Smoke [1995]
1. “You never know what’s gonna happen next. And the moment you think you do, that’s the moment you don’t know a goddamn thing.”
2. Daniel Auster has a cameo as a shoplifter. In real life he was later charged in the overdose death of his 10-month-old daughter and soon thereafter died of an overdose himself.
3. Tearing apart the chicken with his bare hands.
A Bigger Splash [1973]
1. Sitting on a leather sofa. One blue sock, one red sock.
2. After studying the painting of himself he takes a few sips from a drinking fountain. A Warhol picture is visible in the foreground.
3. Wooden cutouts of tulips.
Beverly Hills Madam [1986]
1. Without trying on the dress first, she purchases it, instructing the saleswoman to “accessorize it for me” and deliver it that afternoon.
2. John Ingle as a professor.
3. Left adrift on Sunset Blvd. surrounded by WRONG WAY and DO NOT ENTER signs.
China Moon [1994]
1. He makes a circular incision around the bullethole with an X-Acto knife.
2. Drinking beer on the rocks.
3. Charles Dance’s shaky Yankee accent.
The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe [1991]
1. “I always wanted to be somebody. But now I realize I should have been more specific.”
2. A cardboard disc which reads THIS BUTTON HAS BEEN RECYCLED.
3. Zipping all the zippers.
Scorpio [1973]
1. Exploding, collapsing wooden scaffolding.
2. Burt impersonates a Black priest.
3. Fake suicide capsule.
I have never, ever liked a film directed by Michael Winner. And while I can’t say it’s a “good” movie, I came closer to liking Scorpio than any other Winner film.
It’s basically a John le Carré simulacrum with a flabby, derivative screenplay, burdened with some truly terrible dialog, that doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. The ending in particular has none of the gravitas it thinks it has, simply because it feels contrived rather than fated. However you do get some excellent location work, beautifully lensed by Robert Paynter, and a helluva chase sequence. Burt and Alain are fun to watch, especially in their few scenes together.
So yeah, it’s a tolerable way to kill a few hours.
Illegal [1955]
1. A poison that takes 45 minutes to work.
2. Storefront: DALE’S RECORD SHOP
3. Deathbed confession that arrives too late.
Mickey 17 [2025]
1. The tail becomes a sauce.
2. An accent somewhere between Bobby Brady and Columbo.
3. Sex expends too many calories.
Gidget [1959]
1. She’s reluctant to strip down to her bathing suit; one of her friends commands: “Peel, girl!”
2. Breast-enhancing exercises.
3. When The Four Preps pop in to perform “Cinderella” at the luau, it’s the squarest, corniest, whitest musical interlude in 1959 cinema.
French Cancan [1955]
1. An afternoon tryst in the backroom of the boulangerie.
2. Taking turns showing off their newfound limberness.
3. Pepto-Bismol walls backstage.
RandomCha 