Tuesday, November 14, 2006

Similes on the Big Screen, Take 1


From Woody Allen:

A relationship, I think, is like a shark. You know? It has to constantly move forward or it dies. And I think what we got on our hands is a dead shark. (Alvy Singer in “Annie Hall,” 1977).

Alvy, you're incapable of enjoying life, you know that? I mean you're like New York City. You're just this person. You're like this island unto yourself. (Annie Hall in “Annie Hall”).

You, you, you're like New York: Jewish, left-wing, liberal, intellectual, Central Park West, Brandeis University, the socialist summer camps and the, the father with the Ben Shahn drawings, right, and the really, y'know, strike-oriented kind of, red diaper, stop me before I make a complete imbecile of myself. (Alvy Singer in “Annie Hall”).

You stand on the brink of greatness. The world will open to you like an oyster. No... not like an oyster. The world will open to you like a magnificent vagina. (Helen Sinclair in “Bullets Over Broadway,” 1994)

He’s an American phenomenon (Halley Reed). Yeah, like acid rain (Clifford Stern). (“Crimes and Misdemeanors,” 1989)

[About life] It's like Vegas. You're up, you're down, but in the end the house always wins. Doesn't mean you didn't have fun. (The Devil in “Deconstructing Harry,” 1997)

It's an interesting group of people, your friends are … Like the cast of a Fellini movie. (Isaac Davis in “Manhattan,” 1979).

[About a Jackson Pollack painting] It restates the negativeness of the universe. The hideous lonely emptiness of existence. Nothingness. The predicament of Man forced to live in a barren, Godless eternity like a tiny flame flickering in an immense void with nothing but waste, horror and degradation, forming a useless bleak straitjacket in a black absurd cosmos. (Museum Girl in “Play It Again, Sam,” 1972)

You can't learn to be real. It's like learning to be a midget. (Tom Baxter in “The Purple Rose of Cairo,” 1985).

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I am enjoying this blog. The diversity of your postings,various the sources for the similes are so interesting. I especially liked the Annie Hall references, one of my favorite movies. The link to the Ben Sohn drawings was cool too.
Thanks and keep up the good work.