Yesterday, I featured my favorite scene from 1996’s The Brady Bunch Movie. Today, my scene that I love is my second favorite scene from that same film. In this scene, the Brady kids save the day (and their house) with this exciting performance of Keep On.
I love the way that the song just fades out when the Bradys stop to take their final bow.
Hi there! You may be reading this post on September 22nd (or even later) but I’m sitting here writing it on August 23rd. That’s because, starting on the 22nd, I will be on vacation for the next two weeks. Jeff and I will be traveling America, searching for ghosts, adventure, and love! YAY!
However, fear not, for I will be checking in from the road and I am also writing up and scheduling a few posts ahead of time. Like this one!
Since this is the start of my vacation, I felt it would be only appropriate to feature a scene that I love specifically because, every time I see it, it makes me feel incredibly happy. That scene comes from the 1996 film, The Brady Bunch Movie.
The Brady Bunch Movie is one of my favorite movies of all time and I’m happy to say that it’s one that seems to pop up on cable every few weeks or so. In the scene below, the Bradys put on their Sunday Best, go to Sear’s, and let us all know that it’s a sunshine day!
(By the way, I recently noticed that Mr. Brady and Mrs. Brady spend most of this scene handling a vibrator. It only took me a few dozen times to notice.)
After people see this scene they will think I’m either crazy or a glutton for heartache for loving this scene. It’s hard to disagree with that statement. There’s a reason why I love this scene from the anime series Clannad After Story and it has less to do with the tone of the scene, but a major reason why anime is not just for kids or about boobs, tentacle rape and all the other things adults in the Western media dismiss the art form for.
This scene from Clannad After Story happens between the series’ main lead in Tomoya who has now come to the realization that he must now make amends to the daughter he left behind to be cared for by his wife’s family. It’s a powerful scene that has brought many to tears from young teen girls to grown-ass men who probably bawled more than the former. One doesn’t even have to have seen the previous season to this anime or any episodes leading up to this scene. The moment itself has enough of a backstory that one cannot help but get caught up in the moment. It’s also a scene that does a great job of emphasizing that bond between parent and child even when the former hasn’t lived up to their responsibilities.
I think if more people watched anime like Clannad After Story their opinions of anime would change for the better and see it in a new and positive light.
(This is not a political post but if it was, it would solely reflect my opinion and not necessarily the opinion of anyone else who writes for this site.)
The big news tonight seems to be that former President Bill Clinton is giving a speech at the Democratic National Convention. After being told by several people on twitter that Clinton is “one of the greatest speakers of all time,” I listened to a few minutes of “America’s greatest politician” and you know what?
I still prefer Clint Eastwood.
That’s not meant to be an endorsement of any political position that has or has not been advocated by Clint Eastwood over the past few weeks. This is not a political statement as much as it’s just an acknowledgement of the fact that Presidents give speeches but Clint Eastwood gets results.
And that leads me to tonight’s scene that I love. From the classic 1971 crime film Dirty Harry, here’s the famous scene that explains why so many people love Clint Eastwood in the first place.
I finally got around to checking out Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky over on Netflix Instant and It’s as great as the first time I saw it on VHS almost 15 years ago. It’s during the second fight Ricky finds himself in that I’ve picked the latest entry in the “Scenes I Love” feature.
This scene has Ricky in just his second day in prison (for a crime he did commit) and already gaining the attention of the prison gang leaders who control the different cell blocks. This scene has him fighting it out with Oscar who happens to be the leader of the gang that runs the North Cell. It’s a fight that has Ricky fighting unarmed against Oscar who wields a custom machete/saw-toothed sword. One would think that Ricky would be at a major disadvantage, but one would be oh so mistaken.
Ricky is not just a master of kung fu, but he’s got powers that Crouching Tiger and Hidden Dragon would kill babies and cook kittens to acquire. The scene best explains it all and having it dubbed in classic martial arts style makes it even better: “Alright! you got a lot of guts Oscar!”
[SPOILERS]
The world of cinema lost one of it’s own with the death of British filmmaker Tony Scott (brother of filmmaker Ridley Scott). The circumstances of Tony Scott’s death has now been confirmed and could be found and read easily on most on-line news site.
This post is not to focus on Tony Scott’s death but on the life he lived and how his contribution to the art of filmmaking. Tony Scott has been a major influenc on me and those who grew up during the 80’s and 90’s. His films were huge commercial successes but also unique in that he tried to advance the genre of action filmmaking beyond the bullet point steps on how to make them that other filmmakers could never get beyond.
Tony Scott experimented and innovated with the action genre these last ten or so years to mixed results, but no one could ever say that his visual style was ever boring. Just like his brother Ridley, Tony Scott was a visual director first and foremost, but he also had a way in getting the most out of the cast he was given. It didn’t matter whether they were award-winning veterans like Denzel Washington or up-and-coming stars like Keira Knightley and Chris Pine. His action films weren’t just all about the visual and auditory overload his contemporaries only focused on. Tony Scott used his actors and got from them good to great performances which raised what would’ve been your typical action film to something more.
One of my favorite scenes Tony Scott ever did was also from one of his films I consider one of his best. It’s the last main sequence for his 2001 spy thriller, Spy Game, which starred Robert Redford and Brad Pitt. It was a film that was the passing of the torch from one blue-eyed star of Hollywood’s yesteryear to the current blue-eyed star. This film could’ve been all about action and explosions and techno-spy babble, but it instead became a great exercise in how to create an action-thriller that allowed for dialogue to become the engine that moved the action.
This scene is a favorite because it was the culmination of the machinations and secret plannings of Redford’s aging spymaster, Nathan Muir, to try and save his wayward protege in Brad Pitt’s Tom Bishop. While it would be best for people to watch this scene having watched the rest of the film beforehand, even just watching Redford take control of the room is a clue to how well Tony Scott allowed his actors to work the scene instead of forcing them to do it his way. It’s no wonder that Denzel Washington, considered to be the best actor of his generation, kept working with Tony over and over for the past decade.
It’s been awhile since I put up a scene I love from a film I love. Time to change that and what better way to do it than pick a favorite scene from one of the best films ever made: Apocalypse Now.
This particular scene occurs in the last act of the film which finally puts Capt. Willard (Martin Sheen) face-to-face with his target in the off-the-reservation Special Forces commander Col. Kurtz. This is the first time we actually see Marlon Brando in the role of Kurtz in a film that’s been obsessed with his character right from the very beginning. The glimpses we get of Kurtz are fleeting as he remains in the shadows with only his rumble of a voice giving weight to his presence in the scene. I have to admit that even after seeing this film for over a hundred times through the years it’s still pretty difficult to understand some of what he is saying. Yet, when such an occurrence would be a death for a scene it doesn’t for this scene. It only helps highlight just how far down the abyss this former paragon of American military might has put himself in to accomplish a mission given to him by people he dismissively call “grocery clerks”.
There’s no soundtrack to try and manipulate the scene for the audience. It’s just the ambient noises of the jungle and the ancient temple Kurtz and his people have called home. Even the dialogue in the beginning of the scene where Kurtz inquires about where Willard was from was full of menace and hidden dangers. It’s very difficult not to get hypnotized by this scene. There’s not a fake beat to the dialogue between Sheen and Brando. The way the scene unfolds almost acts like a metronome that lulls the viewer until the reveal in the end when we finally see Kurtz’s face in full for the very first time.
Coppola has done great work before this film with hi first two Godfather films but this scene in this film I consider the best he has ever put on celluloid.
“Kurtz: Are you an assassin?
Willard: I’m a soldier.
Kurtz: You’re neither, you’re an errand boy, sent by grocery clerks to collect a bill”
Today, Arleigh and Pantsukudasai have left town to attend the Anime Expo and I find myself momentarily alone here at the TSL Bunker, curled up on the couch in my beloved Pirates t-shirt and Hello Kitty panties, and cursing my asthma. As I lay here, it occurs to me that it’s been a while since I’ve shared a “scene that I love” here on the site. So, why not rectify that situation now?
Norman Jewison’s 1972 film version of Jesus Christ Superstar is a film that I’ve been meaning to review for a while but for now, I just want to share my favorite scene from that film, the performance of Simon Zealotes/Poor Jerusalem.
There’s several reasons I love that scene but mostly it just comes down to the fact that it captures the explosive energy that comes from watching a live performance. Larry Marshall (who plays Simon Zealotes) has one of the most fascinating faces that I’ve ever seen in film and when he sings, he sings as if the fate of the entire world depends on it. That said, I’ve never been sold on Ted Neely’s performance as Jesus but Carl Anderson burns with charisma in the role of Judas.
Mostly, however, I just love the choreography and watching the dancers. I guess that’s not that surprising considering just how important dance was (and still is, even if I’m now just dancing for fun) in my life but, to be honest, I’m probably one of the most hyper critical people out there when it comes to dance in film, regarding both the the way that it’s often choreographed and usually filmed. But this scene is probably about as close to perfect in both regards as I’ve ever seen. It goes beyond the fact that the dancers obviously have a lot of energy and enthusiasm and that they all look good while dancing. The great thing about the choreography in this scene is that it all feels so spontaneous. There’s less emphasis on technical perfection and more emphasis on capturing emotion and thought through movement. What I love is that the number is choreographed to make it appear as if not all of the dancers in this scene are on the exact same beat. Some of them appear to come in a second or two late, which is something that would have made a lot of my former teachers and choreographers scream and curse because, far too often, people become so obsessed with technical perfection that they forget that passion is just as important as perfect technique. (I’m biased, of course, because I’ve always been more passionate than perfect.) The dancers in this scene have a lot of passion and it’s thrilling to watch.
So, last week, our newest contributor here at the Shattered Lens, The Trash Film Guru, posted his wonderful review of Herschell Gordon Lewis’s The Gruesome Twosome. Reading that review got me thinking about the unique cinematic vision of Mr. Lewis. Though I’ll be reviewing Scum of the Earth and Something Weird later on this week, I would like to first share with you one of my favorite scenes from the work of Herschell Gordon Lewis.
Below, in all it’s glory, is the famous Egyptian feast conversation from Lewis’s 1963 epic, Blood Feast. The caterer here is played by Mal Arnold, who appeared in several of Lewis’s films.
I was recently lucky enough to catch a showing of the classic film The Godfather at the Cinemark West Plano theater down here in DFW and, in honor of that occasion, allow me to present this scene that I love. This is the opening of The Godfather and it’s one of the best first scenes in cinematic history. In just a matter of minutes, director Francis Ford Coppola tells us everything that we need to know about Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando) and his business.
Add to that, I love the cat!
Through the Shattered Lens 