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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

The single greatest SHOT ever...?

Tom said:
Yes indeed! Almendros + tropical island + shields = heaven. :)
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+ this guy's score.

Again, one of the most beautiful film music I've ever heard :).

The movie is a classic.

But it's sad that both the DP and the composer are not alive anymore :sad:, their work on the lagoon is a landmark.
 
Blue Lagoon would be a great title for a Bluray release.... along with just about all the other pictures on this thread!
 
A lot of great ones posted already for sure but I can't believe some of these have not been posted yet.


et_l.jpg


exorcist.jpg


rocky1.jpg


060608_shining_vmed_1p.widec.jpg


Maybe more later.
 
I didn't read the whole thread but my favorites are from Tonino Delli Colli and Sergio Leone

* Edit - to appease the Gods of Topics on this board, I change to a shot, not a "poster"

GoodBadUgly_Mexicanstandoff.gif
 
CraigWB said:
That looks to me like a "poster" as opposed to a "shot".
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Wow, you're a smart one. I wasn't going to pull a still frame from the movie just to "talk" about it on a website, and I couldn't find a reference frame online. Damn the "My D is bigger than your D" talk on this site is annoying. I think the grabs from ET, The Shinning, The Exorcist are all promotional poster materials also.
 
Tom said:
Fail.
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Just to note, I said "my favorites" not "your favorites". I do realize that the topic is "The single greatest SHOT ever...?" There is no such thing since there is this thing call personal opinion. For my own personal interest there are a number of great, well composed, well acted scenes in GBU. If I want to talk about one frame, I'll leave the motion pictures alone and head over to still photography discussions.

PS - Don't be such a self righteous ass.
 
Khristian said:
chill out man!
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I apologize for getting worked up. I just don't see the need in people to be so quick to 'correct' people on their comments. I think its rude and it doesn't aid to further discussion.
 
lol, man, we were just joshing with you. sorry. sometimes sarcasm and zingers don't come off on the net like they would if you were joking around with someone in person.
 
240 posts and no one mentions Citizen Kane? Shots like the crane in of Welles at a podium in front of a huge image of himself while running for Govenor are that much more impressive when you realize that he did it with no crowd of supporters in the shot and created his images equally in the camera and on the optical printer.

Of course, even though I worked as a DP, I always liked great EDITS because that is the one facet that is truly revolutionary in motion pictures -- the juxtaposition as a secondary statement. So a hundred posts or so ago someone show an ape man from 2001 learning how to use a bone as a tool -- to kill. But to me the more powerful moment comes shortly afterwards, when the ape man, having just killed one of his rivals, tosses the bone high into the air. A close-up, slow motion shot of the bone rising is hard cut to a similarly-shaped spaceship descending in frame as we suddenly progress tens of thousands of years into the future. It's an enormous commentary on the nature of man, his tools, knowledge and its use. That's some edit.

Another nice one is in Lawrence of Arabia (again, I can't believe no one referenced this film!). Lawrence finally gets the assignment he wanted -- to go out into the desert to recruit Prince Faisil and his armies. Having just lit Claude Rains' cigarette, Lawrence holds out the match in his fingers, watching it burn down closer and closer to his skin. Rains sas that the desert is a terrible place that is horribly unforgiving and Lawrence counters that it is going to be fun, and then in an extreme closeup his lips blow out the match -- cutting to a sunrise over the vast desert. This sets up Lawrence's struggle for the entire movie. Sweet.

If I must pick a SHOT, then to me it has to be about context rather than simply a bit of iconic imagery. Sometimes it doesn't even have to be the most technically accomplished visual if it achieves something within the storytelling that is uniquly cinematic.

A good example would be the way Peter Weir usually ends the first act of his films. He always tries to find the essential conflict of the character and when that character discovers that conflict moment (end act one) Weir always shows it instead of says it ('cause he's a damn fine filmmaker). So in Witness, the murder-witness Amish boy wanders around the police station until he recognizes something in a trophy cabinet. Harrison Ford realizes and comes over to see. The boy points to a photo of the killer, police officer Danny Glover, and --here it is -- Ford looks to make sure no one else has seen and covers the boy's pointing finger, as we now realize that we are trapped in the Belly of the Beast. And it's done wordlessly.

Here's an even better example from another Weir film. In The Truman Show (love the meta name), Jim Carrey begins to suspect that the world around him may not be as it seems. In a perfect existential moment with some brilliant Philip Glass music supporting it, he begins to enter a building via a revolving glass door. Instead of going in he spins around and around. He can see the people outside but cannot reach them. The camera is spinning too, above him but looking through a pane of glass, so that it cannot reach him either and the reflections of the people are superimposed upon him as well. He is surrounded yet utterly alone and he realizes it all as we're seeing it, a brilliant visualization of his inner realization. That shot is a moment of pure cinema.

So that's my version of a great single shot. ;-)
 
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