Stuck in the middle with you.
November 21, 2011 10:43 AM   Subscribe

SadisticCinemaFilter: Film scenes in which person A deliberately and for no apparent reason hurts person B when person B obviously poses no threat whatsoever to person A.

For instance, the scene in Reservoir Dogs where Michael Madsen cuts the cop's ear.

I want scenes where one person is deliberately and directly hurting another, so scenes where there's any mediation (such as the traps in Saw) are out.

Help me, hivemind. How many can you think of?
posted by gauche to Media & Arts (33 answers total) 6 users marked this as a favorite
 
I could be wrong but isn't this how the rope bridge scene in McCabe & Mrs. Miller plays out?
posted by steinsaltz at 10:47 AM on November 21, 2011


Chad taunting the deaf Christine about the trick he and Howard agreed to play on her in In the Company of Men is one of the more horrifying examples I can think of.
posted by xingcat at 10:48 AM on November 21, 2011 [1 favorite]


In Black God, White Devil, a religious cult leader stabs a baby.
posted by perhapses at 10:50 AM on November 21, 2011


I hesitate to recommend that anyone watch these films, but I believe you'll find tons of examples in both "Salo" and "A Serbian Film." Not gonna link to either of them.
posted by jbickers at 10:50 AM on November 21, 2011


Oldboy has this in spades.
posted by machinecraig at 10:51 AM on November 21, 2011


*spoiler* Pretty much the entire plot of The Shape of Things. Went in thinking "Hey romantic comedy with Paul Rudd & Rachel Weisz" came out sick to my stomach.
posted by librarianamy at 10:52 AM on November 21, 2011 [1 favorite]


*Spoilers *
At the end of Kanal, the commander shoots one of his own men. And at the end of Rumble Fish, a cop shoots the Motorcycle Boy.
posted by perhapses at 10:55 AM on November 21, 2011


Salo, pretty much every scene.
posted by biffa at 10:59 AM on November 21, 2011


SPOILER I guess:

The guys in the truck shoot Dennis Hopper then Peter Fonda at the end of Easy Rider.
posted by cmoj at 11:02 AM on November 21, 2011


This is pretty much the whole point of Funny Games, and the German movie it is a remake of, known by the same title in English.

Speaking of German movies, there's a fair amount of unprovoked and unexplained cruelty in The White Ribbon.
posted by adamrice at 11:03 AM on November 21, 2011 [1 favorite]


TV Tropes calls this "kicking the dog".
posted by Clandestine Outlawry at 11:06 AM on November 21, 2011


Joe Pesci in:

1) Casino (pen scene at bar)
2) Goodfellas (Spider)
posted by mazola at 11:07 AM on November 21, 2011


Man Bites Dog. It's a mocumentary about a serial killer. Good, but really disturbing.
posted by Hactar at 11:07 AM on November 21, 2011


The ending of Fat Girl.
posted by hmo at 11:11 AM on November 21, 2011 [2 favorites]


In Fight Club there's a scene where the narrator (Edward Norton) is fighting "Angel Face" (Jared Leto). Norton gets Leto on the ground and it looks like the fight's over, but the Norton just keeps beating his face in. The crowd stops cheering when they realize it's real. He finally just gets up, walks away, and says, "I felt like destroying something beautiful."

I wasn't able to find the full scene online on youtube, but there are a couple uploads where people replaced the audio with music.
posted by Deflagro at 11:11 AM on November 21, 2011


um, The Passion of the Christ
posted by needsnoprosecutor at 11:20 AM on November 21, 2011


Persona, a film in which two women, intensely, passionately bonded with each other in platonic and possibly romantic love, inflict physical injuries on one another with broken glass, fists, and other methods.

Not once is there an apparent reason, and movie lovers and critics have debated the less apparent reasons ever since the film came out in 1966.
posted by Gordion Knott at 11:28 AM on November 21, 2011 [2 favorites]


Funny Games is a whole movie about this.
posted by swingbraid at 11:28 AM on November 21, 2011




Jack Nicholson's Joker to his henchman in the 1989 Batman movie.
Joker:"Bob, gun."
Bob hands him the gun. Joker shoots Bob.
posted by monkeymadness at 11:45 AM on November 21, 2011


An American Crime
posted by cazoo at 11:48 AM on November 21, 2011


A Clockwork Orange
posted by quiet coyote at 11:57 AM on November 21, 2011


Much of The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover is about this - the opening sets the tone but there is a lot of sadistic violence in it, solely for the purpose of sadism, it seems.
posted by pombe at 12:01 PM on November 21, 2011


Comedy and not sadistic, but Cato (sp?) in the Pink Panther series.
posted by digitalprimate at 12:59 PM on November 21, 2011


Pulp Fiction
posted by exphysicist345 at 1:05 PM on November 21, 2011


The Devil's Rejects is a Rob Zombie film that's not quite a horror film. Might open you up to a whole genre of what you seem to be looking for.
posted by jander03 at 2:32 PM on November 21, 2011


In Taken , the hero played by Liam Neeson shoots an innocent woman to make her husband talk and apologizes to her later (IMDb discussion).
posted by elgilito at 4:11 PM on November 21, 2011


Near the end of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, when the Nazi sympathizer art dealer shoots Sean Connery.
posted by colin_l at 4:25 PM on November 21, 2011


The evil lord in 13 Assassins does this throughout the film. Ugh. It's a good movie, though.
posted by misozaki at 5:21 PM on November 21, 2011


Pretty much every scene in The Last Seduction
posted by Mchelly at 7:39 PM on November 21, 2011


Martyrs
posted by zombieApoc at 8:26 PM on November 21, 2011


The ending of Audition. Do not watch if at all squeamish. Seriously, wtf.
posted by Rhaomi at 10:15 PM on November 21, 2011


Repulsion by Roman Polanski
posted by Mael Oui at 11:41 PM on November 21, 2011


« Older Hasselblad Accessory Hassle   |   Songs that keep building until they almost explode Newer »
This thread is closed to new comments.