I love a good speech, now I'm not talking about a drunken family member stumbling their way through a wedding speech, or in fact a lecture - like those horrifically boring Christmas lectures channel 4 love to put on. I'm talking about a speech that can leave it's audience spellbound, can inspire a failing team to produce greatness or reduce its recipient to tears. Films have produced some incredible moments of individuals delivering a monologue that leaves you wishing it was you in that moment giving this awe-inspiring speech.
Here at The Armchair Director let me take a moment to pay homage to some of my favourite movie speeches. There are hundreds and I couldn't possible mention them all - although I happily would I just figure that would probably take me about a month to write and let's face it, that's too obsessive!
Where to start?!
As a huge sports fan it's only fitting I begin with the sports movie. Cinema is full of magnificent speeches in sports films, if anything its a cliche of the genre - The usual scene, a team at half time, losing, in disarray, fans on their backs, no way back in sight. Up steps their manager, a fallen hero or a usually quiet team member to deliver a rousing speech that causes a team to unite and produce 'the miracle comeback' - This first speech is truly inspiring, it has been used by coaches all over the world before big games, it's that good. The film in question is Any Given Sunday - Oliver Stone's hard-hitting look at running a Pro Football team, for me this is a massively underrated film and one many don't rate as it's about a sport they don't get (an excuse I have heard from some of my friends, I say friends I mean former friends because with excuses like that they are clearly pointless).
Al Pacino is coach Tony D'Amato and the perfect man to deliver a speech that will inspire a team 'on the brink' to turn their fate around. I defy anyone to watch the scene where he delivers his 'inch by inch' speech and by the end not have a shiver down their spine. If you do not like American Football, or sport, I don't care - watch this scene. It is the most powerful speech delivered in the history of sports films and will leave your fist clenched with you punching the air screaming COME ON.
While my second choice is also a sports film it is not the big speech in the locker room I have chosen - although Samuel L Jackson's 'I came to teach boys and you became men' speech is fantastic. For most of the film Coach Ken Carter asks the question 'What is your deepest fear Mr Cruz' to the troubled and temperamental student Timo Cruz, and for the most the question is met with utter confusion. As an audience we have no idea what it is that Carter is trying to get out of the arrogant player and as you witness Cruz on the brink of making one more bad decision and ending like his brother, shot dead in the street he turns to his coach for help.
The scene that makes this film for me is after Ken Carter has been forced to end the lock-out he enforced for his players failing in their classes (I won't go in to the full details, needless to say this film is a brilliant coming of age story and even more compelling as it's a true story) so as he walks into the basketball court he is greeted by his team sitting at desks taking exams. A true show of unity from a team for their coach, what happens next is Timo Cruz stands and delivers 'Our Deepest Fear' (often believed to be from Nelson Mandela at his inaugural speech as President of South Africa in 1994, in fact it's not and was never a Mandela speech its by American writer Marianne Williamson - knowledge. Dropped, right there!) it's a fabulous monologue and epitomises everything that Ken Carter is trying to get his team to believe in not to mention it is spoken from the heart and a brilliant piece of acting.
Let's move away from the sports genre now and let me 'doff my cap' to Mr Robin Williams for a moment. This guy can captivate an audience, yes he is insane and spends most of his time being a crazy, funny, high octane maniac but every so often he plays a role that is truly inspiring. I could quote every line of his in Dead Poets Society as being examples of great speeches; his 'carpe diem' and 'we don't read and write poetry because it's cute' to name two. The of his scene I have chosen is one I have mentioned before and for me my favourite speech ever.
Good Will Hunting is one of my favourite films, following Sean's first meeting with Will and after having Will, in Sean's words 'rip my fucking life apart' their next meeting takes place on a bench by a lake. A simple enough setting, what happens next is, for me, Robin Williams' finest moment. I wish I could deliver a speech like this, it is utterly compelling, said from the heart and done in the calmest manner - which for me adds to the power of it and leaves Will sat speechless. Magnificent acting, great writing and a sublime scene.
Now I am aware I have been talking for quite a while here about my love of great speeches. I have decided to carry this over to another time. So consider this part one, half time if you will. Time for us to take a break, have someone perhaps give us a rousing speech to get us ready for the second half of my homage to the inspiring world of movie speeches.
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