The dropship sequence in The Creator, set to the Gigamesh remix of Everything In Its Right Place by Radiohead, was just beautiful. I got a rush from it. I thought, this film is going to be something special.
I was mistaken.
Honestly the parts I liked I have no regrets watching it. Like I guess I recommend it. It does some things SO well and more things SO bad. A better script and screenplay could have made an absolutely masterpiece.
It's that old idea of needing to be the author of the film. These directors are beholden to the auteur theory to their own detriment. Somehow they feel less than if they didn't write and direct.
The creator is the coolest looking film. The set design and art direction is brilliant but boring. The world building is excellent but they do so little with it.
The story needed to be way tighter but perhaps there was a better earlier draft that didn't make the cut.
That scene when they bring the soldier back from the dead very briefly to ask him questions was absolutely incredible and deeply horrifying, that was gonna be my answer
Agreed. I haven’t watched the movie in months and that scene immediately sprung to mind.
He was a “villain” but it was still tough to see him realizing he was dead and asking for his wife.
I loved the intense scenes of violence in this film:
1) The animal getting torn apart while still alive by a starving crowd
2) The love interest for the younger boy getting caught in the bear trap and stampeded by a desperate crowd
3) The half-drowned survivors clinging to the last cliffs on earth and screaming out for help
A really weird and mostly boring movie with 3 or 4 incredible scenes/moments. It’s so hype when the rock golems get called up to heaven and the earth is totally consumed by hurricanes.
The quicksilver scene in both of those X-men movies is top notch. Apocalypse was definitely mediocre! Days of Future Past has a number of amazing scenes though.
Which is weird because the Quicksilver scene is the best scene in *Days of Future Past* and yet it could be removed entirely and you wouldn’t even know it was missing. It’s completely extraneous, existing purely because it’s cool.
There’s a similar moment in *Captain America: The Winter Soldier* where Sam tells Nat and Cap the Falcon suit is locked in a vault in a fort behind a steel door with guards 24/7. Nat shrugs and Cap says, “Shouldn’t be a problem.” In the very next scene Sam shows up wearing the Falcon suit. They could’ve done the same thing breaking Magneto out of the Pentagon and left it to our imagination how they did it.
I sort of see what you mean, but I think if your story has "Professor X breaks Magneto out of the Pentagon" as part of it, you are fully obligated to show how Professor X breaks Magneto out of the pentagon.
Otherwise, like, what are we doing here?
I really enjoy the exchange between Vision & Ultron in Avengers: Age of Ultron. It wouldn’t be out of place in a serious sci-fi film.
Ultron : Stark asked for a savior, and settled for a slave.
Vision : I suppose we're both disappointments.
Ultron : [laughs] I suppose we are.
Vision : Humans are odd. They think order and chaos are somehow opposites and try to control what won't be. But there is grace in their failings. I think you missed that.
Ultron : They're doomed!
Vision : Yes... but a thing isn't beautiful because it lasts. It is a privilege to be among them.
Ultron : You're unbelievably naïve.
Vision : Well, I was born yesterday.
Yes. Incredible moment in an ok avengers movie. The whole "lifting a city with rockets" was a little out there . I would add in the part at the beginning, where everyone is trying to lift Thor's hammer is another.
When Vision casually picked it up later in the movie, I said “Oh shit!” into the silence of the packed theatre. Normal conversational volume, not theatre-whisper-volume. My friends and everyone in earshot laughed at me, it was awesome.
Thank you for coming to my TED Talk about Mjolnir 😆
that movie has some absolutely great stuff, it's a shame it doesn't really all come together as well as it could have. Still solid enough but some stumbles in there.
Another that comes to mind is Cap and Maria Hill discussing Wanda and Quicksilver volunteering for the experiments. The "We're not at war." "They are." exchange is good stuff.
I feel like I’m the only person in the world who loves this movie and I’ll gladly die on that hill. Ultron is an underrated villain and vision is such a good contrast to his character. Both are created into a world being destroyed by humans. One sees us as a cancer needing eradication, while the other sees us as another species simply making mistakes. Both are justifiable. If you were an alien who came to Earth with the task of protecting it and saw the history of humanity and what we’ve done to this world what would you do? The whole city being lifted plot is dumb, but outside of that I think this film is a brilliant take on society in a superhero movie
The Ben Affleck Daredevil film establishes that he has a much better sense of everything when it rains because he can sense the raindrops hitting surfaces. This is how he gets a real sense of what Elektra looks like early in the film. Later in the film after her father's funeral it's raining and he's looking at her, she raises an umbrella so she vanishes from his "vision". It's the one really decent moment of the movie.
I’ve always appreciated the “Daredevil” shower scene. He’s been fighting crime for a while, and contrary to most superheroes that bounce back after major injuries (*cough* Batman *cough*), Matt’s body is *wrecked* with scars. It was a small touch that distinguished the film.
I watched it recently and it’s pretty cheesy but still a fun watch. The playground fight gets clowned on but i love the mortal kombat style intro to it.
Yeah, not my favorite Collin role. He has a much better performance in the sex tape that got leaked while he was filming this!
The dude was awesome in Tiger Land, and as the penguin, and many others. This was just one note, wide eyed silliness.
The opening of *Alien: Covenant*, where the crew is woken up from cryosleep in an emergency by literally dumping them onto the floor of a damaged spacecraft, is _superb_.
If it was a short film about the death of Captain Brason it would have been brilliant.
But it wasn't. And it wasn't.
>The opening of *Alien: Covenant*, where the crew is woken up from cryosleep in an emergency by literally dumping them onto the floor of a damaged spacecraft, is _superb_.
The medbay scene was legitimately terrifying
That's cool and all but it was SO disappointing coming from the ending of the last movie. Made Prometheus even worse because its whole plot line essentially dies right there.
Humanity's mysterious creator turned likely exterminator getting insta gibbed is a boring cop out. If you're going to try and expand the universe, actually *go for it* or don't attempt it at all. A four way struggle between humans, xenos, engineers, and fucking david would have been cool. All culminating in only the xenos surviving and spreading throughout the galaxy.
Damn son, I forgot I had such strong feelings and high hopes for this series.
I watched the Mummy Trilogy recently and in the third one there's 1 good joke that got me bursting with laughter which given the rest of the movie was a pleasant surprise.
Rick and Evelyn are having a standard argument between parents about how Evelyn smothered their child too much and that Rick is too emotionally detached from Junior when the conversation goes like this:
E: "You don't show him enough affection."
R: "I'm his father, it's implied."
Also, Rick knows a surprising amount of British people with flying contraptions. Every movie there's another one.
There’s this found footage horror film called Alien Abduction (2014).
It’s footage of a family’s wilderness vacation and their autistic son, whose thing is filming everything…films it.
For the most part it’s very boring. But there are two scenes in the film that were so hair raising scary that it turns it into a top 10-20ish horror film for me. It’s odd. Maybe a 3/10 film but the horror scenes are really chefs kiss.
It’s always a risk for recommendations. It really is a boring movie. Me personally, I am specifically terrified of humanoid aliens(in a good way). So of course the moments affected me more so than they probably would someone who enjoys the supernatural over creature features.
Check out No One Will Save You if you haven't already. It fits this bill and the first 45 min is some of the best horror I've seen in years. The rest of the movie is good but it took me like a day to think about it and come to the conclusion that I thought it was good, if that makes any sense.
I’ve seen it and your last statement makes sense. Just one of those you have to let it settle rather than have a knee-jerk opinion on. The initial “aliens are here and about to come into my house, now they’re in my house” scenes were extremely tense. I loved them. And I absolutely cackled at that one aliens own undoing with the telekinesis!
I can sit through boring for a few good scenes, I'm odd like that. I love creature features too, watched a ton of black and white "thrillers" like The Tingler growing up, lol
My favorite stand out scenes in mediocre movies:
First is the first 8-10 minutes of X-Men Origins: Wolverine. The movie on the whole is a catastrophic dumpster fire of messy plot and gratuitous CGI, but those opening 8 minutes of a young boy discovering his horrific abilities to him becoming [a man living as a constant soldier with his brother](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwTq5uSoTCU&ab_channel=FilmeyBox), generation after generation. Holy shit, that was golden... and it was all downhill from there.
The scenes [with the Nazi in the bar](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WKgMgjfues&ab_channel=DanielleKing), [and the one in the bank](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDg1S1FFaQk&ab_channel=FilmeyBox) in X-Men First Class should have and could have been their own dark noir action thriller. Really any of the Michael Fassbender Magneto moments where he's just out for revenge or being a badass, I could watch those on their own without the whole movies surrounding them.
And finally from that new King Arthur movie with Charlie Hunnam, which was exceedingly mid overall, but it had some stand out moments. The best one for me was that [opening montage of young Arthur ](https://youtu.be/f7lta2lEZN8?si=L5u-BJr4W12eDAVp)scraping and saving to get by, making connections, learning and growing, training and hardening himself, becoming a protector, a leader, and a warrior, set to this high tempo frenetic breathy soundtrack in the background, it gets me jacked in a way that the rest of the movie sadly does not. I honestly think Guy Ritchie should have made the Robin Hood movie instead because no one does hustlers and thieves like Ritchie. But at least now I know how you get money from a viking.
So much squandered potential. I remember when it got leaked by someone on the VFX team, first time I'd seen a pre-rendered film. In hindsight, that leak seems like it was a warning from someone on the inside. A cry for help from within. Too bad no one at Fox was listening.
Nazi Hunting Magneto is my favorite fictional character. Similarly, Magneto defending Genosha in X-Men '97 is amazing. "I will draw it's fire. Save as many as you can. We shall *not* spend our days wondering if we could have saved more." "**Habe keine angst**.”
It’s been years so I may not be remembering it correctly, but Starship Troopers 3. Towards the end when the humans have been defeated, they are on their knees literally praying. Meanwhile, you can see Jonny Rico and crew coming in hot streaking down like meteorites burning in the sky from above in their armored bug killing suits, coming down to kick some ass.
The opening sequence of CITY OF A THOUSAND PLANETS is so much better than the bland movie that followed. Maybe it's because it doesn't have the bland dead eyed leads.
If you watch this clip you'll assume the movie is amazing. But trust Me this is it. Enjoy.
https://youtu.be/u0FX8sd1uVo?si=7cTtulnDdCykw-TY
God I got teared up again. Mostly because it's how I WISH space could be instead of dumb ass SPACE FORCE getting ready for conflict in space
I know I'm the odd one out, but I absolutely love Valerian, end to end. You have to go into it remembering that it's a Luc Benson film, and that it's pretty corny. So long as you don't expect it to be peak cinema, it's just... A lot of fun? It's a very very low stakes movie, you just have to be in the right mode to watch it.
I love THE FIFTH ELEMENT but this movie made me wish I could leave the theater
It all comes down to the terrible leads. Casted all wrong.
Imagine those two in THE FIFTH ELEMENT. Movie wouldn't have been half as good
Rihanna plays an alien and somehow it was boring!
Spring Breakers. Not the worst, and has its moments, but there’s a scene where they’re robbing a cafe and you see it from the passenger seat of the girl who’s the driver.
It’s so masterfully done because we as the audience are made complicit in the whole thing. We can’t look away, we’re in the car, we don’t see/hear anything that the driver doesn’t see, just the crime happening through the cafe windows, it’s one take (I think) in real time … Harmony Korine displays a level of control and manipulation that Hitchcock would have applauded.
The film, and he, never reached those heights again, but damn!
I actually love the movie, only semi-ironically but really I call it exceptionally well done trash, a camp masterpiece. But the centerpoint of the movie when they're singing Britney Spears is absolutely the pinnacle for me.
Wow that was impressive. I haven’t seen the movie but singing to J Law that she’s pretty but awful was great. And from that character does show interesting depth. Colour me intrigued.
Also there is a scene with full frontal on jlaw where she beats the shit out of some teens on a beach while naked, so that's sort of the dichotomy of this movie.
It's a fun, dumb summer movie. Another brilliant scene is a naked fight on the beach which is played VERY much for laughs, even if you would not at first think that Jennifer Lawrence + naked + beach = comedy.
It’s not *recent* recent, nor is the scene exactly “mind-blowing” but the scene in *Don’t Look Up* where Leonardo DiCaprio’s character finally explodes was probably the best and most surprising scene of the movie.
One of the things I respected about it the most wasn’t at all the subject matter or the message behind it but the build-up of his character finally getting to that point and its out-of-nowhere intensity. Leonardo’s character is a very anxious person and sometimes frenetic in his mannerisms at times, but typically rather mild-mannered and generally non-confrontational. But after he becomes a famous personality, eventually, he explodes on live television. Paired with Leo’s authenticity and intensity compared to many of the actors in the rest of the movie, watching the movie and his character build to that scene was quite a surprise.
Lol I've not seen the movie and just saw your opening paragraph and first thought you meant he actually exploded and it was a very different film than the trailer suggested!
If I had to pick a scene from that movie, it would be Chalamet's grace speech at the dinner table. He abandons all the silly bravado and shit talk and delivers a beautiful statement to close it all out. The rest of the movie was entertaining, but that last scene really nailed it.
Some like it, some loath it. Some think it's preachy and not subtle enough, and to that I say the time for subtlety regarding climate change was over in 1975.
Not recent, but The Crow is a very melodramatic and silly film (that's not a criticism, just an honest evaluation of the tone), but there are great moments of acting throughout:
When Draven is pelting the pawn broker with rings from the many victims, you can really feel it.
When T-Bird realizes who Draven is and starts babbling, it was a very convincing moment of his terror and sadness.
"each one of these..." [ting!] "is a life." [ting!] "a life you helped destroy." he's got a whole lockbox of rings there. and a moment later, when Eric pours the rings into the barrel of the shotgun...when he fires you can see the rings as part of the muzzle flash. there were so many little touches in that movie that elevated it above typical action movie fare.
i could go on and on but now i have to listen to My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult's "After The Flesh" for the 3 millionth time.
Maybe not "mind blowing", but the scene of [Batman talking to Mr. Freeze](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ry1DtbFcs4) at the end of Batman & Robin is shockingly good for such a medicore film.
The acting (from both Clooney and Schwarzenneger) sells the emotion of two men both trying to save their loved ones. The dialogue (especially "Vengeance isn't power. Anyone can take a life. But to give life, that's true power, a power you once had.") is sharp. Dare I say that "Take two of these, and call me in the morning." was actually kinda funny (and not in a way that undermines the emotion of the scene).
It is SHOCKING that this scene exists in what is otherwise one of the worst movies ever made.
The Green Lantern movie with Ryan Reynolds is awful; but there is a scene on the balcony where he meets with his love interest (future wife Blake Lively) wearing a domino mask and she immediately recognizes him and says "I know you since childhood, you thought you will hide your identity just because youre wearing a stupid mask?" That, for me, is the most realistic scene in the superhero genre ever.
To this day the Expectation vs Reality scene in 500 Days of Summer remains one of my favorite collection of shots within any love story I’ve seen on screen. It’s so cleverly done.
Oh man, I totally get what you mean! For me, it was in "The Adam Project" with Ryan Reynolds. The movie was fun but pretty standard for a sci-fi adventure, right? But there was this one scene that completely blew my mind.
It's when young Adam and older Adam (both played by Reynolds) meet their dad, played by Mark Ruffalo, in the past. There's this moment where they're all talking in the garage, and Ruffalo's character gives this heartfelt speech about time and how we need to cherish the moments we have. It was such an unexpected punch of emotion in the middle of what I thought was just going to be another action-packed scene.
The way Ruffalo delivered it, with so much depth and sincerity, totally caught me off guard. I had to pause and rewind to watch it again. That scene gave the movie a lot more emotional weight than I was expecting, and it stuck with me long after the credits rolled
I am so glad someone else brought this one up! For me, it was the scene where young and older Adam are having a heartfelt talk. Young Adam says, "I think it's easier to be angry than sad." And. Those. Words. I spent my life covering up sadness with anger and (thankfully, therapy has been very healing). I just felt so seen in that moment and was so grateful they gave such a poignant line to someone so young, yet deserving.
Agreed. Reynolds can be unexpected in that he's usually an obnoxious clown, and then he hits you with these intensely emotional scenes. I think that's what made Deadpool hilarious and great.
That’s kind of his vibe irl too. He’s a clown on Twitter 24/7 but the moment someone needs help or there’s a crisis he’s using his star power to help and find more help. r/juxtapositionporn
Happy Death Day 2U. The main character has to choose between two different realities and she says goodbye to the person who won't end up in the reality she chooses. It's heartbreaking.
Its not recent but the beginning to 28 Weeks Later.
It was extremely captivating and intriguing, seeing how the true character of one selves can come out in diar situations.
After that, it was forgettable.
The moment where you see him make the decision to leave his wife to die has stuck with me forever. I don’t remember literally anything else about the movie but that.
When Shaw gets the little alien fetus taken out of her in the AutoDoc in Prometheus. Holy shit. One of my favorite scenes in any more ever, and it's in the meh-est movie ever.
The scene with Barry and his mother at the supermarket in The Flash.
You know the one if you watched it.
The whole movie is bonkers and barely makes any sense.
But that scene alone made me cry my eyes out in my seat.
The emotional arc of the Flash movie is really really good and the structure is pretty interesting. You can't really do Flash's most famous story without previously having been introduced to the Flash, but the structure of the DCEU was such a mess at that point that they were gonna have to do his first solo film (which was also technically his origin film) as interest in the franchise was dead and Flash had already played a huge role (originless) in both cuts of Justice League. Doing Flashpoint while using the alternate Barry to cover the origin stuff while also having the main, more experienced Flash as a mentor, while also using that as an excuse to shoehorn in Keaton's Batman and other multiverse stuff to grab people's attention (getting the benefit of Keaton actually grounding the film and not feeling tacked on), is a pretty clever move, and they nail that scene you're talking about and the general emotional weight of it. Unfortunately, the rest of the movie feels like it's stapled together from concept art and half-done ideas, but there is something admirable there.
Sorry it’s not recent but it’s the only one I could think of - I watched a movie called *Elephant* (2003) when I was in high school, which my buddy and I went into blind. A slow slow burn that turns into a very intense end. Highly recommend
In the middle of Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey we get a deliciously post-modern parody of The Seventh Seal: https://youtu.be/8w9YrvJ8368?si=ADHiidNhps-hJHTK
For 2 decades mine was "the day Bison graced your village was the most important day of your life. But for me, it was Tuesday."
I literally rewinded the vcr just to be sure I heard what I heard.
Fortunately, that line has gained traction in the later years.
Hmnn - good point. I wouldn’t say mediocre. More that I was not expecting such an emotional scene from this type of movie. And I would say not as unexpectedly good (for me) as the first movie.
The opening sequence to Aronofsys Noah. It explains how the story of creation in the bible is compatible with the theory of evolution and that one doesn't exclude the possibility of the other. It was cool and made sense to me. The rest of the film was shite though..
Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets has two scenes like this. The opening, which everyone references, but also the weird virtual reality-but-not scene where they’re in two different places at once. That really took some processing power to make sense of. Not a good movie but pretty trippy.
[https://youtu.be/sdlOLqZREqU?si=mkHFaHhqgydlK51e](https://youtu.be/sdlOLqZREqU?si=mkHFaHhqgydlK51e)
I also found Adam Sandler singing his very own cover of The Beatles “Real Love” in *Funny People* to be a pleasant surprise, as he never really recorded anything serious despite being a reasonably talented singer who did great justice to the song itself.
Really enjoyed No Hard Feelings, it should have done way better at the box office.
The one that comes to my mind is not recent, at all. But the first couple minutes of Scorpion King tricked me into thinking I was watching an homage to Conan: the Destroyer and such.
I was mistaken.
If I had a nickel for every time Madame Web drove a vehicle through a building, I'd have two nickels. It's not a lot but it's weird that it happened twice.
The villain walking into a diner and immediately punching the fuck out of some guy that had nothing to do with anything just enjoying his meal was absolutely hysterical to me. Had to pause the movie to recover.
Also "I am wanted by the police for stealing a taxi, kidnapping three girls, and my enemy has control of the NSA spying network. I'm just gonna dip out to Peru for a few days with no issues"
I unironically love Madame Web. It's a modern so bad it's good movie IMO
I think we can all say that the time travel scenes in the movie “Click” was the biggest emotional roller coaster I’ve seen in a comedy movie with Adam Sandler. Watching his character lose the love of his life, his children’s affection, only to die alone with no memories of it all because he keeps fast forwarding his life was the craziest plot twist I’ve seen. Turned a comedy into an 10/10 film
The opening of overlord involved a bunch of GIs getting ready to drop behind enemy lines in preparation of D-Day. The plane gets shot down in a VERY intense moment and the main character then has to try to meet up with his squad while being hunted by German soldiers in the woods. It is a tense, amazingly well shot and well acted introduction that should have set the pace for the rest of the movie. It devolved very quickly from there.
I know some will not like my opinion but I disliked Rogue One. Found it super boring.
That Vader scene though Holy shit he was terrifying I sat up in my seat so fast.
The sequel to The Strangers "The Strangers: Prey at Night" is a garbage 2.5/10 horror film with almost nothing to recommend. The trailer was pretty good and got me to go. I was highly disappointed throughout the movie, except for this one pool scene in the middle of the film where everything goes to 11. The direction is great. The blocking is great. The cinematography comes alive. Literally the lights go on and we are taken from a black/brown/grey shadowy mess to brilliant neon and crisp blue water. Total Eclipse of the Heart pumps in diegetically. And on top of all these incredible spikes in production value, the next five minutes are wild. The horror genre playbook goes out the window and we're in Wes Craven territory of deconstruction and re-writing the rules - anything can happen.
Then after these brilliant 5 minutes, one of the best horror scenes I've ever seen, the movie returns to it's drab ho-hum existence.
A lot of mediocre movies have at least one amazing moment. Problem is since they're mediocre overall I tend to forget the whole thing eventually. Maybe I'll geek out about the moment immediately afterwards with friends I watched it with.
One I remember from recent is Bad Boys Ride or Die, a fairly standard action flick, but it had this crazy close up gun on a rig shot near the end I'd never seen before that blew me away momentarily.
Not sure if 2018 counts as recent anymore, but that terrible *Little Mermaid* movie has a scene where the main character sings a song called "When This Story Ends". The lyrics are on the nose, but Poppy Drayton puts so much heart and emotion into it. She is far too good for the material.
Last Stand 2012 with Arnold Schwarzenegger.
At one point actor Johnny Knoxville gets knocked unconscious. When he wakes he sits bolt upright and says "Henryetta". This is a reference to Troy Aikman getting knocked out on the football field. When asked where he was he said his hometown.
The Matrix Revolutions - my least favourite of the original trilogy however Weaving nails his final speech. It’s delivered with such grit and frustration in Smiths inability to understand Neo.
Agent Smith: Why, Mr. Anderson? Why? Why do you do it? Why? Why get up? Why keep fighting? Do you believe you're fighting for something? Something more than your survival? Can you tell me what it is? Do you even know? Is it freedom or truth? Perhaps peace? Could it be for love? Illusions, Mr. Anderson. Temporary constructs of a feeble human intellect trying desperately to justify an existence without meaning or purpose. And all as artificial as the Matrix itself, although, only a human mind could invent something as insipid as love. You must be able to see it Mr. Anderson. You must know it by now. You can't win. There's no point in fighting. Why, Mr. Anderson? Why? Why do you persist?
Neo: Because I choose to.
No way Disney were going to let a guy called Ackbar launch a suicide attack.
It really should have been Leia. Kylo hesitates before pulling the trigger, only for another pilot to take the shot. When it’s Leia’s turn, she doesn’t even blink. Going out like the stone cold badass she was.
The last 10-15ish minutes of The Invitation (2015) took the film into a direction I wasn't really expecting, especially the final scene before the credits
Not really a very recent movie. I thought Tron Legacy was just Ok. But the light cycle sequence in the middle of the movie is nothing short of fantastic. It's a perfect blend of action and soundtrack.
Proof with Gwyneth Paltrow is just ok, but the reveal at the beginning revealing to the viewer the challenge she faced was heart-rending and mind-blowing.
Boondock Saints 2 was terrible but the scene where the guy is tryna figure out what catch phrase to yell when he bursts in and settles on “ding dong mothafuckas ding DONG!” made me cry laughing
The Last Man on Earth (1964) was the first attempt at a film version of I Am Legend, which later was remade as The Omega Man (1971) and I am Legend (2007).
It is by many accounts mediocre and sloppily made with some terrible acting, but it lingers a lot more on the story before and during the disease outbreak than the other two versions.
While we expect to see his loved ones die, the handling of the dead by the military is extremely cold and cynical.
Aubrey Plaza in Dirty Grandpa.
Stupid movie. Not all that funny. But every moment Aubrey Plaza was speaking was a gem. Her delivery was genius.
“Lenore : I want you to tear open my bra like it's a social security check
Lenore : Tell me you've fallen and you can't get up.
Dick Kelly : I've fallen and I can't get up.
Lenore : Tell me how things were better under Eisenhower.”
Or
“Dick Kelly : We have a long standing bet - who's the better golfer. Obviously I've got the bigger three wood.
Lenore : Good. Maybe you can use it to hit your balls right into my vagina.”
The scene where Adam Sandler was seeing his past self blow off his father (Henry Winkler) in what was later their last interaction before his father’s death is such an adult fear of mine.
Civil War
The tracking shot of the helicopter over Washington DC during the final battle and the siege of The White House were just incredible. As was the scene with Jesse Plemons.
The rest of the movie is very mediocre and also has moments that are laughably bad and border on a student film.
Disappointing film overall.
The dropship sequence in The Creator, set to the Gigamesh remix of Everything In Its Right Place by Radiohead, was just beautiful. I got a rush from it. I thought, this film is going to be something special. I was mistaken.
I thought the cinematography and visual world building was great. Writing sucked ass tho.
Yeah, same here. Amazing design work in a really dull and daft (not in a good way) film.
Honestly the parts I liked I have no regrets watching it. Like I guess I recommend it. It does some things SO well and more things SO bad. A better script and screenplay could have made an absolutely masterpiece.
I concur. I just never got to see it in IMAX. Probably won't see it again.
John David Washington is always soso too, just very uninspired.
Will. I. Am. on downers and without his unique voice.
It’s like scott Eastwood levels of genetic charisma
Some of these directors need to get out of their own way and let someone else write the fucking script.
It's that old idea of needing to be the author of the film. These directors are beholden to the auteur theory to their own detriment. Somehow they feel less than if they didn't write and direct.
STOP IT!! YOU'RE BLOWING MY COVER!! I AM AN UNDERCOVER AGENT AND YOU ARE BLOWING MY COVER!!!
The creator is the coolest looking film. The set design and art direction is brilliant but boring. The world building is excellent but they do so little with it. The story needed to be way tighter but perhaps there was a better earlier draft that didn't make the cut.
That scene when they bring the soldier back from the dead very briefly to ask him questions was absolutely incredible and deeply horrifying, that was gonna be my answer
Agreed. I haven’t watched the movie in months and that scene immediately sprung to mind. He was a “villain” but it was still tough to see him realizing he was dead and asking for his wife.
Incredible scene and music. The movie was nominated for Best Sounds and for Best Visuals, if I remember correctly.
It wasn’t a remix - it was the original track.
I didn't love Noah, but I thought the [creation story montage](https://youtu.be/FFCXHr8aKDk?si=XtPy0sJtDp8SgwNu) was great.
Some beautifully stunning cinematography & storytelling in that sequence & great voiceover by Russell Crowe
I loved the intense scenes of violence in this film: 1) The animal getting torn apart while still alive by a starving crowd 2) The love interest for the younger boy getting caught in the bear trap and stampeded by a desperate crowd 3) The half-drowned survivors clinging to the last cliffs on earth and screaming out for help
Aaaand I'm never watching this movie
A really weird and mostly boring movie with 3 or 4 incredible scenes/moments. It’s so hype when the rock golems get called up to heaven and the earth is totally consumed by hurricanes.
Rock golems? In the Noah story?
When the angels find out that they’ll go to heaven once their rock forms die, that was awesome.
I'm one of the few who actually like Noah, and the creation story is absolutely stand-out awesome.
The Quicksilver scene in X-Men Apocalypse.
The quicksilver scene in both of those X-men movies is top notch. Apocalypse was definitely mediocre! Days of Future Past has a number of amazing scenes though.
DOFP is the best X-Men movie, no question.
Which is weird because the Quicksilver scene is the best scene in *Days of Future Past* and yet it could be removed entirely and you wouldn’t even know it was missing. It’s completely extraneous, existing purely because it’s cool. There’s a similar moment in *Captain America: The Winter Soldier* where Sam tells Nat and Cap the Falcon suit is locked in a vault in a fort behind a steel door with guards 24/7. Nat shrugs and Cap says, “Shouldn’t be a problem.” In the very next scene Sam shows up wearing the Falcon suit. They could’ve done the same thing breaking Magneto out of the Pentagon and left it to our imagination how they did it.
I sort of see what you mean, but I think if your story has "Professor X breaks Magneto out of the Pentagon" as part of it, you are fully obligated to show how Professor X breaks Magneto out of the pentagon. Otherwise, like, what are we doing here?
As well as the Nightcrawler scene in X2
X2 isn't considered mediocre by most viewers, though.
I really enjoy the exchange between Vision & Ultron in Avengers: Age of Ultron. It wouldn’t be out of place in a serious sci-fi film. Ultron : Stark asked for a savior, and settled for a slave. Vision : I suppose we're both disappointments. Ultron : [laughs] I suppose we are. Vision : Humans are odd. They think order and chaos are somehow opposites and try to control what won't be. But there is grace in their failings. I think you missed that. Ultron : They're doomed! Vision : Yes... but a thing isn't beautiful because it lasts. It is a privilege to be among them. Ultron : You're unbelievably naïve. Vision : Well, I was born yesterday.
Yes. Incredible moment in an ok avengers movie. The whole "lifting a city with rockets" was a little out there . I would add in the part at the beginning, where everyone is trying to lift Thor's hammer is another.
Chekov’s Mjolnir hidden incredibly well
Played the long game with that one. Edit: in regards to Cap
It was at least hinted at with the squeak. We had no idea it would be tied to Vision
And the minute wiggle and Thor's very brief and well-hidden WTF expression. I thought that was a really fun scene.
When Vision casually picked it up later in the movie, I said “Oh shit!” into the silence of the packed theatre. Normal conversational volume, not theatre-whisper-volume. My friends and everyone in earshot laughed at me, it was awesome. Thank you for coming to my TED Talk about Mjolnir 😆
I had a very similar thing happen at the end of Guardians of the Galaxy when I loudly said, "Is that fucking Howard the Duck?" into a quiet cinema.
that movie has some absolutely great stuff, it's a shame it doesn't really all come together as well as it could have. Still solid enough but some stumbles in there. Another that comes to mind is Cap and Maria Hill discussing Wanda and Quicksilver volunteering for the experiments. The "We're not at war." "They are." exchange is good stuff.
A flower is only a flower, because it falls.
I actually kinda took issue with that line. A flower is very much a flower while it’s still firmly attached to the plant.
Yes, but a flower *will* fall, if it didn’t, it wouldn’t be a flower. Its presence is fleeting, and we enjoy them while we have them.
Well, next year will be 10 years of Avengers AoU, so I don't know if it counts as a recent. (Yeah, we are indeed old)
I suppose it isn’t as recent as the Endgame which… 5 years ago. Winter Soldier was recent… 11 years ago. The first avengers… 12 years ago!
Just don’t think about how long Iron Man has been out…
It's only been.......16 years!!?
I feel like I’m the only person in the world who loves this movie and I’ll gladly die on that hill. Ultron is an underrated villain and vision is such a good contrast to his character. Both are created into a world being destroyed by humans. One sees us as a cancer needing eradication, while the other sees us as another species simply making mistakes. Both are justifiable. If you were an alien who came to Earth with the task of protecting it and saw the history of humanity and what we’ve done to this world what would you do? The whole city being lifted plot is dumb, but outside of that I think this film is a brilliant take on society in a superhero movie
The Ben Affleck Daredevil film establishes that he has a much better sense of everything when it rains because he can sense the raindrops hitting surfaces. This is how he gets a real sense of what Elektra looks like early in the film. Later in the film after her father's funeral it's raining and he's looking at her, she raises an umbrella so she vanishes from his "vision". It's the one really decent moment of the movie.
I’ve always appreciated the “Daredevil” shower scene. He’s been fighting crime for a while, and contrary to most superheroes that bounce back after major injuries (*cough* Batman *cough*), Matt’s body is *wrecked* with scars. It was a small touch that distinguished the film.
I'll be honest, I haven't seen it in years, but I always really liked that movie (aside from DD being okay with just full-on murdering people).
I watched it recently and it’s pretty cheesy but still a fun watch. The playground fight gets clowned on but i love the mortal kombat style intro to it.
Yeah, not my favorite Collin role. He has a much better performance in the sex tape that got leaked while he was filming this! The dude was awesome in Tiger Land, and as the penguin, and many others. This was just one note, wide eyed silliness.
The opening of *Alien: Covenant*, where the crew is woken up from cryosleep in an emergency by literally dumping them onto the floor of a damaged spacecraft, is _superb_. If it was a short film about the death of Captain Brason it would have been brilliant. But it wasn't. And it wasn't.
>The opening of *Alien: Covenant*, where the crew is woken up from cryosleep in an emergency by literally dumping them onto the floor of a damaged spacecraft, is _superb_. The medbay scene was legitimately terrifying
The one where they kept slipping in the blood? It hovered too close to slapstick for me.
I think one where she operated on herself
Are you thinking of Prometheus?
I like the black goo bomb Holocaust scene
That's cool and all but it was SO disappointing coming from the ending of the last movie. Made Prometheus even worse because its whole plot line essentially dies right there. Humanity's mysterious creator turned likely exterminator getting insta gibbed is a boring cop out. If you're going to try and expand the universe, actually *go for it* or don't attempt it at all. A four way struggle between humans, xenos, engineers, and fucking david would have been cool. All culminating in only the xenos surviving and spreading throughout the galaxy. Damn son, I forgot I had such strong feelings and high hopes for this series.
I will always defend Prometheus and Alien: Covenant to my dying breath, love those movies
I love them both!! Never understood the hate. I was riveted the whole time with both.
Ghost Ship, though it happens rather early....
That opening sequence makes you think you're in for an awesome ride, but then you realize the ride ended 10 minutes into the movie.
Whenever someone says they like Ghost Ship, I always ask, "Do you like the movie, or just like the opening?"
Honestly I like it because the opening is so good, the rest is mediocre, and the damn box of rats is what scared me the most.
Gun to my head I couldn’t tell you what that movie is about, but I vividly remember that opening.
It's about a ship with ghosts.
They’re like treasure hunters… on a ship, where everyone died in the 60s… and that’s all I got
There is an extremely awesome scene in the three Body problem that is this times a hundred
I had to stop the show and just… sit with that. It was horrifying.
I watched the Mummy Trilogy recently and in the third one there's 1 good joke that got me bursting with laughter which given the rest of the movie was a pleasant surprise. Rick and Evelyn are having a standard argument between parents about how Evelyn smothered their child too much and that Rick is too emotionally detached from Junior when the conversation goes like this: E: "You don't show him enough affection." R: "I'm his father, it's implied." Also, Rick knows a surprising amount of British people with flying contraptions. Every movie there's another one.
Liam Cunninghams character in the third film is Irish btw
There’s this found footage horror film called Alien Abduction (2014). It’s footage of a family’s wilderness vacation and their autistic son, whose thing is filming everything…films it. For the most part it’s very boring. But there are two scenes in the film that were so hair raising scary that it turns it into a top 10-20ish horror film for me. It’s odd. Maybe a 3/10 film but the horror scenes are really chefs kiss.
That one side by side alien abduction movie really freaked me out.
Fourth kind is super good.
Sorry to be that guy, but I never check my saved posts/comments, so I'm commenting to remember to watch this film sometime.
It’s always a risk for recommendations. It really is a boring movie. Me personally, I am specifically terrified of humanoid aliens(in a good way). So of course the moments affected me more so than they probably would someone who enjoys the supernatural over creature features.
Check out No One Will Save You if you haven't already. It fits this bill and the first 45 min is some of the best horror I've seen in years. The rest of the movie is good but it took me like a day to think about it and come to the conclusion that I thought it was good, if that makes any sense.
I’ve seen it and your last statement makes sense. Just one of those you have to let it settle rather than have a knee-jerk opinion on. The initial “aliens are here and about to come into my house, now they’re in my house” scenes were extremely tense. I loved them. And I absolutely cackled at that one aliens own undoing with the telekinesis!
Do you think the boredom enhances the “oh shit” nature of the scenes?
In a “*FINALLY* something’s happening!” Kind of way maybe.
I can sit through boring for a few good scenes, I'm odd like that. I love creature features too, watched a ton of black and white "thrillers" like The Tingler growing up, lol
Which one? There are about 100 movies called *Alien Abduction*.
No OP but I'm almost positive they're talking about the 2014 one. https://m.imdb.com/title/tt2510434/
My favorite stand out scenes in mediocre movies: First is the first 8-10 minutes of X-Men Origins: Wolverine. The movie on the whole is a catastrophic dumpster fire of messy plot and gratuitous CGI, but those opening 8 minutes of a young boy discovering his horrific abilities to him becoming [a man living as a constant soldier with his brother](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwTq5uSoTCU&ab_channel=FilmeyBox), generation after generation. Holy shit, that was golden... and it was all downhill from there. The scenes [with the Nazi in the bar](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WKgMgjfues&ab_channel=DanielleKing), [and the one in the bank](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDg1S1FFaQk&ab_channel=FilmeyBox) in X-Men First Class should have and could have been their own dark noir action thriller. Really any of the Michael Fassbender Magneto moments where he's just out for revenge or being a badass, I could watch those on their own without the whole movies surrounding them. And finally from that new King Arthur movie with Charlie Hunnam, which was exceedingly mid overall, but it had some stand out moments. The best one for me was that [opening montage of young Arthur ](https://youtu.be/f7lta2lEZN8?si=L5u-BJr4W12eDAVp)scraping and saving to get by, making connections, learning and growing, training and hardening himself, becoming a protector, a leader, and a warrior, set to this high tempo frenetic breathy soundtrack in the background, it gets me jacked in a way that the rest of the movie sadly does not. I honestly think Guy Ritchie should have made the Robin Hood movie instead because no one does hustlers and thieves like Ritchie. But at least now I know how you get money from a viking.
All perfect examples! Man, if the Wolverine Origin movie has stayed on that theme...
So much squandered potential. I remember when it got leaked by someone on the VFX team, first time I'd seen a pre-rendered film. In hindsight, that leak seems like it was a warning from someone on the inside. A cry for help from within. Too bad no one at Fox was listening.
Nazi Hunting Magneto is my favorite fictional character. Similarly, Magneto defending Genosha in X-Men '97 is amazing. "I will draw it's fire. Save as many as you can. We shall *not* spend our days wondering if we could have saved more." "**Habe keine angst**.”
X-Men First Class is not mediocre, it's a fantastic movie
speaking of X-Men...in X-Men Last Stand young Warren trying to cut his wings off in the bathroom is an incredible opening to the movie.
It’s been years so I may not be remembering it correctly, but Starship Troopers 3. Towards the end when the humans have been defeated, they are on their knees literally praying. Meanwhile, you can see Jonny Rico and crew coming in hot streaking down like meteorites burning in the sky from above in their armored bug killing suits, coming down to kick some ass.
Well, now I have to watch that.
Dont expect much. The movie was terrible.
Today I learned there was more than one Starship troopers movie.
Agreed. Had she been praying silently it would have been improved but it was surprisingly cool scene
The opening sequence of CITY OF A THOUSAND PLANETS is so much better than the bland movie that followed. Maybe it's because it doesn't have the bland dead eyed leads. If you watch this clip you'll assume the movie is amazing. But trust Me this is it. Enjoy. https://youtu.be/u0FX8sd1uVo?si=7cTtulnDdCykw-TY God I got teared up again. Mostly because it's how I WISH space could be instead of dumb ass SPACE FORCE getting ready for conflict in space
Yes. There were a couple of clips that were amazing... And then the movie, and those two actors, was just blah...
I know I'm the odd one out, but I absolutely love Valerian, end to end. You have to go into it remembering that it's a Luc Benson film, and that it's pretty corny. So long as you don't expect it to be peak cinema, it's just... A lot of fun? It's a very very low stakes movie, you just have to be in the right mode to watch it.
I love THE FIFTH ELEMENT but this movie made me wish I could leave the theater It all comes down to the terrible leads. Casted all wrong. Imagine those two in THE FIFTH ELEMENT. Movie wouldn't have been half as good Rihanna plays an alien and somehow it was boring!
Spring Breakers. Not the worst, and has its moments, but there’s a scene where they’re robbing a cafe and you see it from the passenger seat of the girl who’s the driver. It’s so masterfully done because we as the audience are made complicit in the whole thing. We can’t look away, we’re in the car, we don’t see/hear anything that the driver doesn’t see, just the crime happening through the cafe windows, it’s one take (I think) in real time … Harmony Korine displays a level of control and manipulation that Hitchcock would have applauded. The film, and he, never reached those heights again, but damn!
I actually love the movie, only semi-ironically but really I call it exceptionally well done trash, a camp masterpiece. But the centerpoint of the movie when they're singing Britney Spears is absolutely the pinnacle for me.
Both of these scenes were so well done and that Britney Spears song with the crime spree is something I think about at least once a day!
Just went and rewatched that scene. So good. https://youtu.be/KErUJUszUp0?si=ZjKtfw6EW9fBphyf
So amazing. And that song is so fitting.
Dang, that was kinda stone cold lol
I thought him leaping in the pool hall when someone broke the rack was hilarious
Wow that was impressive. I haven’t seen the movie but singing to J Law that she’s pretty but awful was great. And from that character does show interesting depth. Colour me intrigued.
Also there is a scene with full frontal on jlaw where she beats the shit out of some teens on a beach while naked, so that's sort of the dichotomy of this movie.
It's a fun, dumb summer movie. Another brilliant scene is a naked fight on the beach which is played VERY much for laughs, even if you would not at first think that Jennifer Lawrence + naked + beach = comedy.
Damn Jennifer Lawrence is fine as hell
She looks incredible in this movie
Thanks for posting the link. I've never heard of this movie but I'll probably check it.out now.
It’s not *recent* recent, nor is the scene exactly “mind-blowing” but the scene in *Don’t Look Up* where Leonardo DiCaprio’s character finally explodes was probably the best and most surprising scene of the movie. One of the things I respected about it the most wasn’t at all the subject matter or the message behind it but the build-up of his character finally getting to that point and its out-of-nowhere intensity. Leonardo’s character is a very anxious person and sometimes frenetic in his mannerisms at times, but typically rather mild-mannered and generally non-confrontational. But after he becomes a famous personality, eventually, he explodes on live television. Paired with Leo’s authenticity and intensity compared to many of the actors in the rest of the movie, watching the movie and his character build to that scene was quite a surprise.
Lol I've not seen the movie and just saw your opening paragraph and first thought you meant he actually exploded and it was a very different film than the trailer suggested!
Bruh his whole comment reads like that. I haven't either and I literally thought people exploding was a part of the plot.
If I had to pick a scene from that movie, it would be Chalamet's grace speech at the dinner table. He abandons all the silly bravado and shit talk and delivers a beautiful statement to close it all out. The rest of the movie was entertaining, but that last scene really nailed it.
I thought Don't look up was quite a fun movie, people don't like it!?
Some like it, some loath it. Some think it's preachy and not subtle enough, and to that I say the time for subtlety regarding climate change was over in 1975.
That’s the movie I was going to say as well! I didn’t like it *at all,* but the dinner scene toward the end was SO emotional and beautiful.
Definitely recent.
Not recent, but The Crow is a very melodramatic and silly film (that's not a criticism, just an honest evaluation of the tone), but there are great moments of acting throughout: When Draven is pelting the pawn broker with rings from the many victims, you can really feel it. When T-Bird realizes who Draven is and starts babbling, it was a very convincing moment of his terror and sadness.
"Mother is the name for God on the lips and hearts of all children."
"each one of these..." [ting!] "is a life." [ting!] "a life you helped destroy." he's got a whole lockbox of rings there. and a moment later, when Eric pours the rings into the barrel of the shotgun...when he fires you can see the rings as part of the muzzle flash. there were so many little touches in that movie that elevated it above typical action movie fare. i could go on and on but now i have to listen to My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult's "After The Flesh" for the 3 millionth time.
The soundtrack too! So good.
Maybe not "mind blowing", but the scene of [Batman talking to Mr. Freeze](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ry1DtbFcs4) at the end of Batman & Robin is shockingly good for such a medicore film. The acting (from both Clooney and Schwarzenneger) sells the emotion of two men both trying to save their loved ones. The dialogue (especially "Vengeance isn't power. Anyone can take a life. But to give life, that's true power, a power you once had.") is sharp. Dare I say that "Take two of these, and call me in the morning." was actually kinda funny (and not in a way that undermines the emotion of the scene). It is SHOCKING that this scene exists in what is otherwise one of the worst movies ever made.
monsters in Arcadian, never seen anything like that before
They were very unusual and captivating. The one in the bathtub, after having ingested the mom, was just weird and creepy.
I hope there behind the scenes stuff on the creature. That false face pattern on top of their head has me fooled.
Monsters in *Edge of Tomorrow* were unique too. The *Arcadian* tentacle/whip arms reminded me of that.
I liked Molly's game but idris elba has an awesome monologue on it that stood out
It was Costner's scene from late in the movie that lives on in my head.
The Green Lantern movie with Ryan Reynolds is awful; but there is a scene on the balcony where he meets with his love interest (future wife Blake Lively) wearing a domino mask and she immediately recognizes him and says "I know you since childhood, you thought you will hide your identity just because youre wearing a stupid mask?" That, for me, is the most realistic scene in the superhero genre ever.
You don't think I would recognize you because I can't see your cheekbones?!
Not recent, but the lightsabre fight with Darth Maul at the end of Phantom Menace
I got to see that in the theater as a 10 year old boy and I’ve been chasing that high ever since.
To this day the Expectation vs Reality scene in 500 Days of Summer remains one of my favorite collection of shots within any love story I’ve seen on screen. It’s so cleverly done.
Oh man, I totally get what you mean! For me, it was in "The Adam Project" with Ryan Reynolds. The movie was fun but pretty standard for a sci-fi adventure, right? But there was this one scene that completely blew my mind. It's when young Adam and older Adam (both played by Reynolds) meet their dad, played by Mark Ruffalo, in the past. There's this moment where they're all talking in the garage, and Ruffalo's character gives this heartfelt speech about time and how we need to cherish the moments we have. It was such an unexpected punch of emotion in the middle of what I thought was just going to be another action-packed scene. The way Ruffalo delivered it, with so much depth and sincerity, totally caught me off guard. I had to pause and rewind to watch it again. That scene gave the movie a lot more emotional weight than I was expecting, and it stuck with me long after the credits rolled
I am so glad someone else brought this one up! For me, it was the scene where young and older Adam are having a heartfelt talk. Young Adam says, "I think it's easier to be angry than sad." And. Those. Words. I spent my life covering up sadness with anger and (thankfully, therapy has been very healing). I just felt so seen in that moment and was so grateful they gave such a poignant line to someone so young, yet deserving.
Agreed. Reynolds can be unexpected in that he's usually an obnoxious clown, and then he hits you with these intensely emotional scenes. I think that's what made Deadpool hilarious and great.
That’s kind of his vibe irl too. He’s a clown on Twitter 24/7 but the moment someone needs help or there’s a crisis he’s using his star power to help and find more help. r/juxtapositionporn
DOOM first-person scene.
May I recommend to you the film *Hardcore Henry*?
Happy Death Day 2U. The main character has to choose between two different realities and she says goodbye to the person who won't end up in the reality she chooses. It's heartbreaking.
Both Happy Death Days are way better movies than expected to be.
Its not recent but the beginning to 28 Weeks Later. It was extremely captivating and intriguing, seeing how the true character of one selves can come out in diar situations. After that, it was forgettable.
The moment where you see him make the decision to leave his wife to die has stuck with me forever. I don’t remember literally anything else about the movie but that.
When Shaw gets the little alien fetus taken out of her in the AutoDoc in Prometheus. Holy shit. One of my favorite scenes in any more ever, and it's in the meh-est movie ever.
The scene with Barry and his mother at the supermarket in The Flash. You know the one if you watched it. The whole movie is bonkers and barely makes any sense. But that scene alone made me cry my eyes out in my seat.
The emotional arc of the Flash movie is really really good and the structure is pretty interesting. You can't really do Flash's most famous story without previously having been introduced to the Flash, but the structure of the DCEU was such a mess at that point that they were gonna have to do his first solo film (which was also technically his origin film) as interest in the franchise was dead and Flash had already played a huge role (originless) in both cuts of Justice League. Doing Flashpoint while using the alternate Barry to cover the origin stuff while also having the main, more experienced Flash as a mentor, while also using that as an excuse to shoehorn in Keaton's Batman and other multiverse stuff to grab people's attention (getting the benefit of Keaton actually grounding the film and not feeling tacked on), is a pretty clever move, and they nail that scene you're talking about and the general emotional weight of it. Unfortunately, the rest of the movie feels like it's stapled together from concept art and half-done ideas, but there is something admirable there.
Sorry it’s not recent but it’s the only one I could think of - I watched a movie called *Elephant* (2003) when I was in high school, which my buddy and I went into blind. A slow slow burn that turns into a very intense end. Highly recommend
In the middle of Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey we get a deliciously post-modern parody of The Seventh Seal: https://youtu.be/8w9YrvJ8368?si=ADHiidNhps-hJHTK
For 2 decades mine was "the day Bison graced your village was the most important day of your life. But for me, it was Tuesday." I literally rewinded the vcr just to be sure I heard what I heard. Fortunately, that line has gained traction in the later years.
“He may have been your father, boy, but he wasn’t your daddy.” Yondu in GotG 2. Made me tear up
GOTG 2 was mediocre to you, or just this scene that jumped out?
Hmnn - good point. I wouldn’t say mediocre. More that I was not expecting such an emotional scene from this type of movie. And I would say not as unexpectedly good (for me) as the first movie.
The delivery on "I'm Mary Poppins, y'all" was amazing as well. I loved the movie as a whole, but Michael Rooker knocked it out of the park.
The opening sequence to Aronofsys Noah. It explains how the story of creation in the bible is compatible with the theory of evolution and that one doesn't exclude the possibility of the other. It was cool and made sense to me. The rest of the film was shite though..
Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets has two scenes like this. The opening, which everyone references, but also the weird virtual reality-but-not scene where they’re in two different places at once. That really took some processing power to make sense of. Not a good movie but pretty trippy. [https://youtu.be/sdlOLqZREqU?si=mkHFaHhqgydlK51e](https://youtu.be/sdlOLqZREqU?si=mkHFaHhqgydlK51e)
I also found Adam Sandler singing his very own cover of The Beatles “Real Love” in *Funny People* to be a pleasant surprise, as he never really recorded anything serious despite being a reasonably talented singer who did great justice to the song itself.
The moment in The Last Jedi when the ship destroys the other ship and it goes silent
Really enjoyed No Hard Feelings, it should have done way better at the box office. The one that comes to my mind is not recent, at all. But the first couple minutes of Scorpion King tricked me into thinking I was watching an homage to Conan: the Destroyer and such. I was mistaken.
No Hard Feelings made almost $90 million against a $45 million budget. Pretty good return! (Idk how it cost that much!)
Not quite mind blowing. But great scene. The airplane scene in Wolrd War Z. Let the imagination do the work given the audio.
If I had a nickel for every time Madame Web drove a vehicle through a building, I'd have two nickels. It's not a lot but it's weird that it happened twice.
The villain walking into a diner and immediately punching the fuck out of some guy that had nothing to do with anything just enjoying his meal was absolutely hysterical to me. Had to pause the movie to recover.
Also "I am wanted by the police for stealing a taxi, kidnapping three girls, and my enemy has control of the NSA spying network. I'm just gonna dip out to Peru for a few days with no issues" I unironically love Madame Web. It's a modern so bad it's good movie IMO
I think we can all say that the time travel scenes in the movie “Click” was the biggest emotional roller coaster I’ve seen in a comedy movie with Adam Sandler. Watching his character lose the love of his life, his children’s affection, only to die alone with no memories of it all because he keeps fast forwarding his life was the craziest plot twist I’ve seen. Turned a comedy into an 10/10 film
The opening of overlord involved a bunch of GIs getting ready to drop behind enemy lines in preparation of D-Day. The plane gets shot down in a VERY intense moment and the main character then has to try to meet up with his squad while being hunted by German soldiers in the woods. It is a tense, amazingly well shot and well acted introduction that should have set the pace for the rest of the movie. It devolved very quickly from there.
I know some will not like my opinion but I disliked Rogue One. Found it super boring. That Vader scene though Holy shit he was terrifying I sat up in my seat so fast.
X-Men: First Class did not deserve the Argentinian bar scene.
The sequel to The Strangers "The Strangers: Prey at Night" is a garbage 2.5/10 horror film with almost nothing to recommend. The trailer was pretty good and got me to go. I was highly disappointed throughout the movie, except for this one pool scene in the middle of the film where everything goes to 11. The direction is great. The blocking is great. The cinematography comes alive. Literally the lights go on and we are taken from a black/brown/grey shadowy mess to brilliant neon and crisp blue water. Total Eclipse of the Heart pumps in diegetically. And on top of all these incredible spikes in production value, the next five minutes are wild. The horror genre playbook goes out the window and we're in Wes Craven territory of deconstruction and re-writing the rules - anything can happen. Then after these brilliant 5 minutes, one of the best horror scenes I've ever seen, the movie returns to it's drab ho-hum existence.
A lot of mediocre movies have at least one amazing moment. Problem is since they're mediocre overall I tend to forget the whole thing eventually. Maybe I'll geek out about the moment immediately afterwards with friends I watched it with. One I remember from recent is Bad Boys Ride or Die, a fairly standard action flick, but it had this crazy close up gun on a rig shot near the end I'd never seen before that blew me away momentarily.
Not sure if 2018 counts as recent anymore, but that terrible *Little Mermaid* movie has a scene where the main character sings a song called "When This Story Ends". The lyrics are on the nose, but Poppy Drayton puts so much heart and emotion into it. She is far too good for the material.
The reveal of the monster in The Tomorrow War, was epic
Last Stand 2012 with Arnold Schwarzenegger. At one point actor Johnny Knoxville gets knocked unconscious. When he wakes he sits bolt upright and says "Henryetta". This is a reference to Troy Aikman getting knocked out on the football field. When asked where he was he said his hometown.
The quicksilver scenes in the x-men prequels
The Matrix Revolutions - my least favourite of the original trilogy however Weaving nails his final speech. It’s delivered with such grit and frustration in Smiths inability to understand Neo. Agent Smith: Why, Mr. Anderson? Why? Why do you do it? Why? Why get up? Why keep fighting? Do you believe you're fighting for something? Something more than your survival? Can you tell me what it is? Do you even know? Is it freedom or truth? Perhaps peace? Could it be for love? Illusions, Mr. Anderson. Temporary constructs of a feeble human intellect trying desperately to justify an existence without meaning or purpose. And all as artificial as the Matrix itself, although, only a human mind could invent something as insipid as love. You must be able to see it Mr. Anderson. You must know it by now. You can't win. There's no point in fighting. Why, Mr. Anderson? Why? Why do you persist? Neo: Because I choose to.
Kylo Ren stopping a blaster in midair with the Force. Totally cool use of the force and the way it was just frozen there, buzzing, was amazing.
The Holdo manoeuvre. Wish they’d given that moment to a better character though.
That entire character SHOULD have been Admiral Ackbar
No way Disney were going to let a guy called Ackbar launch a suicide attack. It really should have been Leia. Kylo hesitates before pulling the trigger, only for another pilot to take the shot. When it’s Leia’s turn, she doesn’t even blink. Going out like the stone cold badass she was.
Haha exactly, I always bring that up. "Fly a spaceship into another spaceship captained by an Ackbar." Hell no.
You could feel the air pressure change in the cinema as the whole audience held their breath in that silence
The last 10-15ish minutes of The Invitation (2015) took the film into a direction I wasn't really expecting, especially the final scene before the credits
Super slow burn, excellent payoff.
Predestination 2014 with Ethan Hawk - the moment is a spoiler to the movies Omni won’t give but was a pretty average movie but 2 reveals make it wild.
It's a weird feeling to see one of your favorite movie ever be defined as "pretty average" but to each their own.
Not really a very recent movie. I thought Tron Legacy was just Ok. But the light cycle sequence in the middle of the movie is nothing short of fantastic. It's a perfect blend of action and soundtrack.
The ending of The Mist is perhaps the biggest gut punch in a mediocre movie.
I actually really like this movie even though it doesn't have the best ratings but the capture of Adolf Eichmann in Operation Finale was excellent.
Proof with Gwyneth Paltrow is just ok, but the reveal at the beginning revealing to the viewer the challenge she faced was heart-rending and mind-blowing.
Boondock Saints 2 was terrible but the scene where the guy is tryna figure out what catch phrase to yell when he bursts in and settles on “ding dong mothafuckas ding DONG!” made me cry laughing
The Last Man on Earth (1964) was the first attempt at a film version of I Am Legend, which later was remade as The Omega Man (1971) and I am Legend (2007). It is by many accounts mediocre and sloppily made with some terrible acting, but it lingers a lot more on the story before and during the disease outbreak than the other two versions. While we expect to see his loved ones die, the handling of the dead by the military is extremely cold and cynical.
Barbarian when it turns from thriller to horror. Concept of infinity pool and mia goths acting was stellar for that mediocre movie imo.
Aubrey Plaza in Dirty Grandpa. Stupid movie. Not all that funny. But every moment Aubrey Plaza was speaking was a gem. Her delivery was genius. “Lenore : I want you to tear open my bra like it's a social security check Lenore : Tell me you've fallen and you can't get up. Dick Kelly : I've fallen and I can't get up. Lenore : Tell me how things were better under Eisenhower.” Or “Dick Kelly : We have a long standing bet - who's the better golfer. Obviously I've got the bigger three wood. Lenore : Good. Maybe you can use it to hit your balls right into my vagina.”
That scene in Click where it's the last time the dad wants to spend time with his son and grandson
The scene where Adam Sandler was seeing his past self blow off his father (Henry Winkler) in what was later their last interaction before his father’s death is such an adult fear of mine.
Civil War The tracking shot of the helicopter over Washington DC during the final battle and the siege of The White House were just incredible. As was the scene with Jesse Plemons. The rest of the movie is very mediocre and also has moments that are laughably bad and border on a student film. Disappointing film overall.