BITS AND PIECES

by John M. Floyd

In the summer of 1981, when I acquired my first VCR and our first cable TV hookup at our house, I started doing something that would continue for the next thirty years. I started videotaping and saving certain scenes in movies that I really liked. (I also taped a lot of full-length movies, of course, but these favorite scenes went onto a separate cassette that I could plug in when I just wanted to see the best parts. Or at least what I considered to be the best parts.)

Our three children grew up watching these special collections of film clips — we called them “bits and pieces” because that’s what they were — and I often worried that I probably ruined some great movies for the kids, because when they finally got around to watching the whole feature, they sometimes already knew the ending, or some of the best twists and turns. But I figured that was a small price to pay, for such neat previews. I was following Elmore Leonard’s advice, and leaving out the parts that people skip.

As you might imagine, a lot of these favorite scenes wound up being either openings or endings. But some weren’t. Since my wife doesn’t watch many movies, and since I was the primary user of the VCR and the TV, the only common denominator for these scenes was that I liked them. (It’s good to be king.) As you might also imagine, the content leaned heavily toward gunfights and car chases. In addition, some of the beginning and ending credits sequences didn’t include anything except the music and the credits themselves (Superman is one example) — but since I’m crazy about movie scores, even that was often enough to make them favorites.

Anyhow, I recently looked back through those seven six-hour tapes, and listed some of the scenes that I saved for posterity. Remember these?

Opening credits — Midnight Cowboy, Top Gun, Raising Arizona, Forrest Gump, Once Upon a Time in the West, From Russia With Love, The Ballad of Cable Hogue, A Shot in the Dark, Blazing Saddles, Crossing Delancey, The Big Country, Dr. No, Two Mules for Sister Sara, Superman, Cat People (1982), The Magnificent Seven

Opening scene — Goldfinger, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Jaws, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, The Hustler, Romancing the Stone

Final scene — An Officer and a Gentleman, Escape from New York, Cool Hand Luke, Cat Ballou, The Usual Suspects, The Thomas Crown Affair (1968), Back to the Future, Die Hard, Sleepless in Seattle, The Cider House Rules, Silver Bullet, Rudy, Gone With the Wind, Rocky, Dead Poets Society, Wait Until Dark, Lonesome Dove, It’s a Wonderful Life, Blood Simple, Thelma and Louise, Signs, The Silence of the Lambs

Final shootout — Shane, Quigley Down Under, A Fistful of Dollars, The Last Sunset, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, 3:10 to Yuma (2007), High Noon, For a Few Dollars More, Hombre

End credits — Glory, Body Heat, M*A*S*H, Peggy Sue Got Married, Victory, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Monte Walsh (1970), A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum

Car/train chase, The French Connection

“Play it, Sam” scene, Casablanca

The throne room, Star Wars

Breaking the sound barrier, The Right Stuff

Final card game, The Cincinnati Kid

Bank robbery (“Do you Feel Lucky?”), Dirty Harry

Orient Express fight with Red Grant, From Russia With Love

Prisoners’ march, The Bridge on the River Kwai

Rooftop scene, The Untouchables

Escape from Galaxy Island, Our Man Flint

Rescue of Carol Anne, Poltergeist

“Make My Day” scene, Sudden Impact

Final audition, Flashdance

Car chase, Bullitt

“Minimum safe distance” scene, Aliens

Travolta/Thurman dance, Pulp Fiction

Starting up the plane, Flight of the Phoenix (1965)

Final home run, The Natural

Climbing in Monument Valley, The Eiger Sanction

“I’ll have what she’s having” scene, When Harry Met Sally

Desert rescue of Roger’s daughter, Lethal Weapon

Flying, Out of Africa

“I love Kung Fu” scene, Office Space

Fistfight in the apartment, The Bourne Identity

Death of Oddjob, Goldfinger

Chasing the brumbies, The Man From Snowy River

“Is it you?” scene Somewhere in Time

Banjo and guitar, Deliverance

“Seventy-six Trombones,” The Music Man

Arrival of the killers at the farm, Witness

The fruit cellar, Psycho

Final race, The Black Stallion

“Now that’s a knife” scene, Crocodile Dundee

Dorinda’s flight, Always

Chased by the train, Stand by Me

Buffalo stampede, Dances With Wolves

“You can’t handle the truth” scene, A Few Good Men

Defusing the bomb, The Abyss

Death of Reverend Scott, The Poseidon Adventure

“Old Man River,” Showboat

Crop duster, North by Northwest

Church wedding, The Graduate

“Hi, Boo” scene, To Kill a Mockingbird

Chariot race, Ben-Hur

Railroad crossing scene, Close Encounters of the Third Kind

First glimpse of the dinosaurs, Jurassic Park

Motorcycle chase, The Great Escape

Opening credits of TV shows: Hill Street Blues, Dallas, Ben Casey, Remington Steele, The Wild Wild West, Crime Story, Miami Vice, China Beach, The Rifleman, Cheers, Cimarron Strip, ER, The Avengers, The Man From U.N.C.L.E., Mission Impossible

Question: If you were crazy enough to save clips like these, what would be some of your favorite scenes? Or would you want to capture any at all? I’ve heard some folks say it’s a disservice to a film to watch part of it, out of context, without watching the whole thing.

And please, don’t let this odd habit of mine give you the impression that I enjoy all movies. Some of them I don’t like a bit. An example? I’ll put it this way:

Never re-watching Love Story means never having to say I’m sorry.