Monday, January 7, 2013

My Favorite Movie Moments of 2012

2012 might not go down in history as a good year for great movies, but it was most definitely a GREAT year for GOOD movies. There was a lot to like this year, and so much of the good stuff this year went down so easy that I know I'll be revisiting a ton of these movies for years to come. Here are some of my favorite moments from movies I really liked, plus some great moments from movies I didn't. It was that kind of year -- even the movies I wasn't crazy about had their moments. Here they are.
  • James Bond adjusts his shirt sleeves in Skyfall.
  • Cillian Murphy shows up to hold court in The Dark Knight Rises.
  • Hulk smashes Loki in The Avengers.
  • Mark Duplass sings for Aubrey Plaza in Safety Not Guaranteed.
  • Snow White tells the Queen she can't have her heart in Snow White and the Huntsman.
  • Philip Seymour Hoffman does some informal processing on Joaquin Phoenix in The Master.
  • Denzel Washington crashes a plane in Flight.
  • The cemetery shootout in Seven Psychopaths.
  • The card game heist in Killing Them Softly.
  • Jackie Siegel goes to Wal-Mart in The Queen of Versailles.
  • Dana and Marty open all the cages in The Cabin in the Woods.
  • Channing Tatum says "Fuck you, Science!" in 21 Jump Street.
 
  • The final fight in The Raid: Redemption.
  • Scott Adkins and Andrei Arlovski fight in the sporting goods store in Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning.
  • John C. Reilly's opening monologue in Wreck-it Ralph.
  • Maurice Smith's teary monologue in Miami Connection.
  • Dr. Schultz just can't resist in Django Unchained.
  • Any of Albert Brooks' scenes in This is 40.
  • Anne Hathaway dreams a dream in Les Miserables.
  • The "Take This Waltz" sequence in Take This Waltz.
  • Channing Tatum backflips off a bridge in Magic Mike.
  • Gina Carano and Michael Fassbender's hotel room fight in Haywire.
  • The girls go shopping for a new dress while high in Bachelorette.
  • The Game of Riddles in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
  • John Carter singlehandedly takes on all the aliens in John Carter.
 
  • Christopher Walken's monologue at the end of Seven Psychopaths.
  • The Flash Gordon fantasy in Ted.
  • Django gets the whip in Django Unchained.
  • Gina Gershon brings home some K-Fry-C in Killer Joe.
  • The Black Widows reveal their plan in The Man With the Iron Fists.
  • Studio logo after studio logo in Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie.
  • Norman walks to school in ParaNorman.
  • Everyone shoots the same guy in The Expendables 2.
  • Sara Paxton takes out the trash in The Innkeepers.
  • The first few minutes of Prometheus.
  • The last few minutes of Seeking a Friend for the End of the World.
  • All of Cloud Atlas.
  • The first outing to see Rocky Horror Picture Show in The Perks of Being a Wallflower.
  • Sam and Suzy dance in Moonrise Kingdom.
 
  • Everyone dances in Damsels in Distress.
  • Any time Jennifer Lawrence dances in Silver Linings Playbook.
  • Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum walk through the high school parking lot in 21 Jump Street.
  • Alan Arkin negotiates the price of a screenplay in Argo.
  • Future Paul Dano starts disappearing in Looper.
  • The "Canaries" sequence in Zero Dark Thirty.
  • Jack Reacher takes out five guys in Jack Reacher.
  • Shawarma. The Avengers.
 

14 comments:

  1. Is Miami Connection worth watching?

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  2. I love these kinds of lists! This is like a little yearbook for 2013. And it reminds me of what I still need to see. :)

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  3. Excellent list. I agree with pretty much all of it that I have seen, especially James Bond's cuff link adjustment, Mark Duplass' singing for Aubrey Plaza, Hulk smashing Loki in the Avengers and Chaning Tatum's "Fuck you, science!"

    However, as ol' anonymous there stated, this list also makes me realize just how many movies I HAVEN'T seen this year, including:

    Snow White and the Huntsman
    Flight
    Haywire
    The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
    John Carter
    Seven Psychopaths
    Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning
    The Man with the Iron Fists
    Killing Them Softly
    The Raid: Redemption
    Miami Connection
    This is 40
    Take This Waltz
    Killer Joe
    Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie
    The Expendables 2
    The Perks of Being a Wallflower
    Ted
    The Innkeepers
    Prometheus
    Damsels in Distress
    Cloud Atlas
    Silver Linings Playbook
    Zero Dark Thirty
    Jack Reacher
    Seeking a Friend for the End of the World

    And here I thought I went to a lot of movies last year...

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    Replies
    1. I haven't seen 14 of these flicks.

      And here I thought... well, you know. :-)

      Delete
  4. Great list. To these I'd add:

    •The two moments in "Take This Waltz" in which 'Video Killed the Radio Star' are used.
    •Dr. Banner's 'spit the bullet' story in "The Avengers."
    •The hospital emergency stairs conversation between three characters in "Flight" (which is like a movie-within-a-movie)
    •Any time James Purefoy is on-screen in "John Carter" (talk about stealing the movie from the lead with an all-charisma supporting turn).
    •The diner scene in "Looper."
    "Argo-fuck yourself" (which my parents haven't stopped saying to me and to each other since they saw the movie :-P)
    •Candie and Stephen share a moment alone in the middle of dinner (which puts their relationship in a whole new light) in "Django Unchained."
    •The 'hand job' scene in "Hyde Park on Hudson" (because you cannot believe what you're seeing/hearing).
    •Matthew McConaughey closes the show in "Magic Mike."
    •The first time we flash back to the ship in the dock in "Titanic 3D."
    •Harry Dean Stanton's and Sam Rockwell's pitch-perfect scenes in "Seven Psychopaths."
    •Bond and Eve enter an office, and the pattern on the door that they close behind them looks awfully familiar.
    •The "hand" scene in "Amour."
    •The opening and the final scene of "The Dark Knight Rises" (and the middle too except when Bain's nuts are chopped off).
    •Day the 13th amendment gets voted on in "Lincoln."
    •Janet Leigh gives Alfred Hitchcok a corn candy-eating lift on her VW Beetle in "Hitchcock."
    •The 'animals-to-Costco' sequence in "Samsara."
    •The father-daughter scene in "Holy Motors."
    •The "raft" sequence in "Beasts of the Southern Wild."
    •The ending of "The Sound of My Voice."
    •The high school fight scene in "The Amazing Spider-Man."
    •The 'falling back in time' scene in "Men in Black 3."
    •The subtle and not showy use of 3D to enhance the depth of field in "Prometheus" (one of the only few salvagable things about this movie).
    •The deliberately jerky/skippy animation of the characters in the game-within-the-movie version of "Wreck-It Ralph."
    •The 'motorcycle riding through the desert' scene in "The Master."
    •James Gandolfini's scenes in "Zero Dark Thirty" (they're actually the worse scenes in the movie but they provide welcomed comedir relief).
    •The closing credits of "Cloud Atlas" (which makes you appreciate it more).
    •The entirety of "Birdemic" as seen through the snark of "Rifftrax Live's" performers (the funniest thing I saw on a movie theater in all of 2012)
    •All of Christopher Walken's scenes in "A Late Quartet."

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  5. Liam Neeson's ending monologue in The Grey.
    (I'm surprised Vargas or Bromley didn't mention that one.)
    Chuck Norris telling a Chuck Norris Fact in the Expendables 2. (The whole theater crowd was laughing their asses off for about a minute after that.)
    Chuck Norris/Mcquade(?) shooting the henceman by the X-Ray machine in The Expendables 2.
    Mark Ruffalo's/Bruce Banner's "I'm always angry" one-liner in The Avengers.
    Bane's "Oh, so you think darkness is your ally" rant after Batman uses his EMP device in their first fight in The Dark Knight Rises.
    Any scene with Q-Bert in Wreck-It Ralph.


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  6. Antonio Banderas with that hot chick at the end of Haywire

    The end credits of Dark Shadows (I survived!)

    The bear/mom miming what to say for Meridda in Brave

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  7. My new-to-me movie (1/7/12)

    The English version of Fritz Lang's M (1932) on Blu-ray: http://www.dvdverdict.com/juryroom/viewtopic.php?f=50&t=6028&p=74484#p74484

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You really need to start your own blog for these.

      Delete
  8. Secretary of War Edwin Stanton leaving the room when President Lincoln starts telling a story.

    Hushpuppy "beasting" it.

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  9. POSSIBLE DJANGO UNCHAINED SPOILER

    Am I the only person who laughed a lot when the one old guy asked Waltz and Foxx to come out of the snowy snow for some bday cake? Then he says 'pretty good.' I Love that part and I for some reason really thought it was cool when they shaved/filed the foam off the beers in the saloon. Man, that movie!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No, I had a good chuckle at the birthday cake scene too. No idea if there was any real point to it besides comic relief, but it was a fun scene.

      Delete
  10. A few of mine made it here (the monsters escaping in THE CABIN IN THE WOODS; "Fuck you, science!" in 21 JUMP STREET...mainly because of the genius of him saying that in front of a blackboard with nothing on it but a shitload of 4's). My others:

    - Rodriguez revealed, SEARCHING FOR SUGAR MAN
    - A citizen of East Carthage explains "the five states of Texas", BERNIE
    - The President tells a story about Ethan Allen, LINCOLN
    - "Yard Work", SINISTER
    - Tenpole Tudor's "Swords of a Thousand Men" over the opening titles of THE PIRATES!: BAND OF MISFITS
    - A teddy bear talks about selling a parsnip, TED
    - Iko Uwais gets down a hallway, THE RAID
    - "That's my secret. I'm always angry", THE AVENGERS
    - Richard Parker doesn't say goodbye, LIFE OF PI

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