A really fun compilation of great movie monologues. The writing is my favorite part of it – even though I haven’t seen a lot of those movies, and would probably choose different monologues to make up my own list. But I just love some of the phrasing – especially when I am familiar with the monologue.
For example, Chunk’s big monologue in The Goonies is on the list. I just … come on. It’s perfect. Like – what? But listen to how she writes about it, I actually got a LUMP in my throat and I’m reading about CHUNK from THE GOONIES.
Past the endearing real-kidness about him, he’s not actually a great actor. But he is SO a real kid, so the neighbor that we all had or the boy in the playground yelling that he would get his older brother to beat you up, that you believe ever second of every word in this scene. The beauty of the speech is that a child actor couldn’t have done it. Haley Joel Osmont talking about making a bucket of fake puke just doesn’t ring true, you don’t believe he’d do that. But you believe Chunk because he IS the boy on the playground. And that’s why we all still love him so much. Because even after 20 years, Chunk is still the most true guy we know.
That’s what I’m talkin’ about. There’s magic in language used like that.
Oh, and here’s an excerpt for my sisters – who both loved Chris Farley and Tommy Boy so much (“Fat man in a little co-oat…”) that it is legendary to me. Chris Farley’s speech in Tommy Boy made it on the list (when he sets the desk on fire??) – anyway, listen to how Justin writes about it – to me, it is a perfect description of that whole Chris Farley thing:
[Chris Farley] reminded me of a modern-day Lenny for a generation far too disallusioned by an 8th grade literature cirriculum to even understand my reference, rife with the proclivity for inadvertantly mangling everything he’d come to love and hold dear. Take this scene for instance, in which he determines that the best way to court a potental customer would be by lighting the guy’s desk on fire. Even though the idea is monumentally stupid, he’s so committed in believing it to be the best course of action that instead of looking like some sort of fucked up arsonist we all laugh and say “awwww,” as if he were a baby getting more spaghetti on him than in him!
Also, the fact that someone chose Cristina Ricci’s hilarious speech excoriating the entire “Thanksgiving story” being told at her summer camp (in Addam’s Family Values) and she basically tells the TRUTHFUL story to a listening crowd of horrified clean-cut parents – and the camp then ends up in FLAMES … I just love that that speech is on the list.
I’ll come up with a list of my own – it’s really fun to think of my favorites – Field of Dreams (James Earl Jones) would most certainly be on mine … and probably the Pride of the Yankees speech too – but I’ll think up some more.
Finally!!!! Someone that has respect for Jason Lee in “Mallrats”. Although “Clerks” is Kevin Smith’s best work (which made the list too!), “Mallrats” was filled with those moments that you can just randomly quote and laugh until you hurt!
Oh and when we did Picnic up here this summer, the actor playing Hal used to sing the “Fat guy in a little coat” song backstage while he was wearing my coat right before we would go on stage…too funny.
Great list of moments!!
James Leer’s movie suicide list from Wonder Boys. “Albert Dekker – he wrote his suicide note in lipstick on his stomach…”
(Technically, what happened to Dekker was much more gruesome, but still, that line is funny.)
This reminds me to mention that I completely adore Christina Ricci. In absolutely anything.
I love what they say about Billy Crystal’s monologue at the end of When Harry Met Sally. Such a great moment that’s been aped (badly) thousands of times since.
And speaking of Goonies, I love love love Sean Astin’s monologue in the well. “Up there it’s their time, but down here? Down here it’s our time, it’s our time down here…” Maybe it’s kind of cheesy and definitely more actory than Chunk’s monologue, but it’s still so so good, and whenever I feel like “the man” is bringin’ me down, I totally think of the well monologue.
My favorite monologue is Robert Shaw’s from Jaws, just because it is freaking terrifying.
I don’t know if the Dennis Hopper/Christopher Walken scene in True Romance is technically a monologue. I think it comes close enough.
Bill Murray’s speech to Bravo Company in Stripes.
Dorothy Michael/Michael Dorsey’s speech (and it truly is BOTH of them giving the speech, in way) as she’s/he’s walking down the stairs during the live tv taping, improvising the reveal of her/his secret identity. Dustin Hoffman is SO great in Tootsie. One of my favorite performances ever.
And we all know what the WORST monologue of all time is, don’t we?
Okay, good ones:
Thomas More’s speech to the court in “A Man for All Seasons”.
Henry V’s “St. Crispin’s Day” ditto in the Branagh version.
Walter Matthau’s total breakdown in “The Odd Couple”.
Edna’s dissertation in “The Incredibles”: “No keps!”
(I just noticed the first three were filmed plays – do they count? or does it have to be a movie movie?)
I’m very mortified that this is one of my favorite guilty pleasures, but –
Bruce Willis’s farewell in “Armageddon”
One of my all time favorite mini-monologues was from a movie that was heavy on the “schmaltz”, (I actually got to use that word in a sentence!), but the kind you get pulled into when channel surfing while avoiding some menial, household task that is long overdue but staring you in the face, “You’ve Got Mail”.
Tom Hanks’ character is talking to Meg Ryan’s about the similarities of the type of coffee people order and the way it seems to mirror just who they are.
I’m definitely a:
Grande. Light Roast. Shot of Hazelnut.
(sorry if my entry isn’t relevant! )
Joe Fox:
“The whole purpose of places like Starbucks is for people with no decision-making ability whatsoever to make six decisions just to buy one cup of coffee. Short, tall, light, dark, caf, decaf, low-fat, non-fat, etc. So people who don’t know what the hell they’re doing or who on earth they are can, for only $2.95, get not just a cup of coffee but an absolutely defining sense of self: Tall. Decaf. Cappuccino.”