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April 3rd, 2008
12:33 PM ET
No wordsJules Dassin died the other day. You may know the director's name from his best-known films, “Never on Sunday” and “Topkapi,” the former for the performance by Dassin’s future wife, Melina Mercouri, and the latter for its Oscar-winning turn by Peter Ustinov. 
Melina Mercouri and Jules Dassin are shown in 1960. Dassin's films included "Topkapi," "Never on Sunday" and "Rififi."
 But then there’s “Rififi,” which should be more famous than it is. At the heart of “Rififi,” which Dassin directed in 1954 when he was down on his luck due to the Hollywood blacklist, is an almost 30-minute sequence showing a robbery. Not a word is spoken, not a note of music is heard. (After all, the thieves need complete silence.) You want tension? “Rififi” builds it beautifully. “Rififi” has me thinking of other wordless (if not necessarily music-less) sequences in the movies. “There Will Be Blood,” which is due for release on DVD Tuesday, begins with essentially no speech for the first 15 minutes or so – a thematic echo (pardon the word choice), down to the occasional ominous music, of “2001: A Space Odyssey,” which has no dialogue for the first 20 minutes. (“Blood” director Paul Thomas Anderson has talked about his affinity for “2001” director Stanley Kubrick.) And though it’s melodramatic, complete with musical stings, I can’t help but remember (SPOILER!) the climactic scene of “Bang the Drum Slowly,” in which Robert De Niro’s ailing baseball catcher loses track of a pop-up, quietly hammering home his fate. A dialogue-less sequence can be difficult to pull off, but when it works, the result can ... well, leave you speechless. What are some of your favorites? - Todd Leopold, CNN.com Entertainment Producer |
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A program I saw as a kid in the 70's. A small child is missing.The parents enlist the aid of a tough cop with special skills and few social graces , to follow the few pieces of evidence left by the kidnappers(?)
The balance of the movie is about the cop chasing everywhere trying to beat the clock,and return the little girl (?). At the end the cop arrives at a hospital (father in a coma!) to update the mother.. The cop is bleeding from his shoulder and generally messed up from an altercation .He draws her behind a bedside curtain for privacy.
.From this point we are watching the characters in silhouette with just quiet piano music playing.. The tragedy and anguish of the silent communication was gripping. Even a kid like me didn't have to ask my Dad what was happening.
The body language was positively eloquent .
Anyone remember it?
Kurasowa's battle scene in "Ran" The way the battle is played out...without sound effects or dialogue, just the music. It plays out like a ballet. Stunning.
Angie Dickinson's 10-minute art gallery scene in DePalma's "Dressed To Kill." The plane crash sequence of "Fearless." Almost anything by Jacques Tati.
this was a small, but lovely silent moment in a movie classic that has always impressed me...
in West Side Story–the rumble has taken place, yet on a rooftop some blocks away sits Maria. she has no idea what has taken place. all she knows is that she's in love and will meet her lover soon. she's alone and is caught up in her thoughts. she gets up and begins to dance alone. at first slowly, then she twirls and runs around the roof while Leonard Bernstein's music soars. she is stopped abruptly when one of the gang members arrives to give her the bad news.
this little scene is my favorite in the history of movie musicals, and one of my favorite movie scenes period.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer's "Hush" episode was mentioned several times but no one has mentioned the episode of Buffy where Buffy finds her mom's dead body on the couch. The scene is several minutes long and has no dialogue or music. I've only seen it once but it completely stuck with me.
I agree with the thoughts about History of Violence. What could dialogue have added to that? Bravo Cronenberg.
"Heavenly Creatures"- (Spoilers) As the girls kill Melanie Lynsky's mother, director Peter Jackson removes all sound, and replaces it with a quiet musical riff, with simple soft thuds as the brick hits mother. He used the same trick in Fellowship of the Ring with Boromir's death. And it works amazingly well to convey death and sadness.
Or, perhaps the three way sex scene in "A Clockwork Orange" set to William Tell's Overture.
First one that came to my mind....Mel Brooks' "Silent Movie" One of my all time favs!
The scene in "Braveheart" where William Wallace gets his revenge against the English for his murdered wife Muron is pretty much without any dialogue. It's a great and pivotal scene.
"Grand Slam". 1960's film. Another heist film that takes place during the height of Rio de Janero's Carnival celebration. Edward G. Robinson, Klaus Kinski, Janet Leigh. The thieves, all hand-picked professionals in their choice specialty, have to somehow break into the Grand Slam 70-series vault that holds a fortune in diamonds. An elaborate sound detection system is circumvented with shaving cream. You get the sense that the actors dare not even breathe out of fear of setting it off during the tense, deliberate and elaborate scene. And you can't go wrong with Edward G. Robinson and Janet Leigh.
For long parts of the Tom Hanks' movie "Cast Away," there is no speaking. He is alone on the island. (This is before he makes his volleyball-friend.)
One surprisingly not mentioned so far is Quest for Fire (La Guerre de Feu), which has almost no dialogue of any kind in it, and yet tells an extremely emotive and dramatic story. Also coming to mind is the "The Bear" (L'Ours) which, mostly told from the bear's perspective, has little to no dialogue in the entire movie. Both were powerful and exquisite works.
Paccino at the end of Donnie Brasco. Putting his watch away for his wife to find it.
In "The Red Violin" a master picks up the item in question and plays a lovely melody. Samuel Jackson just sits there and listens; I swear he doesn't move a muscle but you just feel the intensity of the music solely through his eyes. (Joshua Bell on the violin...wonderful!)
Thanks, King Puma! I'm glad somebody else besides me thought of A History of Violence. That last 10 minutes is exactly what I think of when I think of how powerful silence in a movie can be. Cronnenberg was brilliant!
Koyaanisqatsi (1982)
Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ probably could've been told with absolutely no dialouge. It was truely cinema told in images that transcended any language.
The first 10 minutes of Sam Peckinpah's "The Wild Bunch" is pure movie making magic. Peckinpah sets up the entire scene with the gang slowly riding into town. The first line of dialog after about 10 minutes sets the stage for everything that follows. Bill Holden (handing a shotgun to one of his gang): "If they move- kill em!"
The final scene of Dangerous Liaisons, which starred John Malkovich, Glenn Close, and Michelle Pfeiffer. After being revealed as the cruel, manipulative monster she is, Close's character is humiliated in front of the society crowd that she has kept fooled all these years. In the final scene, Close stares into the camera as if it were her mirror, sloooowly removing her makeup, and a single tear runs down her cheek, until she completely loses control and flies into hysteria. One of the most intense scenes I have ever seen.
To Lucy:
"Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge," although it aired on Twilight Zone, was a French mini-movie. Don't know if you can find it in DVD, but it is a stunner, with one of the real "surprise" endings of all time.
I believe there is another silent French short, which is done entirely from B&W stills, from which the movie "12 Monkeys" was adapted.
Another vote for Cornell Wilde's "The Naked Prey" (1966).
First 10-20 minutes: A hunting party on safari in Africa disrespects the natives. The natives capture the group and kill the offenders in various nasty ways.
Remainder of the movie: The safari guide is stripped down and sent running. One by one, the native warriors take off in pursuit. For the rest of the chase, no dialogue except for the native warriors. But there's no subtitles or translations; you know what they're saying.
Not just a "no dialogue" scene or shot, but nearly an entire "no dialogue" movie.
The scene in Amedaus when Saliari is looking through the original works of Mozart.
There is a long silent scene in "Lawrence of Arabia" where Lawrence rides into the desert to rescue one man. With no music or dialogue, we watch as a small dot on the horizon appears and slowly grows bigger as the dot approaches the camera. It's quite lengthy and holds your attention as you look to see if they both make it back. Excellent film.
No one mentioned Mel Brooks' Silent Movie?! Wasn't the only spoken word in the film spoken by Marcel Marceau? Sure, not a great film by many measures, but at least Mel tried something different.
Most of the scenes in Tom Hank’s in “Castaway”. No music. No words. Just what I imagined being stranded on an island would be like.
I read through most of the list . . . did anyone mention the beginning sequence of "Touch of Evil" ??? Orson Welles at his best!
Correction: The Naked Prey starred Cornel Wilde (who also directed it)
Please don't forget the wonderfully suspenseful sequence in the 1956 Alfred Hitchcock-helmed The Man Who Knew Too Much. The sequence I refer to is an attempted assassination during a concert at London's Royal Albert Hall. Hitchcock's editing and use of "The Storm Cloud Cantata" is enough to still make people squirm with the suspense, right to the moment when Doris Day–if you haven't seen the film, I won't spoil it for you. (NOTE: Composer/conductor Bernard Herrmann makes his only on-screen appearance in this sequence.)
This other choice may not be exactly in keeping with the tone(?) set by so many of the other films referred to, but there is also the terrific, still hysterically funny "mirror" sequence in the classic Marx Brothers comedy Duck Soup. Completely, totally silent, but it remains for me one of the funniest scenes in any film–it was also the inspiration for the famous "I Love Lucy" episode, the one with Harpo Marx.
The "Hush" episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer was absoulutely brilliant, also in the movie "Crash" when the man fires the gun and the little girl jumps in front of her father to save him with her invisible cape, his scream on thinking his little girl was dead was seen, not heard. You felt his anguish. Brilliant
The final 2 minutes of The Long Good Friday is a continuous shot of the great Bob Hoskins face as his expression changes as he comes to realize he has reached the end of his line.
The preview of "Backdraft" no dialogue just music with scenes from the movie, made me want to see the movie without having any of it ruined by too much showned or spoken in the preview.
"Master and Commander" when Captain Aubrey must make the descision to abandon a man who has fallen overboard. The mans best friend must sever the ropes that provide the only hope of his salvation. Anguish and grief are on all of the faces and not a word is spoken between them. Brilliant.
Not film or movie, but Marvel did a series of books with all their top characters called "Nuff said!" which showed all kinds of action without any dramatic and long-winded speeches typical of comic books. Great effect!
The greatest film piece without dialogue? I need your help. A movie was made in Argentina that reflected the "Dirty War" reality and the "Disappeared" finality of daily life. The movie was so moving that I know some of your readers will have seen it. I can't conjure up the title. An injured protester is gobbled up for treatment by the security forces. This person can't speak but, otherwise, is fully aware. The movie forces the viewer to respond as the injured party would. The subject matter, settings, characters, etc are absolutely brutal and show how thin the line is between civility and chaos, and actually forces the viewer to become interactive, in a sensory, pre-digital way. Great cinema.
In addition to the Twilight Zone episode with Agnes Moorhead, my favorite "silent" sequence occurs in "Immortal Beloved," during the scene where Beethoven (Gary Oldman) is conducting the 4th movement of his 9th symphony, "The Ode to Joy." The scene altenates between the glorious music that the audience is hearing and the total silence that Beethoven is "hearing" as he conducts. Brilliant, I thought.
I love Rififi and Never on Sunday. For years I've tried to find a copy of He Who Must Die. It's a sorry state of affairs when that is omitted. It's a beautiful movie from a beautiful book.
P Berwick
The hilarious Valentine's episode of "Frasier" where Niles attempts to iron his pants... brilliant physical comedy in 7 wordless minutes...
Joseph H. Lewis's film The Big Combo (1955) features the contract killing of a mobster who can't hear without a hearing aid. The killers remove the hearing aid and shoot him. The killing is shot from the victim's point of view; you see dark, shadowy figures, bright flashes of rifle fire coming straight toward the camera, and no sound whatsoever. Extremely creepy, effective scene.
The gripping, awe inspiring final dogfight scene in the epic "Battle Of Britain" of 1969. No sound effects, no dialogue..only a majestic and harrowing music score set to sheer brutality in the skies over London. The scene lasts for what seems like an eternity, which is exactly what a real dogfight might seem like, yet it is probably only 5 minutes long. I haven't seen any scene like this since. This sequence actually made aerial dogfighting seem less of an adventure and more of what they really are..horrific.
The scene in English Patient where the soldier is attempting to disarm a large bomb, even as a class of children and then a convoy of military vehicles go by. No words are spoken and it had me on the absolute edge of my seat. Very scary.
The opening scene of Once Upon a Time in the West. A train station in the middle of nowhere the only sounds a buzzing fly, dripping water and a creeking sign.
There's a sequence near the end of "Last of the Mohicans" with Daniel Day-Lewis where there is only music as the party tries to escape from the avenging Native American warrior. No dialogue but very heartwrenching.
I have two:
First:
The final major sequence of Michael Mann's remake of "Last of the Mohicans". The sequence begins after the "trial" and ends with the death of Magua. Brilliantly shot, brilliantly acted (watch Wes Studi's and Jodhi May's facial expressions) with the wonderful repetitive violin music in the background. A fairly violent cinematic ballet.
Second:
Kubrick has MANY scenes (and movies for that matter) with little dialog. Sure the beginning has no dialog (as speechless man begins his evolution) but niether does the ending scene where Dave Bowman is "imprisoned" in the jupiter room waiting for the next step in his evolution. Fascinating, puzzling and never to be attempted again...ever.
I haven't seen the movie in awhile so I don't remember all the characters, but the scene in Lawrence of Arabia when Lawrence is walking through the desert and comes across a well. He looks around, and there's nothing but sand and sky in all directions. Just when he thinks it's safe to dip the urn into the water, out of nowhere a bullet hits the well. What follows is one of the most gloriously beautiful cinema shots I've ever seen. The camera focuses and stays on one panoramic view of the desert while the owner of the well moves slowly toward it riding a camel. The amazing colors of the sky and the silence make it an awesome spectacle.
The opening of "Once upon a time in the West" where the three killers wait for the train to arrive and the various ways they entertain themselves (knuckle cracking, getting a drink from the top of the hat and capturing a bothersome fly in the gun barrel. No music, just sounds of the depot.
I watched The Birds the other day (with no commercial interruptions) and the only soundtrack besides dialogue was the eerie sounds of birds, singly and in large numbers; sometimes the sounds of the birds was manipulated into a sort of echo and by the end of the film all the sounds seemed to be a part of me–incredibly effective.
Another epic Sergio Leone classic, Once Upon a Time in the West, opens with a long drawn out scene of probably 15 minutes where no words are actually spoken that I've always loved. Jack Elam and 2 other bad guys are waiting at a lonely, windy, dusty train station for the train to come in. Its a great sequence with lots of closeups of these guys' unshaven dirty faces and great background noises of squeaking windmills. Even without dialogue, you know they're bad guys and you know they're waiting on the train. Charles Bronson gets off the train unseen and plays his eerie harmonica song, and you know he's the one they came for and he knows it too, still before any dialogue is spoken.
How about the beautiful scene in "road to perdition " Were tom hanks comes out of the dark with his machine gun blazing and the rain is falling and yet we do not hear the gun all we see is the flash of the machine gun ...absolutly beautiful...or even better "lawrence of arabia" were omar sharif rides up after shooting down lawrences guide...david lean the master of the long silent shot...
My favorite wordless scene is the very end of "The Third Man." Holly Martin [Joseph Cotten] has just gotten out of a Jeep to wait for Anna, who is walking toward him [and the camera] along a tree-lined street in post-war Vienna. He loves her, but has just killed her boyfriend/his former best friend Harry Lime [Orson Welles] who is a black marketeer. Holly leans against a wooden cart and waits as Anna approaches. He straightens up as she gets nearer. She walks past him without a glance, nearly fills the screen and then disappears.
Holly lights a cigarette and gives his match a defeated toss.
Fade to black.
To: Todd Leopold, CNN.com Entertainment Producer. That Twilight Zone episode is the first thing I thought of. I believe there were more in that series, but I don't remember "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge". Thought I'd seen them all.
Just to correct Vicky – The Naked Prey was with Cornell Wilde, not Tyrone Power.
One of my favorite silent scenes is the classic climax from Diabolique (the original French version, not the terrible American remake). The supposedly dead husband rises slowly and silently from the bathtub to the fatal horror of is wife. To paraphrase one critic, if this doesn't make you climb the wall in sheer fright, then nothing will.
the opening shot in The Shining, as jack drives up that mountain road with that eerie music playing. the opening for Apocolypse Now is also perfect
How about the very last scene in A History of Violence where Viggo Mortensen comes home to his family after the climax of the film? Definitely powerful without the use of unnecessary dialogue to puncture the tension the silence gives to the scene.
Two scenes......
1. At the end of "The Last of the Mohicans", after Magua kills Uncas. The music is playing, and the camera focuses on Chingachgook rushing forward and the look of pain and horror on his face. You don't he his scream of anguish from the movie, but, you can hear it in is head.
2. "Saving Private Ryan", when Tom Hanks is trying to decide what to do after Matt Damon informs him that he's not leaving the bridge. You don't hear him talking, but, you can just see his mind spinning around and around and around......
I see that there are a few Sergio Leone fans that remember The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, so what about his best picture......Once Upon a Time in The West? Silence throuhout, Henry Fond's penetrating blue eyes and the final shoot out scene (about 15 mins long) with Fonda and Charles Bronson and of course the third star of the movie, that eerie music.
Not as particularly well known, but amazingly well done would be a classic episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I know that might get some giggles, but it was spectacular. I'd guess that over half the hour is spent speechless (the episode was titled "Hush"). It is a credit to the creativity of the entire production that they pulled off humor, drama and horror in a network (sorta) show to the point that the moment sound returns you are almost disappointed.
To Jim Dunn – I distinctly remember that scene in "101 Dalmations."
I was young when I saw it and I remember being transfixed and the only sound of the ticking clock.
There are a handful of scenes in "The Band's Visit" (currently out) that are dialogue-free and/or silent and are either incredibly powerful or highly funny (like the scene at the roller rink, where the violinist gives his new friend some 'subtle' physical tips on hitting on his date). It's not to be missed–it has a staggering 98% on RottenTomatoes at the moment.
British version of the Office, When Tim finally lets Dawn know his true feelings, takes her into a room, closes the door and rips off his microphone, you are left watching there conversations in complete silence. Great moment in TV.
The last scene in Big Night was amazing, i almost forgot about it until i read this blog.
One of my fav's is the opening sequence of "The Thin Red Line" No spoken dialouge except for a ffew words from the nararator. Just the beauty of an island and its people.
There is a great dialogueless scene in 'Blow Up'. It is an intense moment and the lack of dialogue makes it even more so.
Though it may not fit with the movies and tv listed above, but don't leave out one of the legends of anime.
In Neon Genesis Evangelion, there is a powerful scene with Shinji on the train listening to his headphones. I never ran the time, but it is an incredibly long time (especially for an anime show) of absolutely no dialog, and not even any change in the scene – just him sitting alone on the seat, flicking the walkman from Rewind to Play and back over again.
How about Kurt Russell in the 1975 TV Movie "Deadly Tower" where he plays Charles Whitman the gunman who shoots passers-by from a Texas tower on Aug. 4, 1966, killing 13 and wounding 33. Russell goes through the whole movie without one word of dialogue. It was one of those movies that showed Russell could act using just facial expressions and body language.
A good portion of Tom Hank's "Castaway" is free from dialogue and when there finally is some interaction, its between Hanks and a volleyball. Not cinematic history, but very effective for the mood of the film.
"Enchanted April" Mr. Briggs' oboe does all of the talking in this beautful scene. The expressions on the faces of the charachters and the Italian lndscape are priceless.
The scene from Gone With the Wind, (which "Mary" described below), where the camera keeps pulling back to reveal more and more dead and wounded soldiers lying along the railroad tracks, has no dialogue, but only the sound of “Dixie” playing in the background.
This was one of the most gripping, poignant and stunning scenes I've ever witnessed in a movie. The impact of that scene brought home to me the magnitude and consequences of War more than any bloody, battle scenes I've ever seen, before or after..... And it was done without any sounds except the music.
This is for M. Olsen – the show was 77 Sunset Strip and yes – not a word was spoken but it was a terrific episode.
How could anyone forget the "minute of silence" in Godard's "Band of Outsiders"? I was lucky enough to catch the film in revival, and the dead air of the movie theater when the soundtrack was cut was both shocking and delightful. Godard broke some sort of wall with that scene.
Even if you aren't a racing fan, the beginning of Le Mans is phenomenal. There isn't any dialog or the first 20 minutes or so (maybe just that in the background of the track announcer) and then about a minute before the start of the race, there's the sound of a heartbeat, ever increasing untile the clock strikes 4:00, the starter waves the flag to start, and engines fire up all at once and tear off. In those days, it was a standing start and to see it depicted is incredible.
The first 20 minutes or so of Leone's Once Upon A Time in the West. Nothing but water dripping, a windmill creaking, and a fly buzzing in a gunbarrel... nothing much even happens, and you can't take your eyes off it due to the brilliance of the composition.
City Lights...The ending is magical when she touches his hand after she gets her sight back and knows right away who he is...amazing
The US version of The Office when Jim and Pam just stare at eachother for 20+ seconds in the Booze Cruise episode...Perfect scene.
I'd forgotten all about "Big Night." What a terrific movie. I'm going to have to watch that again - and soon.
There is so much emotion, but no dialogue, in the scene where Al Pacino's daughter gets killed in the Godfather III, on the steps to the opera. The anguish and horror conveyed by the actors is quite amazing. When Al Pacino screams silently for several moments before dialogue is restored, you just want to rip your heart out.
Another Twilight Zone episode, "An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge," based on the story by Ambrose Bierce, utilizes virtually no dialogue to powerful effect.
The scene in "Road to Perdition" where Tom Hanks is shooting down all his former employer's thugs in the pouring rain...no sound...you just see the flashing of the tommy gun shots and all the bad guys falling dead around their boss, who Hanks saves for last.
One of my all time favorite movie scenes has background music but no dialogue. The listening booth scene in Richard Linklater's "Before Sunrise" is a wonderfully romantic scene almost in spite of it's simplicity. Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and Celnie (Julie Delpy) sit in a listening booth at a record store in Vienna and listen to Kath Bloom's "Come Here." The two characters do their best to try to check each other out without letting the other know that they're doing so. It's simple, it's sweet, and by the time it's over you just want to reach in and grab their heads and make their eyes meet.
The end of "Lost in Translation"...Murray jumps from the cab and says something in her ear - but we aren't privy to the words spoken.
"Rosebud"
The opening scene of "Contact" with camera pulling away from the noise filled Earth to the silence of deep space was particularly effective.
I have to agree with the earlier posting about "The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly" – the scene in which Eli Wallach is running through the cemetery while "The Ecstacy of Gold" (not Metallica's version) is playing is awesome. However, the gunfight scene a few minutes later with music (along with an occasional crow cawing in the background) and close ups of Eastwood, Wallach, and Van Cleef's faces, eyes, and hands is even more intense.
The first 45 minutes or so of the Steve McQueen film LeMans has no dialogue whatsoever unless one counts the track announcer explaining how the race runs. The whole movie has very little dialogue and really concentrates on the racing and the cars, which is a breath of fresh air compared to other racing movies.
The classic crop dusting chase scene from "North by Northwest," beginning after the man waiting for the bus remarks to Cary Grant that the plane is dusting crops where there weren't any crops. The rest is cinematic history. 🙂
M. Olsen ... I remember the wordless private eye episode very vividly some forty-plus years after the fact. It was an episode of the Warner Brothers TV series "77 Sunset Strip." The series starred Efrem Zimbalist Jr. (father of Stephanie Zimbalist), Roger Smith (future husband of Ann Margret) and Edd "Kookie" Byrnes. This particular episode featured Roger Smith, and if I recall correctly, the plot centered around an earring made from a few little bells. The entire episode was minus any dialogue, except for the very last scene, in which "Kookie" scratched a supposedly fake diamond ring across the windshield of a car he was parking. It caused a deep gouge in the windshield. The driver (possibly played by comedian Jonathan Winters) looked at Kookie and inquired with emphasis, "Why?"
There was actually an entire American feature film made in the fifties with no dialogue whatsoever. It was an espionage story starring Ray Milland entitled "The Thief." Martin Gabel was also in the film.
One of my favorite wordless film scenes is at the end of the film "The Big Night" as the two principal characters sit alone in the kitchen of their restaurant at dawn. One of them makes a plain omelet for the other and a busboy breaks bread and joins them. The scene is without a cut, and runs the many minutes it takes to make an omelet from scratch, dish it out for three, and eat it. Absolute cinematic poetry of the understated variety.
"The Black Stallion." The entire sequence showing the boy shipwrecked on the island. A return to the power of silent film-making and telling a story through images.
Basically, the second-half of Westworld is simply Yul Brynner's Gunslinger relentlessly stalking poor Richard Benjamin. And that funky music. No talking, just stalking.
At the end of "The Big Night" two brothers who own a restaurant wake up on the morning after the title's event to face reality. They share a simple breakfast w/their only employee/waiter, of scrambled eggs and bread. No words, but love and hope are there to mitigate their resignation to the previous night's events. Stanley Tucci directed, I believe, as well as starred along w/Ian Holm, Isabella Rossellini and Tony Shaloub. An awesome scene and one of my favorite movies.
The Naked Prey – Tyrone Power
The end scene of 'The Big Night". An underated scene from an underated movie. In this scene, the two brothers had been fighting and just went through a horrible evening. They reconcile in silence. Better than any words could have told this part of the story.
Bruce Willis in Tears of the Sun when he's in the helicopter and trying to decide to return to save the 70 or so natives he left behind. It's just a close up of his face as he struggles with the decision. he carries the whole seen with just his facial expressions and the sound of the helicopter in teh background.
There's a sequence in "The Black Stallion," in which the boy and the horse bond. It's about 40 mins long with no dialogue. Yet says so much!
The final scene of The Searchers, with John Wayne in the doorway.
The opening segment to Jim Jarmusch's Dead Man is totally silent until the conductor played by Crispin Glover begins an incredibly weird monologue before briefly conversing with Johnny Depp's character.
One of my favorites.
How about Buffy the Vampire Slayer's season 4 episode Hush? 20 minutes of dialogue, 40 minutes of pure, Joss Wheedon's silent, and often unappreciated by the masses, brilliance.
There's a great moment in the movie "Shine" when David is performing the infamous Rach 3 concerto. The music drops out, and you only hear the light thumping sound of the piano keys being pressed. It creates a really cool effect.
Also, in the original version of the series "The Office", when Tim finally decides to tell Dawn that he wants her, he takes his mic off, and you see him pouring his heart out to her without any sound. It makes the scene that much more powerful.
"Un Chien Adalou" (1929) by Brunel and Dali has no dialogue or subtitles...it's a great work of avante gaurde/surrealist imagery, and is like watching one of Dali's paintings in movie format
What a great topic for cinema fans! I think some of the best use of silence has to be in Terence Malick's movies. He has learned how to give silence a true cinematic weight. I think of moments in Days of Heaven and The Thin Red Line. I think of his characters' faces. They remind one of Dreyer.
M. Olsen, I'm not sure what episode you're talking about in your post, but you've triggered a memory of the "Twilight Zone" episode "The Invaders," in which a mute Agnes Moorehead fends off some aliens. No dialogue until the ending, which provides a marvelous twist.
One of my favorite scenes is in Gone With the Wind. It is when Scarlet runs away from the hospital, down the street toward the railroad tracks and the camera keeps pulling back to reveal more and more dead and wounded Confederate soldiers lying along the tracks. There are first a few, then dozens, then hundreds. When the camera pulls back the final time, there is a tattered Conferate flag in the upper left corner flying over thousands of wounded, and the sound of "Dixie" playing in the background. It always makes me cry.
There is a surprisingly touching scene in "One Hundred And One Dalmations" (the original, animated version-seriously) in which Roger, the male human of the household, gently rubs and pats an apparently stillborn puppy wrapped in a blanket to see if there is any hope for it, while Pongo, the puppy's father, looks on. There is no music or dialogue, and the only sound is from the clock on the wall.
Not a movie- but Buffy The Vampire Slayer had an Emmy-nominated episode entitled "Hush" that (after the first 15 minutes or so) had no dialogue. A group of cadaverous, levitating villains called "The Gentlemen" steal the voices of everyone in town. Several developing romances reach fruition during the episode, without the characters speaking of how they feel- it really makes for a clever, unique and poignant episode. The Gentlemen are freakin' creepy, too. At the end, when voices are restored, Buffy and her boyfriend meet- and sit in silence, unable to find anything to say.
I have never understood why movies have to have background music. half the time in Star Wars you could not hear the actors because of the music.
This man made great movies. I wish other directors would follow his lead
Don't forget all the Star Wars flicks. Every one of them ends with a moving scene sans dialogue. Those little vignettes perfectly cap off the best of the movies in the series (Empire) and go far to redeem the worst of them (Clones).
In my opinion, the finest scene ever without dialogue is the ending of a movie called Cinema Paradiso. If you haven't seen it...do yourself a favor.
The final scene in "The Pawnbroker". It may be silent, but you can still 'hear' the scream.
The scene in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly in which Tuco runs through the sprawling graveyard looking for the grave of the unknown while The Ecstacy of Gold plays, is, for my money, one of the most beautiful ever filmed.
not sure how long the sequence is, but the beginning of apocalypse now accompanied only the song "the end" by the doors...it's gorgeous.
The sequence in the Coen brothers' Miller's Crossing when a armed gunmen break into crime boss Leo's house to assassinate him has to be one of the all-time greats. Although the sequence is far from silent – it's punctuated by extended sub-machine gun fire and a gorgeous recording of "Danny Boy" (that juxtaposition alone is devilishly wonderful) – it has no dialogue, yet it manages to reveal depth of character, advance the story, and completely enthrall. If just this sequence was the sum and total of the Coen's work, I think it would still place them among the finest filmmakers working today!
The first part of Rio Bravo anyone?
I don't recall the tv show's title, but, there is one episode (I recall it being a full hour) without any dialouge. the show is of the private investigator/murder mystery/ who done it genre. other than the action telling the story, occasionally the written word (in a letter, or note scibbled on a pad) is used to tell the story. of course the edisode's music is used to create tension and set each scene's tone.
after a while I forgot that there was no dialouge.
perhaps you can tell what the show was. it was in black & white.
the music in both "Blood" and "2001" was key to establishing the mood and did much to communicate what dialouge did in the past.
I look forward to finding and watching Rififi.
thanks for a great article.