10 best scenes of 2014

Here we go - the first of my end of 2014 lists. I have not seen all noteworthy movies - Wild and A Most Violent Year being the ones that I would probably enjoy the most - but I already completed the lists, seeing how I don't think there are any scenes better than those I chose here. The best shots of 2014 list is next in line, but for now I hope you enjoy my choices here:

Scene of the Week - The Social Network

The Henley Royal Regatta

directed by David Fincher

This is one of the many scenes in the Social Network that are so well directed it just takes your breath away. But it's probably also the most memorable scene for most of the people. Just what the hell is it about this scene? It's not really connected to the main narrative, it's sticks out of the movie but doesn't distract.

Scene of the Week - Snow White and the Huntsman

Mirror, mirror, on the wall....

directed by Rupert Sanders

The scene: Though the entire Snow White and The Huntsman was a bunch of people walking and one wasted talented chasing another, I did enjoy Charlize Theron's work here and if I ever get around to watching Director's Cut of the movie that has been rotting on my shelf for months, it will only be for her performance as the iconic Evil Queen.

Scene of the Week - Batman Returns

HELLO THERE
directed by Tim Burton

Once upon a time, when Tim Burton actually brought in originality with his movies, he made terrific Batman Returns. I really enjoy the film, its naughty humour and grotesque scenes, but my favorite aspect of it is Michelle Pfeiffer's splendid performance as Selina Kyle/Catwoman. As good as Anne Hathaway was in The Dark Knight Rises - she is no Pfeiffer.

10 romantic scenes for Valentine's Day

On the occasion of Valentine's Day I decided to share 10 romantic scenes that came to my mind. Some of those are just the scenes where the characters expressed their love for each other with gestures and the look in their eyes. Others include beautiful quotes that I'll remember forever. Though the film that for me showed the strength of love the most - Brokeback Mountain - is not included, the films from which those scenes come from did a great job at showing the miracle of love. Jennifer Connelly's devotion in A Beautiful Mind, Viggo Mortensen's eyes in The Return of the King and Berenice Bejo's innocence and kindness in The Artist - they all portrayed beautiful emotions and at the same time the incredible strength of love.

Scene of the Week Special: 10 favorite scenes in The Lord of the Rings trilogy

Since I've recently seen The Hobbit I found myself missing the first trilogy taking place in the magical Middle-earth. I must have seen every of The Lord of the Rings movies at least 5 times, including the lovely extended editions. I really love these films - they show the beauty of friendship, courage and love. They are filled with amazing performances and they are extremely well made. As I rewatched the trilogy in the last few days, I finally managed to put together the list of my ten favorite moments:

Scene of the Week - The Assassination of Jesse James by the coward Robert Ford

What must be done

directed by Andrew Dominik

The scene: In a titular scene of Andrew Dominik's masterful picture, we observe the fear, anxiety and sadness in a form of almost a dance that is happening right before our eyes. With beautiful "What must be done" by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis playing in the background, treacherous Robert Ford (Casey Affleck ) and reluctant Charley Ford (Sam Rockwell, in one of his finest performances) prepare to kill Jesse James (Brad Pitt).

James can clearly sense what is about to happen - he looks at his daughter through the window, focusing on every little detail as Robert and Charley try to compose themselves, wordlessly - Robert clearly battles with an idea of killing his friend and mentor, while Charley already shows the signs of immense sadness and despair he will experience after committing the murder, as he raises his armed hand with much resignation, in an apologetic way.

As Jesse says "Don't that picture look dusty?" and approaches the picture of the horse, he sees Robert aiming at him with a gun in its reflection. If Jesse didn't turn his back to him, who knows if Robert would shoot, if he was able to see his face. When the shot is fired, that beautiful, subtle, incredibly orchestrated scene erupts with violence and blood in a matter of seconds as Jesse is shot, hits his head on the picture and dies. He turns from the living hero into cold, lifeless corpse in a matter of seconds and the break the scene provides - from dreamlike, slow and delicate movement prior to the shot to the frenzy after it, only amplifies it.

Scene of the Week - The Dark Knight Rises

Deshi Basara

directed by Christopher Nolan

The scene: In my absolute favorite moment from Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight Rises, Bruce Wayne attempts to climb out of pit - the jail he was thrown into by Bane - without the rope supporting him. He made many attempts to get out before, always with the rope attached to him to save his life in case he failed, but that changes when another inmate tells him the story of a child who managed to escape - while climbing without the rope, the fear of falling and dying made it possible to escape.

Wanting to get out and protect Gotham, Bruce does the same, as fellow inmates chant, encouraging him. At one point Bruce stops as the swarm of bats emerges, which oddly only gives him confidence. He makes the jump and as Hans Zimmer's triumphant "Why do we fall?" stops for a moment we see the inmates freezing in silence too. As the music starts again we see that Bruce managed to make the jump and he gets out of pit, just as Batman theme starts playing in the background.

Scene of the Week - Interview with the Vampire

I want some more

directed by Neil Jordan

The scene: After Louis (Brad Pitt) kills little girl named Claudia (Kirsten Dunst) when the thirst overcomes him, Lestat (Tom Cruise) sees the opportunity to create a perfect companion for his innocent hearted friend and another way to manipulate him. He decides to turn Claudia into a vampire, while Louis is present in the room. Louis attempts to stop Lestat but then changes his mind as Lestat starts feeding Claudia his own blood. Louis watches with horror as Claudia suffers and shakes in pain and suddenly she is reborn as a vampire, as her fangs grow and her hair starts to curl. After that she sits up, turns to Louis and Lestat and says "I want some more" referring to blood.

Scene of the Week: Prometheus

  Hello Mommy

directed by Ridley Scott

The scene: After Dr Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace) learns that she is pregnant with her boyfriend, who just died after being infected with something, she is horrified - not only the place she believed to be a beautiful miracle is a hideous nightmare - something strange and unnatural (the fetus is growing very fast) is growing inside her. She manages to escape and go to Meredith Vickers's room where she finds the machine that is capable of performing surgery. Shaw is trying to tell the machine that she needs a caesarean but since it's mysteriously programmed for a man all she manages to do is to program it to remove foreign object from her body. She gets into the machine, with the syringe packed with painkillers, as her stomach starts rising. The machine manages to cut her open and remove the fetus. Upon seeing it, Shaw looks at it with astonishment until it comes to life trying to attack her. She escapes and leaves her offspring behind, locked in the machine.

Scene of the Week - Running Scared

Monsters hide in plain sight

directed by Wayne Kramer

"I said back the fuck up, you sick, twisted, motherfucking cunt!"

The scene: In the most memorable and intense scene of uneven Running Scared Teresa (Vera Farmiga) gets a phone call from Oleg who is her son's friend. He is trapped in the apartment where he was taken to by strange couple. He is calling her from the bathroom and manages to get an address off prescription medication bottle. Teresa drives there and knocks on the door. Edele (Elizabeth Mitchell) opens and is very reluctant to let her in but Teresa threatens to call the police. Edele shows her the bedroom with two sleeping kids, who we know were in the van with Oleg, that she claims are her children. Teresa sees the creepy room with all the toys and drawings. She is also introduced to Edele's husband Dez.

Scene of the Week - True Romance

You gotta a lot of heart, kid

directed by Tony Scott

The scene: Tony Scott's True Romance, based on a screenplay written by Quentin Tarantino, is like a perfect cinematic mosaic of outstanding individual scenes. In this one a gangster named Virgil (James Gandolfini, acting a lot like he will in the Sopranos) visits Alabama and Clarence's hotel room - he is searching for the drugs that Clarence stole. Clarence is not there, though, so Virgil decides to interrogate Alabama. After a cute chit-chat he punches her repeatedly, while she continues to stay silent about where the drugs are. Then she finds a corkscrew and finally nods that the drugs are under the bed. She then shows Virgil what she has in her hand and he, impressed by how much courage she has, gives shaken girl a chance to take a stab. She stabs shim in his foot and then a ferocious and violent fight occurs - Alabama uses sculptures, hair spray and whatever she can find until Virgil catches on fire. After that Alabama - who is ridiculously cute, fun and joyful person - keeps stabbing him with a corkscrew, grabs a shotgun, shoots him several times and then starts hitting him with a said shotgun, after which she collapses on the ground with a wild scream.

Scene of the Week - Take Shelter

The Storm

directed by Jeff Nichols

The scene: The film tells the story of a man obsessed with building a storm shelter. Throughout the movie he is unsure whether what he is seeing is real or fake - hallucinations caused by schizophrenia he suspects he may be suffering from. In the finale, his wife finally convinces him to leave his paranoia behind and spend a day with her and their daughter on the beach. He agrees and the last scene of the movie shows him playing with his deaf daughter as she suddenly raises and shows him the symbol for the storm. He stands up and looks at something in the distance. Then we cut to his wife, who looks stunned, glancing at the distance and then at him. We see weird yellow raindrops falling on her hand, same we saw in the film's opening. And we finally see she is looking at the horrible storm approaching them. The ending is ambiguous - whether it's all symbolic showing that the wife accepted her husband's condition or - something I chose to believe in - it's cruelly ironic - the husband finally caved in and left the safety and now they are away from the shelter, facing death. The important thing though, is that they are together.

Scene of the Week - Se7en

Searching for clues

directed by David Fincher

Scene of the Week - The Dark Knight

Hit me! 

directed by Christopher Nolan

Scene of the Week: The Girl with The Dragon Tattoo

Out in the cold

directed by David Fincher

Scene of the Week: Casino

Baby, you're the one
directed by Martin Scorsese

Scene of the Week: Kill Bill: Vol. 2

You don't even know what fucking day you work

directed by Quentin Tarantino

The scene: Budd, Bill's brother, who is a bouncer in a lousy bar gets told off by his boss Larry. What we witness in that barely 3-minute long scene is an epic exchange worthy of the best of Tarantino's moments. Larry takes a marker and proceeds to cross Budd's name on the calender, which is especially funny since Budd, former assassin who is very dangerous, just stands there looking calm, resigned and pretty damn put in his place.

- You looking for me?
- I don't know what car wash you worked before you came here that let you stroll in  minutes late, but it wasn't owned by me - and I own a fuckin' car wash.         
- Larry...there ain't nobody out there, so...
- What's your point? That you're not needed here?
- My point is...l'm the bouncer, and there ain't nobody out there to bounce.    
- You saying that the reason that you're not doing the job that I'm paying you to do is that you don't have a job to do?
- No...
- Is that what you're saying? What are you trying to convince me of, exactly? That you're as useless as an asshole right here? Well, guess what, buddy? I think... you just fucking convinced me. Let's go to the calendar. It's calendar time. Calendar time for Buddy. OK. You working tomorrow?
- Yeah.
- Mm. No, you're n... You don't even know what fucking day you work. Here. You're not working tomorrow. You're working Wednesday. Here you are. There you go. Workin' Thursday?
- Yeah.
- I don't think so. Friday. There's your name.
- If you say so.
- There used to be your name. OK? Saturday. There used to be your name. Uh, Monday... Here. How about that? Fuckin' with your cash is the only thing you kids seem to understand. OK? Now, I want you to go home till I call you. Till I call you. Before you leave, talk to Rocket. She's got a job for you to do. And... the hat. That fuckin' hat. That fucking...How many times have I told you, don't wear that fucking hat here? How many?
- Customers wear hats.
- Well, I'm not the boss of the customers. I'm the boss of you. And I'm telling you that I want you to keep that shit-kicker hat at home.

Scene of the Week: Carrie

directed by Brian De Palma

The Prom Massacre

The scene: In one of the most famous scenes in history when Carrie and Tommy get on stage as the Queen and King of the prom, Chris pulls the rope attached to the bucket with pig's blood, which falls on Carrie and knocks Tommy unconscious. Carrie, horrified, disturbed and shocked focuses her rage and her telekinetic powers of her schoolmates and even on Miss Collins, who was her friend - in her demented mind Carrie thinks she is laughing at her. De Palma used split screen here which is extremely effective - at the same time we are able to see the horror and the bloodshed and extremely frightening look on Carrie's face. Originally the entire prom sequence was shot this way but De Palma changed it. The massacre ends with Carrie setting the place on fire and walking through the door. What's adds to the horror of the scene is Pino Donaggio's score, heavily inspired by Bernard Hermann's work, who was originally set to compose music for "Carrie" but he died shortly before the making of the movie.

Scene of the Week: Lost in Translation

directed by Sofia Coppola

The Silent Goodbye

The scene: In the memorable and beautiful ending to the movie, Bob, middle aged actor and Charlotte, young woman who met in Tokyo few days before and formed a friendship, say goodbye to each other. Bob catches up with Charlotte on the busy street, to her big happiness and surprise, hugs her and whispers something in her ear, which we never hear but we get the sense it's something reassuring. Then they share a kiss and say "bye". After they walk away in opposite directions they turn around, to catch one last glimpse of each other and walk with a smile on their faces.