Top 10 BEST Movie Quotes

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Hey everyone, Jack Drees here with another countdown! When I watch movies, one thing I pay a lot of attention to happens to be the characters. After all, in most movies, the characters are the one thing that can make you decide whether the movie is either good or bad. There are a lot of characters I like, some more than others, but there are some times in movies when you witness one character, and they give a quote to remember forever. Whether it’s funny, original, deep, or epic, certain characters can compel me when they speak. Today I’m gonna talk about my top 10 favorite quotes from movies. Now, keep in mind, these are my personal picks. If you don’t like these quotes, that’s totally OK, you can make your own list with your own quotes, or you can leave a comment displaying your personal favorite movie quotes or why you disagree with me. Although just don’t be a dick about it and then we’ll most likely be cool. Anyway, let’s start the list, and get counting down on my top 10 BEST movie quotes.

10: Jaws

“Jaws” is probably the most famous shark movie ever made. It was one of the first big summer movies, it came out before other summer movie hits like the original “Star Wars” and “Alien,” and many people say it still stands the test of time despite having a fake shark. What quote from the movie belongs on this list? If you’re asking this question, you either haven’t seen or heard of “Jaws,” or your brain isn’t wired properly. Anyway, here’s the quote:

BRODY: You’re gonna need a bigger boat.

The first time I heard this quote I was watching the movie with my dad, it set the stage for some of what was to come, I got a laugh out of it, and it almost felt like hearing something that a teacher would say to you that you’d never forget as long as you live. The line delivery given by Roy Schneider in this instance is fabulous. Not to mention, when you see him in frame, he’s got a perfect posture and the image seems to have no flaws when it comes to the quote, the quote just seems to fit with literally everything this moment of the movie has going for it. The delivery itself gives a sense of danger and it pulls you in, John Williams’s music building up along with it is also perfect. If you haven’t watched “Jaws,” you’re either lying, under a rock, or some talking shark told you to never watch the movie otherwise it would eat you.

9: The Terminator

I don’t usually watch the “Terminator” franchise all that often, however I do find enjoyment out of it every once in awhile. I consider “Terminator 2: Judgment Day” to be one of the best action films ever made, but it doesn’t mean I keep the others (mainly 1, 3, and 5, the 4th one was dull) in consideration. OK well, to be fair, the fifth actually wasn’t the best movie ever. In fact, despite “Judgment Day” being my favorite of the bunch, I still think the original had the best line in the franchise. Don’t get me wrong, the second one had cool lines including Schwarzenegger’s “Hasta la vista, baby,” and the exchange between John Conner and Schwarzenegger after a chase scene early on in the movie.

JOHN: Who brought you here?

THE TERMINATOR: You did.

The best line is one I’ve been saying a lot all my life, and I imagine a lot of other people have as well. If you have seen the first movie, you’d probably agree with me when I say this is the film’s best line.

THE TERMINATOR: I’ll be back.

If that line were used in any random conversation, it would most likely fly over people’s heads, but the execution of this line is perfect. It gives you a feeling of suspense, a wonder for what’s to come. THEN BAM! A car comes crashing into a building driven by The Terminator himself! The thing that makes the line perfect, isn’t necessarily how it’s written, it’s more towards how it’s delivered. Also, think about it, this almost feels like a line only people like Arnold could ace. Imagine if someone like Gilbert Gottfried was playing the Terminator, imagine how that would turn out! It wouldn’t work as much.

8: The LEGO Movie

I love “The LEGO Movie.” To me, it’s one of the best animations ever made, and one of the characters in that movie is Will Arnett’s interpretation of Batman. He’s by far the funniest part of the movie and a definite scene stealer. When I was making this list, I was trying to think of quotes that made me roll on the floor, then I thought about this movie. When it comes to the best quotes in the entire film, it’s a really tough competition because the film’s screenplay is probably one of the funniest I’ve witnessed in my life! Although I ended up picking one quote over everything else. But before I show you the quote, let me give you some buildup. So there’s one point in this movie where our heroes are stuck in an ocean, they pop out of the cushions of a double decker coach. So Batman interrupts the conversation at hand, and lets everyone know of reality.

“I don’t mean to spoil the party, but does anyone else notice we’re stuck in the middle of the ocean on this couch? I mean, it’s not like a big gigantic ship is just gonna come out of nowhere and save us. (suddenly a big gigantic ship becomes visible as it comes over to them) My, gosh!”

So the heroes get on the ship, Metal Beard, a character who we knew earlier from the film, is there too. Not too long after getting on, Emmett, the main character played by Chris Pratt (Guardians of the Galaxy, Jurassic World), reveals his plan to save the world. Although, when it comes to a part involving a spaceship, the folks run into a problem. In order to complete the manufacturing of a spaceship, a hyperdrive is required, which none of the heroes have. At one point, Batman utters this:

“What do yo think, a spaceship’s just gonna appear out of the blue? (suddenly a spaceship appears behind them) Are you kidding me?! The same thing!”

I remember loving that when I first saw the film, but I recall watching it on HBO at one point and I laughed like a supervillain! There are few films I’ve watched that have the humor this film managed to deliver, and when I saw “The LEGO Batman Movie” a spinoff to “The LEGO Movie,” I knew this movie wasn’t a fluke. In fact, I love a quote from that movie which stands out as well, the one where Batman makes fun of the Suicide Squad. These movies are just factors behind why I’m excited to find out what “The LEGO Ninjago Movie” is going to be like.

7: Kingsman: The Secret Service

I love “Kingsman: The Secret Service.” As a movie, it knows it’s a ridiculous spy flick and it even sometimes compares itself to Bond. Not to mention there’s a dog in the movie whose name has the initials “JB,” when the main character of Gary “Eggsy” Unwin is talking with Michael Caine’s character of Arthur, Arthur asked if the initials meant “James Bond,” which they didn’t. He also asked if they meant “Jason Bourne,” which also wasn’t the case. By the way, they mean “Jack Bauer.” It has obvious product placement in one scene, but in ways it can probably bring chuckles. One of my favorite scenes in the entire movie takes place in a church. Colin Firth’s character of Harry Hart is there, this church is full of people in a hate group. The antagonist of the film, Valentine, played by Samuel L. Jackson is planning on initiating a test associated with the SIM cards introduced in the film. Harry gets up out of his seat, he tries getting by one lady, and she wonders where he’s going and what his problem is. Hart responds by uttering this:

HARRY HART: “I’m a Catholic whore, currently enjoying congress out of wedlock with my black, Jewish boyfriend who works at a military abortion clinic. So hail Satan, and have a lovely afternoon, madam.”

This is basically going against the ideas of this specific church and the way this line is delivered is pure quality. How often have you always wanted to say to anyone in a hate group, it could be anything, “You’re wrong, I’m right, everyone deserves to be happy, have a fine day.”? Not to mention this sets up one of my favorite action sequences in movie history. Valentine initiates the test, and then literally everyone in the church starts killing each other. It’s well shot, well choreographed, and the music choice, otherwise known as “Free Bird” by Lynyrd Skynyrd was a great pick for this scenario. If you haven’t seen this movie, I’ll remind you it’s not for everyone, but the church scene alone is a work of art. The cinematography and music, combined with the shock value in that scene is amazing. I honestly CANNOT wait for “Kingsman: The Golden Circle,” it’s gonna kill!

6: V For Vendetta

When it comes to some of my most recent discoveries throughout my movie watching experience, “V For Vendetta” is definitely up there with my favorites. This is a film that I bet some people don’t even realize is based on a DC Comics graphic novel. Maybe I’m wrong, but who knows really. There’s a lot I like about the movie, the characters, the effects, the story, the acting, and the score. Another thing that stood out to me is this quote near the end of the movie given by V, played by Hugo Weaving (The Matrix, Captain America: The First Avenger).

V: Beneath this mask there is more than flesh. Beneath this mask there is an idea, Mr. Creedy. And ideas are bulletproof.

What I love about this quote is specifically the last sentence. Before the given quote, V is interacting with the character of Creedy, and by interacting I mean fighting. It’s V for himself against a bunch of other people trying to take him down. What makes the quote so lovable to me, given time to marinate, has not really too much to do with the character of V or even the film itself, it’s mainly about how one can take an idea, try to put it into action, and regardless of whether or not it works out, the idea itself will never go away. This even includes stupid ideas, and I’m not just saying that to make people feel better about a stupid idea.

5: Inception

I LOVE CHRISTOPHER NOLAN. He is one of my favorite directors of all time. He’s done some movies revered by many people such as “The Dark Knight,” “Memento,” and the movie I’m gonna be talking about here, “Inception.” There’s a lot of great moments in this film, from the first time Ariadne and Cobb are in a dream together, to the hotel hallway fight, and the AMAZING climax. I already mentioned Cobb is a character in this movie, in fact, he’s the lead character played by none other than Jack from “Titanic” himself, Leonardo DiCaprio. There’s another character in this movie who goes by the name of Mal, she’s played by Marion Cotillard, who eventually went on to play Miranda in “The Dark Knight Rises.” The two in this movie were once married, I won’t go into any further details than that, but that’s an important element during the film. Although let’s get into a quote which can associate with that. This quote is mentioned more than once throughout the picture, and here it is:

MAL: I’ll tell you a riddle. You’re waiting for a train. A train that will take you far away. You know where you hope this train will take you; but you don’t know for sure. But it doesn’t matter. How can it not matter to you where that train will take you?

As stated, this is not the only time it’s mentioned in the movie, but this is just one example. This is also mentioned during a scene towards the end of the film that’s pretty much a reversal of this. There’s also a time that Mal mentions it again that gets more haunting the more I think about it. What I love about this quote is how much it goes along with a motif that we witness during the movie. We start off the movie, Cobb is on a train, and he says “I don’t like trains.” Then we get this quote, which comes up again later, and we also have a scene where a locomotive is sliding through a city street, which by the way, sounds awesome on Blu-Ray. Not only that, but once again, I’ll mention, the quote itself is haunting, and that is during the time Mal is saying the quote and Cobb is shouting at her. The last time it’s stated, there’s actually a train in the frame as it’s being spoken. If you haven’t watched “Inception” I highly recommend it, one of the greatest movies ever made.

4: Whiplash

I know a lot of people have been talking about the movie “La La Land” which was directed by Damien Chazelle, but I feel that a lot of people are either forgetting about or just don’t know the work he did before that came out. To be more specific, the work I’m referring to is “Whiplash.” This movie’s about an aspiring drummer named Andrew Neimann, played by Miles Teller (Fantastic Four, Divergent), he goes to a school which is basically THE music school to attend, and he meets JK Simmons’s (Juno, Oz) character of Terence Fletcher. This is also the movie which gave JK Simmons his first Golden Globe, and his first Oscar, both of which in my book are amazingly beyond well deserved. I also have to give credit to how his character is written along with casting JK Simmons in the first place because not only was his character well written, this kind of seems like a role that only someone such as JK Simmons could really play. Think about it, JK Simmons has done more than one role playing someone arrogant or bossy. Just watch Sam Raimi’s “Spider-Man” trilogy or TBS’s “Men at Work.” This movie’s character, to me, feels like a tribute to JK Simmons. So what’s my favorite line from the character? Well, it’s this:

TERENCE FLETCHER: You are a worthless, friendless, faggot-lipped little piece of s*it whose mommy left daddy when she figured out he wasn’t Eugene O’Neill, and who is now weeping and slobbering all over my drum set like a f*cking nine-year old girl! So for the final, FATHER-F*CKING time, SAY IT LOUDER!

I bet some of you are wondering what the hell is happening when this line is coming out of this character’s mouth. Well, I’ll tell you. Terence is instructing the students to play a certain song, and they’re all playing it. Andrew is playing the drums, and Terence Fletcher keeps telling Andrew, in a polite tone, that he’s not playing the way he should. Then all of a sudden, no more interruptions are happening, but soon thereafter, Terence throws a chair at Andrew. Soon, they start getting into a rivalry with words. Andrew is just trying to cooperate and Terence is basically yelling at him! At one point, Andrew even starts tearing up, Terence is embarrassing Andrew in a way telling him to yell the fact that he’s upset, which he does multiple times. After saying it once more, the line shown above comes into play, and after Terence shouts “SAY IT LOUDER,” at the end, Terence says he’s upset one last time. The reason why I love this line so much is because it’s well acted, well written, and it shows how intense certain teachers can get. If you watch this movie, chances are you could relate to this line, because teachers like this exist. Terence sounds more like a drill sergeant as opposed to a jazz teacher. This is not even the only great line this movie has, Terence also gives a memorable line that I still think about today.

TERENCE FLETCHER: There’s no two words in the English language more harmful, than “good job”.

This almost sounds like a quote worthy of being on the list, but I’m only giving my focal points toward one quote per movie series unless I think there are multiple lines that I like equally, and I like the one I showed you first a bit better.

3: Risky Business

When it came to doing this list, I knew a quote from “Risky Business” HAD to be on here somewhere, but the problem I had was, which one was worthy? To confirm whether or not a quote from “Risky Business” would even make the list in the first place, I actually rewatched it since I own the DVD. “Risky Business” is about a guy named Joel, played by Tom Cruise (Mission Impossible, Jack Reacher) whose parents go away on a trip. Joel is left responsible for the house, but it doesn’t end up going so smoothly. Oh yeah and we also get scenes with the gorgeous Rebecca De Mornay (Wedding Crashers, Flipped). So which quote did I pick? The image at the top should give you a hint if you seen the movie before. This quote comes from the very beginning of the film, Joel and Miles, played by Curtis Armstrong (Revenge of the Nerds, Supernatural), are outside Joel’s house. Miles is about to leave, but before he goes, he says the following:

MILES: “Every now and then, say, “What the f*ck.” “What the f*ck” gives you freedom, freedom brings opportunity. Opportunity makes your future.”

OK, as much as swearing might not usually mean much of anything except for the fact that someone may be angry about something, Miles’s character has an incredible point. Let’s say that you have an idea, and you don’t know how it’ll turn out, but you want to go along for the ride, you might say “What the f*ck.” Then you get to your creative freedom, you get to execute an idea and see what happens with it. Maybe the idea will get you noticed somehow depending on what said idea is. If you get noticed or revered in some fashion for that idea, chances are you possibly just won your entire future. This feels like something that would happen if someone doesn’t know what the future holds but they want to see it play out in the best way possible, and to do that, they have to take a chance. Now that I think about it, this almost sounds like a game show such as “Press Your Luck” or “Deal or no Deal.” In fact, if there’s one quote that can associate with the movie’s overall intended idea, it might as well be this one. Why? The director of the film, Paul Brickman thought that it would be a good idea in this film to show that greed can bring consequences. Also, fun fact, the ending of the film wasn’t something he intended. His original ending stuck to a less upbeat tone. I’ve seen both the theatrical ending and the director’s preferred ending, and as of the moment, I personally prefer the director’s ending, the way it’s written feels more memorable and the other ending, while not exactly terrible, contains some dialogue almost sounds like something that one wouldn’t really say. If you ask me, the director’s cut did suit the vibe more, but the first one regardless of suitability wasn’t too bad to begin with.

Also before I move on, if you know me, I’m actually a mega-fan of Curtis Armstrong, I even talked to him multiple times, and you’d know that about me if you met me in real life. I say this because I have a feeling some of you might think I’m just putting this here because of my fanaticism, I’m not, and if you watch this scene, it’s kind of easy to see why. Anyway, let’s continue!

2: Interstellar (Two quotes tie because I can’t decide which is better) *SPOLIERS*

When it comes to the sci-fi genre, to me there’s no better film than “Interstellar,” this film is well written, well directed, well shot, well acted, and has the greatest ending to a film I’ve ever seen. We’re gonna talk about two lines here. They’re both kind of in spoiler territory, but one is in greater spoiler territory as opposed to the other. Let’s talk about the one that’s less spoilery first.

So if you’ve watched this movie you may know about the sequence which Matthew McConaughey’s character of Cooper observes the messages sent by his kids. He gets a number of messages from his son, Tom, but he barely gets any from his daughter, Murph. Cooper is in space, and time is flowing at a different pace for him as opposed to his kids back on Earth. He just got back on the ship after going to a planet which contains a crapload of water. When the ship is back in space, Romilly, one of the astronauts in this movie, wakes up, and he hasn’t seen the other characters for twenty-three years. This is how long the messages span. Cooper plays all of the messages, which many people consider to be the most emotional part of the movie, which I personally disagree with, and once all of Tom’s messages are over, Murph’s face shows up, she looks different than how she did before considering this is the first time we are seeing her as an adult. Here’s what basically goes down here.

MURPH: Hey Dad.
COOPER: Hey, Murph.
MURPH: You son of a bitch. I never made one of these when you were still responding because I was so mad at you for leaving. And then when you went quiet, it felt like I should live with that decision, and I have. But today is my birthday. And it’s a special one, because you told me… you once told me that when you come back we might be the same age. And today I’m the same age you were when you left.
(SHE BEGINS TO CRY)
MURPH: So it would be a real good time for you to come back.
(MURPH WIPES THE TEARS FROM HER EYES AND ENDS THE MESSAGE)

I love this entire moment, you can argue this isn’t technically a quote, but Murph is saying all of this in a pre-recorded message that Cooper is viewing, so he can’t really talk to Murph. Nevertheless, I love it. Just imagine how it feels to realize that your kid is back on Earth, you’re in space, time is moving differently for the both of you. Hearing this just shows the speed which time is moving, and it shows how much of a connection this father and daughter have with each other. In this scene you feel the emotion between these two, I mean for crying out loud, Cooper has been in this important mission which is the key to mankind’s survival, and the time he’s been in space is longer than the time spent in both World War I and World War II COMBINED, even if you take the spans of both wars, which comes out to a total of 1,567+2,193, which simplified is 3,760, and if you multiply it by two, it still wouldn’t be as long as the time these folks have been in space. I thought waiting from a Saturday morning to a Wednesday afternoon for my mother to get back from Arizona in October 2011 was long, this is a whole new level of long!

Now onto the second quote, while the first quote may have been in spoiler territory, this next one is probably going to ruin the entire movie for you, so if you haven’t seen “Interstellar,” go watch it, it’s a great film, and this is your warning.

The next quote takes place during the film’s final act, where everything is coming together, and we get to one of the only parts of a movie, if not the only part, where I cried while watching. Our heroes are near a black hole, and to shed some weight on the ship, Cooper thinks it would a good idea to send TARS straight into the black hole. Sounds cruel, I know, but TARS is a robot, so he doesn’t really care. Once TARS goes down, Cooper is about to do the same, Brand, one of the other astronauts, is freaking out, she is questioning why Cooper is doing this, but Cooper does it anyway. So he’s going down, meanwhile we see Earth drama, then we cut back to what’s going on from Cooper’s perspective, he’s falling, then he ejects his seatbelt, he’s out of his ship, he’s floating, and we see, something. It’s a tesseract, and Cooper is falling inside it. He wonders what’s going on, and I know I’ve been spoiling a lot, but this is important. Cooper is pushing something, it’s moving, and it falls, we see Cooper’s daughter, Murph, at the age of 10. I won’t go into COMPLETE detail, but I’ll spill some things here and there. Cooper is looking at his daughter and he’s watching her leave her room, which is in another dimension Cooper is looking at while he’s inside the black hole. It turns out this isn’t the only daughter observing Cooper is doing. He’s also looking at her in other moments in time, including moments we’ve seen in this movie, moments Cooper himself was involved in. Cooper, in a way, is communicating with Murph, which connects to an event that occurs in the movie’s beginning. Then, we get to listen to what Hans Zimmer does best, create epic music. We cut between a “current” moment on Earth, and Cooper looking at Murph from a time which she was younger. The editing is flawless. Soon, we get to this quote:

COOPER: Tell him Murph. Make him stay. Make… Make him stay Murph. Make him stay Murph! Don’t let me leave, Murph! Don’t, don’t let me leave Murph! (CRIES) NO, NO, NO, NO!

In case you have gone on this long and haven’t seen the film, I should let you know I’m being merciful and leaving out a huge part. If you have seen the film and paid close attention at the end, you’d know what I’m talking about. This is just part of an entire ending that after multiple watches, had me in tears. I love the quote for its emotional impact, how it’s delivered, and there’s really barely any words I can use in order to describe it. “Interstellar” is a movie you have to truly see to believe, there’s a reason why I talk about it all the time. Please, watch “Interstellar,” there’s a chance you will remember at least one quote from the movie after you watch it. Trust me.

1: Taken

My #1 movie quote comes from the movie “Taken.” “Taken” is a sick action flick. The sequels don’t live up to the original, but at least Liam Neeson has proven to be pretty kick-ass in the first installment. The plot of taken is that Bryan Mills, a retired CIA agent played by Liam Neeson, has a daughter, the daughter goes to Paris, and then she gets captured by someone who’s basically gonna turn her into some sort of sex slave. What quote gets me going when it comes to this movie? Well, it’s the one that is abridged on the poster above, which is also the one that Liam Neeson stated after his daughter got captured. Bryan Mills is on the phone, he hears his daughter screaming, and seconds later we hear this:

BRYAN MILLS: “I don’t know who you are. I don’t know what you want. If you are looking for ransom, I can tell you I don’t have money. But what I do have are a very particular set of skills, skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. If you let my daughter go now, that’ll be the end of it. I will not look for you, I will not pursue you. But if you don’t, I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you.”

This one quote sets the stage for whatever comes next. The rest of movie is a terrific thrill ride and has some action, especially when you compare it to “Taken 3.” That movie shouldn’t have even been called “Taken,” it’s just there to exist and make a trilogy. The plot almost has nobody being taken. In the first two movies, somebody was taken, not in the third one. Ah, whatever. This quote was mentioned by Bryan when his daughter was in Paris, he was instructing her to do all sorts of things in order to protect herself. As much as I love the quote based on its delivery, how its written, and simply the fact that it exists, it might just suggest one thing above all else, which is that Liam Neeson is a badass when it comes to action films. I haven’t really seen much of his other work, but seeing him in this film was enough to convince me he was a badass. Throughout the making of this list, it has been hard to decide what quotes should go where and even what quotes should appear on the list in the first place. This is #1 because of how memorable it is, how it set the tone for the movie, and made me root for Bryan Mills and his daugter, Kim, as characters. Other quotes from this list are either funny, intriguing, or important, but there’s something about this quote from “Taken” that makes it more than just words written on a script. You know, unlike how everything from “Taken 2” is just words written on a script.

Alright folks, these are my ten favorite movie quotes. Going through this list I realized how interesting my picks were considering how Michael Caine was in three of these films, a couple of these films have some sort of association with trains, and Christopher Nolan directed two of these films, by the way I almost included a quote from “The Dark Knight,” it almost made the cut. I want to know, what are your favorite movie quotes? Why do you like the quotes so much? Let me know in the comments! Pretty soon I’m going to have my review for “The Glass Castle,” I just got to get around to seeing it. Stay tuned for that review and more great content! Scene Before is your click to the flicks!

Interstellar (2014): A Beautiful, Intense, Breathtaking, Brilliant Sci-Fi Marvel

Hey everyone, Jack Drees here! Today I’m starting a series of reviews I plan to do, it’s either gonna contain two or three movies, I’m not done deciding yet. But the point is, “Dunkirk,” one of my most anticipated films of 2017, is gonna be out soon. That film is directed by Christopher Nolan, one of favorite directors of all time. So I figured I’d review some other films Nolan has directed prior to “Dunkirk.” The first film by Christopher Nolan I plan to tackle is actually his most recent work, “Interstellar,” it came out November 5th, 2014 in select theaters, and it came out November 7th everywhere else. So without further ado, let’s start the review.

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“Interstellar” is directed by Christopher Nolan, as mentioned earlier, and it stars Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, and Michael Caine. You also have some other important roles from Casey Affleck, Mackenzie Foy, David Gyasi, John Lithgow, and Timothee Chalamat. This film takes place in the future and Earth is dying, all sorts of plants are dying, wheat is dead, corn is soon coming to an end, and Matthew McConaughey teams up with other explorers in order to find a new home for mankind.

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Here’s a true story about this film, this movie, when I purchased my Blu-Ray at a store, cost $49.99. For the record this was in a casino so everything’s a little pricier there as opposed to other places. But still, after a couple years of owning this Blu-Ray, I have to say my purchase was worth the money. Also, you may notice it says that it has an actual IMAX film cell inside, which was part of why I wanted this edition of the movie. Speaking of which, I’m gonna talk about my first experience of going to see this movie. When seeing this movie, I did not go to any of my local theaters. I actually went to a theater in Providence, RI, which was over an hour away from my house. Why? They had a very rare presentation. Remember how I said that this film released on November 5th in select theaters? This theater was one of them, and that’s because the theater was showing “Interstellar” on film. Nowadays, seeing a movie on film is a rare experience itself, but this was special. This theater had an IMAX. Also, it was an older one at that. And it shows because this IMAX had film equipment. If I saw this movie with IMAX digital equipment, I would have a cool experience, but something would be missing, I would either have a smaller screen, or a smaller image. Depending how footage shown in IMAX is shot, it could fill up the whole screen with no black bars. That’s how the presentation of “Interstellar” was for 66 minutes of its runtime. At certain IMAX digital theaters, you could get that, but the screen would be smaller. At other IMAX digital theaters, the image would be bigger, but it wouldn’t fill the whole screen. This is why IMAX film is superior to digital, I even go into it a little deeper in a recent post, if you want to read that, the link’s down below. Also, I just want to say, I went to this presentation with my aunt, and if she’s reading this, I can’t thank her enough.

https://scenebefore.wordpress.com/2017/06/19/why-dunkirk-must-be-seen-on-35mm-film-70mm-film-imax-70mm-film-or-imax-laser/

Starting off the character segment of this review, let’s dive into the main character of the movie, Cooper. He’s played by Matthew McConaughey, who you may know from films like “The Wolf of Wall Street” a filmed praised by average moviegoers and critics alike, and films like “Ghosts of Girlfriends Past,” a movie with an opposite reaction, including an WFCC Hall of Shame award dedicated to McConaughey himself, with the following suggestion: “Matthew McConaughey as cardboard cutout misogynist, in one too many phone-it-in rom-coms featuring toxic bachelors.” One thing’s for sure in this movie, his performance was great. He had all the necessary emotions at the right times, and his character, much like everyone else in this movie, is well written and chosen by casting. Cooper has two kids, Tom and Murph, who we’ll get to eventually. He also lives with a character played by John Lithgow named Donald. The reason why he gets recruited to the mission to save mankind is because he’s a great pilot, and there aren’t many of them on Earth. Oh yeah, and he also hates farming, which sucks for him because that’s what the world needed during this movie. Not to mention he lives on a farm. One more thing worth mentioning is that while he’s often referred to by his last name, his first name is actually Joe.

Anne Hathaway, who you may know from “The Dark Knight Rises” and 2012’s “Les Miserables,” is also in this movie, and according to IMDb, her character’s name is Brand, but if you are curious to know her first name, that happens to be Amelia. Like Cooper, Amelia Brand is also a part of the mission. Watching her in this film, I noticed how she acted as a character and there’s one scene where she’s on this planet, she finds an entity, but there’s this giant wave that’s bigger than the wave you saw in the final moments of “Point Break” coming in towards her along with the rest of the crew, she says she needs to take this thing back to the ship. Although Cooper is against this, he’s forcing Amelia to just get back to the ship as quick as she can. Their chemistry throughout the entire segment on this planet, is believable and fluid. By the way, her father is also an important character when it comes to this film, but we’ll get to him later.

The last human character who goes into space worth bringing up is Romilly. He’s played by David Gyasi, and he honestly isn’t in the film all that much as opposed to other characters, but when he is in the film, he’s there for good reason. There’s one segment where he’s wearing a blue shirt, you’ll see what I mean.

There are multiple robots in “Interstellar,” but the one worth mentioning here goes by the name of TARS. Why is he worth mentioning? Simply because he’s the funniest character in the movie. He has a bunch of different settings that can be played around with, and the characters in this film actually do play around with the settings. Some of you might think of robots as these emotionless things that can’t even do anything but serve people, but this robot kind of is emotional per se, because of a unique feature, humor settings. They’re introduced at the point when the crew’s ship is launched into space and TARS says “Everybody good? Plenty of slaves for my robot colony?” Also, when he’s joking, there’s actually a cue which can suggest that.

Michael Caine is also in this film, and if you have seen some of Christopher Nolan’s past films, Caine’s appearance here might not be a surprise to you. Why? Because he was in a good number of Christopher Nolan movies prior to this one, in fact, I just looked at his IMDb page, and the films listed in his “known for” section are all films directed by Christopher Nolan. Yeah, it said he’s known for “The Dark Knight,” “Batman Begins,” “The Prestige,” and “Inception.” It’s almost as if he and Nolan are a team and they have some sort of unbreakable bond, somewhat like Peter Berg and Mark Wahlberg, they’ve already done of films together based on true events, and I only wonder if they’ll do more in the future. Caine plays a professor, he’s also Anne Hathaway’s character’s father, which can be suggested by his name, Dr. Brand. He’s important to the mission, but he doesn’t go into space, he basically encourages Cooper into going on the mission. His side of the story is mainly developing an equation of his own in order to help the Earth survive. During the movie, he also happens to work with Cooper’s daughter, who we’re actually gonna talk about right now.

Cooper’s daughter goes by the name of Murph, kind of sounds like a guy’s name if you ask me, but still, that’s her name. Murph probably has the most interesting story out of each character who remains on Earth during this movie. Not to mention, the actors portraying her do a phenomenal job with the role they’re given. Let’s start off by talking about young Murph, played by Mackenzie Foy. Mackenzie Foy’s performance in this movie, as far as child performances go, may be one of the best I’ve ever seen. Her acting ability is so fluid, so believable, so emotional at various points, that I instantly felt a connection with this character at first sight. Her character as a child is shown to be very unique in this futuristic realm. I’ll get into why a little bit later, but now let’s talk about the adult version of Murph, played by Jessica Chastain. Much like Foy’s performance, I was able to believe Chastain’s character as a person. The moment she appears is probably gonna get you glued to the screen. I won’t describe the scene in detail, but I’ll give the first words spoken by Chastain in this movie: “Hey dad. You son of a bitch.”

 

Let’s move away from Murph and talk about Cooper’s other kid, Tom. The young version of Tom is played by Timothee Chalamet, and the old version of Tom is played by Casey Affleck. As far as Tom goes, performance-wise, I think the versions of Murph did better overall, I’m not saying the Tom performances suck, but they’re just not as good as the Murph performances. Also, Tom doesn’t get much screentime as Murph. Believe it or not, I’m not against this. We see both characters and get to know them a little bit, Tom doesn’t seem to have much of a problem with anything, and his behavior shouldn’t come as much of a surprise in real life considering his age. If you look at Murph, she cries occasionally in the movie, she does it as an adult, but she is ten years old for a period of the runtime. One of my favorite scenes between the adult versions of Tom and Murph is when there’s all sorts of drama going on on Earth, while at the same time, there’s drama going on on another planet. I won’t go into detail because I feel like the flavor should be savored for watching the movie, but if you guys have watched the movie and somehow don’t understand what I’m saying, I’ll give you a line uttered by Murph during this scene: “Dad didn’t raise you to be this dumb Tom!”

One of my favorite things about the movie is the score, composed by Hans Zimmer. In one of my recent reviews, specifically for “The Amazing Spider-Man 2,” I mentioned Hans Zimmer did the score for that movie. I also mentioned that the score for that movie was underwhelming in some ways. This score however, IS NOT that. The score in this movie may be my favorite of all time! There are so many great pieces of music and it’s a soundtrack I often listen to. It works very well in the movie for every segment, and one of my favorite things about it is that when you’re listening to it, it’s almost like listening to a clock. At some points of the score, you can hear something that almost sounds like ticking or tocking, and at other points, it’s 60 beats per minute, which also means 1 beat per second, so that is kind of a suggestion of time. This sort of stuff is shown in pieces of music played during the movie called “Mountains” and “Coward.” Below I’m actually gonna place a few YouTube videos, they’re actually songs from the movie. You can listen to them if you want to, however it isn’t mandatory, but these are some of my favorite pieces from the film. Speaking of which, I want to know, what is your favorite movie score? Let me know in the comments!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SoP44KNu0IQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ca_Cv7seV4Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pR_5QRO6kPM

There are a number of songs I like in this movie, however these are the ones I just felt like displaying here, so enjoy! Also, there’s one thing that I want to bring up that this part of the movie makes me think of.

Right here we have the director of the movie, Christopher Nolan, and sticking with a topic I mentioned earlier, look at the camera he’s got. That right there is an IMAX camera. And if you ever watched an IMAX documentary, those cameras are often used for them. They also have a 3D camera which is heavier than the one Christopher Nolan’s holding, although this movie wasn’t meant to be shown in 3D, and the same can be said for any Christopher Nolan movie, so Nolan thought this camera would do the trick. Also, if you consider the difficulties of both cameras, difficulties having to do with size, sound, etc., imagine how much harder it would be to use an IMAX 3D camera as opposed to an IMAX 2D cameras. They have made lighter versions over the years, but those are digital and Nolan is against digital cameras in general. When I saw this in the theater and the aspect ratio changed, my mind was going in circles with excitement. Also, if you buy the Blu-Ray, you can see the aspect ratio change there as well. Although it doesn’t change like it does in the theater. Because nowadays, people traditionally use widescreen TVs, and those are different in terms of aspect ratios as opposed to IMAX screens. So for the scenes shot in IMAX, you can get the aspect ratio of 1.43:1 in a traditional IMAX theater, you can get the aspect ratio of 1.90:1 in an IMAX digital theater, and on Blu-Ray you can get the aspect ratio of 16:9/1.78:1 for said scenes. I don’t know if you’ll experience that when streaming the movie on Amazon or Netflix or something, but I know the entire movie if shown on cable channels would be 1.78:1 with the exception of the opening credits. Although if you watch the movie on DVD, the entire movie will have black bars and the aspect ratio will be 2.35:1. The way it’s used in this movie is pretty awesome. It’s better in the theater, but it doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate it at home too. I was mentioning in the last paragraph about one of my favorite parts of the movie, when all of the drama starts in space, and it is shot with an IMAX camera, it soon cuts to the Earth drama, the Earth drama is shot with regular film cameras and is shown in an aspect ratio of 2.35:1. It’s transitions like these that don’t feel jarring as opposed to other movies *coughs* “Transformers: The Last Knight,” that I’ve seen shot with IMAX cameras. By the way, this later turns into all IMAX shots for a period of time and it looked amazing on my TV.

The father-daughter relationship between Cooper and Murph is actually one of my favorite relationships in all of cinema. Each scene with these two characters together on screen was screenwriting bliss. It felt authentic, and right before Cooper leaves, you can understand both of the characters equally. At the beginning of the movie, Murph is ten years old, and Cooper is a grown man. Murph wants her father to stay, but Cooper says he has to leave. Let’s face it, I can actually relate to Murph, because one time I was actually 11 years old, my mother was going on a business trip to Arizona, I wanted my mother to stay, but she couldn’t. Mom never left me alone without her for a few days so the whole idea of it was scary at the time.

In search for a new home, the crew stopped by a couple of planets, one of them was icy and the other watery. I enjoyed all of the moments on each planet, but some of my favorite parts in the movie happened when the crew was on the icy planet. I will not dive into detail because this is a movie whose details are worth keeping in secret.

By the way, this is a long movie, it’s actually one of the longest movies to come out in the 2010s. If you ask me, I don’t mind the long runtime. This movie to me, in terms of runtime mixed with entertainment value is like watching any of the “Lord of the Rings” films. Sure, they’re long, but they’re amazing! This movie is so long in fact that when it was brought to the IMAX 70mm theaters, the movie almost couldn’t be projected because of how long it was.

You may have read throughout this post and noticed me say that I can’t dive into detail about certain aspects of the film. There are a couple of reasons for that. For one thing, some of the stuff in this movie wasn’t shown in the trailer. Another thing is that when I see certain segments in this movie it leaves me with some sort of emotion that I feel shouldn’t be wasted before you decide to watch this movie one day. Also, in my view, this movie, based on the premise, sounds like it can simply be enjoyed by a lot of people. But to truly appreciate it, you have to watch it. And when I say watch it, you can’t take your eyes off the screen too many times. Various parts of the film either involve absolute observing or die-hard thinking. In fact, I’ll tell you, almost single time I watch this film, there’s something I might not notice when watching previous times. So who knows? Even though as I’m doing this review and suggesting to you the high number of watches I’ve gotten with the movie “Interstellar,” there still might be stuff I haven’t noticed. Although I will say, if you have seen some of Christopher Nolan’s other films, this film may be less confusing depending on who you are. You’ll probably know what I mean if you have seen “Memento.” Then again I only watched that movie once so what do I know?

However, there’s one detail I feel like sharing. This movie takes place in the future, and one thing that’s brought into the movie is idea of the Apollo missions. Essentially, Cooper is at a parent-teacher conference at the school his kids go to, and one of the teachers is talking about Murph. This teacher says that she believes that the Apollo missions were faked in order to bankrupt the Soviet Union, suggesting she doesn’t believe one bit of those missions actually happened and it’s customary for people in the future to believe that the people of Earth never went to the moon. Not only is that an interesting idea to put in the movie, but with all of the people who deny that we actually went to the moon nowadays, I can only imagine what the future holds when it comes to that.

Now let’s get serious for a moment and I’ll ask you a question. Has a movie ever made you cry? I can’t say many films have done that for me. “Toy Story 3” almost did, the same can be said for “Ice Age,” and perhaps even “Inside Out,” but I don’t recall one time where I shed tears during a movie because of something happening in it. I’ve watched this movie many times, and I did feel emotions during multiple watches, however, I never cried… until the last time I watched it. I rewatched this film for the umpteenth time in preparation for this review, and as the movie was coming to an end, there’s a very emotional number of moments in this movie, as this was happening, I was choking, and tears were falling from my eyes at various points. I WILL NOT go into detail, I need you to see this for yourself. This is how much I love this movie, not many other movies can make me feel this way. I cry in real life, and honestly, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it, but it’s very rare for me to cry during a movie, and when I do, how do you think I feel about it after watching it? When I first saw this film, I thought it was a good time, I truly appreciated it for its cinematography and effects, but overall it was not the best film I ever seen. Then I watched it a few more times, enjoyed it, but still thought it didn’t hit me or anything. Then the next time I watched it from beginning to end, and didn’t fall asleep because it was super late, I f*cking loved the hell out of it. Now I’m here at this point, where I actually cried. That says something, this is definitely up there with my favorite movies of all time, and this is one of those movies I can’t stop watching because of my own connection with it before going in, after coming out, the technical aspects, the story, and my own emotions I feel while watching this masterpiece.

Ultimately, “Interstellar” defines what I love about movies. It has great characters, excellent technical aspects, including cinematography, effects, set design, also good location choices when this movie was shot in the real world, a compelling story, great music, a high replay value, likable performances, and execution delivered with such ambition that it shows how much passion was put into a project by so many people. “Interstellar” probably isn’t a film for everyone. Some people say it takes forever get into space, and I get that. Some people say some of the science in the movie is flawed, and I get that. Some people say they find it confusing, and I get that. Some people think it’s long, and I get that. Some people think it’s boring, and I get that. Some people think Tom as a character doesn’t get enough attention, and while that is a complaint I disagree with, I get that. Some people might go in thinking this is truly all sci-fi and has a complete focus on the space exploration and not as much of the Earth stuff and the drama and tose people might end up disappointed by the results, and I get that. However, to me, these complaints aren’t ones I have, and while I do sometimes pick movies apart for scientific inaccuracies, for example in my review for “The Fifth Wave” I pointed out there was a physics error, this movie is good enough in all of its other terrific aspects for me to ignore scientific errors. I mean, I cried, and I never do that during movies, so that says something that can’t be said about many other movies I’ve viewed in my lifetime. I’m going to give “Interstellar” a 10/10. This is a movie you should watch at least once in your life, if you have a bucket list and you didn’t write “watch “Interstellar”” on it, I command you to write it down. Or if it is written down and it isn’t crossed off, make an effort to watch the movie in any way you can. If you ask me, I’d personally watch the Blu-Ray on the biggest screen possible, because this movie is meant for that, if I ever get kick-ass surround sound one day, this is a movie I would use as a test for that. But please, seriously, watch “Interstellar.” You’ll likely thank me later. Thanks for reading this review and next week I will be reviewing another Christopher Nolan film, I’m not sure what it’ll be, probably either “Inception” or “Batman Begins.” Also “Spider-Man: Homecoming” comes out this weekend, so I hope to go see that as soon as possible, and if you are on a “Spider-Man” high right now like I imagine a number of people are, be sure to check out my last movie review for “The Amazing Spider-Man 2.” The link for it is down below, please check it out, and stay tuned for more reviews! Scene Before is your click to the flicks!

Do not go gentle into that good night; Old age should burn and rave the close of day. Rage, rage against the dying of the light. -Dr. Brand

“THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2” REVIEW: https://scenebefore.wordpress.com/2017/07/02/the-amazing-spider-man-2-2014-a-crappier-version-of-spider-man-3-spoilers/