The one that surprised me most was When Harry Met Sally...I thought I knew this film fairly well, but I somehow hadn't registered the slap scene. (Or the two F-bombs Sally drops during the course of the movie.)
When I asked various friends about it, not one of them could remember the face-slap scene either. These are all people who are fond of the movie. (I'd conducted an informal survey of What's Your Favourite Rom/Com? among friends a year earlier and WHMS came out on top, by a wide margin.)
Watch out, Harry, here it comes...
Probably in Miller's Crossing, Groundhog Day, Romance & Cigarettes, The Holiday, and Raiders of the Lost Ark, the
slap/punch is deserved. The rest are debatable, to say the least. Which
raises the question of what purpose these face-slaps fulfill in movies.
Are they a vicarious I-Wish-I'd-Done-That moment to satisfy a female audience still seething over some historical wrong, or do they fulfill some other function?
Bill Murray deserved it. Definitely.
I asked a
number of women if they'd ever slapped a guy's face. Only one admitted
to it, and she pleaded serious (and violent) provocation. The others
were generally vague (read, non-committal), and some were decidedly defensive.
Edward Burns deserved it, too.
From a cinematic perspective, I think of the Cecil B. De Mille quote: "I will trade you forty gorgeously beautiful Hawaiian sunsets for one good sock on the jaw."
For the benefit of those looking at the timing—for structural reasons—I checked five of our films. The punch in The Holiday takes place at the 12% mark, the slap in Only You at the 54% mark, in Groundhog Day at the 57% mark, in Definitely, Maybe at the 75% mark, and in When Harry Met Sally at the 89% mark.
What does it all mean? Who knows? Certainly not me. But I am now reviewing confrontation scenes in my scripts with a view to adding a decent slap somewhere.
Back in the mid-90s, when I first became interested in screenwriting, the one source of information I stumbled across was Terry Rossio's Wordplay columns. At the time, I worked in desktop publishing for the Department of Defence at DSTO, Salisbury. I spent all day, every day, working with PageMaker. So it was natural for me to copy the Wordplay columns into PageMaker and turn them into a convenient-sized book.
I lugged that homemade paperback around with me for ages, read it cover-to-cover at least three times, and was inspired, exhilarated and intimidated. [I went looking for it a few weeks ago, but couldn't find it. Probably the victim of some well-intentioned clean-up.]
I would like to take this opportunity to give a big shout-out of gratitude to Terry Rossio. Man, your columns kept me going. I grew up in a Housing Commission estate in the bush, a place where no one expected us to do much more than the occasional stint in prison. I avoided that option, but (until I moved far away) never hinted to anyone that I wanted to write. So, thank you for your encouragement. I am indebted.
I'm also indebted to a bunch of other wonderful people who share their knowledge on the internet. You can see their blogs listed on the side of this page. Take some time today to check them out; I'm sure you'll learn something.
Anyway, back to Wordplay. The column I read most often, the one that intimidated me most, was Column 34, Throw in the Towel. It includes a section on "Knowledge," meaning knowledge of the film industry. Terry snaps out a series of questions designed to make the point that most people have, at best, a superficial knowledge of the movies. One of his questions was:
Quick, George Lucas just asked you to name your favorite Kurosawa film.
That shook me. At the time, I knew zip about Akira Kurosawa, but I was determined to learn. A few weeks later Seven Samurai (1954) played at an art house in the city and I was there. Ran (1985), Rashomon (1950), Yojimbo (1961), High and Low (1963), and Dersu Uzala (1975) followed. To answer George's question, while I have a sentimental fondness for Seven Samurai (as the first Kurosawa film I ever watched), my real favourite is Yojimbo. I think it's also Hollywood's favourite. It was referenced in The Bodyguard (1992) and Rising Sun (1993), remade with Clint Eastwood as A Fistful of Dollars (1964), remade with Bruce Willis as Last Man Standing(1996), then remade again, with a major remix of the key elements by the Coen Brothers, as Miller's Crossing (1990). It's probably due for another remake about now.
Akira Kurosawa had a big impact on George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. They watched all his movies and later presented him with an honorary Academy Award in 1990. You can watch the presentation here on YouTube.
One of the things about rewatching old Japanese movies is, you start to notice little details. This is especially true if you're familiar with the adage to "steal like an artist." The following frames are taken from Seven Samurai (1954) and the second Star Wars movie, The Empire Strikes Back (1980).
On the left we have Gisaku, the wise old man, who teaches the villagers to use hungry samurai to defeat the bandits.
On the right we have Yoda, the wise old Jedi, who teaches Luke Skywalker to use the force to defeat Darth Vader.
If you learn to steal like an artist, you're going to find yourself in good company.
The one that surprised me most was When Harry Met Sally...I thought I knew this film fairly well, but I somehow hadn't registered the slap scene. (Or the two F-bombs Sally drops during the course of the movie.)
When I asked various friends about it, not one of them could remember the face-slap scene either. These are all people who are fond of the movie. (I'd conducted an informal survey of What's Your Favourite Rom/Com? among friends a year earlier and WHMS came out on top, by a wide margin.)
Watch out, Harry, here it comes...
Probably in Miller's Crossing, Groundhog Day, Romance & Cigarettes, The Holiday, and Raiders of the Lost Ark, the
slap/punch is deserved. The rest are debatable, to say the least. Which
raises the question of what purpose these face-slaps fulfill in movies.
Are they a vicarious I-Wish-I'd-Done-That moment to satisfy a female audience still seething over some historical wrong, or do they fulfill some other function?
Bill Murray deserved it. Definitely.
I asked a
number of women if they'd ever slapped a guy's face. Only one admitted
to it, and she pleaded serious (and violent) provocation. The others
were generally vague (read, non-committal), and some were decidedly defensive.
Edward Burns deserved it, too.
From a cinematic perspective, I think of the Cecil B. De Mille quote: "I will trade you forty gorgeously beautiful Hawaiian sunsets for one good sock on the jaw."
For the benefit of those looking at the timing—for structural reasons—I checked five of our films. The punch in The Holiday takes place at the 12% mark, the slap in Only You at the 54% mark, in Groundhog Day at the 57% mark, in Definitely, Maybe at the 75% mark, and in When Harry Met Sally at the 89% mark.
What does it all mean? Who knows? Certainly not me. But I am now reviewing confrontation scenes in my scripts with a view to adding a decent slap somewhere.
(she slaps him twice), The Holiday
(she punches him twice), No Strings Attached
(she slaps him repeatedly), Only You
(she slaps and kicks him), Miller's Crossing
(she punches him), Jerry Maguire
(she punches him), That Old Feeling
(she attacks him), Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark
(she punches him), Groundhog Day
(she slaps him repeatedly), Hollow Point
(she punches him repeatedly), Romance & Cigarettes 
(she attacks him), The Royal Tenenbaums
(she slaps him), and Scenes from a Mall
(Bette Midler knees Woody Allen in the clods). 
I thought I knew this film fairly well, but I somehow hadn't registered the slap scene. (Or the two F-bombs Sally drops during the course of the movie.) 
That shook me. At the time, I knew zip about 
(1954) played at an art house in the city and I was there. 
(1985), 
(1950), 
(1961), 
(1963), and 
(1975) followed. 
(1992) and 
(1993), remade with 
(1964), remade with 
(1996), then remade again, with a major remix of the key elements by the Coen Brothers, as 
(1980).
