountered a shark, Errata? Or maybe worked with sharks?! If you have any interesting stories, please share! I still haven't encountered a shark in the water but...I'm keeping an open mind.

Eww, the scene with the giant runaway breast in Everything you ever wanted to know about sex (but were afraid to ask) was sooo disgusting. But I enjoyed the sketch where there are 2 people dating and the man's brain is shown like a NASA-like control center, and Burt Reynolds plays the swithboard operator, while Woody Allen plays an insecure spermatozoon. The funniest line is, I think, when the date says “I'm a NYU graduate.“ and the operators inside the man's brain say “Huh! Piece of cake. Roll out tongue.“ I don't know if the other famous Woody Allen line (of a man to his date) “Can I kiss you before we eat, so that I can digest my dinner?“ is from this flick?

[mariab]

Did The Ghost and the Darkness never make it to Europe, because up to now I had never heard of it? I've looked it up, and what a fascinating story.
I've never been to the Field Museum in Chicago, but I just looked at online pictures of the lions of Tsavo and they kinda look like dogs. But on Wikipedia there's a black and white picture where they look more impressive.

[The Good Michael]

Val Kilmer finding Micheal Douglas has been attacked in The Ghost and the Darkness. Reminded me of being a kid, and going the wrong way to the bathroom at the Field Museum, and walking up on the real lions of Tsavo.

I've been to Chicago 3 times and have never been to that museum though I've wanted to go. It was all about timing, I suppose. I was there to play rugby, and so, the night life seemed more important at those times. Chicago is a great town. It's got the Boston attitude and the Midwest friendliness without the New York smugness. I love the city.

Mike

[caz]

Not the most famous scenes by any means, but memorable all the same:

Donald Sutherland's squeal at the end of Invasion of the Bodysnatchers

Hot Lips in M.A.S.H

At the end of Zulu, when their hearts sink to see yet another line of warriors on the horizon and then find out they are being saluted

Marilyn doing her "jello on springs" down the platform in Some Like it Hot. "I tell you it's a whole different sex."

The band picking up their instruments again on the Titanic in Night to Remember

The "Infamy infamy" scene in Carry On Cleo

Jenny Agutter frantically waving her red flannel petticoat in The Railway Children

The Life of Brian crucifixion scene: "Always look on the bright side of life"

Love,

Caz
X

[Hunter]

I'll show my shallow depth of intellect... the scene when Henry Fonda finally throws the Captain's palm tree overboard in Mister Roberts.

Caz,

A Night to Remember was a much better movie than the one that had the young horny couple chasing each other around the ship.
Graphics ain't everything.

[sleekviper]

If the Field Museum has never been experienced, watch the movie The Relic, Field was used basically for the whole film. Spooky place when small, and rambles on for what seems like forever. The display has to be removed from time to time because the lions were not well attended after being killed, and it was at one of the times that it was taken from the floor that I stumbled on it. Two males with no mane, killing in tandem, day or night. Had nightmares for years.

[sleekviper]

Scene in King Kong, where they open the huge gate. It was not anything special that made it famous, it was just the question of if you build a huge wall to keep huge things out, why on earth do you need a huge gate? The scene had been cut, it was to tie into the demise of Kong. Kong can climb up and over the wall, and in the scene he does that, and kills several natives. I do think that he eats one, anyway the only way to get him out, is to open the gate. That gate would later be burned for the movie Gone with the wind.

[mariab]

sleekviper wrote:
That gate would later be burned for the movie Gone with the wind.
Oh, you're talking about the 1933 King Kong? Where does the gate get burned in Gone with the wind? During the fall of Atlanta, when Rhett and Scarlet (with Melanie, her baby, and Prissy) escape with the horse and carriage?
Where is the Field Museum located in Chicago? I live there (in Hyde Park) half of the year and never noticed. But I guess it's more for kids (or at least, to give kids a scare).

[Errata]

[B]
I'd be very interested to hear how you know about this. Have you ever encountered a shark, Errata? Or maybe worked with sharks?! If you have any interesting stories, please share! I still haven't encountered a shark in the water but...I'm keeping an open mind.

well, i was on a boat in the caribbean with some ex army rangers who were fishing. one of the guys pulled in a fish about a foot long, and a six foot shark jumped onto the boat about two seconds after the fish. I gather he had been hunting the fish when it put on an unnatural burst of speed (due to him being yanked out of the water) and the shark just went for it. the rangers ran to the other side of the boat screaming like little girls, and I all of 17 at the time jumped on it, sat on him behind the dorsal fin and pulled my knees in to keep him from thrashing around. cut the crap out of the insides of my legs. i kept trying to convince them that one of them had to grab the damn thing by tail and toss it back over, but they wouldnt move until i started fake crying about how it was going to get free and kill me. big babies. but while i was on the shark, i heard the weird raspy sound. my personal code of conduct is to not worry about a shark in the water with me unless its my size or larger. and since i am usually in the caribbean and i dont scuba dive, im usually around nurse sharks or lemon sharks, which are very small, and genetically dont give a crap.