“It’s so horrible to see your own confusion and understand it.”
“Thought will fuck you up.”
"You're using this conspiracy theory to avoid having sex with me."
"Touch my heart--with your foot."
"There it is--the Eiffel Tower." (This one only works in context.)
"All pregnancies are unplanned, son."
"I've never had rectal bleeding before, but I'm pretty sure I'm not a fan of that."
"Dick me dead, bury me pregnant."
"Nothing keeps you awake better than always thinking about death."
"Everybody has their own ideas about what paradise is."
"Paradise begins with the love we show each other on earth."
"I have a friend who, even though he loves women, claims they are sacks of excrement."
"It's the big wide world, and it sure has changed."
"The first thing I ever masturbated to was probably a rerun of Charles in Charge."
"John Wayne can kick death's ass."
"You're not going to do a young lady any good, not with that little thing of yours."
"All you've got to be is white in America to get what you want."
"Blow your spoons!"
"I cannot live without my life. I cannot die without my soul."
"All I wanna do is be a cowboy and wear my own pants."
"Art is our life. Art! Art!”
"One doesn't easily forget an arm torn out by the roots."
"To have a vagina that smells like the fish of Hades."
"My inner baboon is taking over."
"The cooties is gettin' desperate."
"Well, I got an idea for you. Why don't you just go back to the land of fucking wall sockets?"
"They looked like mermaids on crack!"
"Why else should his grandfather have sent me as an engagement present one roller skate covered in thousand island dressing?"
"I'm going away so you don't have to see my ugly face when you're eating."
“I can think of only three words to describe women, none that are worth expressing."
"That's quite an erection!"
"That took you long enough. What did you do--douche while you were at it?"
“I am the muffin.”
“If I had a nickel for every cigarette your mom smoked, I’d be dead.”
“He’s got my bumper! What will my wife say?”
Best Fart
I thought for sure Dafoe’s early fart in The Lighthouse would win this before checking my notes. Another contender is the Video Joker’s fart noises and commentary in the middle of a bad guy meeting in Who Killed Captain Alex? And there’s a good one in 35 Shots of Rum. And yes, Lion King fans, Pumba farts in that remake because that’s the kind of thing that would have made Walt Disney proud.
But the winner is from November, Kratt’s far accompanied by Jew’s harp from Hans. It’s a simple equation really: fart + Jew’s harp = movie magic
Best Scene Involving Urine
Lots of compeetition in this category!
There’s the kid peeing on the superhero dream character in Who Wants to Kill Jessie?
There’s a great bathroom scene in Seven Servants.
There’s a scene in Mother where the main character feeds her son broth while he urinates on a blue wall at a bus stop, a scene ending with a beautiful shot of broth and urine running down a sidewalk.
The kids in Ozu’s I Was Born, But. . . get a chance to urinate on screen.
A kid pees in the hall of a hotel room in The Silence because. . .well, I never figured out why that was happening, but it sure was inspirational.
An old man wets himself at what you might call the turning point in A Separation.
There’s lots of pissing in Kramer vs. Kramer.
Treat Williams’ stream off a ledge in Central Park in Hair is impressive stuff!
In Teorema, the son urinates on a crappy blue painting he made.
Climax has a scene where a tall blonde woman urinates on the floor while a guy says, “Way to party!”
Stephen Rea helps Forest Whitaker pee in The Crying Game.
And a character pees in jugs of wine in Red Sorghum.
That’s a lot of urine! My favorite, however, is in a much earlier film--Earth. Farmers urinate on a tractor, prompted by the order to “Let ‘er fly!”
Best Scene Involving Defecate
Not as many to choose from.
I already mentioned the collective dumping in the backyard while that Nico song plays in Cold Water.
There’s a nice pooping moment in Le Quattro Volte when a goat herder takes a dump in a field while a fly walks around on his face.
A serial killer in I Saw the Devil digs a tracker thingy out of his own fecal matter. That was pleasant. Man, I really disliked this movie.
Sam Elliott smells Bigfoot’s feces in The Man Who Killed Hitler and Then the Bigfoot.
And there’s squirrel poop at the very end of La Ardilla Roja (The Red Squirrel).
But the winner has to be The Lion King, a Disney remake that had the balls to include a 5+ minute sequence where giraffe shit is a major factor.
Best Primal Scream
Apparently, Andrew Garfield (and the kid playing his younger self) has a pretty good one in Never Let Me Go, but I don’t have any recollection of this movie at all.
Creed’s boy--Creed--has a good one in a pool after his first fight with Drago’s boy--Drago. That’s in Creed II, the sequel to a movie called Creed.
The dad in Teorema has a good one, too, and that one involves yelling at a volcano. That’s the kind of the thing that seems to sum up the last three years for me actually.
And Matthew McConaughey has a Cage-esque “Ee-yah!” in Serenity.
My favorite is at the end of Support the Girls though, characters screaming from a rooftop at a beach highway.
Best Scene Involving Food
A tennis match, panning shots between food with Cheung and Leung in In the Mood for Love
A meatball scene in Brain Damage
Dennis Hopper grabbing a burrito during a shootout and escape from a restaurant in Backtrack
The winner: a wild and dizzying bread-making montage in Earth
A still can't do it justice. It's all about the editing.
Rudolf Klein-Rogge has great villainous hands in Spies.
Best Feet
It’s love at first sight in El with some tangential foot-washing.
But if Tarantino has released a movie during the year I do these for, there’s no way he can’t win. Why haven’t I named the “Best Feet” award after him?
Best Use of a Nose Guard
Angel Heart
Best Laughing
El, a climactic scene in a church where a man’s jealousy hits a peak. Did you know that Bunuel has a cameo as a priest in this one?
Best Windsock Man (Balloon Goon, Tube Dude)
Hale County This Morning, This Evening, has a lovely shot of one beside fireworks.
But Clint Eastwood pulled off something special when he filmed a sequence with three windsock men in three seconds of film in The Mule. So this belongs to Clint!
I'm surprised this movie didn't have a sex scene between Eastwood and two windsock men.
A random painting of guys in turbans putting cats down a shirtless woman’s pants spotted on a wall in the background of Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion
A picture of George Bush on a wall in George Washington (a picture that made me laugh)
A painting of the titular dress in van Warmerdam’s The Dress
Fireworks has two--the flower things or the snowlight/suicide painting
A recurring painting in Barney’s Version depicting the main character as a demon
The artwork in Midsommar--both the tapestry seen at the beginning and a pubic hair love potion story in pictures a little later on
Any of the tableaux vivants in Hypothesis of the Stolen Painting, the best probably being the one with the hanged kid
Willie’s paintings in 3 Women
Teorema’s son’s paintings on glass
The winner is a kid’s police sketch of a kidnapper in High and Low because it made me laugh. My favorite art is art that makes me giggle.
Best Statues
The Innocents has some great statues, but I like the random bit of surrealism in The Belly of an Architect with a guy chiseling off the noses of statues. So that wins.
Best Lighting
Last Black Man in San Francisco thrilled me with how light was used throughout, but I have to go with Once Upon a Time in Anatolia as the winner for one scene featuring an angel with tea. She’s a rare female presence, and my reaction probably matched the reaction of the men in the room with her.
Best Thumbs Up
It’s gotta be the one a kid gives in Pilgrim after watching his mom bludgeon an evil pilgrim lady with his father’s head.
Oh, sorry. Spoiled that one again.
Best High Five
Though a high-five exchanged between a senile old man and a son during a foosball game in A Separation is pretty good, I’m giving this award to Joshua Leonard giving a high-five to a random kid in Humpday.
Best Facial Tic
Mastroianni in Divorce Italian Style
Best Drug Trip
Midsommar, a nice long take with the screen getting all warbly
Worst Spoken Word Poetry in a Movie
“Ode to Alex Ramsey” in The Black Stallion, though the girl is really trying to sell it
Most Disappointing Movie-Related Things
Varda’s Kung Fu Master! was not a kung-fu movie at all!
No Hermit Bob character poster for The Dead Don’t Die (though a friend did give me that movie poster, and I hung it in my classroom)
The glorious, warbling “whoa” in Gunga Din did not become a Wilhelm Scream
That the climactic scream in Hunchback of Notre Dame didn’t become another Wilhelm Scream
That Gone with the Wind isn’t filled with little people--apparently Singer’s Midgets were busy
That Pavel Juracek didn’t make another movie after Case for a Rookie Hangman
Unanswered Questions
Does Olaf fart?
What’s an ear nostril called?
Is there some sort of online group where serial killers can meet up and become friends?
Did Opening Night have a black cowboy who wore an eye patch and swaggered or was that my imagination?
Am I allowed to use the word “boychik” or not?
Why did the Creed movies skip over Mr. T’s son?
What game show had a giant pinball machine? (Note: This is in The China Syndrome.)
How did Paul Frees and ben Burtt get involved in The Milpitas Monster?
What the hell am I doing with my life? (This was in my review for Happy Death Day 2U.)
What is the etymology of “shitballs”? (Is it a Pet Detective thing?)
Did I really hear a “What the fuck?” in the remake of The Lion King?
Was Edgar Bergern actually a good ventriloquist?
Do I want to know what a “human toilet” is, or am I better off not knowing?
My Biggest Laugh of the Year
The big “I’m Still Standing” climactic moment (a reenactment of the music video) in that Elton John movie
This was Rocketman's big "Live-Aid" moment.
My Proudest Moments as a Wildly-Popular Movie Blogger from 2019
Coining a new word--whoreography
Coining a new word--pop-doc
My double Dick Hyman (That's back-to-back movies scored by Dick Hyman. In the industry, we call that a "Double Dick Hyman.")
The use of “con-fu fighting” in my write up for House of Games
The fact that the only flaw or thing I need to fix in 2020 is seeing more Satyajit Ray movies
Things I Learned from Watching Movies This Year
Seattle is not Fun Town, USA.
The Italian army wore goofy feathers on their caps during WWII.
The ostrich is the fastest land animal.
Trash cans in Baltimore are 34 inches high.
Hell is full of bears, Indians, and mountains.
A new buffet strategy--never sit down. Thanks, Mother.
Grand Illusion is really funny if you’re high. (No, I haven’t tested this.)
The makers of Lassie were inspired by Bunuel’s use of a goat in The Young and the Damned.
Abraham Lincoln cheated at tug-of-war, the kind of thing that is almost as shocking as Trump gleefully admitting that he grabs women by their genitalia.
The Internet and cell phones have ruined society. As Clint Eastwood said, “You can’t open a fruit box without opening the Internet.”
Roy Andersson invented the selfie stick.
Movies That Made Me Cry (Likely an Incomplete List)
Paddleton
The Biggest Little Farm
Rise of Skywalker
Amazing Grace
Yeah, that’s definitely an incomplete list. I cry all the time. Heck, two days ago, I cried while watching an episode of The Office.
Movies I Watched Only So I Would Be Allowed to Enter a Person’s House Again After Being Threatened
The Birdcage
The “Attaboy, Luther” Award (Best Offscreen Dialogue)
“Yahoo! That’s the stuff, baby! Take it off baby!” (The Night Strangler)
Lots of things characters say about Shelley Duvall in 3 Woman (“He’s in for a good time,” etc.)
“He stole my pen again.” (Also 3 Women)
“Grease my gun” or “I’m ready to powwow tonight, baby” in Apocalypse Now
“Way to party!” after the tall, blond dancer starts urinating on the floor in Climax
“Look what you done to my pretzi!” (Herbie Rides Again)
The winner: “Hey, Penguin, you gonna pick up the little girlie, huh?” (The Milpitas Monster, one where the subtitles may have let me down)
Worst Pun I Heard in a Movie This Year
“Victim of sawcumstance” (You Can’t Cheat an Honest Man)
Note: This is not Batman's The Penguin. (Note: This is an inside joke.)
That Cold Pursuit is a black comedy
Best Lebowski Reference
Thor in Endgame
The “How Did I Miss That the First Time?” Award
The silent comedy references in the John Wick movies.
I mean, they even start with Buster Keaton!
Best Ideas I Had All Year
A Harry Nilsson biopic starring Tim Heidecker
A spin-off movie of The Black Stallion where Hoyt Axton has sex with mer-people
A hybrid sequel to Rocketman and Crawl where a bunch of Elton Johns try to eat a father and daughter
Asking former students for favors (like free glasses) because they owe a debt to me as a teacher. Thanks for that idea, The Big City!
Best House
Alex van Warmerdam’s farm house with its well-planned doors in Little Tony (all van Warmerdam’s houses are awesome--I think he has them specially constructed)
Survive Style 5+, the house of the man who wants his wife dead
The winner is the Victorian in Last Black Man in San Francisco, aided by that aforementioned light.
