Dingus
3. Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back
2. Election
Margin Call
Kelly Wand
3. The Survivors
2. Jerry Maguire
Glengarry Glen Ross
What are your favorite firings from a job in movies? Do you think being…uh…discharged from the military can count as being fired? Listen to the show to hear us discuss our choices, and to hear Dingus read a bunch of cool listener choices.
I agree with Scott that Dan wins the thread. But some mention should be made of Up in the Air, because, after all, the entire movie is about firing people.
Batman Returns - Christopher Walken takes a tip from the Darth Vader School of Management by “firing” Michelle Pfeiffer out of a window after she learns too much about his plans. Walken really Walkens it up in this insanely dark movie. Kelly said there’s only one good Batman movie, but Returns is probably the second best bad one (?). It’s so crazy and Danny Devito and Walken and Vincent Schiavelli and what the hell?! In this scene, I love his pretending it’s a joke, “Ehhhhh? ehhhh?” before shoving her out. Later, after finding out she’s still alive, he delivers the ultimate Max Schrek line, “Bottom line: she tries to blackmail me, I’ll drop her out a higher window. Meantime, I got bigger fish to fry.” It’s my second best Walken in a movie.
Speed - Joe Morton, the fine character actor I mentioned last week for T2, but stupidly forgot his name, who, upon learning that the freeway the bus is on is incomplete, fires everyone.
Upstream Color - Upstream Color, you guys. I watched (and loved/hated) this and listened to your podcast just a few weeks ago. As “the guy” is fired and walked out by security, it’s intercut with the “farmer” capturing his pig and separating it from the girl pig. The pig paces about its small isolation pen while the guy paces around the small platform overlooking the lobby, before he attacks his two escorts and scatters his papers over the edge of the bridge. This opsis sounds crazy when I read it back. Just go watch it, if you haven’t. The falling papers mirror another scene which I couldn’t find or remember, I think with the flower petals falling?
The Waterboy - Bobby gets fired as the water boy for the top college team in the South, leading him to look for another team to “water” for. After an awkward interview with The Fonz, Bobby volunteers to provide hydration for the SCLSU Mud Dogs. The rest is football history.
How has no one mentioned Up in the Air in this thread?!
The entire movie centers around firing people, and almost every scene is fantastic. It was extra brutal when it came out, since we were in the midst of the economic crisis.
Up in the Air came out just over a month before I got to live that experience myself. I survived 3 rounds of layoffs during a torturous 2009 only to get snagged in the surprise 4th round that came in December 2010, with the added bonus that I found out later the VP over my group volunteered one Dev - me - and one guy from the network admin team to show he could “play ball”. So I got to meet those people! None of them were as pretty as Clooney, Vera Farmiga, or Anna Kendrick, though. But they totally had brochures and a presentation. I told them I was a man, not a number, and left the meeting promptly. I feel the reference was lost on them, but I was going to leave either way so who cares. I also ditched my “handler” on the way out so I could go shake a team-member’s hand. This seemed to freak out the handler (who was an HR drone employed by my company) but I didn’t mind. I had not seen Up in the Air before this and I’m not sure how I would have felt about going through it shortly after watching the movie honestly.
My favorite firing is probably Robocop.
But close on the heels is Michael Keaton’s firing in Mr. Mom. Tambor’s character is such a sleaze in that movie (making things worse by setting out that month’s carpooling gas money on his desk, down to the copper). Sure it’s not his decision but he still handles it pretty terribly (and we’re not at all surprised when we find out later he has been lying and covering his own ass at the expense of others). But it’s the scene when he gets home that really makes it all work. Caroline has everyone dressed nice to give Dad a warm welcome when he gets home. Kenny has been given explicit instructions not to bring it up. Naturally it’s the first thing out of his mouth.
Kenny: “Heard you got fired”.
Jack: “Technically furloughed sport.”
And so they go through the rest of the greeting to which Caroline announces they’re having Colonel Chicken for dinner, which is a cause for celebration amongst the kids.
Jack: “We can’t afford that”
Alex, cheerily: “We better enjoy it, it may be our last!”
In fall of 1982 my parents announced to me that Dad had been transferred to a new plant and we’d be moving hundreds of miles from the only place I ever knew. I turned 8 that fall, and I didn’t take it very well. Dad left ahead of the family; my brother and I were allowed to finish the school year (well he was in Kindergarden; I was 2nd grade). So we lived with my grandparents that spring (basically after Christmas, as I recall). My grandfather and I shared a deep passion for Knight Rider and The A-Team (he replacing my father in those watching rituals). And every Sunday evening we had a special dinner: KFC (who back then served Dinner Rolls and these awesome steak fries). So needless to say the Colonel Chicken scene really struck a chord with me when I saw it at a movie theater in my new home town the following year. As an added bonus, the VP from my job in 2009 reminded me a lot of Tambor’s character from Mr. Mom.
