Star Wars: The Clone Wars - S3E1 - "Clone Cadets"

Recently, I found a note I made about a detail in The Clone Wars episode "Clone Cadets" (S3E1).  At the time, I decided not to write about it because it seemed too small of a point, but since significant details (especially in Star Wars) are the sort of thing I've been focusing on lately, I thought I'd write about it now.

The episode follows a particular squad of clone troopers (Domino Squad) who are having trouble working together.  While watching the squad perform poorly in a training session, Shaak Ti remarks, "The one they call Echo never adapts to the situation," and the bounty hunter El-Les, who is helping the Jedi train the clones, comments, "CT-782 seems to follow his own path.  He can't do it all alone."  Two other clones argue with each other too much and are shot down by training droids, and the last clone surrenders when he's surrounded.  Shaak Ti then summarizes the squad's problem:  "If these cadets can't get past their short-sighted selfishness, they will never come together.  Unity wins war, gentlemen."

Later in the episode, Commander Colt comes to watch a few squads perform their final tests.  The squads meet him in a hangar, and after Bravo Squad is chosen as the first squad to run the simulation, the clones file out of the hangar.  As each squad turns in formation, the clones stomp their feet, but while the clones in the other squads all stomp their feet simultaneously, the clones of Domino Squad stomp their feet at different times.  In the shot, they're shown from the waist up, so it's easier to hear the various footfalls than see them.

This detail shows that the clones are still a bit too independent and aren't yet working together.

The Terminal

Earlier this week, I watched The Terminal again (because the movie starts around this time of year), and I realized the significance of a detail.

Shortly after the situation with Mr. Milodragovich (which I wrote about a number of years ago), Viktor Navorski shows up at Frank Dixon's office and tries to give him a Virgin Isle sailfish for his wall, apparently trying to mollify Dixon's anger.  Navorski must have remembered the other fish displayed on Dixon's wall, visible in a scene earlier in the movie when the two first meet:

The fish that Navorski offers, however, is considerably larger than Dixon's fish (briefly glimpsed again in this scene as the camera pans with Dixon as he sits down), and this is significant.

Immediately after the problem with Mr. Milodragovich, Dixon had threatened Navorski as a punishment for cheating the system and allowing Mr. Milodragovich to leave with the medicines for his father but without the necessary documentation.  "Do you think this is a game?  Do you think I need an excuse to put you back in that cell, to keep you there for another five years?  You go to war with me, and you go to war with the United States of America."  Dixon made these threats in front of the review board that was there to inspect the airport and assess him for the role of chief field commissioner, a position he's wanted for years, and now he blames Navorski for making him look bad.

In this particular scene, he repeats some of his threats:  "Let me make you a promise, Viktor, and this is a promise that comes from a man who is stuck here, a man who may be stuck here for the next ten years.  From now on, you and I are partners.  If I stay, you stay.  You will not set one foot in New York City, not a single toe in the United States of America.  Do you understand what I am saying to you?"

Navorski answers, "Yes, you don't like [the] fish."

It's sort of a humorous response, but it can also be taken in a somewhat more literal sense.  Dixon doesn't like the fish that Navorski freely offers because it's bigger than any of his own and makes him look bad in comparison, just as he did in front of the review board.

Star Wars - Episode III: Revenge of the Sith

After writing about Anakin's body language in a scene in Attack of the Clones, I figured that I might as well also note its significance in a scene in Revenge of the Sith.

At around 53 minutes into the movie, there's a scene in Padmé's apartment where Anakin tells Padmé that he "feel[s] lost" and that the Jedi don't trust him.  Then he says, "I'm not the Jedi I should be.  I want more, and I know I shouldn't."  As he says, "I know I shouldn't," he turns away, as if he can't bear to maintain eye contact with her while admitting this fault.

In the featurette titled "The Chosen One" on the bonus disc from one of my copies of Revenge of the Sith, there's even behind the scenes footage of George Lucas directing this scene, and he specifically tells Hayden Christensen, who plays Anakin, to turn away during that line.

Star Wars - Episode II: Attack of the Clones

I recently re-watched part of a scene in Attack of the Clones in order to verify some dialogue for a future post about an episode of The Clone Wars on my other blog.  While doing that, I noticed a significant detail in the conversation that Anakin and Padmé have while she's packing in her apartment.

After Anakin claims that "in some ways, a lot of ways, I'm really ahead of [Obi-Wan]," expresses his frustration that Obi-Wan "won't let me move on," and gives a further list of complaints, Padmé placates him by saying, "All mentors have a way of seeing more of our faults than we would like.  It's the only way we grow."  In a sort of defeated manner, he admits, "I know" and sits down.  Padmé then says, "Anakin, don't try to grow up too fast," and he replies, "But I am grown up."  Significantly, he stands up as he says this, as if trying to prove his point by showing that he's taller than she is.

Despicable Me 2

Earlier this week, I watched Despicable Me 2 (for only the second time), and I noticed a brief visual allusion.  Early in the movie, there are some scenes of Gru's lab, and one of them shows a group of minions sitting on a beam and eating lunch:

This seems to be based on the photograph known as Lunch atop a Skyscraper:

According to this article (which is also my source for the above image), the photograph was taken on 20 September 1932.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars - S4E15 - "Deception"

In my latest re-watch of The Clone Wars, I've reached the episode arc in season four where Obi-Wan Kenobi goes undercover as the bounty hunter Rako Hardeen.  I noticed some metaphorical significance in the staging of a particular scene in "Deception."

After Moralo Eval, Cad Bane, and Rako Hardeen have escaped from prison, they steal a police speeder to get to the docks to steal a ship and leave Coruscant.  Moralo Eval and Cad Bane take the front seats, leaving the back seat for Rako Hardeen:

Since this is a police speeder and the back seat is where criminals are detained, there are bars in the interior and on the canopy.  Visually, this represents Kenobi's situation.  His goal is to investigate a kidnapping threat against Chancellor Palpatine that Eval is allegedly involved with, and for the moment, he simply has to go along with Eval's plans in order to discover more information.  In the same way that he experiences this temporary lack of agency, he's confined in the prisoner's seat of the police speeder.

Jaws

Earlier this week, I re-watched Jaws, and this gave me an opportunity to flesh out a note I recently found about something I realized shortly after I watched it a couple years ago:  although Hooper has expertise and Quint has experience, Brody is actually the best candidate to kill the shark.

About halfway through the movie, Quint comments that the shark is "either very smart or very dumb."  I think it's the former.  After Hooper is submerged in the cage, the shark is clever enough to lure his attention in one direction before circling back and surprising him from behind.  Because he's startled, Hooper drops the spear with which he had planned to give the shark a lethal injection.

Rather than outsmarting Quint, the shark merely overpowers him.  The shark's strength is greater than what Quint has seen before, so he's able to withstand Quint's strategy of harpooning barrels into him and using their buoyancy to force him to the surface.  Near the end of the movie, the shark essentially leaps onto the boat, causing it to sink and Quint to slide straight into his mouth.

The shark is able to counter and evade the plans that Hooper and Quint have, and it's almost because of Brody's lack of qualifications that he's able to succeed.  Throughout the movie, he's ill at ease around and on the water, and his last-minute plan involves frantically shooting at the compressed air tank in the shark's mouth.  There's even an added degree of randomness in his shots because his glasses were knocked off earlier and he doesn't see clearly.

If Brody were more comfortable on the water or had a thought-out plan, the shark would have had some idea of what to expect from him and how to avoid it, just as he did with Hooper and Quint.  It's Brody's unpredictability, spurred by his discomfort and desperation, that leads to his success in killing the shark.