Many movies today, perhaps as a reflection of the world around us, are unbelievably loud, relying on explosions and special effects and outré visuals to stimulate and, at the same time, mesmerize the viewer. Thus, among all the scenes of chaos, devastation and conflict that may be either or both external and internal to the characters portrayed, a viewer appreciates all the more the scenes of penetrating quiet and introspection. 

Although from not so recent movies, a few such quiet scenes come to mind. 

One is that scene in “Cross of Iron” where Sergeant Steiner (James Coburn), the archetypal grizzled noncom on whose leadership smarts and survival skills all armies in the world rely, but this time with a rebellious antiwar mindset (“I hate this uniform and all that it represents…”), decides to free the Russian child soldier taken prisoner by his recon unit. He takes the boy beyond the wire and tells him: “It’s all an accident. An accident of hands: mine, others’, all without mind. One extreme to another. And neither works, nor will ever! And we stand in the middle, in no man’s land you and I…” The scene is all the more heartrending because as the boy turns toward his lines, he is cut down by his compatriots’ bullets who happen to be at that very moment launching a counterattack against the German invaders.

Another example is something more mundane, something that happens every day, such as on a very busy Tokyo sidewalk, the final parting scene in “Lost in Translation” of ageing actor Bob (Bill Murray) and lonely wife Charlotte (Scarlett Johansson). They hug for the last time and this time there are no words, no sound, as Bob whispers into her ear. It is absolutely quiet, absolutely still, even as the world turns and people busily walk by as only busy people on a busy street in Tokyo can. 

“Lost in Translation” is a mostly quiet movie, with the turmoil inside the characters, about a love you cannot have, an elusive feeling of ennui, of disconnection, of being adrift in the very moment when the timelessness of infinity echoes in the chanting of monks in a monastery.

But there it is, that moment of heart-piercing quiet, in that parting scene. Whatever else may have been lost in translation, now in this climactic moment, there is nothing to translate. It is pure, quiet, and lost forever. 

Action and dramatic movies are actually the best vehicles to elucidate the need for quiet, to look inward and take the time to wonder: In the end, what does it matter? This is best exemplified in the oft-performed monologue of Macbeth when he is told that his wife, the queen, is dead. Here, my favorite version is Michael Fassbender’s (closely followed by Jon Finch’s) maybe because there is no attempt at dramatic delivery, just a quiet, bitter, melancholic reverie: 

“Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,

Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,

To the last syllable of recorded time;

And all our yesterdays have lighted fools

The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player,

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

And then is heard no more. It is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing.”

Even pure, cathartic action can have a core of quiet, as encapsulated in David Morrell’s “First Blood” which launched the “Rambo” movie franchise, having a taciturn, stoic Vietnam vet as the titular character: “The native allies in the war had called it the way of Zen, the journey to arrive at the pure and frozen moment, achieved only after long arduous training and concentration and determination to be perfect. A part of movement when movement itself ceased. Their words had no exact English translation, and they said that even if there were, the moment could not be explained. The emotion was timeless, could not be described in time…” 

Of all the Rambo movies, the goriest one, Rambo IV directed by Sylvester Stallone, is the best. Maybe because after all the shredded bodies and eviscerations, one just feels completely spent and just as skeptical as ever that peace will ever come to our planet.

The world and the movies to which we escape being what they are, we must in our daily lives seek those moments of quiet and keep balanced in our center, in our inner no man’s land, unfazed and unafraid.