Bohemian Cinema By Jonathan Pacheco

Momentous Occasions

Tags: The Office, Brando

Lately, I’ve been finding myself enamored with the small moments in some pieces I’ve been watching.

To observe Marlon Brando in his prime is a thing of awe. There’s a gesture in A Streetcar Named Desire found in such an unexpected place, and it’s such an insignificant move, yet to me it spoke volumes. Brando’s Stanley Kowalski is half-berating his wife Stella, who’s back is to him, and as he scolds her, he picks a piece of lint off of her shoulder and tosses it aside in mid-sentence. Such a telling gesture took me by such a surprise that it left me speechless—to see Kowalski lecture his innocent wife built anger towards him, yet the personal and intimate touch that seems so trivial reassures me that Stanley isn’t a complete monster.

Another small touch that I’ve fallen in love with lately comes from a place that couldn’t be any more different. I’ve been diving into the U.S. version of The Office, and during the now-familiar theme song, Steve Carell’s Michael Scott candidly reaches across his desk to straighten up a small awards statue. The purpose of the shot is to dissolve to a similar figure on an “Office” sign placed on an office door. Or so it would seem. Call me an over-thinker, but that small move by Carell’s character is one of the best pieces of character development displayed on the show; my heart breaks watching this man proudly straighten a dollar store statue with such innocence. It doesn’t make him stupid or child-like, it just makes him a little more human.

It’s moments like these that I hope happen in my movies; the ones that make your heart just barely skip a beat—did he just do that? The moment that tells more about a character than any 7-page monologue. That’s what I’m hoping for.