10) In Bruges
Like Cabin in the Woods, In Bruges was one of the most surprisingly popular movies in the year of its release. Its element of surprise contains even more layers, however; while a story about two hitmen on a job doesn’t scream comedy, we quickly understand that that’s what we’re watching, until we’re confronted with the fact that this is also a beautiful and tragic story about two friends forced to come to terms with decisions they’ve made and the consequences thereof.
So it oscillates between weird black comedy and gripping tragedy without really skipping a beat, occupying some strange state of limbo between the two moods and being perfectly comfortable existing there. The tragedy is alluded to in the exploration of Colin Farrell’s character’s backstory, but we’re finally exposed to the depths of their relationship, and the loyalty of the Brendan Gleeson character, in his final act of defiant sacrifice, a shock of a moment in a movie that has felt up to this point like it could go in any direction but it was still impossible to see this coming.
11) The Place Beyond The Pines
Derek Cianfrance burst onto the indie scene with 2010’s Blue Valentine, a bold and experimentally-minded endeavor that followed the story of a couple over the course of several years. It’s a larger narrative than love stories (or anti-love stories) tend to allow, not to mention far more emotionally real and resonant, and yet it’s nothing compared to the immense scope of The Place Beyond the Pines.
Given that it was a relatively quick followup to Blue Valentine (his only feature previous to that one was made back in 1998), Cianfrance’s new project was the subject of great anticipation, especially because he seemed to be developing a rapport with Ryan Gosling, one of the Hollywood’s biggest contemporary draws. Despite the anticipation, little seemed to be known about the movie’s actual story, which also featured roles played by Bradley Cooper, Eva Mendes, Ben Mendelsohn, Ray Liotta, Dane DeHaan, and Rose Byrne, although given the quality of the cast, it would have been safe to assume that it would be something of an ensemble picture.
And yet it was still rattling beyond measure when one pivotal scene essentially repudiates all the promotional material that made it seem as though this was primarily Ryan Gosling’s, and the character Luke’s, movie. It’s the big confrontation between Luke and Avery, played by Bradley Cooper, and what happens between them goes without saying. It’s a moment that has a ripple effect on the lives of characters spanning across generations, and one that forced the audience to recalibrate their expectations for the remainder of the film.
More and more I’m coming to appreciate the value of a wonderfully executed movie scene. When it’s done to near perfection as the aforementioned scenes are, it can salvage an otherwise uninteresting movie, elevate a movie from being just good to being excellent, or solidify a movie’s status as a masterpiece. Nothing else is quite like the experience of a scene that completely transfixes an audience in a full theater. The best movies are more than a sum of their parts, but sometimes a part of a movie can overwhelm and make up for or enhance the strength of the perceived whole. These are the kinds of surprising moments that make the unpredictability of any movie one of the purest joys of watching.
