The Blue Angel (1930, Germ.) (aka Der Blaue Engel)

In Josef von Sternberg's erotic drama:

• the captivating and alluring image of leggy, black-stockinged temptress Lola Frohlich (Marlene Dietrich) with a tilted top hat singing "Falling in Love Again" and "They Call Me Wicked Lola" in a sleazy German nightclub cellar (named The Blue Angel Cabaret)
• the degradation scene in which once-dignified but now disheveled, disgraced and broken Prof. Immanuel Rath (Emil Jannings) crows like a rooster in a pathetic clown act for her

The Blues Brothers (1980)

In director John Landis' rock-filled comedy:

• the tremendous number of noisy and wasteful multi-car crashes, pile-ups, carnage, destroyed buildings and malls
• the many cameo appearances (Twiggy, Carrie Fisher, Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker, James Brown, Aretha Franklin, Cab Calloway, Steven Spielberg, Frank Oz - of the Muppets)
• Elwood Blues' (Dan Aykroyd) famous line of revelation to Jake Blues (John Belushi) to justify their brotherly activities: "They're not gonna catch us. We're on a mission from God!"

Blue Velvet (1986)

In director David Lynch's definitive film with many bizarre images and scenes:

• a bizarre, erotically-charged and nightmarish film of the dark-side of life
• the masterful opening scene of images of small-town, white-picket fence Americana concluding with a zoom-close-up into the grass finding insects fighting to the death
• the discovery of a severed ear carelessly discarded in undergrowth
• the scene of Dorothy (Isabella Rossellini) singing "Blue Velvet" in a nightclub
• the victim/voyeur/abuse scenes as clean-cut Jeffrey (Kyle MacLachlan) watches from Dorothy's closet and is then seduced by her at knifepoint
• the evil and depraved drug-pusher psycho Frank (Dennis Hopper) with an oxygen inhaler while terrorizing and raping Dorothy as he play-acts being both her Daddy and Baby
• Sandy's (Laura Dern) description of her dream of the robins returning to Lumberton
• the Heineken/Pabst Blue Ribbon line of dialogue
• crazed Ben's (Dean Stockwell) remarkably surreal scene when he lip-syncs - karaoke-style - Roy Orbison's pop tune "In Dreams"
• the truly terrifying scene of Frank's brutalization of Jeffrey by distorting the metaphor of the lyrics of the song "Love Letters Straight From Your Heart"
• the appearance of a naked and battered Dorothy on the Beaumont's front lawn and into Sandy's house and her odd declaration ("He put his disease in me")

Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969)

In Paul Mazursky's satirical film about changing sexual mores in the late 60s, with the tagline "Consider the Possibilities":

• its story of encounter groups, permissive sex, countercultural temptation and emotional openness among affluent adults
• two couples: Bob and Carol Sanders (Robert Culp and Natalie Wood) and their best friends Ted and Alice Henderson (Elliott Gould and Dyan Cannon), who have their marital vows of fidelity challenged during a weekend swinging trip to Las Vegas
• the scene of Dyan Cannon urging: "Orgy, have an orgy" after being asked what she wanted to do
• the film's publicity - a view of the couples in bed together discussing either group sex or seeing Tony Bennett
• the film's end with the Burt Bacharach song "What the World Needs Now (Is Love, Sweet Love)"

Body Double (1984)

In Brian De Palma's homage to both of Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window (1954) and Vertigo (1958):

• hard luck and out-of-work LA actor Jake Scully's (Craig Wasson) voyeuristic watching through a high-powered telescope as a beautiful, rich Gloria Revelle (Deborah Shelton) performed a self-pleasuring dance in a nearby apartment
• the infamous phone cord strangulation/erect power drill murder of Gloria by her disguised husband "Sam Bouchard" (Gregg Henry)
• Melanie Griffith's breakthrough role as porn queen Holly Body
• the famous use of British pop band Frankie Goes To Hollywood's "Relax" for the 'film within a film' porn shoot - with Jake's opening ironic line to her: "I like to watch"
• the use of a naked 'body double' during the closing credits
  

Body Heat (1981)

In Lawrence Kasdan's film-noirish crime drama modeled after The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946):

• the tempting, sizzling femme fatale Matty Walker (Kathleen Turner) with her famous line toward simple-minded Florida attorney Ned Racine (William Hurt) - "You're not too smart, are you? I like that in a man"
• the erotic, steamy sex scene in which Ned breaks down the glass patio door with a chair to make love to an eager-looking Matty inside the house
• the sound effects of wind chimes
• the fight-to-the-death with Edmund Walker (Richard Crenna) during a botched murder in the hall of his opulent home
• Matty's final assuring words to Ned: "Whatever happens, you must believe that I love you" which prove to be empty
• the surprise ending when Ned sees Matty's picture in a yearbook (received while serving time in the Florida State Penitentiary), with her name displayed as "Mary Ann Simpson" (with the nickname "The Vamp" and her ambition: "To be rich and live in an exotic land")
• the final view of 'Matty' reclining on a beach chair in the tropics

Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

In Arthur Penn's controversial, ground-breaking film:

• bank-robbing Clyde Barrow's (Warren Beatty) first seduction of Bonnie Parker (Faye Dunaway) by showing off his gun and bouncing a wooden matchstick (shot upright as a phallic symbol) between his teeth
• numerous sped-up (a la Keystone Cops slapstick) bank robberies to the sound of banjo music
• the scene of refuge in a movie theatre while viewing We're In The Money
• the scene in which the gang takes pictures of itself
• the realistic death scene in a field of Clyde's mortally-wounded brother Buck (Gene Hackman) with Blanche's (Estelle Parsons) hysterical screaming
• Bonnie's poem - "The Story of Bonnie and Clyde"
• the quick montage-succession of events during the roadside ambush sequence
• the final violent, slow-motion, two-minute "ballet of blood" as both gangsters' bodies spasm in a dance when pummeled with an unprecedented number of bullets

Boogie Nights (1997)

In Paul Thomas Anderson's period film, with the recreated look of the late-70s LA porn industry:

• the virtuoso long, opening tracking shot into and throughout the interior of a Reseda, California Hot Traxx nightclub
• the dignified presence of LA porn filmmaker Jack Horner (Burt Reynolds)
• high-school dropout Rollergirl (Heather Graham) who removes everything but her roller skates for sex
• the filming of bus-boy turned porn star Dirk Diggler's (Mark Wahlberg) first sex scene with porn queen Amber Waves (Julianne Moore)
• the nerve-wracking, violent cocaine sale/rip-off scene in the house of silver bath-robed, raving drug tycoon Rahad Jackson (Alfred Molina) with his young Asian servant boy Cosmo setting off firecrackers in the background - all accompanied by Night Ranger's "Sister Christian" and Rick Springfield's "Jesse's Girl" on the soundtrack
• the final shot of Diggler's endowed (prosthetic) 13 inch "special thing" as he recites in his mirror: "You're a star, you're a big shining star"

Born on the Fourth of July (1989)

In Oliver Stone's anti-war message film:

• the emotional home-coming scene in which father Mr. Kovic (Raymond J. Barry) hugs his newly paralyzed, wheel-chair bound Vietnam veteran son Ron Kovic (Tom Cruise) - a former star wrestler with shattered illusions and ideals
• the blunt dialogue that Kovic screams at his mother (Caroline Kava) about his biggest casualty or loss ("Penis! Big fat f--king erect penis, ma!")
• the scene of the July 4th parade in which Kovic is both cheered and jeered
• the scene of anti-war veterans, including political activist and paraplegic Kovic, attempting to storm and disrupt the 1972 Republican National Convention

Born Yesterday (1950)

In George Cukor's great comedy:

• the famous scene of unrefined "dumb blonde" and ex-chorus girl mistress Billie Dawn (Judy Holliday) playing a gin rummy game with corrupt and uncouth millionaire junkyard tycoon Harry Brock (Broderick Crawford)
• the sound of Billie's unabashedly vulgar, shrill, stupid-sounding, Betty Boop-like voice
• Billie's ignorance about the difference between a peninsula and penicillin, but her increased intelligence after being tutored by Paul Varall (William Holden) - i.e., Harry Brock: "Shut up! You ain't gonna be tellin' nobody nothin' pretty soon!" Billie Dawn: "DOUBLE NEGATIVE! Right?" Paul Verrall: "Right!"
• Billie's retort to Harry: "Would you do me a favor, Harry?...Drop dead!"
• the scene when she finally stands up to Harry ("You're just not couth...You don't own me!...Big Fascist!")
• the film's final line spoken by Billie to a police officer about her recent marriage to Paul: "We'll make it. It's a clear case of predestination." Officer: "Pre--- what?" Billie: "Look it up"

Bowling for Columbine (2002)

Activist documentarian Michael Moore's interview-laden film:

• interviews with pro-gun advocates, including a bizarre James Nichols and members of the Michigan Militia (who counted Terry Nichols and Timothy McVeigh of the Oklahoma bombings as members)
• the scene about a Michigan bank that offers new customers a rifle for opening a specific type of account
• actor/NRA chairman Charlton Heston at his home, who expressed his pro-gun position only a few weeks after the Columbine (Littleton, Colorado) HS shooting in April, 1999

A Boy Named Charlie Brown (1969)

In the first film starring the Peanuts characters:

• the evocative opening of the characters of Charlie Brown, Linus and Lucy looking for cloud shapes in the sky, and Charlie's resigned response to Linus' extravagant visions: "Well, I was going to say I saw a duckie and a horsie... but I changed my mind"
• Charlie's repeated failures trying to fly a kite, win a baseball game, and kick a football teed up by Lucy (and Lucy's demonstration of his faults afterwards on a slide projector)
• Charlie's final victory at his school spelling bee (after singing the spelling song "I Before E (Except After C)" with Linus and Snoopy playing a jaw harp
• Snoopy's two fantasies of an ace pilot fighting the Red Baron with his doghouse transformed into a Sopwith Camel, and as a hard-nosed hockey player
• Charlie's embarrassing failure to win the National Spelling Bee by mis-spelling "beagle" (Snoopy's breed)
• the powerfully poignant ending sequence that follows, beginning with Linus' exquisite speech to a morose, bedridden, and depressed Charlie Brown after so many failures: "...I suppose you feel you let everyone down, and you made a fool out of yourself and everything. (pauses before leaving) But did you notice something, Charlie Brown?...The world didn't come to an end"
• the scene of a thoughtful Charlie walking through town watching life go on as before, and his futile attempt to kick the football out of Lucy's hands for the umpteenth time while thinking that she was unaware of his presence
• Lucy's warm greeting as he lay on the ground: "Welcome home, Charlie Brown!" - with Rod McKuen's soulful "A Boy Named Charlie Brown": ("He's just a kid next door, perhaps a little more / A boy named Charlie Brown")

The Boy on a Dolphin (1957)

In director Jean Negulesco's adventure drama:

• the quintessential image of sexy, dripping wet, well-endowed Greek sponge diver Phaedra (Sophia Loren in her American film debut) in a diving sequence - emerging from the water

Boys Don't Cry (1999)

In Kimberly Peirce's shocking debut film:

• the Oscar-winning performance by Hilary Swank as real-life 20-year old small-town Nebraska girl/boy Teena Brandon (or Brandon Teena), who masqueraded as a boy when trapped in a girl's body while suffering an identity crisis/confusion and awaiting a sex-change operation
• the scene of her confession of her true sexual identity to teenaged, white-trash factory worker and love interest Lana Tisdel (Chloe Sevigny)
• their heartbreaking covert lesbian relationship and first sexual encounter
• the shocking murder of Brandon in the film's conclusion

Boys Town (1938)

In director Norman Taurog's biographical drama:

• the memorable scene in which Father Edward J. Flanagan (Oscar-winning Spencer Tracy) pulls up rebellious, wise-guy punk teen Whitey Marsh (Mickey Rooney) by the collar and introduces himself: "I'm Father Flanagan...You're coming with me to Boys Town"
• further scenes of Father Flanagan's discussions with Whitey (i.e., "Are you going to see these boys turned out into the streets, into the alleys, into reformatories, and worse, lose their home?")