Best Movie Opening / Ending?

[Curt McGirt 7,073]

How it wraps up is great. 

Spoiler

Joker finally has to kill someone, even out of mercy, after a brutal search for the sniper. By that point they're all so desensitized that they start singing the fucking Mouseketeers theme song together. The film is an ultimate statement about how war can fuck you up, only in two parts -- one admittedly a bit lesser, but still awesome. 

Now I really want to read The Short-Timers

[J.T. 8,112]

The nihilism masquerading as joy is so fucking terrifying and awesome at the same time.

Soldiers singing the theme from the Mickey Mouse Club television show set against the backdrop of burning buildings.

And then Paint It Black kicks in and the Stones tear shit the fuck up.

[Curt McGirt 7,073]

HOW COULD I FORGET ABOUT "PAINT IT BLACK" PLAYING AT THE END?!?! That is just perfect.

Oh and BTW, Abe Books is down but I went on Amazon (ugh) and The Short-Timers is going for at minimum $218 for a softcover copy. Yes, you read that right.

[J.T. 8,112]

Apparently I am a dumbass that has forgotten half of my young adulthood.

How could I have forgotten this ending scene?

This is my gift.  My curse..

Hey... why is the room so dusty all of a sudden?

[J.T. 8,112]

In a movie about a dystopian future where books are burned, the director had the opening title sequence narrated orally so that YOU COULDN'T READ THE CREDITS FOR YOURSELF~!!

BRILLIANT~!

[Pete 13,169]

Always loved the OHMSS opening. Brilliant bit of business to hand-wave the elephant in the room (Connery's departure), segueing into the most underrated title music across the entire run.

[(BP) 4,400]

The ending of OHMSS is amazing too, and an incredibly bold move at the time. 

 

[Contentious C 587]

A part of me wanted to start a separate topic for Worst Openings/Endings, but Dirty Dancing and The Secret of NIMH take Worst Ending with their Dusty Finishes pretty handily.

And "Worst Opening" is called "didn't become a movie". Though this movie:

Too Late

sure as shit tries to win the award. The opening "take" is so fucking pretentious, I couldn't make it any further into the movie to find out the director was trying to do the whole film in long, uninterrupted takes. Somebody watched Before Sunset a few too many times. I think David Foster Wallace once crucified Magnolia (perhaps another contender for worst opening) as "100% gradschoolish in a bad way", but if he'd had to listen to the first 15 minutes of dialogue in this radioactive turd, he would have killed himself all over again. I won't link any videos, because I wouldn't do that to you guys.

[nate 4,535]

Blues Brothers makes my list for both categories.

[Curt McGirt 7,073]

Sometimes I love the Internet more than others

https://msuweb.montclair.edu/~furrg/i2l/shorttimers.pdf

EDIT: Read the first part of the book already (the Parris Island half of the movie) and it flew, and was even more brutal than what was filmed. Also a lot of the same dialogue. Highly recommend you read it if you like the film. 

[Elsalvajeloco 4,924]

James Horner goes full Ennio Morricone

 

 

I wish the opening confession scene from Calvary was still up because that one is tremendous.

[CreativeControl 3,464]

16 hours ago, Curt McGirt said:

Heat is one of those rare movies where I don't want it to end that way so I stop watching at the precise point where I WANT it to end. 

Then again it's still so good that sometimes I finish it anyway. 

Yup, every time he turns off the motorway I'm screaming "YOU IDIOT!" internally.

As far as OHMSS goes, that ending was a massive gut punch. Remains my favourite James Bond film and it still annoys me that the follow up to that was the awful-on-so-many-levels Diamonds Are Forever.

I'd really like to go back and watch Full Metal Jacket and skip the first bit because the marine training just overshadows everything else in that film. Talk to anyone about it and that's all they'll talk about and all anyone remembers (me included)

[(BP) 4,400]

1 hour ago, CreativeControl said:

As far as OHMSS goes, that ending was a massive gut punch. Remains my favourite James Bond film and it still annoys me that the follow up to that was the awful-on-so-many-levels Diamonds Are Forever.

That's one of my biggest reasons for choosing to believe that each Bond is a separate agent using a code name. Lazenby-Bond's arc is a new 007 who thinks he's going to have the time of his life being a super spy, catches feelings almost immediately for the first "Bond Girl" that strolls into his life, isn't particularly the danger junkie his predecessor was, and is ultimately broken by Blofeld's revenge plot. He retires, and M has no choice but to reactivate the paunchy toupee-wearing sociopathic Connery-Bond to hunt Blofeld.

[S.K.o.S. 1,139]

18 hours ago, Contentious C said:

Though this movie:

Too Late

sure as shit tries to win the award. The opening "take" is so fucking pretentious, I couldn't make it any further into the movie to find out the director was trying to do the whole film in long, uninterrupted takes. Somebody watched Before Sunset a few too many times. I think David Foster Wallace once crucified Magnolia (perhaps another contender for worst opening) as "100% gradschoolish in a bad way", but if he'd had to listen to the first 15 minutes of dialogue in this radioactive turd, he would have killed himself all over again. I won't link any videos, because I wouldn't do that to you guys.

Agree that the dialogue is terrible throughout.  Kept thinking "people don't talk like this, and whoever wrote this is way less clever than they think they are".

I love that split screen alternate camera shot during the phone call in the first section, though.

[Zartan 882]

Opening ^^ 

This is like the ending for Heat if it was actually good- 

 

[Curt McGirt 7,073]

Not to keep this the Full Metal Jacket Thread but to add to the end of the movie from The Short-Timers... well, you really don't want to know what they do to the sniper's body. 

EDIT: If they filmed it the way the book is written, it'd be a splatter flick. 

[J.T. 8,112]

How in the world did I forget the intro for Layer Cake?  THE BEST~!

 

[Curt McGirt 7,073]

You know what, since CreativeControl reminded me, another movie I turn off right at a certain point? A Clockwork Orange. Then again it doesn't have the cop-out of the book (which I've still read a zillion times)

[odessasteps 10,493]

1 hour ago, J.T. said:

How in the world did I forget the intro for Layer Cake?  THE BEST~!

 

I love the alternate ending of Layer Cake. 

[Control 724]

Also there’s this

[GodzillaPerez 603]

 

Yeah I'm cheating. For an actual movie:

 

[Control 724]

Also these:

 

 

[StuntmanCrowley 187]

Terrible internet connection at work, so not able to link the video

 

But for great openings.....I'd throw Way of the Gun into the mix, just for how funny it is and well done to introduce the characters.

[happjack 173]

For as great as the Lupus catch is the Bad New Bears really nails what it's like to lose the big game and have to deal with the half assed sportsmanship of the other team.

 

[odessasteps 10,493]