My best movies of 1990s

Mia: Don't you hate that? Vincent: What? Mia: Uncomfortable silences. Why do we feel it's necessary to yak about *beep* in order to be comfortable? Vincent: I don't know. That's a good question. Mia: That's when you know you've found somebody special. When you can just shut the *beep* up for a minute and comfortably enjoy the silence.

Best quote: And for what? For a little bit of money? There's more to life than a little money, you know. Don'tcha know that? And here ya are, and it's a beautiful day. Well. I just don't understand it.

Henry Hill: [narrating] One day some of the kids from the neighborhood carried my mother's groceries all the way home. You know why? It was outta respect.

Julie Vignon: Now I have only one thing left to do: nothing. I don't want any belongings, any memories. No friends, no love. Those are all traps.

"A year before Kieslowski made this film, the Maastricht treaty had brought the European community into being and the European ideal was a fashionable topic for the political classes in continental Europe, if not the Britain of John Major. In Blue, the composer had been working on a huge, Beethoven's-9th-ish orchestral work to celebrate European union: it is a rather bombastic-sounding piece of music which the audience is nonetheless expected to take seriously. Yet this European anthem appears at disquieting moments. Great, deafening shards of music will crash into scenes with Julie, like traumatic flashbacks, re-awakening Julie to what she is, what she has done. A great chord will announce what looks, bafflingly, like the end of a scene, we fade to black, fade back in – and Julie is still there, still talking, still dealing with her memories. That great chorus of supposed unity is juxtaposed with a drama of dislocation and alienation." Peter Bradshaw, the Guardian

"For me, art is the experience of what you've felt inside" Sabzian

"Sabzian acts. He acts with the Ahankhahs, and he plays a part in the courtroom. But everyone in this film pretends. The father, Mr. Ahankhah, pretends that he knew about the pretense all along. The mother pretends that her older son’s job is better than it is. The younger son, Mehrdad Ahankhah, pretends that he was afraid of a burglary. The judge is as much playing the part of a judge in this staged trial as actually judging. Sabzian/Makhmalbaf wants the family to see his film The Bicyclist in a theater because, he says, the theater’s version is less censored. (Here Kiarostami is playing on a well-known tactic of Makhmalbaf’s to evade the censors. He would show them a version with the objectionable parts cut out, but he would send to the theaters versions with those parts back in—another instance of pretense.) And, of course, Kiarostami is the biggest pretender of all. He pretends he is making a factual documentary, when he is in fact staging and directing all this and even creating the final outcome. We can understand social class in this context of pretense as a part you play in public, a role that society has cast you in.

A victim of social inequity, Sabzian pretends to be what he is not because he does not like what he is. In his courtroom speeches, he describes himself as a poor man without enough money to buy his son a treat. (In the top picture on the right, Kiarostami has shown him with a hole in his sock.) By contrast, he cut quite a figure as Makhmalbaf. People respected him. They did what he told them to do. He found that being—or pretending to be—this ideal self was like a drug, immensely satisfying, but dangerous. He felt guilty about his pretense.

Sabzian is not alone. Other characters in this little drama are not as they wish themselves to be. The journalist wants to be famous like celebrity journalist Oriana Fallaci. The soldier-policemen are displaced from their homes and reluctantly soldiering. They’re in, so to speak, the wrong place. The Ahankhah sons are unemployed or under-employed. They have the wrong jobs. The younger son wants to be an actor. The father was in the Shah’s army and has been unemployed since the revolution in 1979. The taxi driver was a pilot in the Iraq-Iran war, but now has to drive a cab." Norman N. Holland, A Sharper Focus

Hannibal Lecter: Well, Clarice - have the lambs stopped screaming?

Jimmy Gator: The book says, "We might be through with the past, but the past ain't through with us."

“All right, I’m not saying that life will end or the world will end, or the universe will cease to exist. But man will cease to exist. Just like the dinosaurs passed into extinction, the same thing will happen to us. We’re not fuckin’ important. We’re just a crap idea.”– Johnny“

This is a painful movie to watch. But it is also exhilarating, as all good movies are, because we are watching the director and actors venturing beyond any conventional idea of what a modern movie can be about. Here there is no plot, no characters to identify with, no hope. But there is care: The filmmakers care enough about these people to observe them very closely, to note how they look and sound and what they feel.”– Roger Ebert"

There’s no shortage of irony and contempt in such sex battles, especially the ones portrayed in Naked. Johnny and the women he affects, namely Louise and Sophie, display a complex array of emotions. Savagery and tenderness, cruelty and care, the lives of these men and women are treated with seriousness and strain. Horror and hubris is shown in their tight situations, and this is how abusive relationships should be depicted, is it not?

Naked is not the kind of film that makes you feel safe and secure, but nor is it a didactic sermon against society. It’s a movie that you experience and stumble away from, weak-kneed and reeling, your mind just blazing.

It departs hugely from Leigh’s other works––usually domestic dramas about families––stylistically and thematically Naked is more attuned to the arthouse cinema we’d seen from late greats Krzysztof Kieślowski or Alain Resnais, instead it comes from Leigh in a package of anti-social fervor and shrewdly ironic disruption.

A savage, stressful, allegorical and deeply human experience, Naked is, unexpectedly, a ticking time bomb of a film that you’ll never be able to shake off." Shane Scott-Travis, Taste of Cinema

Best quote: ''Isn't everything we do in life a way to be loved a little more?

Veronique: Not long ago, I had a strange sensation. I felt that I was alone. All of a sudden. Yet nothing had changed.

"Kieslowski's camera spends a great deal of time regarding Jacob's face. Let's not waste any time observing how beautiful she is. What he is searching for is her soul. Sometimes he asks her to smile, or look pensive or thoughtful, but sometimes he simply shows her thinking. She shows herself vulnerable, romantic, joyous, tender. She has a good face. We become invested in her introspection. Krzysztof Kieslowski (1941-1996) was a great man. With his writing partner, Krzysztof Piesiewicz, .He is drawn to coincidence and synchronicity. He is little interested in focusing on a character hurtling from point A in the first act to Point C in the third. He is fascinated by Point B, and the unseen threads linking it to past and present. His films can be mystical experiences. He trusts us to follow him, to sense his purpose, to leave the theater having shared his openness to a moment. The last thing you want to do after a Kieslowski film is "unravel" the plot. It can't be done. If you try it, you will turn clouds into rain. If there seem to be inconsistencies, it is because life and time itself sometimes try again and take an unexpected turn."

Bill Munny: It's a hell of a thing, killin' a man. Take away all he's got, and all he's ever gonna have.

The Dude: That rug really tied the room together.

The Dude: Let me explain something to you. Um, I am not "Mr. Lebowski". You're Mr. Lebowski. I'm the Dude. So that's what you call me. You know, that or, uh, His Dudeness, or uh, Duder, or El Duderino if you're not into the whole brevity thing.

Valentine: You're not afraid?

The Judge: I wonder what I'd do in their place. The same thing.

Valentine: You'd throw stones?

The Judge: In their place? Of course. And that goes for everyone I judged. Given their lives, I would steal, I'd kill, I'd lie. Of course I would. All that because I wasn't in their shoes, but mine.

"If all three films are examined as a whole, the common unifying element is love. by allowing himself to feel love again, even though it may be platonic, Joseph breaks down his self-imposed isolation and helps put a chain of events in place leading to Valentine and Auguste finally meeting. Thus, it is love that saves all the principals of the trilogy from the trials and tribulations which they face, which is fitting considering the theme of Red" Anthony Leong

Sick Boy: Personality, I mean that's what counts, right? That's what keeps a relationship going through the years. Like heroin, I mean heroin's got a great *beep* personality.

John Doe: Wanting people to listen, you can't just tap them on the shoulder anymore. You have to hit them with a sledgehammer, and then you'll notice you've got their strict attention.

Buzz Lightyear: You my friend are responsible for delaying my rendezvous with star command! Woody: You are a toy!!

Lester Burnham: Remember those posters that said, "Today is the first day of the rest of your life"? Well, that's true of every day but one - the day you die.

Victor Ziegler: Listen, Bill. Nobody killed anybody. Someone died. It happens all the time. Life goes on. It always does, until it doesn't. But you know that, don't you?

"We can view Bill’s odyssey as a path back to Alice and his marriage. The dream state is an undesirable one that Bill has entered because of his disillusionment with his marriage. Once Bill finally confesses where he was all night to Alice, the dreamy atmosphere of the film is broken. When they reconcile the next day, Bill’s return to reality is consolidated, so to speak. The earlier mentioned quote comes from Bill and Alice’s final conversation in the film. In their attempt to make amends with one another, they both agree that the “dream” is over. The two cannot erase or ignore last night’s events, but they can choose to move past them. Both characters agree that they’re “awake” now and that that’s all that matters. Bill even promises he will remain that way “forever,” which Alice says she finds to be a frightening idea.When this scene arrives at the end of the film, even though the meaning of their conversation is ambiguous; the words they exchange seem to make a lot of sense. Bill needs to leave the dream state to find his way back to Alice and their marriage. Returning to the idea of movement, this conversation is entirely stagnant. Bill and Alice stand face to face unmoving in a department store for a few minutes for its entirety. Instead of floating from location to location, as Bill does throughout the majority of the film, they are grounded in the moment. As for their fate, Eyes Wide Shut is open-ended. Can Bill and Alice remain motionless and awake? Perhaps more importantly, do we believe that that’s what they really want?" Madison Brek, Film School Rejects

It's Hebrew, it's from the Talmud. It says, "Whoever saves one life, saves the world entire."

Morpheus: What is real? How do you define 'real'? If you're talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see, then 'real' is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain.

Wooderson: That's what I love about these high school girls, man. I get older, they stay the same age.

Mr. Pink: Why can't we pick our own colors? Joe: No way, no way. Tried it once, doesn't work. You got four guys all fighting over who's gonna be Mr. Black, but they don't know each other, so nobody wants to back down. No way. I pick. You're Mr. Pink. Be thankful you're not Mr. Yellow.

Older Woman/TV: But if you had regular hands, you'd be like everyone else.

"If Edward were just another neighbor, this misunderstanding would have been forgivable. However, since Edward is different and mistaken as harmful he is shunned out of the town after trying to save Kim’s little brother off the street. Edward ends up back in seclusion in the black and white mansion out of the town where they believe he is dead. The town returns back to normal, but Edward continues to touch them by giving the effect of snow falling with the shavings of his ice sculptures.

I think Tim Burton’s film, Edward Scissorhands, makes a significant statement on judging others out of the norm. People in today’s society have a hard time accepting others that are different, even people from other cultures. This film demonstrates how society works by the brightly colored, similarly fashioned neighbors and the opposite, Edward, trying to be accepted for who he is. As Peg explained to Edward, “blending is the secret”, it almost appears as if Edward was more human than those of the suburb." https://phdessay.com/edward-scissorhands-theme-analysis/

Phil: Well, what if there is no tomorrow? There wasn't one today.

Tyler Durden: You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your *beep* khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world.

Countess Ellen: The real loneliness is living among all these kind of people who only ask you to pretend.

"Archer was a man who loved one woman and married another, because it was the right thing to do. Or, more accurately, because everyone in his world thought it was the right thing to do, and made sure that he did it. The film employs a narration (read by Joanne Woodward) that reflects the way Wharton addresses us directly in the novel, telling us how Archer was trapped. Listen to her: "They all lived in a kind of hieroglyphic world. The real thing was never said or done or even thought, but only represented by a set of arbitrary signs." Roger Ebert

X: Fundamentally, people are suckers for the truth. And the truth is on your side, Bubba.

"I don't have the slightest idea whether Oliver Stone knows who killed President John F. Kennedy. I have no opinion on the factual accuracy of his 1991 film “JFK.” I don't think that's the point. This is not a film about the facts of the assassination, but about the feelings. “JFK” accurately reflects our national state of mind since Nov. 22, 1963. We feel the whole truth has not been told, that more than one shooter was involved, that somehow maybe the CIA, the FBI, Castro, the anti-Castro Cubans, the Mafia or the Russians, or all of the above, were involved. We don't know how. That's just how we feel.

The assassination of John F. Kennedy will obsess history as it has obsessed those whose lives were directly touched. The facts, such as they are, will continue to be elusive and debatable. Any factual film would be quickly dated. But “JFK” will stand indefinitely as a record of how we felt. How the American people suspect there was more to it than was ever revealed. How we suspect Oswald did not act entirely alone. That there was some kind of a conspiracy. “JFK” is a brilliant reflection of our unease and paranoia, our restless dissatisfaction. On that level, it is completely factual." Roger Ebert

The Terminator: I need your clothes, your boots and your motorcycle. Cigar Biker: You forgot to say please...

Craig Schwartz: You don't know how lucky you are being a monkey. Because consciousness is a terrible curse. I think. I feel. I suffer. And all I ask in return is the opportunity to do my work. And they won't allow it... because I raise issues.

Bela Lugosi: Home? I have no home. Hunted... despised... living like an animal. The jungle is my home! But I will show the world that I can be its master. I shall perfect my own race of people... a race of atomic supermen that will conquer the world!

"Burton's career has always shown a fondness for touching outsiders, like "Beetlejuice" and "Edward Scissorhands", "Batman" and Jack Skellington (the lonely star of "Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas"). In "Ed Wood," he gives us a hero who is not merely an outsider, but one who attracts even more desperate cases to himself. Played with warmth and enthusiasm by Johnny Depp, Wood is a guy who simply must make movies - and who is so bedazzled by Hollywood legend that he mistakes poor Bela Lugosi, long past his prime and mired in drug addiction, as a star." Roger Ebert

Floyd Gondolli: I like simple pleasures, like butter in my ass, lollipops in my mouth. That's just me. That's just something that I enjoy.