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Well, if you want sparkling dialog, wit and wordplay, look no further than the many Myrna Loy/William Powell films, and many others from that era.
For quirky dialogue, George Clooney's character in O Brother Where Art Thou (one of my favorites) is a hoot, in part because he takes himself so seriously. Doesn't hurt that the film is based on The Odyssey.
Yes, but is it not true (seems like this is the way I remember it) that the Coen Brothers hadn't actually read The Odessey before writing it? It was based only on their pop-culture understanding of the novel. So it's not as if they're borrowing dialog.
Yes, but is it not true (seems like this is the way I remember it) that the Coen Brothers hadn't actually read The Odessey before writing it? It was based only on their pop-culture understanding of the novel. So it's not as if they're borrowing dialog.
Maybe that's why I enjoyed it so much! It made me recall the B movies I saw as a kid, one with a Cyclops, and another with the sirens.
At any rate, the dialog that they DID write was quite interesting.
For quirky dialogue, George Clooney's character in O Brother Where Art Thou (one of my favorites) is a hoot, in part because he takes himself so seriously. Doesn't hurt that the film is based on The Odyssey.
first you must travel a long and difficult road. a road frought with peril. you shall see things. wonderful to tell....
like three dollars in change and a couple of singles. people only get the paper and coffee this time of morning.
you're trusting.
why do you say that?
how do you know they're taking the right amount of change? or even paying for what they take?
theoretically, people see money on the counter and nobody around, they think they're being watched.
honesty through paranoia...
.. suck any more d**** on your way through the parking lot.
Sex talk is one of the most difficult of topics there is to make into a good screenplay I'd say. Being too indirect and hidden when it's under discussion just comes off as prudish and silly. A lot of older movies could have stood being more upfront about what the characters were really thnking about sex --though there was a Production Code back in the day.
OTOH, being too explicit and open comes off as just crass and unimaginative. This is not what I would consider first rate dialogue. Even in a move called Slackers, where we're presumably not dealing with intellectual giants (I never saw the movie), I get the feeling it makes the characters sound dumber than even the director might have wanted. Sexual hypocrisy is great subject to explore if its done smartly. This dialogue just sounds dopey and immature. But I do understand that it's not the whole movie.
Last edited by citylove101; 10-28-2013 at 03:00 PM..
A Man For All Seasons....Lawrence of Arabia..... words and dialogue drive these films alongside the visuals. Moviemaking at its very highest I think. Beautiful work. I could be wrong but I don't think these things are fashionable' nowadays.
From O Brother... George Clooney's character (Ulysses Everett McGill), still chained with 2 fellow inmates, hops a train and asks the hobos there for help:
Quote:
Say, any of you boys smithies? Or, if not smithies per se, were you otherwise trained in the metallurgic arts before straitened circumstances forced you into a life of aimless wanderin'?
...I think we probably could find quite a few pre-1970 films with Montgomery Cliff, Laurence Harvey, Albert Finney, Laurence Olivier, Gregory Peck, Richard Burton, Kirk Douglas, Charlton Heston, Paul Schofield, Robert Shaw, James Mason, Peter Ustinov that fit the bill. When quality films focused on quality dialogue and had the necessary voice tenor to deliver.
What a lineup! I'll reach in the hat and pull one out - Spy Who Came In From The Cold with Richard Burton.
listen, could you come in to discuss these x-ray results?
G-D! That line gave me chills re-reading it. I swear that that film belongs in the Top Ten of All Time. I do not understand why out of all the Coen Brothers films, it gets a so-so from their fans. I can't watch it often enough. It's what Woody Allen would have made had he been capable, as the Coens are but he is not, of mixing drama with comedy. "Burn After Reading" IMO is another underrated Coen film. I've only seen two Brad Pitt films, but he steals the show in this one.
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