Most Rewatchable Scene
Coughlin giving Flanagan tips; Addicted to Love bottle flipping; late-night Coughlin's laws stair fall; Cell Block barman poet; Jamaica bar reunion with Coughlin; first Bonnie scene; last Flanagan-Coughlin scene; showdown with Jordan's dad
In the discussion (28)
Approx. transcript time · 00:29:29Read transcript
- The first entry lumps together Coughlin giving Flanagan tips, and possibly Uncle Pat giving Flanagan advice before he starts bartending.
- Uncle Pat is a very familiar figure; Monty's father in 25th Hour is compared as another Uncle Pat who runs a New York bar and is cheap. — Sean Fennessey
- Uncle Pat being cheap is the opposite of how to run a bar, answered by the point that he only has six people in his bar.
- Coughlin's law "Anything else is always something better" is followed by Flanagan's first good night clicking with the waitresses, which is when the movie starts cooking.
- Director Roger Donaldson is imagined asking Cruise whether he can dial it up another level.
- A movie set entirely at TGI Fridays is floated; that stretch is called the best part, but a whole movie of it would be a good YouTube video rather than a movie.
- TGI Fridays is praised as a realistic New York bar compared with movie bars like Cell Block; bartending there suggests Coughlin is not a life winner.
- Coughlin may have just served time or been in a money-laundering scheme and is trying to regroup; "Coughlin's Law" is joked about as a prison movie.
- Cruise bartending to Addicted to Love is called one of the five most 80s moments captured on film.
- Cruise looks like he is hearing Addicted to Love, or music, for the first time, cheering it like a game; Robert Palmer's reaction is imagined.
- The late night where Coughlin falls down the steps while streaming Coughlin laws and they do the Hippy Hippy Shake is really funny; Coughlin writes the laws around his own behavior.
- Cell Block is called the greatest bar set ever built, a three-story prison cell like the set of Oz; Rembrandt reacted to it in real time on a Grantland video.
- Cell Block is compared to the multi-level Terminal 5 concert venue in New York.
- Nobody at Cell Block drinks; they wait for poems, and Flanagan delivers the world's last barman poet speech ending with the bar being open.
- Gina Gershon ordering an orgasm and the Coughlin-Flanagan routine to All Shook Up complete an unassailable five minutes; the Cell Block scene is called hysterical.
- The barman poet may have invented Steve Austin's "that's the bottom line" gimmick.
- In Jamaica, Cruise keeps giving Shue the Rock Bottom by throwing her into the ocean. — Sean Fennessey
- Cruise's two romantic interactions, the ocean throws and tickle-attacking Gina Gershon among feathers, suggest he had never done these things before.
- The Jamaica bar scene with Shue, Eckhouse hovering and Coughlin showing up is magic, ending with the success-manual bet and the revelation that he married a rich girl.
- Whether Coughlin sought out where Flanagan was is questioned; maybe he guessed from Flanagan talking about Jamaica and the poster.
- Coughlin convincing Flanagan to open a bar should have been in the list too.
- The Jamaica bar is a bummer full of lonely regulars rather than sunburned tourists.
- Coughlin's "there's my wife" cuts to Kelly Lynch clearly shot in another location, which is very funny.
- The first Bonnie scene is great, and Flanagan then screws up things with Shue because he is a dirtbag.
- The last Flanagan-Coughlin scene is the final pick, since the first half is much better than the second.
- A self-described first-half guy calls Brian's showdown with Elizabeth's dad the funniest scene in the movie by far; another voice adds that the showdowns with the dad and with the sculptor are both excellent.
- Another personal pick is the entire Cell Block scene, plus the electrifying Addicted to Love sequence.
- The accountant-looking guy at the bar who owns the hottest spot in New York raises the question of why he is at a TGI Fridays.
