Comments on: And I'll Never Have That Recipe Again

And I'll Never Have That Recipe Again

griphus — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 09:43:11 -0800

Film Class 101: Cake comes before the fall.

[via mefi projects]

By: condour75

condour75 — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 09:49:44 -0800

This is awesome. Surely, however, the Cuba cake in Godfather II should be included?

By: darksasami

darksasami — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 09:56:59 -0800

When Cake or Death just isn't enough.

By: Room 641-A

Room 641-A — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 10:16:32 -0800

Excellent! The Omen is also missing from the list, although I could only find a clip from the remake.

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 10:21:21 -0800

Sugary frosted creamy moist DOOM ( go herm!)

By: KGMoney

KGMoney — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 10:28:52 -0800

Is it weird that my first thought was The Sesame Street Baker?

By: Calzephyr

Calzephyr — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 10:36:52 -0800

Wow, what a neat cliche! And an excellent blog.

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 10:40:36 -0800

It's like watching a tv trope entry have it horrible horrible birth.

By: twoleftfeet

twoleftfeet — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 10:41:21 -0800

Missing Some Like it Hot. Mob Boss [re: shooting]: "There was something in the cake that didn't agree with them." Detective Mulligan: "My compliments to the chef. Nobody leaves this room until I get the recipe."

By: Navelgazer

Navelgazer — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:00:38 -0800

All I can think of with this is the November Rain video.

By: twoleftfeet

twoleftfeet — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:01:10 -0800

Pies should be included. I'm thinking in particular about the pie fight at the end of Dr. Strangelove, which although it didn't make the final edit still survives as images on the internet.

By: twoleftfeet

twoleftfeet — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:03:01 -0800

Sorry. images

By: hermitosis

hermitosis — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:03:18 -0800

No pies.

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:07:26 -0800

I read that in the voice of Edna mode.

By: kmz

kmz — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:17:09 -0800

Any cakes left in the rain? With the sweet green icing flowing down?

By: kmz

kmz — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:17:58 -0800

Oh damnit, just noticed the post title. Oh well.

By: twoleftfeet

twoleftfeet — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:19:18 -0800

No pies. I could understand the omission of muffins or cornbread, but pies are an integral part of cinematographic history, beginning with Chaplin's Behind the Screen (pie fight starts about 50 seconds in) and Laurel & Hardy's Battle of the Century (which used over 3000 pies). A good pie fight always begins as a harbinger of doom. Someone aims a pie, and everyone knows that the pie will hit somebody, though not necessarily the person you thought it would hit. Pie fights are wildly unpredictable and chaotic, and should strike fear into anyone observing one.

By: oneswellfoop

oneswellfoop — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:23:47 -0800

The pies should have their own separate tumblr.

By: hermitosis

hermitosis — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:36:59 -0800

There is some overlap in the narrative uses/symbolism of cakes and pies, especially inasmuch as they serve as a sort of "safe" outlet for audience's destructive impulses. Pies, however, are very rarely elaborate, and very rarely celebrational, and those are two important lenses through which I'm viewing these clips. Most of the pies in a staged pie-fight are little more that foam/cream sprayed into a paper plate -- you rarely get the sense that much effort, care, hope, or taste has been invested in them -- they are "easy as pie." While pies are still associated with gender (femininity), it's not in quite the same way or to the same degree as are cakes. I suspect the aspirational aesthetics cake is what makes the vital difference.

By: piratebowling

piratebowling — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:37:12 -0800

Pies have their own place in cinematic and and cultural history. It's more about bringing hoity-toity types down a peg.

By: twoleftfeet

twoleftfeet — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:39:19 -0800

The pies should have their own separate tumblr. Well, I for one can imagine a world where all baked goods live in harmony. There will come a day when every pie has his share of the pie. Where cakes stop saying "let them eat cake". Where donuts stop being holier than thou. Imagine a world where strudel coexists peacefully with baklava, where cheesecake earns the right to be a real cake, where biscotti and tart sit down with sticky buns. You may say I'm a dreamer. But I'm not the only one. I hope one day you will join us. Bring coffee.

By: hermitosis

hermitosis — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:40:24 -0800

Right, piratebowling -- a pie is folksy. There's a sort of class issue buried in there for sure. Cake destruction underscores our uneasy relationship with decadence. We crave and aspire to it, but deep down we know it's unhealthy and unsustainable. Seeing an elaborately decadent cake bite the dust before it can be enjoyed confirms something we already suspect about the life and our own nature.

By: hermitosis

hermitosis — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:41:00 -0800

about life, rather.

By: CCBC

CCBC — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:49:27 -0800

Personal favorite: The smashed birthday cake in Mean Streets (with "Rubber Biscuit" playing in the background.)

By: troll

troll — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:55:57 -0800

her-mi-to-sis! her-mi-to-sis! her-mi-to-sis! Somebody get the palanquin! We have an occasion to celebrate and a man to venerate! (But leave your cakes at home).

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 12:41:47 -0800

Great, now cakes are going to fill me with deep foreboding.

By: ricochet biscuit

ricochet biscuit — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 13:29:31 -0800

From the Silence of the Lambs piece: Blink and you'll miss this instance where one of the male agents clamors for a photo with Ardelia, clasping her in a embrace that suggests they're old chums. This seems to be Demme's cynical hint at the role Ardelia will most likely find herself playing in the FBI, the public face of the agency's new inclusivity. This would be a trenchant analysis if the writer had paid more attention to the movie. These are not agents, they are the pair of geeky entomologists that Starling goes to for information on the moth. They are the outsiders, hoping to enhance their prestige by appearing in a photo with an agent. Or if you want to keep on the psychosexual track, these are chess club geeks, posing for a yearbook shot with the cheerleader they barely know. In either case, the males in the picture have less cachet than the female agent.

By: hermitosis

hermitosis — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 15:20:20 -0800

You know what? You're totally right. I didn't rewatch the whole movie before I posted that. I'll edit the entry when I get home from this wedding.

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 15:23:05 -0800

Wedding? You're not going to ....do something to the cake?

By: hermitosis

hermitosis — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 16:12:42 -0800

In which it turns out that this blog is part of some real life supervillian origin story... Also, I've never seen mini fish tacos as hors d'euvres (drunk sp?) before.

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 16:44:14 -0800

You'll have to join a supervillians group with the butcher and the candlestick maker.

By: hermitosis

hermitosis — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 16:56:25 -0800

Instead of a cake the bride and groom have a Pinkberry buffet set up. Crisis averted!

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 17:02:46 -0800

Pinkberry Buffet? So they hate the lactose intolerant then?

By: hermitosis

hermitosis — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 17:15:30 -0800

Weddings are all about hatred. Surely you of all people know this??

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 17:31:14 -0800

I got Gayeloped, that's why I'm waiting for lobsters to cook after swimming naked by moonlight in a deep clear pond twenty miles from the nearest soul.

By: hermitosis

hermitosis — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 17:40:48 -0800

Why do you hate never-nudes and people allergic to shellfish??

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 17:50:41 -0800

They killed my parents.

By: breath

breath — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 20:22:34 -0800

Thanks, just ate some cake. It was delicious.

By: East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94

East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 20:34:37 -0800

A Doom Cake?

By: marble

marble — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 00:06:12 -0800

A cake thread with no reference to lies? Or did I miss it.

By: NoraReed

NoraReed — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 01:27:26 -0800

Holy crap they made Bella a big cake. WTF is she supposed to do with that thing? Split it with Charlie?

By: ifjuly

ifjuly — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 06:43:01 -0800

Having trouble loading right now but the two I immediately thought of were Marie Antoinette (I think Sofia Coppola agrees with you about all the murky things cake can be tagged as, hermitosis) and Elaine on Seinfeld's rant about office cakes (something like "we're all miserable, do we have to be fat too!") immediately before ingesting Peterman's historical multi-thousand dollar auction Duke of Windsor or whatever wedding cake.

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 07:48:16 -0800

The I Want Candy montage in Marie Anionette is basically one complex cake/tart being consumed while Marie proceeds to bankrupt France with fancy hats. The dog eating the cake at the end could be seen as ruining a cake? Maybe?

By: hermitosis

hermitosis — Sat, 20 Aug 2011 10:28:48 -0800

I have added The Omen and Some Like It Hot and have a lot of other movies from this thread in my Netflix queue now. Thanks everyone for the suggestions and corrections. The blog was featured in The Guardian recently and a few other great places, but I don't think anyone out there thought (or overthought) about it as much as y'all did here in this thread. Win!