Tag Archives: Scene I Love

Scenes That I Love: Putting On The Ritz From Young Frankenstein (Happy Birthday, Mel Brooks!)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today, Mel Brooks is 100 years old!

Mel Brooks.  What can you say Mel Brooks?  Not only did he help to redefine American comedy but he was also responsible for bringing David Lynch to Hollywood.  Brooks was the one who hired Lynch to direct The Elephant Man.  It can probably be argued that, if not for Brooks, Lynch’s feature film career would have begun and ended with Eraserhead.  Brooks not only hired Lynch but also protected him for studio interference.  When the execs tried to make Lynch remove two surrealistic sequences from The Elephant Man, Brooks stood up to them.  When they requested a more conventional biopic, Brooks defended Lynch’s vision and the result was one of the best films ever made.

Of course, Brooks isn’t listed in the credits of The Elephant Man.  Though he produced the film, he went uncredited because he didn’t want people to assume that the movie was a comedy.  By doing so, Brooks missed out on an Oscar nomination but he also ensured that the film was taken seriously.  It’s hard not to respect someone who was willing to go uncredited to help make the film a success.

Though Brooks, as a producer, was responsible for a number of serious films, there’s a reason why Brooks is associated with comedy.  He’s a very funny man and he directed some very funny films.  In honor of Mel Brooks, here’s a scene that I love from 1974’s Young Frankenstein.

Happy birthday, Mel Brooks!

Scenes That I Love: Freddie and Dodd’s Final Meeting From Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today’s scene that I love comes from 2012’s The Master, written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson (who is celebrating his birthday today).

Philip Seymour Hoffman and Joaquin Phoenix were never better than they were in Anderson’s enigmatic story of two very different men who become unlikely friends.  Phoenix plays Freddie Quill, a World War II veteran who has never figured out how to adjust to life during peacetime.  Hoffman plays Lancaster Dodd, a writer who claims to have all the answers but who is actually a charlatan.  In this scene, Freddie and Dodd meet for one last time and, though they are both characters about who most viewers will have mixed feelings, there’s something undeniably poignant about their final moments together.  Both of them realize that the time they had is over.  And indeed, watching this scene today is all the more difficult because it reminds us of what a talent we lost when we lost Philip Seymour Hoffman.

From Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master:

Scenes That I Love: Howard Beale says “We’re In A Lot Of Trouble” in Network

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Everyone remembers the “Mad as Hell Speech” from Sidney Lumet’s 1976 satire, Network.

Personally, I think this scene below is just as good.  Replace “tube” with TikTok and Bluesky and you’ll have a pretty good explanation for why the world today is full of so many angry people who think they know more than they do.

(Usually, heavy-handed scenes annoy me.  Fortunately, much like David Fincher with Aaron Sorkin’s script for The Social Network, Sidney Lumet knew the right directorial tone to take when translating Paddy Chayefsky’s script to the screen.  One shudders to think of what Network would have been like with a less skilled director behind the camera.)

Watch this scene the next time you’re wondering what happened to New York.

 

Scenes That I Love: Norma Desmond visits Cecil B. DeMille in Billy Wilder’s Sunset Boulevard

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today, if Cecil B. DeMille is known at all, it’s for directing Biblical epics like The Ten Commandments.  However, there was much more to DeMille’s career than just that one film.  DeMille got his start during the early silent era and he quickly established himself as one of Hollywood’s first superstar directors.  Unlike many of his contemporaries, he survived the transition to sound and he remained a force in Hollywood at a time when many of the other silent directors were fading into obscurity.  DeMille played a key role in the founding of what would become the American film industry.  He began his career in 1914 and he made his last film in 1958.  That’s quite a legacy.

In 1950, when filming Sunset Boulevard, Billy Wilder needed someone to play the key role of one of Norma Desmond’s former directors.  Who better to represent the old style of Hollywood than Cecil B. DeMille?  In the scene below, DeMille plays himself.  Norma Desmond is, of course, played by Gloria Swanson, an actress whom DeMille had directed in the past.

From Sunset Boulevard, here’s a scene that I love.

Scene That I Love: The Opening of All That Jazz

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

“Showtime!”

Since today is Bob Fosse’s birthday, it’s only appropriate that today’s scene that I love comes from his 1979’s masterpiece, All That Jazz!

This sequence captures everything we need to know about Joe Gideon (Roy Scheider).  We see his talent.  We see his self-destructive habits.  And, though we don’t realize it until the end of the film, we also see that death is patiently waiting for him.

 

Scenes That I Love: Ash Replaces His Hand In Evil Dead II

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today, the Shattered Lens wish a happy birthday to the one and only Bruce Campbell!  And what better way to celebrate and to get the day started than with an iconic scene from 1987’s Evil Dead II?

Scenes That I Love: Bob Fosse’s All That Jazz

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today’s scene that I love comes from Bob Fosse’s 1979 masterpiece, All That Jazz.  This scene features the legendary Ann Reinking at her best.  Roy Scheider said that he cried after shooting this scene.

Happy Father’s Day weekend to all who observe.

A Scene That I Love: Daria Nicolodi and David Hemmings in Deep Red

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Deep Red (1975, dir by Dario Argento)

Today would have been Daria Nicolodi’s birthday so what better time than now to share a scene that I love from Dario Argento’s 1975 masterpiece, Deep Red?

Now, this might seem like a strange scene to love but you have to understand it in context of the overall film.  (And yes, the scene is in Italian but surely you can figure out that it’s a scene of two people flirting.)  Deep Red is often thought as being merely a superior giallo film but it’s also, in its way, a rather sweet love story.  David Hemmings and Daria Nicolodi may investigate a murder but they also fall in love and the two of them have a very sweet chemistry, which is fully displayed in this scene and which elevates the entire film.  Deep Red is a giallo where you care about the characters as much as you care about the murders.

While making this film, Daria Nicolodi and Dario Argento also fell in love and they went on to have a rather tumultuous relationship.  Personally, I think that Argento’s most recent films are underrated but it’s still hard to deny that the ones that he made with Nicolodi have a heart to them that is missing from some of his later work.

So, in honor of Daria Nicolodi and her important role in the history of Italian horror, here she is with David Hemmings in Deep Red!