I can think of at least three movies in the coming two weeks that feature scenes that are strikingly out of tone with the film they're a respective part of and yet seemingly included as a means of getting people to tell their loved ones how ridiculous Bit X in Movie Y is. And so today's Cinematical Seven list will be an arbitrary, far from ultimate compilation of the most distractingly disgusting and supremely superfluous parts in recent movies. Sure, most of these are comedies, and yes, most of them seem to have been released from the year 2000 on, and as always, we welcome your comments below. Just make sure they're not too gross.
(Speaking of which, NSFW clips follow after the jump.)
1. The Hills Have Eyes II (2007) -- This one goes out to my roommate for inadvertently providing me with this topic, citing the opening of this film as a particular example. Before the title even rolls, we're treated to the graphic sight of a captive woman giving birth in a cave before being bludgeoned to death by her mutant guardian. Although one of the characters in the film is eventually snatched in the name of a similar fate, that's something we could've still picked up on without seeing this... though if losing that scene meant not having children subjected to that grisly prologue instead of The Last Mimzy, then I don't want to be right.
2 and 3. Run, Fatboy, Run (2008) and Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist (2008) -- I found both these films to be surprisingly sweet without being sappy, which is why it bugged me all the more when each detoured into cruder territory. With Fatboy, it was Simon Pegg's character having a monstrous blister popped by and spraying all over Dylan Moran. With Playlist, a piece of gum making the rounds ends up in a toilet and fished out by a drunken Ari Graynor. Yeah, really heartwarming on both counts...
4. Along Came Polly (2004) -- Philip Seymour Hoffman accidentally "sharting" himself is one thing, a discreet gag sold entirely on his performance and a universal concept of unexpected discomfort. Having Ben Stiller landing face-first into an especially sweaty and hairy basketball opponent is something else, and yet it was also probably the money shot that earned this shrug-worthy rom-com some $88 million so many Januarys ago. What's that line again, "No one ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public"?
5 and 6. Road Trip (2000) and Tomcats (2001) -- In the wake of 1998's There's Something About Mary and 1999's American Pie, Hollywood was convinced that gross-out comedy and no winning characters to go with it might still equal box office success. They weren't entirely wrong, but I can't say that the former's scene in which Horatio Sanz pubically powders DJ Qualls' order of French toast lured me to that otherwise amusing film, and I can hardly recall the latter laffer save for one doctor's unwitting ingestion of a testicle. I may not be the first to say it, but here's to Apatow for giving R-rated comedies their self-respect back.
7. Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (2006) -- In all honesty, this is the one I mind being included the least, if only because I think it's as marvelous and ballsy (no pun intended) as anything else in this movie, and to see it with a crowd was an all-too-unique pleasure. But in a comedy primarily driven by social awkwardness above all else, I understand why some would have rather been spared some accidental 69'ing. Might I interest you in The Last Mimzy instead...?
1. The old man in the bathroom in Death at a Funeral. An otherwise really funny movie with one horrible, disgusting scene.
Posted at 12:16AM on Mar 11th 2009 by Jessica Dillon