Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Top 10 Bad Scenes in Great Movies

Last week, I published my list of the best great scenes in bad movies. Following the rules of reciprocity, here’s my list of the best bad scenes in great movies. Some things listed here are entire acts of films, others are poorly placed lines of dialogue, or cheap sound design. The point is, every scene here took me out of the great movies they are featured in. Please be warned that minor spoilers lurk within. Feel free to share some notable bad scenes from great films as well!

10. Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)
“Yesterday”

Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? begins in 1917 (we know this because a title card tells us it’s 1917), after a brief scene, the film jumps to 1935 (again, we’re given a title card). Then, after the film’s opening credits, we cut to… “Yesterday”. What does that even mean – yesterday? It’s such a confusing word choice. Why not “1962” (the year of the film’s release)? Or “Present Day”? If the bulk of the narrative of the film took place over the course of one day, then I guess a “Yesterday” title might make sense. But the movie covers several days, so “Yesterday” makes absolutely no sense to me. Perhaps I’m making too big of a deal out of it, but the first time I saw Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?, this “Yesterday” title card distracted me for a majority of the film’s running time. I’ll never understand it.

9. Gone Baby Gone (2007)
“Babe… Nick died.”

Shortly after Patrick (Casey Affleck), Remy (Ed Harris) and Nick (John Ashton) are involved in a gunfight, Patrick returns home and talks with his girlfriend, Angie (Michelle Monaghan). After their talk, the screen fades to black and we hear Angie whisper in voiceover “Babe…………..Nick died.”

I rewatched Gone Baby Gone last week, and literally laughed out loud at this bit of voiceover. There’s nothing wrong with the way Monaghan says the line, but the existence of the line is unnecessary. Immediately after this delivery, we fade in on Nick’s funeral. Isn’t that enough of a signifier of what happened? Voiceover like this screams “Post production save” to me. As in, director Ben Affleck realized in post that fading in on Nick’s funeral wasn’t enough, and instead of shooting a scene where Angie tells Patrick about Nick’s death, they had Monaghan come in a record one line of voiceover. It just seems so unnecessary.

8. Donnie Brasco (1997)
Cartoon Slap
Donnie Brasco is one of cinema’s best, most underrated mob movies. However, it does contain one notable gaff I’ve never been able to get over. Shortly after Sonny Black (Michael Madsen) becomes boss of his family, his temper mounts and he flips out on his crew. Now, this outburst begins with one of the most unrealistic slaps I’ve ever heard in an otherwise great film. As Sonny hits Nicky (Bruno Kirby) on the front of Nicky’s face, a wildly out of place THWACK sound is heard. It sounds like something out of a Wile E. Coyote/Road Runner clip. I still can’t believe that in a movie this great, such a cartoonish bit of sound editing made it all the way into the final cut of the film. (The slap comes at 1:04 in the embedded clip.)

7. 25th Hour (2002)
(Not So) Ugly Hands

The skin on your hands is very close to several bones, so the top of your hands (including your knuckles) bruise easily. If you punch a solid surface as hard as you can (like a new punching bag, a wall, or your best friend’s face), your knuckles will bruise badly. So, if Francis Xavier Slaughtery (Barry Pepper) beat the ever-living shit out of his best bro, Monty Brogan (Edward Norton), Francis’ knuckles would be just as jacked up as Monty’s face. Francis would likely break some fingers, his hand, his wrist, or, at the very least, cause major abrasions and bruising on his knuckles. Yet, the next time we see Francis after the fight, his right hand (his punching hand) is completely unscathed. 25th Hour is a masterpiece, one of my favorite films released so far this century. But this lack of attention to detail is baffling.

6. Cape Fear (1991)
“Traitors to GOD!”
I love the majority of Martin Scorsese’s Cape Fear remake. It’s loud and deliberate in all the best ways. But once the Bowden family boards their houseboat on Cape Fear, the movie goes to shit. Cape Fear is designed to be hyperbolic, but a little restraint in this third act would’ve been most welcome. (Listen for the sound effect of Max Cady’s hair at 1:01 in the embedded clip. Sigh.)

5. Short Cuts (1993)
Car Accident

In the 28th minute of Robert Altman’s excellent Short Cuts, Doreen Piggot (Lily Tomlin) hits a young boy with her car, which will ultimately ruin the lives of several people depicted in the movie. The problem is, the accident is so poorly staged, it’s almost funny. No one wants to put a child’s life in danger, including on a movie set, but it’s so obvious that Tomlin’s car is dozens of feet away from the kid when he is hit. The angle is off and the depth of field isn’t remotely deep enough. Robert Altman knows his telephoto zoom lenses, but this is a botched shot all around.

4. Jungle Fever (1991)
“Yo, Daddy…”
Spike Lee’s Jungle Fever ends in such an unusually touching way. It’s the type of odd satisfaction that you’ll only find in a Spike Lee joint. But then the final scene happens and it all but ruins the whole damn movie. As Flipper (Wesley Snipes) walks down his block by himself, a young woman approaches and offers to blow Flipper for $2. Flipper grabs onto her and screams “Noooooooo!!!!” at the top of his lungs as the camera comes swooping in on his face, before resting on a freeze frame. And I get it, the film’s most compelling storyline has to do with drugs, and, in Flipper’s eyes, this young woman could be his daughter in just a few shorts years. But holy shit, there are certainly more subtle ways to convey that message. If it’s even necessary to convey at all.

3. Carrie (1976)
Tuxedo Porn Chipmunks

As Tommy Ross (William Katt) and his buddies try on different tuxedos for their high school prom, they get into a playful argument over money and clothing. Then, out of nowhere, their argument is sped up. For three seconds, the guys talk so fast that their voices sound like Alvin and The Chipmunks, and their movements are all herky-jerky. And that fact that there is already really bad ‘70s-era porn music playing over the scene certainly doesn’t help matters.

2. Rocky I-IV, Rocky Balboa, Creed
(Damn Near) Every Final Fight
I may catch some heat for this, but here it is: the final fight scenes in the Rocky films are not well done. Don’t get me wrong, I like all of these fights (except the final Creed one, more on that in a moment), but they aren’t realistic. For one, the amount of air punching is laughable. And the bruised and battered make-up is distractingly caked on. Of course I love when Rocky (Sylvester Stallone) and Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers) go down at the same time at the end of the Rocky II fight. But much of what comes before in that fight is so clumsily staged. But hey, look, I get it, the Rocky movies aren’t about boxing, they’re about love, man. About heart. About fighting for what’s yours.

During the final fight in Rocky Balboa, Rocky saves himself from falling down by putting his hand on the mat (which is a knockdown, period). He does this three times, and it is never once called a knockout. Stallone knows boxing, HBO commentators Jim Lampley, Larry Merchant and Max Kellerman (who make cameos in the scene) know boxing, so I’m amazed that this was allowed to slide. The scene also helped start the ridiculous trend of shooting boxing scenes in cheaply rendered HD, as if it were playing on HBO. I’ll never understand why movies like Rocky Balboa, The Fighter and Creed abandon their compelling, gritty aesthetic to make their film look like shitty HDTV.

And then there’s that final fight in Creed, which ranks among the worst boxing scenes I have ever seen (and, to be clear, I loved the rest of Creed). Such a shame, given that the fight before it is a one-take masterpiece. Creed’s final fight utilizes horribly unconvincing digital effects (the crowd looks like a video game), fast motion while punches are being thrown (it’s literally sped up like a cartoon), and a lack of tension that I found inexplicable. I still can’t believe this fight and the one-take fight are in the same movie.

1. The Godfather (1972)
“Touch my sister again, I’ll kill ya.”

Sonny (James Caan) beating up his brother-in-law, Carlo (Gianna Russo), in The Godfather is the worst scene in a great film that I have ever seen. To go further, it’s one most unconvincing fight scenes of any mainstream movie I’ve ever seen. Thanks to the far too revealing angle of the shot, it’s so obvious that Caan isn’t landing any punches on Russo. The scene is staged so poorly, I’m stunned it appears in what is considered by many (myself included) one of the best films of all time.

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41 comments:

  1. Such a great idea for a post. Man I'm so jealous of your encyclopedic knowledge of cinema. I always thought that was scene in Carrie was uncannily horrible!

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    1. Aww thanks Angela! And yeah, why is that even in Carrie!?

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  2. I was going to refute on The Godfather but you're right considering how fake the punches are as it should've been more violent.

    One of the aspects about film-watching is continuity where if I don't notice it. I'm fine with it but if I do notice something is off, it does bother me a bit. I do love that scene in Carrie which I think is hilarious.

    Yeah, I'm with you on the ending of Jungle Fever. I didn't like that one.

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    1. Couldn't agree more about continuity. I wrote a piece about the opening of Jaws a few years ago, and the lighting inconsistencies within it. But my point was that even though the lighting doesn't match, the scene is still iconic because of the staging, music and execution.

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  3. fun list. I personally would have included Brad Pitt's scene in 12 Years a Slave, as well as the bordering-on-rape scene in Goldfinger.

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    1. Thanks. I am a sucker for Pitt's two scenes in 12 Years a Slave. I dunno, they've always worked for me. Your Goldfinger sentence made me laugh out loud.

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  4. I haven't sat down and watched The Godfather movies in their entirety, but from what I've seen there seems to be quite a few scenes that seem a bit weird compared to everyone else. I can't explain it, it would probably make more sense if I took the leap to watch.

    I'm glad you included the scene in Carrie because wtf is that.

    I could add the "big reveal" in the Dear Zachary documentary, the music they chose was so inappropriate it completely threw me off. There's also another movie I watched recently, that I cannot for the life of me remember what it was, but it had the worst bit of CGI towards the end and everything was so good except that moment.

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    1. It was a bad CGI bird or something...now this is going to drive me nuts that I can't remember.

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    2. Dear Zachary...(sigh). While I think that is a film of extremely noble and pure intentions, I simply do not like the way it was made. The editing is so frantic, it completely detracts from the emotional poignancy of the film. Though it is difficult to talk poorly about a film that's so well intentioned.

      I dunno what CGI bird film you mean! But I wanna know so badly.

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    3. This is probably weird coming back to this comment almost a month later, but now I remember. It was The Walk. That bird that flies around him while he's on the high wire was SO terrible.

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    4. Never too late to come back! Yep, I remember that, and yep, very bad. Robert Zemeckis' CG baffles me. It can be such good quality - blend in so well. And other times, it looks like a cartoon. I've never understood why that is.

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  5. Interesting call on the Rocky fights. I mostly agree. The franchise's fights are poorly done, in general, only resembling boxing because of the fact thwy are in a ring. On top of that, the final fight tends to be overly cheesy, too. I'm also of the opinion that while the rest of the movie is pretty good, thw final fight in Rocky Balboa shouldn't even exist. As for Creed, I like the finale, but agree it's nowhere near as good as the earlier fight.

    Spike Lee was made for lists like this. He occasionally can't help but wielding his sledgehammer and going to town. Sometimes it works (School Daze, He Got Game), sometimes not (Jungle Fever, Girl 6). Given your feelings about She's Gotta Have It, the rape scene could have made this pist, too.

    Since we're including gaffs I would include two bothersome continuity errors from The Dark Knight. The first is after Joker throws Rachel out the window at the party. Batman goes after her. The way things were going, it didn't seem like Joker would just take all his goons and leave quietly while Bats is busy saving Rachel, but that's what we're left to assume as we cut away to something else entirely. The other is the odd silence by the guy tied to a chair atop a giant pile of money after Joker has set fire to it. Pretty sure I would be screaming, thrashing about, and raising all sorts of hell. He gave us nothing.

    Great post, Alex.

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    1. Thanks man! Completely agree on everything you said about the Rocky films and those Spike films. Man, I nearly forgot about that rape scene in She's Gotta Have It. Yep, very unnecessary.

      I've always wondered what the hell the Joker did after Bats jumps out of the window. Was he just like, "G'day to you, fine, stupidly rich people of Gotham. I suppose I won't keep looking for Harvey, and I'll just head out now."

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  6. Great post Alex! Here are some that immediately popped to mind for me:

    1. The beach finale in The Shawshank Redemption (I agree with Mark Kermode that Morgan Freeman on the bus would have been the perfect ambiguous ending for the film)
    2. The restaurant scene in Boyhood (No I don't think the scene is racist and I warmed up to it on a second viewing but I still think it's a little too hokey and goes against the tone of the rest of the film)
    3. The pig scene in Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (I actually dislike all the comedic moments in this film but this one is by far the worst)
    4. And last but not least the obvious choice of the therapist explanation scene in Psycho

    -Dan

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    1. Thanks Dan!
      1. YES.
      2. I still adore that scene, might be my favorite in the film. But I see your point.
      3. Forgot about that one.
      4. I still believe that, in 1960, that explanation was warranted, since we as a culture knew very little about extreme mental illnesses like that one. (I say "we" like I was around... but you know what I mean.) In 1998, however, I think the scene could've been cut from Van Sant's version. Though, Robert Forster.

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  7. Nice list! The one from Short Cuts almost made me do a spit-take with my coffee.

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  8. Great list. I definitely agree with the number 1 spot. I love The Godfather, but i can never take that scene seriously. If i had to pick a bad scene from a movie i like though... i guess maybe the Home Alone moment from Skyfall. It's probably my favorite Bond movie to date, but i really wish they would have come up with something better for the ending. Every time i watch it all i can think of is Home Alone and it takes me right out of the movie. And to be honest, Kevin McCallister made better traps than Bond did anyway.

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    1. Thanks! Haha, I do like some aspects of that Skyfall ending, but it does play like a darker version of Home Alone. Really, there's no denying that.

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  9. I do think that all end fight scenes in Rocky movies aren't created equal, but I agree with your point in general. The worst is Rocky V, with its "street fight" being one of the strangest scenes in any Rocky movie. The Rocky II "both guys fall down" scene is laughably ridiculous, but I guess it created some drama. I didn't mind the final fight in Creed too much, though it did pale in comparison to the first big fight. I also didn't mind the big fight in Rocky Balboa, though the HBO approach was weird. I'm really in the tank for that movie, though. Loved the list!

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    1. Thanks! Man, I didn't even include that final fight in Rocky V because it is so absurd. And I really like Rocky Balboa as a whole film. I think Sly's performance in that was just as good as it was in Creed. But that final fight is just all over the place.

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  10. Lots of great stuff to point out in even the best of films, lots of possibilities here. I would say that scene in Godfather is made more Awkward just the way Coppola decided, or was forced, to shoot it.
    I'm not really a stickler for the 25th hour continuity thing, as long as the emphasis is not on his hand like if he were flexing it, I can let it slide. Especially in a work I completely adore, I mean Scorsese has a ton, a ton, of continuity errors in all his work but I couldn't care less and they're fun to point out regardless.
    Even though I would never consider it a 'great' movie, I thought for sure you would mention the "baby doll" scene from 'American Sniper' because you liked it so much. Lordy, I was in shock that a filmmaker like Eastwood was showing us that in a major studio picture, who thought that was passable?
    In Untouchables, Costner has some pretty bad line readings in the Canadian shootout "Oh, Didn't you hear what I said?" "I had to kill him"
    Since you are on the Rocky movies for not getting the Sweet Science right, in terms of baseball movies not getting the sport right I'll throw in that Tim Robbins' pitching motion in 'Bull Durham' is AWFUL, good lord. That they try to pass it off as a minor league ace that can hit upwards of 95mph is laughable. His mechanics would get him tossed off a beer league soft ball team. Dennis Quaid's pitching in 'The Rookie' is ok, except he shows the ball far too early to fool major league hitters. Any player could pick up on the grip that he has on the ball as he delivers it to the plate.
    Fun list my friend.

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    1. Thanks buddy! See, I know next to nothing about the technical mechanics of baseball, so I LOVE hearing tidbits like that. Very interesting.

      And I do agree with you on 25th Hour; it's good that they don't emphasize it. But I remember the first time I saw that movie, I was just completely taken out of that final moment. Such a bummer. Still love the film though.

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  11. I remember noticing several of these myself. When it comes to my biggest things I tend to notice plot gaffs in movies probably more than other things. I remember getting done watching The Dark Knight, thinking it was a an enjoyable popcorn movie, although it was too bad about the stupid manufactured ending. Then over the following weeks just heaps and heaps of praise came down for the movie and it even continues to this day. ONE plot gaff I can see ignoring (i.e. why doesn't John McClane just go down the stairs in Die Hard?). The Dark Knight has three massive plot gaffs in it that I saw on first watch and it's impossible for me to not see them now. Again, The Dark Knight is an enjoyable movie, and the best of the series, but I can't believe a movie THAT praised has these bad scenes in it.

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    1. The thing I never really understood was that people love to shit on The Dark Knight Rises, but many of them give a pass to The Dark Knight. I love many of the performances in The Dark Knight and I think it is a damn fine popcorn flick, but man, that thing's got holes.

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  12. Great post! It's been a long time since I watched any of these movies (and some I've never seen). Oddly, I didn't notice that glaring detail in 25th Hour, and it made me laugh. (It's the kind of thing my husband would've picked up on in a second).

    It's odd how directors can be so meticulous yet miss something that seems obvious. Like Cameron being excruciatingly thorough about the set of Titanic, down to choosing the type of silverware they would've used, and overlooking the fact that there was definitely enough room on that raft for two people.

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    1. Thanks! That Titanic gaff is something I'll never understand. I mean, that thing is huge! If the weight was distributed equally, there's no problem! Oh welllllll.

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  13. The demon dog chasing Louis in Ghostbusters. The scene where the demon bursts out of the apartment and hops the wall leading into Central Park is so poorly animated, that it's jarring, especially given the practical effects work that is done in the movie. It's not even a matter of time making the special effects look dated. It looked bad even back then.

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    1. Just rewatched it, and yeah, it's hard to disagree with you. I nearly put the phantom blow job scene from that movie on this list. That is one thing that always felt completely unnecessary to me in that film.

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  14. Well, I’m definitely making that Jungle Fever clip an inside joke with my friends.

    I hate Carrie. Partially because of that scene. Fast forward through the movie? What a great idea! I also hated the bad Psycho ripoff music that played every time she used her powers. That got very annoying very quickly. Then there’s the opening credits. So many boobs, considering the fact they’re all supposed to be in high school I feel a little creepy for watching it. The worst part is that the novel’s great, and the script’s pretty good, too, but it’s so poorly directed that the film just infuriates me. Brian DePalma, that freakin’ hack.

    I don’t mind that Godfather scene that much. I mean, yes, it’s clumsy, but I guess I was just floored by how vicious the violence was supposed to be.

    As for scenes to add…

    The Shining is one of, if not the greatest horror movies ever made. I’ve got it tied with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre for number 1 in my book. But what was up with the guy in the bear suit? Or the skeletons?

    Those are just miniscule complaints though, and they still work pretty well. But one of the worst scenes I’ve ever seen in a great movie comes from The Dark Knight. As a huge Batman fan, I love The Dark Knight. It’s the only movie Nolan directed that I would actually call great. But… Harvey Dent is examining a witness and, well, the rest has to be seen to be believed. Go to the 1:16 mark of this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSHP8RdahYc What the hell was just happened? Then there’s later, after the famous party scene where The Joker throws Rachel out of the building, Batman goes after her. They land, “Let’s never do that again”, and then, cut to the next scene. Never mind the fact that there’s a deranged madman in a room full of people, we have a plot to move along here.

    I can also think of a memorably awful scene from a forgettably decent movie: The Ferris wheel scene from The Notebook. I don’t care who you are, if you threaten to kill yourself if a girl doesn’t want to go out with you, she is not going to say yes. I can say a similar thing about Charly, that Cliff Robertson movie. He sexually assaults his love interest and she still falls for him. Similar to one scene from a movie that I actually don’t like, but a lot of other people do, is the scene from Blade Runner where Harrison Ford totally rapes Sean Young, but I’m just supposed to go along with it like it’s nothing.

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    1. Dude, that Jungle Fever clip... right?! What IS that?!

      I love that bear suit scene in The Shining because it's so inexplicable. No clue what the hell is going on there... or why.

      And that scene from The Dark Knight is such comic book movie fluff. I guess I don't really mind it. If nothing else, it is a quick reminder that we are most definitely in a world of fiction.

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    2. Okay, The Shining was a weak example. I guess I was just looking for a Kubrick film because, goddamn, those are just too perfect.

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    3. Okay, here's a BIG one that I just remembered. Two quick moments from Interstellar, lines in fact, that really brought down the movie for me. First line, "They're coordinates!", in reaction to the piles of dust in Murphy's bedroom. Second line, from within the black hole, "They're not aliens. They're us! Millions of years from the future." The second time I saw it, I had no other goal except to see if I could pick up on clues that would make McConaughey say those two lines, and I honestly have no clue, and they just feel like really lazy screenwriting to me.

      Another huge one, without a doubt the biggest for me, is actually one of my against-the-crowd ones. I know everyone says the ending to Mulholland Dr. was brilliant, but it just felt like a cheat from me. The only time an ending genuinely ruined a film for me, and wow, did it. I was getting ready to call it one of my favorites, and then they get sucked into that blue box, and now I just really hate it. It's by far my least favorite Lynch film.

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    4. I hear you on those McConaughey line readings. He can fall flat with his delivery on occasion.

      Your Mulholland Dr. one is interesting, because it appears that I have a wildly different interpretation of that scene than you do. But that could be because I'm so pragmatic in my approach to analyzing movies (often, perhaps, to my detriment). I've always thought that was a very straightforward movie of 2/3 Dream, 1/3 Reality. The blue box was just a way to transition from one storyline to the other. To me, it doesn't inherently mean anything.

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    5. My problem's not with McConaughey, but with the script. In such a huge multimillion dollar movie, I'd expect better than such egregious tell-don't-show.

      Anyway, nearing Christmas is reminding me of another big Great Movie Bad Scene: the cat frying in Christmas Vacation. Maybe it's just because I'm a huge cat lover, but that scene horrifies me, and really takes me out of the laugh riot the rest of the film is.

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    6. That cat scene is a great call. That's always left a foul taste with me too.

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    7. And then it's followed shortly thereafter by one of the funniest comedic monologues ever, which just makes it more jarring.

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  15. Remember Copolla onde said he couldn't shoot violence.

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    1. True. But the rest of the violence in The Godfather is so well staged!

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  16. These are pretty spot-on picks, IMO, particularly the sister scene in The Godfather and that awkward hooker-reference in Do The Right Thing. I'm surprised you hated the final Creed fight, however, given the lighting effects during Creed's opponent's introduction, and during some the of the slow-motion sequences. I could tell the crowd was somewhat blue-screened, but for me it was seamless enough.

    A similar complaint I have is the final Power Loader v. Queen fight in Aliens (1986). That's my favorite movie of all time, but each time I watch it, I find that false-ending completely tacked on and lame.

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    1. I just can't get on board with that final Creed fight. I enjoyed most of the movie - how it was made, what it stood for - but that final fight ranks among the worst boxing fights I've ever seen on film. I really wish I didn't feel that way!

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