By Odienator.
Today's 5 for the day pays tribute to that which comes just before the closing credits, the parting shot. Parting shots can be images that remain onscreen as the closing credits roll. Or they can be images that appear just before the screen goes black (or flashes the words "The End" or "Fin" or "Get the Hell Out"). They can also be a visual accompaniment or response to dialogue. But you won't find "Nobody's perfect" or "Shut up and deal" or "It's the stuff that dreams are made of" on this list, because I'm focusing on cappers that are mainly visual.
Here's a brief example: suppose you're watching a movie about Oscar Wilde. Wilde says on his deathbed, "Either the wallpaper goes, or I go." The next shot fades in, and it's of an empty bed in the room. The wallpaper is still there; Wilde is not. Fade out, movie ends, critics boo, and the screen gets bombarded with Sno-Caps. This list would probably focus on the wallpaper shot, and would mention Wilde's last line in passing, if at all.
The first item on my list is my favorite parting shot, and my favorite New York City movie from its era. The others are presented in no particular order. Spoiler alerts are in effect.
1. "The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3." (1974) You may not have heard of this film from the hardboiled detective/police officer phase of Walter Matthau's career, but a certain American director with a penchant for cinematic five-fingered discounts certainly has. Four criminals (Hector Elizondo, Earl Hindman, Martin Balsam, Robert Shaw) decide to pull a million-dollar heist by hijacking the 1:23pm #6 train and holding its passengers for ransom until the city of New York pays up. They refer to each other as Mr. Green, Mr. Gray, Mr. Brown, and Mr. Blue. The movie intercuts scenes of the hijackers with sequences from within the train, where a slew of Noo Yawk semi-stereotypes utter colorful, entertaining, and not exactly necessary dialogue. The Noo Yawkers argue, panic, and, once the train starts barreling out of control, band together as only Strangers on a Noo Yawk Train can. The kidnappers are icy, competent and suave, and one of them (Balsam) sneezes a lot. Meanwhile, a detective nicknamed Z (or Zed, for fans of QT) interacts with them and tries to figure out how they expect to get away with such a feat, considering everyone knows where the 6 train goes. For most of the film Matthau, as Z, only hears the voices of Mssrs. Blue, Gray, Brown, and, in the case of Mr. Green, his horrifically odd sneezes. "Gesundheit," says Matthau repeatedly in that unmistakable voice of his.
Z never sees the faces of the criminals until he meets them, and after dealing with three of them (one of whom deals with himself in a literally shocking manner), Matthau goes to the apartment of the last man standing, Mr. Green. As the suspenseful scene draws to a close, Matthau, satisfied that his lead came up empty, leaves the apartment. We see the door close, then we cut to Mr. Green, who sneezes. "Gesundheit," says Matthau from behind the closed door...
...which then opens on a glorious, knowing closeup of Matthau's face.
Freeze frame, roll credits. If this had been a bad 80's movie, the soundtrack would have kicked up some Bob Seger: "Shakedown, breakdown, you're busted!" 
2. "The Last Picture Show." (1971) On separate occasions, I got to meet Larry McMurtry and Peter Bogdanovich, and on neither occasion was I bold enough to fully express how much this movie meant to me -- and why I'll never watch it again. It's the most depressing movie I've ever seen. Bogdanovich creates a 1950's movie with 1971's freedom of expression; it is brutally honest in emotion and sexuality, and stifling in its hopelessness.
The movie theater in the town of Anarene, which we see functioning in the film's opening pan, is a symbol of hope, a means of escape from the dreary lives of its citizens, citizens who pass the time getting involved in manipulative and costly sexual machinations just so they can feel some connection to humankind. 
When theater owner Sam the Lion (Ben Johnson) dies, it removes the only character who seems to have come to some terms with his past regrets; in effect, the town's figurehead, father figure and historical tie has disappeared. Eventually, the theater plays the titular feature, and when Bogdanovich comes full circle in the pan that ends this film, it rests on the theater which, like the life of its owner, has now gone dark. The last shot is like Nick's green light of hope being extinguished at the end of "The Great Gatsby." 
3. "He Got Game." (1998) Spike Lee has never met a cryptic ending he didn't like, but he topped himself with "He Got Game." Denzel Washington plays mean and nasty, in preparation for his turn in "Training Day," and former Milwaukee Buck Ray Allen plays his symbolically-named son, Jesus. This Jesus' passion is basketball, and Denzel's Jake has been improbably furloughed from prison to convince him to go to the governor's alma mater. Whether Jesus goes there or not is up to you to discover, but Jake winds up going back to jail. Once returned, Jake picks up a basketball and, as Aaron Copland plays on the soundtrack, throws it as far as he can. The camera follows the basketball as it leaves the prison and lands in front of Jesus, miles away, on a playground. The movie ends with a high-angled shot of Jesus looking up at a hoop in wonderment. "What the fuck just happened?" asked the woman seated behind me. I wanted to kiss her.
4. "The Shawshank Redemption." (1994) The WGA released a list of the top 101 screenplays a few weeks ago, and this film was ranked #22. It's my favorite screen adaptation of a novel, and the movie ends with the same words author Stephen King ends his novella. Before Morgan Freeman became the spokesperson/narrator for human-destroying tripods and penguins on punany pilgrimage, he mused about his hopes for the future outside of Shawshank penitentiary. "I hope to make it across the border," narrates Freeman. "I hope to see my friend and shake his hand. I hope the Pacific is as beautiful as it has been in my dreams."
As Freeman speaks, director Frank Darabont fades to the Pacific, which is a very dreamy blue indeed. Then he fades to Freeman, walking on the beach alongside it. As Freeman approaches his aforementioned friend, Tim Robbins, Darabont cuts to Robbins looking up from his boat work to see Freeman, then cuts to Freeman acknowledging his recognition. Freeman walks into a close-up, smiling, then Darabont cuts back to Robbins jumping down from the boat to greet him.
I expected a reunion filled with a close-up of the two actors spouting mushy dialogue, and the film certainly had earned that. But the next and final image is a long shot that pulls back from some perch high above the scene on the beach. The dreamy Pacific takes up two-thirds of the screen, threatening to take up more as the camera continues to back away from this extremely personal moment. We can barely make out the two characters as they walk toward each other and hug. What I love about this shot is that it underplays the ending, allowing me to be moved by a simple majesty that no amount of dialogue, however brilliant, would allow. As I left the theater, I thought about what Red and Andy would have said to each other and why, like Sofia Coppola would later do in "Lost in Translation," the film kept those words appropriately private.
5. "Blazing Saddles." (1974) "'Scuse me while I whip this out!" "Blazing Saddles" is Mel Brooks' best movie, a savagely funny take on Westerns and racism that suddenly turns postmodern as the characters in the film interact with "real life" going on at the Warner Brothers lot. Like Porky Pig in "You Oughta Be In Pictures," the freed movie characters wreak havoc. Hedy Lamarr, I mean "Hedley" Lamarr, foreshadows the film's final image when, after running off the Warners lot, he flags down a taxi and says, "Drive me off of this picture." He is pursued by our hero, Black Bart (Cleavon Little), to the premiere of "Blazing Saddles" at Grumann's Chinese Theater. After vanquishing Mr. Lamarr, Black Bart and the Waco Kid (Gene Wilder) settle down to watch the end of the movie from which they just escaped.
After saying his goodbyes to the townsfolk, Black Bart encounters Jim, the Waco Kid sitting outside. Ever the attendant to detail, Brooks shows Jim holding the bucket of popcorn we saw him eating at Grumann's. "Where ya headed, cowboy?" he asks Bart. "Nowhere special," Bart replies, "I always wanted to go there," says Jim. "Let's go," Bart suggests. As in numerous Westerns before this, our heroes then ride off into the sunset, and as the absurd theme song reaches its crescendo, the camera follows them riding screen left; the shot seems to go on forever. Then, without warning, a '70's style limousine appears from the left side of the frame. Both Bart and Jim trade their 1874 horses for a set of 1974 wheels and ride off into the sunset in style.
Friday, April 14, 2006
5 for the day: parting shots
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How about the parting shot of Wes Anderson's Rushmore? Everyone has taken a break from fighting with each other and decided to dance. The almost-subliminal use of slo-mo gives the shot the little extra bit of power it needed. And, The Faces' "Ooh La La" just might turn out to be one of the best closing-credits selections of all time.
I can't say that any of these would make my list, but they're all pretty great. Here are a few of my personal faves:
Seconds - A bird's-eye view of the beach: Heaven, Hell, and purgatory all at once.
All That Jazz - A joyous freefall into the abyss--and then the cold rimshot: death is not a musical number; death is a body-bag being zipped up.
About Schmidt - Jack's eyes well up with tears: he matters.
Black Christmas - Oh Jesus, he's still in the house.
Jackie Brown - An audaciously long close-up of Jackie, giving this shrine to Pam Grier the capper it deserves.
I'd certainly put The Last Picture Show on my list, as well as Seconds, Black Christmas, and Jackie Brown from bill c.'s list above. But as a fan of final shots, a few others:
Trust - (and for that matter, just about any Hal Hartley film - the man knows how to send you out on a great image) Adrienne Shelly standing in the wind under the swaying traffic lights, wearing her glasses and varsity jacket and her boyfriend's mother's dress as she watches him taken away by the cops.
Contempt - The camera moves away from the characters, past the making of the silly film they've been so concerned about, and settles on the endless sea, which doesn't care and will last longer than any film. "Silencio."
Eraserhead - Henry Spencer smiles over the shoulder of the Lady in the Radiator as he finds that in Heaven, everything is fine.
Barton Fink - The picture comes to life, and the bird falls.
In Sometimes A Great Notion Henry Fonda plays the crabby old patriarch of an independent and defiant logging family at odds with the local townspeople. Paul Newman plays his son.
They get into a bitter conflict with the unionized workers in the area who want them to join them in a work stoppage. They refuse and suffer the violent consequences
In the last shot of the movie Newman straps Fonda's severed arm to the mast of a tug boat, with the middle raised in the direction of their foes.
All classics, Ian, and you just reminded me of another favourite, from Hal Hartley's Henry Fool. I remember my dad asking me, "Is Henry running towards or away from something?" Me: "Does it matter?"
Please, let's not give Hartley any more credit he does not deserve. Harmony Korine does better final shots than Hartley.
1. At the very top for me, nothing surpasses Rick and Louis walking off in to the fog on the rain-slicked airport tarmac in Casablanca.
2. Mia Rarrow staring in awe as Fred and Ginger bring her out of her mood in The Purple Rose of Cairo.
3. John Wayne in the doorway in The Searchers.
4. Michael's henchman closing the door on Kay at the end of The Godfather.
5. The long pullback as Holly Hunter and Albert Brooks talk in the gazebo in Broadcast News.
Hey, thanks for the link! Great blog you've got here...One of the best movie blogs I've seen.
And as long as we're talking great final shots (and "Pelham" certainly qualifies as among the greatest of all time), I'd throw in a few more:
"The Godfather" - one of the most memorable and parodied final shots of all time, as the door closes on Michael Corleone, the new Godfather and head of the Corleone Family business.
"White" - Kieslowski's dark comic masterpiece ends with a breathtaking shot of Julie Delpy, gazed from afar, weeping that sums up the movie's themes with stunning conciseness and accuracy.
"Before Sunset" - Another amazing, long final shot enhanced by the beautiful Ms. Delpy.
"The Passenger" - Antonioni's film features, like, an 8 minute final tracking shot that's one of the most impressive cinematographic feats I have ever seen.
Don't know how one would rank these, but some that spring to mind after minimal thought:
Last Temptation of Christ. How could this not be mentioned on Good Friday of all days? Dafoe tilting his head skyward in close up, says "It is accomplished!" to the expressionistic strains of Peter Gabriel's score and the film flutters, blowing out into a glorious yellow/orange, as though the power of his sacrifice busted apart the apature of the camera. Supposedly an accident on-set too. I'm not even close to religious but it still gives me the chills just thinking about it.
Goodfellas. Another Scorsese special. Right after Liotta tells us about life as a schnook eating egg noodles and ketchup, we hear Sid Vicious tear into "My Way" as Joe Pesci in gangster fedora fires a handgun directly into the camera. Followed by one last doleful look from Ray. First seen when I was 11 years old, I had no idea that Marty was nodding towards cinema history, all I knew was how much of a charge it put in me at the end of an already mind-blowing film.
Monsters Inc. Good call Bill C regarding About Schmidt, and I'd put this one in that same category. At this point it's considered "lesser Pixar" (God knows why) but I still remember fighting back the sniffles as Sully has an off-screen reunion with Boo, peering through a doorway at her. I hear "Kitty" and I'm a goner.
Irreversible. Monica Bellucci splayed out on the grass in happier days as the camera spirals above her endlessly towards the heavens followed by an almost epilepsy-inducing strobe light for about 60 seconds where we're left to our own devices to make heads or tails of what (if anything) we're supposed to be seeing. Pretentious? You betcha, and after seeing Noe's contribution to Districted I'm more convinced than ever he's a one-trick-pony. But for a film that found many of its critics questioning what reason it needed to be made it was one last ambiguity thrown at you as you stagger out of the theater.
Stalag 17. Here's one that's not from the last 20 years. Really understated, nothing mind-blowing but just a perfect cynical note to cap one of the most cynical films Wilder ever made. Bill Holden's scheming and universally reviled Sefton having unveiled the Nazi spy amongst the barracks brokers a deal to escape with Lt. Dunbar, leaving the rest of his men pretty much stranded having given up their sole means of cutting through the surrounding fence. After their two comrades have left and all the men lie in their bunks, Robert Strauss' Animal finally says what we all were partially thinking: "Maybe he just wanted to steal our wire cutters. You ever think of that?" Dead silence as Sefton's lackey Cookie rolls over onto his side and smiles ambiguously as "Johnny Comes Marching Home Again" and end title. Perfect. Sunset Blvd. and Some Like It Hot get more attention for their cappers, but I'll take this one.
I thought of another one that should be on my list: The Little Tramp's shy grin as the newly sighted flower girl realizes who he is in City Lights.
1. The Dreamlife of Angels. The final tracking shot of the women sewing? deepens the movie in some profound way that I can't explain.
2. College. Buster Keaton gets the girl and then rapid timelapse dissolves show them married, having children, aging, and finally becoming two gravestones side by side.
3. The French Connection. Popeye Doyle's second gunshot makes all the difference as he disappears in the darkness, going about his obsessive ways. Technically, maybe not the last shot, because there is also an epilogue.
4. Dazed and Confused. Our teens spark a doobie and barrel down the highway towards the concert of the summer. The fading POV shot of the road makes for a philisophical capper. It suspends time and portends the future.
5. High and Low. The entire final confrontation and confession scene with the villain behind a prison grate makes this the greatest procedural ever, along with M of course.
6. Okay I can't stop dammit. The last bit of Bunuel's Simon of the Desert with our saint as a beatnik at a nightclub is some kind of definition of wit that I can't quite describe.
Ah, The Taking of Pelham One-Two-Three. My personal touchstone for the uniqueness of '70s cinema isn't Scorsese, Penn, or even Altman, but that for a few glorious years Walter Matthau's hangdog, cynical countenance was considered the perfect audience surrogate for some fine, tough, bleakly comic action/thrillers.
lons: Tremendous as the tracking shot in The Passenger is, there is a cut afterwards. The last shot of the film (as a Film Comment critic whose name escapes me pointed out some years ago) is actually and wittily the image of an Andalusian Dog.
To the fun topic, in no particular order:
The Magnificent Ambersons. I mean, if you walk out two or three minutes till the end like all good Americans should. Holt’s defeated silhouette, the rise to the thicket of power and communications lines, the traffic noise crescendo to a suffocating babble. More an honorable mention, perhaps, the way things turned out, but still.
Prince of Darkness: Push comes to shove, my favorite closing shot ever. Carpenter’s career is a catalog of off-kilter yet immediately comprehensible images, and a master’s course in exquisite timing. Parker’s faintly trembling hand approaching the mirror is one of the loveliest of the former, and ends on the precise frame for maximum discomfort.
Passion of Anna: Obliteration, of character and image. The voice over offers hope there will be a next time, but Bergman’s nihilism is so ultimate and inexorable it feels less like the image is blowing up than that you’re becoming smaller and more helpless as you sink into it.
X: The Man with X-Ray Eyes: So blunt and shocking and perfect, I have nothing to add.
Naked Lunch: How does a gentle, engaging presence as David Cronenberg manage to lure his performers to such terrified, hollowed-out places? Forget about the perils of drug addiction: the traumatized despair mapped out on Weller’s face at the end is the best warning against becoming an artist any artist has dared make. As the man says, welcome to Annexia.
Odienator, you are the Superfly of listmakers. Here's five, and I'm sure I'll check in again later with another five.
1. ON THE WATERFRONT. After Terry's bloodied final trudge to the warehouse, he confronts the foreman, who declares, "Let's go to work." Then everybody goes inside, and Elia Kazan lets the metal gate roll down behind them like a falling curtain.
2. JAWS. That wide shot of Brody and Hooper swimming away from the wrecked boat through chum-soaked seas is the capper. But I have even more love for the image that plays out under the final credits: a locked-down, super-wide master shot showing what the boys on the boat have been hankering after for the past hour: land.
3. THE PASSENGER. I was gonna leave this off my list because other people already mentioned it, but Jesus, come on.
4. MILLER'S CROSSING. Our boozing hero, Tom, who's been chasing his hat the whole movie (in real life and in dreams) casts one last cryptic, nearly-fourth-wall-breaking stare, then tugs the brim of his hat down over his eyes, as if to make double sure he's not going to lose it.
5. TAXI DRIVER. Travis Bickle, driving a hack once again, looks at his own eyes in the rearview mirror, then slaps the mirror away (cue dissonant sound effect) and we're left watching the blur of traffic rushing by. Is he or isn't he? He's both, and not only does this one shot convey that ambiguity, it reinforces the creepy push-pull of Scorsese's filmmaking, which immerses us in Bickle's self-infatuation, then pulls us out of it.
Also, Ed: That CITY LIGHTS ending is one of my favorites, too. Woody Allen's homage (or theft) at the end of MANHATTAN is mighty fine, too.
Just read back over Anon's post -- good call on the Andalusian dog. Consider Antonioni off my list (I'll put him back on for the inevitable 5 for the day: great long takes).
In its place, I'll put the closing credits shot of CARLITO'S WAY, with the tropical mural coming to life.
Star Child: 2001
Bang!: French Connection
They Are All Equal Now: Barry Lyndon
Dolly In: Godfather, Part II
Big Rubber Dick: Boogie Nights
Stage to Heaven: Nashville
Playing Sax: The Conversation
Eenie Meanie: Elephant
All Right Hamilton: Fast Times At Ridgemont High
I Wish That...: Rushmore
Bang!: Reservoir Dogs
Anonymous: Big Rubber Dick: Boogie Nights
It was Claymation, and looked about as real as James Trafficant's hair.
Matt, remember when I said that I purposely left a choice off the list because I was hoping someone would say it? Well, somebody did!
Lons: "Before Sunset" - Another amazing, long final shot enhanced by the beautiful Ms. Delpy.
This ending shocked me, as it snuck up on me in the theater. It was the perfect way to end the movie too.
So far, everyone has come up with some great and interesting choices. I shot for the unusual choices on my list, so don't interpret my not mentioning The Godfather, for example, as thinking it's not worthy of this list.
bill c: All That Jazz - A joyous freefall into the abyss--and then the cold rimshot: death is not a musical number; death is a body-bag being zipped up.
All That Jazz is one of my fave movies. I can't believe I forgot that.
EC: Great call on Broadcast News, my favorite movie of 1987.
MZS: THE PASSENGER. I was gonna leave this off my list because other people already mentioned it, but Jesus, come on.
I figured someone would mention Antonioni, and then I'd come on here and balk. You didn't pick the movie I was thinking of, however, (Zabriske Point) so I must save my bitching for another day. :)
I would also like to suggest another Walter Matthau pick -- Charley Varrick. I know it's not as dramatic as Pelham, but after that final sequence with Joe Don Baker, the closing shot of the burning jacket -- Charley Varrick, Last of the Independents.
Along with Matthau, I was thinking about Elliot Gould this afternoon, since I saw _Brick_ last night. I would have to say that the final scene of _The Long Goodbye_, with Gould walking away, his business finally finished...Another nice sequence that really sums up the film.
Also, since there aren't enough comedies on the list, _Some Like It Hot_. Nobody's Perfect, indeed.
Anon
Is this the same Anon that posted above?
Seriously, folks--you don't have to use your real name, but please do click on the middle button ("Other"), make up a screen name and stick with it. Avoids confusion.
This Anon has great taste in Matthau. I'm actually in the process of adapting a novel to script form right now, and I using CHARLEY VARRICK as one of my reference points.
matt: "Is this the same Anon that posted above?"
Nope, there are plenty of us anonymous types that are fans of Matthau.
Sorry for the confusion, I'll comment by name from this point.
I'm the Magnificent Ambersons, Naked Lunch anon, by the bye.
Even though they're numbered, no particular order:
1) Spione (Fritz Lang): Criminal mastermind Haghi (Rudolf Klein-Rogge) shoots himself in front of a wildly appreciative Weimar Germany audience.
2) Forty Shades of Blue (Ira Sachs): Laura (Dina Korzun) walks down a Memphis street, free for a perpetual moment.
3) The Fury (Brian De Palma): Amy Irving brings John Cassavetes to orgasm. Of a sort.
4) Looney Tunes: Back in Action (Joe Dante): Daffy gets squashed by the Termite Terrace target while Porky (bitter and cynical due to a cultural turn of the tide) can't get out his famed punchline.
5) Munich: The corrective to Haneke's facile Cache. An image no less "hidden" for being so brilliantly obvious.
Sorry, forgot the "other" button. I'm the Anon with the good taste in Matthau -- though I will say that I also think _Charley Varrick_ is a great Don Siegel film, with not one wasted moment in it.
Since we're in a 70's mood, I would also suggest the final sequence in Elaine May's _Mikey and Nicky_, really a consummate scene of betrayal -- not simply to have ratted out a friend, but to hold the door closed while he dies on the other side. A scene that should have been somewhere in a Cassavetes movie.
And for comedy, the final scene of Elaine May's _The Heartbreak Kid_. Charles Grodin at his second, tremendously improbable, wedding, sitting on a couch, humming. Restless. Bored. Just about ready to start looking for bride #3.
Anon
I would argue that Glenn Close removing her makeup -- and her power -- at the end of DANGEROUS LIAISONS is one of the greatest closing closeups in movies.
You know what I miss? Movies that ended on the last shot, sending you out of the theatre on an emotional note, before six-minute end title sequences dissipated whatever impact the movie left with you. I'm thinking specifically of the final shot of Frank Sinatra in THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE, damn near weeping, "Oh, hell..." Clap of thunder, fade out, lights up. And later, how Frankenheimer ended SEVEN DAYS IN MAY, with Burt Lancaster striding out of the Pentagon, defeated, and he cuts hard to a title card, "The End" on the Presidential seal, with a single chimed note declaring absolute finality. Fade out, lights up, think about it, folks.
Memo2Self: Right on. It's not just the six-minute title crawls that kill the feeling. It's the inability of movies to just realize they reached a decent stopping point and then stop.
Anon: THE HEARTBREAK KID: Talk about a perfect comedy ending, from a time when comedy heroes weren't required to be "sympathetic."
As a Last Picture Show fanatic, I must correct Odienator with all due respect: the (fictional) name of the town was Anarene. Not to be confused with Thalia, the town's name in the book; or Archer City, the town's real name. Did I say something about "confused"?
weepinggorilla, consider it corrected.
And to pile confusion upon confusion, Clu Gulager's character in the film is named Abilene.
Sorry if I triple posted that earlier comment. I thought I was malfunctioning, but now I think I understand the dealio. Anyway, I sorta cheated and picked up my 1991 copy of Roger Ebert's book and started flipping thru the index of 4 star movies. I barely got thru the B's, there were so many great ones. The whirling around the workplace end of After Hours, I always imagine the camera being pushed on an office chair. The water drip under the sink in Blood Simple, with M. Emmet Walsh's cackling laugh (it's hard to keep sound out of this) and the gun barrel pointed straight, dead at the audience with "directed by Sam Peckinpah" stamped across it in Bring Me The Head Of Alfredo Garcia. Damn, last shots are just so important, like first shots and first and last sentences of novels. So many great ones.
One more thought: looking over these lists, it becomes apparent. If the movie has a philosophy, then that philosophy is most directly expressed in the final shot.
Wagstaff: Wow. That observation is so true.
The same could be said for a film's opening shot, though.
Perhaps if you considered both, you get a snapshot of the filmmaker's worldview so accurate that nothing in between can deny it. Sort of polygraph-by-cinema.
Thanks for the Last Picture Show correction, WG! (I wrote that piece at 4:30 in the morning after getting my ass kicked by Uncle Sam (ie, doing my taxes)--I'm lucky it remotely makes sense!)
Nice to see my favorite curmudgeon, Walter Matthau, getting some love here, even if he was in Candy.
Wagstaff: Damn, last shots are just so important, like first shots and first and last sentences of novels. So many great ones.
This is a great observation. We will have to do a companion piece to this later, great opening shots. I wonder if some of the movies everyone mentioned here would appear as well.
Keith: 3) The Fury (Brian De Palma): Amy Irving brings John Cassavetes to orgasm. Of a sort.
I couldn't use this one, if only because I mentioned it when Matt did his 5 death scenes list. But it's a great choice, and perhaps the greatest exit by a villain yet.
One of my favorite closing shots of all time is that last long shot in Kiarostami's Through the Olive Trees, a silent, but romantic and joyous ending to film filled with pain, tragedy, and resilient humor. I guess their treatment of this film offers another good opportunity to point out how the Weinsteins are the enemies of cinema.
More recently, I also love the way the look on Song Kang-ho's face in the last shot of Memories of Murder kind of encapsulates everything he's been through in the film.
Favorite parting shots:
I would have gone for THE FURY, BEFORE SUNSET and CITY LIGHTS, as well.
Woody Allen's beautiful ending of ANNIE HALL, the lingering shot out the restaurant window and the line "because we all need the eggs."
Elliot Gould skipping away from Mexico as "Hooray for Hollywood" plays at the end of THE LONG GOODBYE.
"Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn," Rhett's perfect kiss-off to fiddle-dee-dee Scarlett in GONE WITH THE WIND.
THE KILLING: Sterling Hayden watching all the money fly away at the airport.
THE BAND WAGON: The glorious finale of "That's Entertainment." Perfect ending to the most perfect musical ever made.
Even though it's a homage/ripoff (your choice) of CITIZEN KANE, the finale of RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK where the grail gets buried in the government basement.
"What do we do now?" Robert Redford's telling question at the end of THE CANDIDATE.
The squib-a-rama shootout and the final look between Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway in BONNIE AND CLYDE.
Beatty, again, on the hill watching Julie Christie drive out of his life in SHAMPOO, as the Beach Boys' WOULDN'T IT BE NICE comes up in perfect ironic counterpoint.
Clint Eastwood, after making that punk feel lucky, throwing his badge in the water in disgust in DIRTY HARRY.
And Eli Wallach screaming BLONDEEEEEEEEEEEE! as The Man With No Name shoots him down from the hanging post in THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY.
And, how could I forget, James Stewart at the top of the mission tower bell, hands outstretched and totally screwed for life, in VERTIGO.
Uh, this was only supposed to be 5, right? OK, I'll stop.
Going along with Wagstaff's comment - that the parting shot summarizes the philosophy of the film: how about My Name is Nobody, where the final shot is a closeup of Terrence Hill's trigger finger poking up Steve Kanaly's butt.
I second the LAST TEMPTATION OF CHRIST ending... incredibly unnerving and duplicitous, actually, as it could be interpreted as either a divine act (as was suggested) or as an indication that this is merely a film and nothing to get worked up about. The perfect solution to the asinine controversy surrounding the film.
I'd also suggest just about any Herzog film, though especially STROSZEK.
And Kurosawa's CURE has an ending that subtly but incontrovertibly conveys the idea that the world is on the brink of an apocalpyse of evil... sometimes a whisper and a long shot are far more effective than any sort of obvious, heavy-handed climax.
I don't know about all time but my favorite parting shot in a movie I saw recently is from "Bright Future": the schoolboys walking in their Che T-Shirts as the title of the movie finally appears and a terrific song by The Back Horn plays. The detailed visual composition of the shot (the whole movie, really) is outstanding.
I would second the vote for _Cure_. A wonderfully creepy ending that demonstrates just how menacing a knife can be, even if there's no (ostensible) reason to be afraid anymore.
I would also second the nostalgia for the title card ending. But I always thought it had something to do with having to officially credit many more people than one used to. If that was all frontloaded the movie would never get started.
Anon
wagstaff: "...the gun barrel pointed straight, dead at the audience with "directed by Sam Peckinpah" stamped across it in Bring Me The Head Of Alfredo Garcia."
Extra Credit for this movie, because the last credits image, recycled from earlier in the film, is that endlessly mysterious shot of, um, Gig Young (?--can't recall) staring into the sack containing Garcia's severed noggin.
matt: "In its place, I'll put the closing credits shot of CARLITO'S WAY, with the tropical mural coming to life."
O, lovely choice.
Keith Uhlich: "The Fury (Brian De Palma): Amy Irving brings John Cassavetes to orgasm. Of a sort."
As is this. De Palma is brilliant at endings. Hell, you could do a 5 for the day:parting shots on him alone; I'd also toss Hi, Mom! (best use of a title in the movie I've ever seen), Blow Out, and Raising Cain into the mix.
that little round-headed boy: "And Eli Wallach screaming BLONDEEEEEEEEEEEE! as The Man With No Name shoots him down from the hanging post in THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY."
I'm no lip reader, but it never looked like Wallach was shouting "son-of-a-bitch" to me.
anon: "If [credits were] all frontloaded the movie would never get started."
If I remember correctly (and I'm not about to watch this again to confirm), Greenaway's Prospero's Books put all it's credits up front just to have such a snap ending. And it did seem to go on forever.
I'm glad little round headed boy mentioned Good, bad, and Ugly, and also Vetigo.Need more Hitchcock. He was great at this stuff.
Train entering the tunnel in NORTH BY NORTHWEST.
Three shots in one for PSYCHO: Norman Bates grinning, triple exposed with Mother and then the car being dragged from the swamp.
And NOTORIOUS, with Claude Rains walking up the steps as the door shuts on his certain doom "Come in, Alex. You don't look so well."
Yeah, you're probably right on Eli Wallach's last words. I was just writing it from memory. But a great ending, nonetheless.
A few I'm surprised not to see here:
Parallax View: the rush towards the doorway and the looming silhouette.
The 400 Blows.
Harold and Maude: dancing over a hilltop playing banjo.
The Graduate: the two on the back of the bus, and that priceless change in expression.
I would have named Fanny and Alexander, but the shot I was thinking of (that cross appearing in the background) is actually a few minutes before the credits.
I'm late for the party as usual, and a little surprised not to see my favorite in recent years mentioned yet...
When all towers come tumbling down in FIGHT CLUB (a visual made even ickier by everything that's happened since) as the Pixies song revs up and snorts... and hey, wait - is that a cock?
Also two great early 70's Nicholson disappearing acts - getting swallowed up and vanishing into the anonymity via an 18-wheeler in FIVE EASY PIECES, as well as Jack's huffing and ineffectually sputtering invective clear out of the frame at the end of THE LAST DETAIL.
A little surprised to see such love for the dancing billboard in CARLITO'S WAY -- it always struck me as a bit mawkish for such a cheerfully cynical movie. But then again, maybe I just never bought the Penelope Ann Miller subplot -- I always considered the movie's real driving love story was between Al and Sean.
Just thought of one more recent one -- the coffee shop at the end of Y TU MAMA TAMBIEN. A whole movie full of wide open skies and boundless horizons, and that last shot is almost 50% ceiling - bearing down on the characters like a lead weight. (Great Zappa music cue, too.)
And ditto to everything Dignan said about LAST TEMPTATION - a movie I used to make a point of watching every Good Friday. Couldn't find the time this year, so I guess I'm even more lapsed than usual.
Well, damn. A lot of great closers have been mentioned before I got here (Barton Fink!). Maybe I can squeeze a couple others out.
Videodrome: James Woods closes his eyes and transcends physical being. Maybe my favorite ending shot ever.
Twentynine Palms: Argue all you want about the film itself, but that last shot is some kind of placid, freaky work of genius.
The Telephone Book: I haven't seen this uber-obscure NYC underground feature for a couple of years, but I've been thinking about it a lot lately for some reason. The last shot is great: Alice, the lead character, is slumped in a phone booth, knocked out by the ultimate orgasm, and the man who gave it to her walks back off into the city.
A Zed and Two Noughts: In the end, we're just decaying matter.
Rejected: Don Hertzfeldt's short gem ends with the artist's vision so compromised that his world falls to pieces. One character gets stuck in the middle of the chaos, and all he can do is scream. This image is so indelible that I had it tattooed on my right shoulder.
Wagstaff, how about the last shot of The Birds, where the survivors drive away into a world that looks overrun by birds? You want more Hitch, you got more Hitch. That ending scared me shitless as a kid.
Tuwa: Parallax View: the rush towards the doorway and the looming silhouette.
Actually, there's still 2 minutes left in the movie after that.
The 400 Blows--great choice.
SB:Jack's huffing and ineffectually sputtering invective clear out of the frame at the end of THE LAST DETAIL.
My favorite Jack performance! My Pops, who was a sailor, says this is one of the most honest depictions of sailor life/attitude he's ever seen.
Also SB: and hey, wait - is that a cock?
I'll take "Words I never hope to hear while naked for $300, Alex." If you have to ask, it's not a very impressive ding-a-ling.
Steve, I can't go with you on Twentynine Palms, which I wish I could have Brillo padded out of my brain, but the Rejected image is a great mention.
All right gang, so I subjected our Host's movie HOME to the opening and closing shot polygraph, and the results are entirely consistent with the body of the movie. The opening establishes a no nonsense verisimilitude with something lyrical edging underneath, and in the closing shot a face disappears from the frame and a gate closes. I'd say the significance here, besides the simplicity, is that when it closes we are on the inside and not on the outside. Anyway, back to the lab.
I'd nominate the parting shot from On Her Majesty's Secret Service.
Wagstaff: Your interpretation of the opening and closing shots was spot-on. The whole movie is deliberately constructed at that level -- a very basic conceptual level. Inside/outside, upstairs/downstairs are always important, as are windows, doors, bars and other elements. It's great to hear that it came across in some form. So thank you.
Odie: My favorite Jack performance!
Hear! Hear! It used to be a running joke around my theater that you could tell it was time for my projectionist and I to go home when we started banging our fists on the bar and yelling: "I am the motherfucking shore patrol, motherfucker!"
You can't beat that early 70's Nicholson run (roughly from FIVE EASY PIECES through CHINATOWN) for such an unflinching, oddly magnetic look at the failed, seething, dissatisfied American male.
My favorite Nicholson moment ever comes in LAST DETAIL, when Randy Quaid and Gilda Radner and all the Buddhists are exumberantly chanting and sharing and celebrating - yet Jack hangs back in the doorway, almost like he can't even force himself to enter a room full of so much happiness. He wonders aloud: "Why does this kind of thing always make me feel so fucking bad?"
Now that I think about it --tying this into every Monday's thread-- you can see a lot of that early Jack character's DNA in Gandolfini's Tony Soprano.
Also, I can't believe I forgot the close of LA DOLCE VITA - as the young girl (re: Marcello's last trace of idealism) beckons from across the beach... and he can't hear a word she's saying.
And yes to everything Wagstaff just said. The more I watch HOME, the more that gate becomes a crucial supporting character.
Odienator: I stand corrected.
I'd propose another but I can't think of any more offhand.
I notice someone mentioned the end of Rushmore: the end of The Royal Tenebaums does the same thing, putting the characters into slow motion. Except in this case it's as they walk away from the grave, and then it tracks into the closing gate with the name "Tenenbaum."
Keith Uhlich:
"Munich -- the corrective to Michael Haneke's facile Cache. An image no less hidden for being so brilliantly obvious."
Funny. I thought Munich, with its painfully telegraphed screenplay -- Avner ends up HIDING IN HIS OWN CLOSET LIKE THE MAN IN HIS COLLEAGUE'S ANECDOTE but not before glancing forlornly at a store-window kitchen that reminds him of THE HOME HE'S LEFT BEHIND and THE HOME HE WANTS TO MAKE FOR HIMSELF(oh, and apparently VIOLENCE IS CYCLICAL) -- was pretty darn facile... right down to the last shot, which is certainly obvious -- and cribbed from Gangs of New York, to boot.
So, I nominate the last shot of Cache as the best ending of the past year, and one of my favourite ever. Actually, I love the last two shots, which inform each other in a way that's lucid and heartbreaking. The long take of Majid being taken away from Georges' childhood home, filmed from what we can only assume is Georges' own vantage point -- distant, detached, cowering in the back of the barn. Then there's the shot of Pierott leaving his school. Forget, for a moment, the potential (and I think very hopeful) implications of his brief exchange with Majid's son, and consider the sight of dozens of French children returning safely to the arms of their waiting parents. Then think about the previous shot.
And while I'm defending Haneke, how about the similarly brilliant final take of his 2003 apocalypse drama Time of the Wolf? A P.O.V. shot from a moving train that asks us to consider not only whether the train is coming or going (a question of great import to the film's stranded characters) but what our responsibilities might be as passengers.
three more:
1)The last shot of the Dardenne brothers' new masterpiece L'Enfant, describing a breathless, reckless, impossible reconciliation.
2) Tricia Vessey spotting the droplet of blood on the shower curtain while hugging Vincent Gallo at the end of Trouble Every Day.
3) Donald Sutherland ratting out Veronica Cartwright -- and freaking me out for life in the process -- at the end of Kaufman's Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
Funny you should mention that Adam N; I just watched that again recently, thought of it in connection to this post, and forgot it again in the time it took me to organize my thoughts. That one is a classic, though--brilliant and chilling.
so... no love for "Gallipoli" ?
Te creepy/funny final shot of High Tension
The final freeze frame of Laura Palmer's face in Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me
The ending of Akira Kurosawa's Ikiru
The cliffhanger ending of The Empire Strikes Back
The Firefly family getting pumped full of bullets to "Freebird" in The Devil's Rejects
By far my favorite: the closing shots of Letter from an Unknown Woman. Louis Jourdan looks back toward a building, trying to remember the face of the woman who had borne him a child and loved him up to the moment she died. Finally, his memory conjures her up--still a child, shyly holding the door open for him. He turns and enters his coach, off to fight a duel in which we know he will die, but more human in that moment than we have ever seen him before.
So far from watching this without crying, I can't even describe it without crying.
Campaspe: So far from watching this without crying, I can't even describe it without crying.
Wow. Your description makes me want to watch this movie!
Wagstaff:I'd say the significance here, besides the simplicity, is that when it closes we are on the inside and not on the outside.
Wagstaff, this is interesting, because for the life of me, I thought I was on the outside of the gate. I don't doubt you, as the director himself has said you were spot on. But I wonder what caused the inversion in my mind.
SB: You can't beat that early 70's Nicholson run (roughly from FIVE EASY PIECES through CHINATOWN) for such an unflinching, oddly magnetic look at the failed, seething, dissatisfied American male.
Yes, and you never feel like he's seeking your pity, nor does he ever ask you to identify with him.
Tuwa: That one is a classic, though--brilliant and chilling.
Which one? Invasion? Sorry, I didn't know which one you were addressing.
Anonymous: Defend Gallipoli's ending, so we can see the error of our ways.
Gene Hackman playing sax in his torn-up apartment at the end of The Conversation -- just fantastic.
A sentimental parting-shot favorite is Diner's, with the bride's bouquet skimming the fingertips of the women and landing on the guy's table.
Odienator writes of the HOME ending, "Wagstaff, this is interesting, because for the life of me, I thought I was on the outside of the gate. I don't doubt you, as the director himself has said you were spot on. But I wonder what caused the inversion in my mind."
It's been a while since you saw the movie, so the details may be fuzzy. But remember, there are three partitions separating the outdoors from the interior of the house: there's a little tiny gate that separates the sidewalk from the house; there's an iron door under the brownstone steps, and beyond that, there's the actual front door of the apartment, which is wooden.
At the end of the movie, Bobby storms out of the house, leaving the wooden front door, the wrought iron alcove door under the steps, and the little swinging gate outside wide open. Susan goes outside to look for Bobby, stands there for a minute by herself, then goes back inside, closing first the wrought iron and then the wooden door behind her. On the way up the stairs to her bedroom she hears the little sidewalk gate squeak (the squeak is a recurring noise in the movie, particularly in that big scene outdoors between the two of them), then goes back downstairs, opens the wooden door, steps into the alcove beneath the brownstone stairs, and looks out to see Bobby standing there, looking at her through that locked wrought-iron door. After a moment, Susan opens the iron door and he steps inside, then she shuts and locks the iron door behind Bobby. The camera lingers on the bars of that iron door while you hear her shutting the wooden door as (presumably) the two of them go inside for the night. At the sound of the wooden door closing (which we hear but don't see), there's a cut to black, and the credits roll.
In the retelling, this can get confusing because some people use the word "gate" to refer to that big iron door under the brownstone steps (Wagstaff, for instance), but others (Sean Burns, above) use "gate" to refer to that little gate leading to the sidewalk, the one Bobby and Susan toy with in their flirting scene.
But obviously, from a filmmaking standpoint they're all used in similar ways, as ways of establishing boundaries between characters, and then removing those boundaries so that a connection can happen.
Logically, though, in that shot Wagstaff describes, Bobby HAS to be on the outside of that wrought iron door, because mere seconds earlier, you saw Susan go inside the house by herself, closing and locking both doors behind her.
That was probably more information than you needed, but what the hell.
Matt:
Darabont's commentary track on the Shawshank DVD reveals that that last shot was actually a studio intrusion. The film was intended to end with the shot of the bus driving away from the camera (same narration though). WB insisted that the audience would have killed them if they didn't give us at least a taste (and confirmation) of the Red/Andy reunion. Darabont resisted strenuously but eventually gave in and shot the visual coda.
Andrew - Re. Monster's Inc: Me too brother, me too. Tearing up remembering it.
Odienator: Yes, sorry. The 1978 Invasion of the Body Snatchers, with the closeup at the end and that (equally hair-raising) shriek/scream.
The montage at the end of V for Vendetta - where the crowd removes their masks, revealing characters (some that have been killed) from throughout the movie - was a nice touch.
The completely whacked-out final shot of Sleepaway Camp.
The coda at the end of Animal House where the bad guys are destroyed by a society whose rules they happily and thoughtlessly enforced.
The final celebretory (crane?) shot of the original Bad News Bears.
Matt, I appreciate you distinguishing between the 3 door/barriers. I would have gone right on using the word "gate" for two of them. BTW, I like the attention paid to that sidewalk gate. I love little observed moments like that in a movie, they really do it for me.
Mr. Odienator, If I remember right, in your overall review of HOME in a comment thread awhile ago, you said much the same thing: fish out of water- desire to wield pimpstick, ect. In my take on the final shot, I meant "we" as in "we, the camera." A decision was made, whether conscious or intuitive, or however such creative decisions are made ( I'm not a movie director, but I play one in my head) to place the camera inside instead of outside. Regardless, you shouldn't feel so all alone with your "outsider" reaction. I gather from your comments (and I've become a fan) that you are eastcoast native, so let me come at it from a west of the Mississippi angle. First of all, I've never been to Brooklyn, nonetheless I'll say that Matt, you've totally got that voodoo of location thing down. I read books and see movies a lot of times to experience things that I otherwise would never experience, and on that count, after viewing HOME, I really feel like I've been to one of those parties. My social sphere is nowhere near as sophisticated as the one in HOME, but my B.S. detector is informed by a couple of smart people parties I went to in San Francisco over a decade ago, and I found the movie all very convincing. As far as feeling comfortable at such an affair, I would fall somewhere in the middle: not exactly a fish in the right water, but I'd get along okay for a couple of evenings anyway. Also, there is an edgyness to New Yorkers that comes across to midwesterners like myself that is disconcerting and a little intimidating. To paraphrase the movie, they haven't toned down their intensity very much. I hasten to add that in my own travels to the big city, the locals have never treated this stranger with anything but kindness, so it's more in the way we see how New Yorkers deal with one another. I'm sure our director understands this, being raised in Kansas and Texas and all. I've shown this movie to several friends, all Okies, and gotten some varied reactions on this front. One of my favorites that I thought was kinda funny came from a friend who is far from being an intellectual-type, but whose reactions to movies often astound me with their insight. Ten minutes into the movie, he turned to me and said "So they're all vampires, right?"
Gordon: The completely whacked-out final shot of Sleepaway Camp.
Interesting choice! You know, that shot doesn't come out of nowhere. The movie sets you up for it well in advance. I wasn't surprised.
A while back, I went on the 'Net to do some research on Sleepaway Camp, which I had seen but never bothered to write a review for it. Everyone seemed bugged by the ending, saying it was "disgusting", "gay", etc.
I find it kind of funny that people were so disturbed by the ending, yet no one seemed to mind seeing someone get killed by a curling iron shoved up their boonky.
Wagstaff: I've never been to Brooklyn, nonetheless I'll say that Matt, you've totally got that voodoo of location thing down.
I've been to "Bwooklyn" hundreds of times, Wagstaff, and you are right about Matt nailing the mise en scene of both the party and the environment. For the record, I liked the movie most for precisely that point--it's good at what it evokes and how it portrays its characters. Otherwise, I wouldn't have wanted to beat the shit out of them with the aforementioned pimp stick (which actually does exist--I have TWO) ; I would have wanted to do that in real life, too. An apathetic reaction, which I certainly did not have, would have indicated that the movie didn't work for me.
All the bells and whistles of sound/visual motifs are nice too. They were like little secret agents operating on the wavelengths only dogs like Odie can hear.
Thanks for the take from west of the Mississippi (and for the shout out as well). I can't say I've been to Oklahoma, but I once did a programming tour of duty in Nacogdoches, Texas. That will make a great chapter in my autobiography. I also lived in the Midwest for 2 years, which proved that I fit in better here, with the view of the Hudson greeting me from my window every morning. Besides, my accent scared the hell out of people out there.
And yes, vampires live in Brooklyn.
I just saw THE DEATH OF MR. LAZARESCU. It doesn't officially get released until April 28, so I won't describe the final shot, but suffice to say that it belongs on this list.
Some more fab parting shots:
Fresh: the young boy crying
Trees Lounge: a devastated Buscemi, just sitting at the bar.
Naked: Thewlis hopping down the road
Silent Running: pulling out from the drone taking care of the plants, through the roof of the dome to watch it float in empty lonely space (a childhood fave)
Irma Vep: the crazy laser beams and stars on Maggie Cheung's eyes in the film-within-a-film.
I am thrilled that I got quoted in the latest Sopranos post. Very cool. Now don't make me open up a can of kiss-ass.
Wagstaff: Naw, man, you got me all wrong. I'm not being nice, just covering my ass. If I quoted you without attribution, half the Houseguests would eat my lunch.
So it's all about your lunch, eh? I should've known. Well that's the last time I try to say something interesting! I keeed, I keeed.
69 posts, and not even Sean B. mentions the final embrace of Michael Mann's "Heat"???? Talk about a philosophy expressed in the final shot of a film.
p. vice: 69 posts, and not even Sean B. mentions the final embrace of Michael Mann's "Heat"????
That's why we have you, p. Vice.
Can't believe this section has all but died without mention of two of the great inscrutable final shots (spoilers, sorta.):
* Beau Travail: Out of (almost) nowhere, Denis Lavant boogies down to no less than "Rhythm of the Night." One more giant ellipsis...
* Days of Being Wild: Out of, um, even more than nowhere, Wong Kar-Wai abruptly winds the film down with a moustachioed Tony Leung: a character we haven't seen before and, this being the final shot, have no chance to get to know. He gets dressed in his cramped apartment, turns off the lights, and FIN! (Admittedly, he's supposed to be the character who becomes Leung's 2046 lothario, and therefore Leung's sadsack cuckold from In the Mood For Love. What a great intro!)
Matt, I have seen Beau Travail, but not Days of Being Wild. I do not recall the guy dancing to the 80's DeBarge classic from The Last Dragon, though. Of course, I block out everything Claire Denis does, so perhaps you're right.
Odienator:
ugh.
Claire Denis is a wonderful filmmaker, and the last scene of Beau Travail --a rapturous explosion of movement from a character defined by his clenched, repressive nature -- is one of my favorites. I mentioned the ending of Trouble Every Day earlier, and I'd say that there's even a third Denis ending that warrants mention: Valerie LeMercier skipping down the street at dawn in Friday Night (2002).
Adam, you've a right to your love of Ms. Denis, and it sounds like you have enough to cover both of us.
I recall getting into a disagreement with someone on line at the NY Film Festival the year that Friday Night played there. It was one of the few movies left that actually had seats available. The guy with the sign that tells you what's sold out came by, and he said "Friday Night" tickets are available. I said "why do I wanna see that shit?!" Almost immediately, this crazed French woman started yelling at me for dissing Denis.
"You have no taste in ze cinema!" she yelled. "Denis ees magnifique!" Then she went off in French for like five minutes. I didn't learn French until 2004, when I went to Paris, so I had no idea what the hell she was saying.
After she finished, I said "Claire, is that you?"
I don't think she got the joke.
Odie:
(chuckles) that's a good story... and hey, maybe it was her. I certainly didn't mean to sound hectoring: you've an inalienable right to dismiss CD, of course.It just so happens that I love a lot of her movies. (Trouble Every Day kind of got away from her, even though it's beautifully made.) I've interviewed her twice, and I can say that she's a lot like David Lynch in that she's very sweet and unpretentious. She comes by her ellipticism honestly -- if it doesn't work for you, what can you do?
Also can't believe I forgot "Long Good Friday." Among the greatest final shots ever filmed. Hoskins just gritting his teeth, pure rage. Mesmerizing.
Late to this one as usual, and I think I'm just going to be sheerly perverse (though these are shots I authentically admire) ...
DEAD OR ALIVE (Takashi Miike). Come on now, if anything ever topped the finale to THE FURY, this is the one that did.
SON OF GODZILLA (Jun Fukuda). Father and son monsters calmed and ensleeped (is that a word? well it is now) by a sudden influx of South Pacific snow, with Godzilla finally accepting his role as a dad (he is distinctly unhappy with the proposition for most of the picture prior).
RODAN (Ishiro Honda). The American version of this one adds Keye Luke's poignant narration and dials the music way up (as it should have been in the original); it's hard to know whether for once the American packagers had the right idea or whether Honda was right to leave it to the viewer to decide what's going on when, as Luke says, "they sank to the earth like weary children."
THE OMEN (Richard Donner). Donner reveals on the DVD commentary that the closing shot of Damien giggling was purely accidental, but he realized that was absolutely perfect, bless his heart.
EXTREME PREJUDICE (Walter Hill). Yes, it's basically a WILD BUNCH imitation, but I've always had a soft spot for this picture, and the last shot of the Mexicans kicking the hat around in the dust as we fade to the strains of Jerry Goldsmith's phenomenal end title has never left me.
I did say I was being perverse (insert obnoxious winky-face).
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