MovieChat Forums > On the Waterfront (1954) Discussion > Is There Anyone Whose Favorite Scene is ...

Is There Anyone Whose Favorite Scene is NOT the Taxi Cab Scene?

posted 16 years ago by missalex
57 replies | jump to latest

First off I just want to say that this movie is my favorite movie of all time. However as brilliant as the taxi cab scene is, it is not my fav scene in this movie. I have two favorites actually. The first one being the scene between Edie and Terry at the docks, fighting for the chip. I had never seen Brando in anything before I saw this movie several years ago. I started watching it randomly and I was intrigued by the film but when the scene came where Terry and Edie were fighting over the chip (at the docks and Edie hits Terry and he laughs and they spin around) - that one moment completely changed by life. It was in that instant that I fell in love with Brando and his acting and realized what treue acting is all about - and what makes a great actor. I had never seen such acting before - it was with such a natural ease - WOW!
My second favorite scene occurs when Brando is talking to the cop on the roof about how he botched that fight at the Gardens - his demonstration of the punches, etc and his explanation about how he was "holding that bum up for half a round." was so unbelievably amazing. Words cannot even describe how much of an impact Brando's acting in this film had on me.
Brando's sensitivity just grabs you - like during the scene with Edie in the Park with the glove, etc and when he asks her to dance at the bar, etc - wow. Ok maybe I shouldn't have said I have just two favorite scenes LOL because obviously the entire film grabs me. But those two scenes in particular stand out to me.
But basically the point I am trying to make is that the taxi cab scene is not in MY top favorite scenes of this film - I think of many other memorable scenes from the movie before that one.
I was wondering if anyone else shares this opinion? Please remember that in no way am I saying I didn't like the taxi scene - of course it is brilliant - I am just saying that in my opinion I like several other scenes better. It is interesting how one particular scene in a movie can have such a lasting impression over the years - you wonder why that scene was chosen above all the rest.
But in closing I just want to say that overall this film changed my life - I finally realized what real film and real acting was all about and it made me appreciate and get into watching classic film and collecting vintage 1950s movie memoribilia.
Performances like Brando in Streetcar and Waterfront are unlike any other and that is why I believe he is he greatest actor ever.

___________________
Long Live Cool

[–] HolyShackles 16 years ago

Definitely. My favorite is probably Terry and Edie's first conversation, particularly the moment when Terry says "you don't remember me, do ya?" to which she replies "I remembered you the moment I laid eyes on you". He then points to his nose, grins, and says "some people just got faces that stick in your mind".

[–] rooprect 16 years ago

That scene was so natural & genuine I wonder if they were ad-libbing parts of it. I agree, that's a great one.

[–] TheSilverScreenJunkie 13 years ago

agreed with all of you on that park scene with edie and terry, so natural, i dont know why it sticks out for me so much, its just the way they are and how theyre talking, and brando taking her glove, and putting it on, youd never think they are acting in a movie, kazan shot that scene VERY well

some of it HAS to be ad libbing, its just gotta be

"...8 year olds, dude..." -Walter , The Big Lebowski (1998)

[–] gsic_batou 13 years ago

She dropped her gloves accidentally. Brando playing with it is 100% improvised, as you can see by her attention to them-even reaching for them more than once.

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BB: Behold I plunge my hands in fire I feel no heat
DC: That's just great! Give us another.

[–] TheSilverScreenJunkie 13 years ago

lol yeah i read LATEr that it was improvised, just blew me away even more

"Who is This under my Knife!" - Bill "The Butcher" Cutting

[–] hadialam 11 years ago

My favourite scene is the one where Brando goes to the roof to see his pigeons after he spilled the beans, and he finds all his pigeons killed. That scene was so raw for me, so well acted that it reached deep inside me. I really felt it

[–] Mechanical 16 years ago

If that's the scene where she drops her glove and he picks it up and starts playing with it, that is my favourite scene too.

There is something really beautiful about that scene, I never get tired of watching it.

[–] BeirutWedding 11 years ago

The taxi scene IS my favorite scene -- except for maybe this one. Beautiful.

[–] Harvestmoonman13 16 years ago

I just watched this movie and was absolutely blown away. It has just skyrocketed to one of my top movies of all time. I completely agree about the two scenes you mentioned.

I was actually a little bit disappointed by the taxi scene...it just...it seemed to me that the actor playing Brando's brother wasn't all that good. I really didn't buy him accepting brando...

[–] missalex 16 years ago

Yes I agree. The taxi cab scene did not affect me anywhere near as much as those other scenes I mentioned. Overall though, its my favorite movie of all time!
___________________
Long Live Cool

[–] ladri_di_biciclette 16 years ago

I loved the fight over the chip, too! Especially the look on Brando's face at the end of the scene.

[–] mike-848 16 years ago

My favorite scene that makes me laugh out loud (which helps to break the tension) is when Friendly yells at Tullio to "Stop breathing that clam sauce on me"!

[–] 16 years ago

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[–] Lakemystery3 15 years ago

I agree with the priest's speech. But also, when Terry and Friendly are screaming back and forth at each other near the end. Then the fight, then to see a beaten and battered Terry walk into work with all the union people, leaving Friendly alone in the river.

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"She flattened a Dear John with a John Deere." - Douglas Wambaugh

[–] mandrake62 15 years ago

That is my favorite non-Brando scene. OK, KO? Yes, the priest paid his dues.

[–] yarrrbles 15 years ago

I was moved by the scene in the pigeon coop when the boy broke all the pigeon's necks and Terry was sitting there holding the dead pigeon.

[–] sneakyboo79 9 years ago

That one just really catches you in the gut. It's one of my favourites too along with the glove scene at the park.
you can feel that punch when the kid cries a pigeon for a pigeon and then throws it. Everything with Brando comes down to the slightest body movement, he has incredible body language and expression.

[–] jcgcsc 15 years ago

The taxi cab scene is my second favorite, but the scene that always stuck out as the best and biggest turning point was when Father Barry "Sermon on the Docks" I feel that this scene had the most passion and emotion of any in this film. Not to take away from the overflowing emotion in the taxi scene, but personally the sermon did more for me. Overall the movie is filled with emotion.

[–] archip57 15 years ago

The late, brilliant Director Elia Kazan, (who we can thank for "discovering" Marlon Brando and casting him on stage in "A Streetcar Named Desire" back in 1947 on Broadway....)

AND who directed him in the 1951 film version...as well as in 1952 in "Viva Zapata"....

...In the last 49 years of his life, in his Biography, and in endless TV interviews said...

[Regarding Marlon Brando's mesmerizing screen performance as Terry Malloy which Won them both Oscars in 1954----]

"If there has ever been a better acting performance captured on film, I haven't seen it".

End of story...

MY FAV: The scene in the bar when he buys Edie her first beer and she grills him about JOEY...and Terry is LYING...and WE KNOW IT...but EDIE does not know this yet....

...The look in his EYES when he says, "I'm sorry there's nothing I can do"..."You would if you could", Edie says...and we FEEL his pain in his eyes---torn by guilt at having her BROTHER killed....the awakening conscience of STANDING UP to the MOB....and the rising LOVE he feels for this woman..."the first nicest thing that ever happened to me"....

BRILLIANT and to be studied by ACTING CLASSES for all TIME....!

I rest my case.

"Imagination is stronger then knowledge, because knowledge is limited". Albert Einstein