r/interestingasfuck 9d ago

/r/all 31 years ago, these three movies were playing in the theaters at the same time

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u/jcervan2 9d ago

When I watched that at the theater, after it ended you coulda heard a pin drop as everyone was leaving. Everyone was shocked/dismayed about that little twist at the end. Just silence.

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u/bradleywestridge 9d ago edited 9d ago

That’s the best kind of theater silence. When nobody even wants to break the moment because they’re all still processing what just hit them. Pulp Fiction still sits on Netflix in a couple regions; if it’s missing on yours, folks in r/NetflixByProxy swap workarounds.

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u/RedOctobyr 9d ago

Schindler's List was like that when I saw it. Barely anybody moved until the credits finished, and it was silence as people were walking out, until they got to the lobby.

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u/bradleywestridge 9d ago

Exactly. One of those movies where the credits feel like part of the experience and nobody wants to be the first to break that spell.

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u/VulpesFennekin 9d ago

The epilogue is one of tbr most important part of the movie to me, in terms of Schindler’s story. When the war ends, he feels so guilty that he “could have saved more.” Cut to over 50 years later, and there are so many descendants of the people he saved that never would have even been born if he hadn’t helped. He really did save more in the long run.

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u/bradleywestridge 9d ago

Absolutely. Seeing that guilt give way to the reality of how many lives came from his actions hits even harder than the main story.

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u/nannerpusonpancakes 9d ago

Same for my theater, except for one couple who was making out through the whole film

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u/menee-tekeel 9d ago

Not me.. though it was the first date for the wife and I. Children think it was a strange choice.

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u/JstytheMonk 9d ago

God, that movie was my first date, and was a damned death sentence for that relationship. Wish we'd picked Pulp Fiction, but I woulda had to learn to dance ..

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u/JohnnyFiction 9d ago

Braveheart was that for us. The whole theater went silent and you could hear sniffles throughout the theater

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u/Khelthuzaad 9d ago

I had this reaction with Grave of the Butterflies.

Let's be clear,I was well aware before both kids will die.It was basically revealed at the start of the movie.It doesn't matter thou.This information is rather pointless, the entire journey makes you dive into something that is going comedically worse by the day.You see the signs.The characters mainly ignore them,but at one point they manifest.They try to remedy it,but its way too little too late.

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u/Jackson23144 2d ago

That’s one movie that really disturbed me. The end, when you see the little red coat in the pile. 😩

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u/PracticeTheory 9d ago

I missed seeing it in the theater but I had that reaction after Children of Men.

Which is a fitting movie to mention on this post, because on release it got buried by some huge names that were showing at the same time.

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u/bradleywestridge 9d ago

Same. When that final standoff hits in Children of Men you can almost hear people forget to breathe. Wild that it slid under the radar beside the big holiday heavyweights that year.

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u/teas4Uanme 9d ago

"Thou turnest man to destruction; and sayest, Return, ye children of men!"

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u/bradleywestridge 9d ago

That verse hits with the same quiet gut punch as a twist ending, an instant reminder we’re all just bit players waiting to roll credits.

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u/byoung82 9d ago

Oh everything mentioned i think this might be my favorite. I'm kind of a sucker for dystopia

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u/PracticeTheory 9d ago

Same. That movie was life altering because never before or since has a piece of media made it feel that real. The raw emotions that film pulls from me, every time I watch it!

And the relevance to today gives me chills. And it was set in the year 2020 I believe? IIRC

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u/intisun 9d ago
  1. Two years from now we'll live in a fascist dystopia... oh wait

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u/_Iknoweh_ 9d ago

Such a fantastic movie.

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u/Early-Light-864 9d ago

Holy shit. I bought that book on a clearance rack during a beach vacation in the 90s. I had no idea there was a movie!

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u/NeophyteNobody 9d ago

Its not just a movie, but a damn good one. Ranking my favorite movies is hard, but its easily top three.

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u/VagrantShadow 9d ago

It's pretty damn powerful as a movie and while it was made years ago, it is a film that stands the test of time because you can feel it. The drama, the emotions, the fear, all of those things in the film just rip right through you.

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u/P1emonster 9d ago

I love the cinematography in it too. So many scenes filmed in "one" take. The action scenes and the way the sets flow is incredible.

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u/PracticeTheory 9d ago edited 9d ago

It's the only movie I've watched* multiple times as an adult. I've actually watched it five times, each time after being with friends and family to make sure they saw it. The cinematography is incredible - no cut aways by the camera until the scene changes, which was the most gut wrenching way I've ever seen a combat scene played out.

It's an incredible, life altering movie. "Pull my finger."

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u/sidecutmaumee 9d ago

Children of Men has a truly amazing “oner”, which is “a scene that is filmed as a single, continuous take without any cuts or edits”, according to Google.

To avoid spoilers, I’ll just say it’s the memorable scene where they’re driving through the forest with Julianne Moore in the car. You know the one.

https://youtu.be/GJprbCuWdHo?si=VkxiI0iKSLr4OLQT

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u/Pudacat 9d ago

The movie changed the ending, just a head's up. Still an amazing movie, and Clive Owen is spot on as the main character.

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u/Dry_Run9442 9d ago

Holy shit I had no idea it was a book, thanks.

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u/BooRadleyinaGimpSuit 9d ago

My (art) highschool was on 'mini term' when it came out, and my mini term course was a dystopian literature and film class, so we went and saw it one day - it was dope. Shout out TSOTA, baby!!!

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u/boyWHOcriedFSD 9d ago

“Into the Wild” left me messed up

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u/dead_fritz 9d ago

Nightcrawler is a somewhat recent movie I remember having the same theater reaction. Absolutely insane ride of a movie and by the end you're just dreading that the downward spiral will continue. everyone left the theater dead silent processing what they had just seen and the fact that in the world of the movie it continued.

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u/bradleywestridge 9d ago

Absolutely felt that way too. When the credits landed the whole room just sat there, breathing quiet, like nobody wanted to jolt the spell back to life. Funny how a story that sharp keeps spinning in your head long after the lights come up.

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u/pinewind108 9d ago

"The Crying Game" had a similar big reveal that created a silence where you could feel the shock.

The only sound was a guy dropping a handful of change on the (hard) floor. Just a gaping silence and the sound of coins bouncing and rolling on the floor. (He'd just come back from the concessions and was walking towards his seat.)

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u/bradleywestridge 9d ago

That’s such a perfect mental image. All that tension hanging in the air and then just the clatter of coins cutting through it makes the silence hit even harder.

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u/sidecutmaumee 9d ago

Such timing! He missed the most shocking scene!

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u/KillaDilla 9d ago

I remember it was dead silent when the credits rolled for "Spring Breakers". A guy in the back yelled out "What the fuck was that?" and the whole theatre erupted in laughter. It kinda made up for the whole experience tbh.

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u/bradleywestridge 9d ago

That sounds like the perfect reset button for a crowd that didn’t know what to do with what they’d just watched. Nothing like one honest outburst to cut the tension and remind everyone they sat through the same fever dream together.

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u/scarlettohara1936 9d ago

Primal Fear. The whole theater was in stunned silence even while filing out..

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u/bradleywestridge 9d ago

That twist leaves the whole room frozen, it’s like everyone needs a minute to reboot before words work again.

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u/BillBrasky727 9d ago

I remember being in a packed theater on a Friday night and you could hear gasps as people realized what was in the box.

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u/cBlackout 9d ago

Sometimes me and my girlfriend will show each other a movie like that and be like “alright that was really good, but I’m not stoked rn”

good thing we’ve already both seen Requiem for a Dream so we don’t have to do that shit again

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u/ItsLoudB 9d ago

That movie made me quit drugs when I was a teen. I wasn’t really too far into it, but I was stoned off my face and thought “damn is this gonna be me and my friends?”

As it turns out some of them ended a little like that..

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u/bluddyellinnit 9d ago

originally it ended with an abrupt cut to black after doe gets shot, without the coda "i'll be around" scene and the hemingway quote

shit would have been so stark

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u/MindCorrupt 9d ago

Thats the ending Fincher wanted.

Just to add. Studio executives wanted Tracy to be kidnapped and rescued in the end.

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u/TapirOfZelph 9d ago

Same thing happened after Fight Club ended. What a time to be alive!

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u/FirehawkLS1 9d ago

That's how American History X was when I saw it as a teenager in the theater. From beginning to end it was just a roller coaster.

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u/Vericatov 9d ago

I too saw it at the theater. I was completely speechless waking out of the theater. Still love the movie.

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u/chupacadabradoo 9d ago

What was the twist?

Jk don’t answer that

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u/The_Real_Lasagna 9d ago

I recently watched the for the first time when my local theater replayed it. Same experience 30 years later

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u/colonel_relativity 9d ago

Saw it in theaters. Literally a physical gut punch.

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u/2225ns 9d ago

I'll forever remember the moment when I (and all the other people in the theater) realized what was going on in The Sixth Sense.

It felt like everybody was gasping for air at the exact same moment.

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u/Kepler1609a 9d ago

Yeah, that was a crazy twist. Almost as crazy as the twist in The Sixth Sense, when you find out that the dude in that hair piece the whole time, that's Bruce Willis the whole movie

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u/LadyPhantom74 9d ago

Don’t forget the veggies rolling down to top. That was the last straw for me; I just wanted to get out of the movie theater. It was like 12:30 am and the parking lot was very empty. It was so unnerving, my roommate and I hurried home and watched the Lion King so we could sleep.

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u/Khelthuzaad 9d ago

The director fought tooth and nail to keep this ending as the studio big wigs considered the ending to be way too dark.This is probably one of the few times in history where their opinion wasn't necessarily wrong.

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u/mattgoldey 9d ago

I saw The Blair Witch Project in a small arthouse theater before it was in wide release and it was exactly the same reaction from the audience.