Cool Movie Taglines 1 Trivia Quiz

Answer: Cool Runnings

"Cool Runnings" was loosely based on the story of how some men from tropical Jamaica ended up participating in the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary, Canada. In this 1993 movie a Jamaican man (Leon Robinson) wanted to be a sprinter in the 1988 Summer Olympics but failed to make the team. Through a set of circumstances the idea was broached to start a bobsled team for the 1988 Winter Olympics. A disgraced former American bobsled coach (John Candy) agreed to coach a team.

The film follows the ups and downs (including an upside down bobsled after a crash) of the team and their eventual acceptance by other Olympic athletes. In real life, the assembling of the team was not haphazard and the team was accepted by other athletes from the moment they arrived in Calgary. This was the last of Candy's movies released before his death. ("Wagons East" (1994) and "Canadian Bacon" (1995) were released posthumously.)

Answer: Pulp Fiction

"Pulp Fiction" was a 1994 black comedy crime drama, directed and partly written by Quentin Tarantino. The film, about Los Angeles underworld characters, has been hailed for its postmodern sensibility, its out of chronological order of sequences and its considerable time spent on monologues (all giving it its "cool" status). It has also been called humorously violent.

There were three main story lines in the film, one involving mob hit man Vincent Vega (John Travolta), aging prizefighter Butch Coolidge (Bruce Willis) and gangster Marsellus Wallace (Ving Rhames) and his wife Mia (Uma Thurman). Samuel L. Jackson played hit man Jules Winnfield. There was murder, drug overdoses, double-crosses and more, all held together (sort of) by a briefcase belonging to the gangster; though many people were after it the audience never found out what it contained.

Answer: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

This was the third of a trilogy of "spaghetti western" movies starring Clint Eastwood. The term "spaghetti western" was derived from the directorial style of Italian Sergio Leone and that the movies were often filmed in Italy. Eastwood's, though, were filmed in Spain. The three movies have also been known as the "Man with no name" trilogy since Eastwood's character was never identified, and also the "Dollars Trilogy".

"The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" was made in 1966, the premise being that in 1862, during the American Civil War, a man stole $200,000 in Confederate gold and hid it in a remote cemetery in the West. Eastwood (Blondie in the film),and Eli Wallach (the bandit Tuco Ramirez) went looking for the gold while Lee Van Cleef (bounty hunter) went after them. The trilogy was not noted for eloquent dialogue, which, I guess, added to it's "coolness" factor back then. Of course, there was a big shootout in the cemetery at the end.

Answer: The Blues Brothers

"The Blues Brothers" movie came from a continuing segment of the "Saturday Night Live" TV show, performed by John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd. They played blues musicians Jake and Elwood Blues.

As the movie opened, Jake (Belushi) was being released from an Illinois prison. His brother Elwood (Aykroyd) drove them to Chicago where they visited a Roman Catholic orphanage where they were raised. Finding out that the orphanage would shortly close because it couldn't pay a $5,000 property tax bill, the brothers devised a plan to have a big concert to raise the money. While dodging the police and Jake's vindictive ex-fiancée (Carrie Fisher) they recruited their former band members for the concert. There were also musical numbers by Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, Cab Calloway and John Lee Hooker. Oh, and there was also an automobile chase through an enclosed shopping mall.

Answer: Le Mans

If Steve McQueen was in a movie it was automatically cool. McQueen was a 'car guy' at heart so he fit right in to the 1971 car racing movie. There was a subplot involving McQueen's character Michael Delaney and Lisa Belgetti (Elga Andersen) the wife of a driver killed in a crash in the previous year's race. Delaney may have been at least partially responsible for the accident.

"Le Mans", though, was a car racing movie and the racing sequences were given prominence. During the race Delaney was momentarily distracted and his Porsche 917 glanced off a slower car, crashing into several guardrails. After returning to his trailer Delaney was approached by the team manager to take over driving one of the other Porsches. It then turned into a contest between the two remaining Porsches and a Ferrari to determine who would win.

Answer: Easy Rider

"Easy Rider" (1969) was a film about American counterculture and its effect on society in general. Two men, Wyatt (Peter Fonda) and Billy (Dennis Hopper) took their earnings from the sale of a large amount of cocaine and headed from Los Angeles to Mardi Gras in New Orleans on their motorcycles. Along the way they met a cross-section of people from commune dwellers to small town rednecks. A character in the latter half of the movie, George Hanson (Jack Nicholson), observed that America had ceased being a country he recognized, pretty much summing up the movie.

The movie had little in the way of a script, much of the dialogue was ad libbed. It was an independent film with a budget of under $400,000 (US); it grossed over $60 million worldwide and has become a touchstone for how the 1960s are judged.

Answer: Taxi Driver

Travis Bickle wasn't cool, he was just weird. Robert De Niro played a Vietnam War veteran suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder in the 1976 Martin Scorsese film. An insomniac, Bickle took a job as a night shift taxi cab driver and was repulsed by the decaying New York City he saw around him. He attempted to convince a young prostitute (Jodie Foster) to give up her trade, to no avail. As time went on Bickle had more violent tendencies and decided to act them out.

De Niro and Foster were both nominated for an Academy Award for their performances. It was a breakout role for Foster, and also a controversial one because she was fourteen-years old at the time, playing a twelve-year old prostitute.

Answer: Dirty Harry

Clint Eastwood was a bit more vociferous in "Dirty Harry" than he was in the "Man with No Name" trilogy but the character was still someone you shouldn't tangle with. The 1971 movie was set in San Francisco, Calif. and was loosely based on a serial killer, nicknamed the Zodiac Killer, who operated in the San Francisco area. Andrew Robinson played the Scorpio Killer...the film's representation of the Zodiac Killer. Homicide Division Inspector "Dirty" Harry Callahan (called such for his continued use of frowned-upon tactics) set out to find him.

Callahan found Scorpio after shooting his way through some smaller crime situations but because of Callahan's illegal methods Scorpio was released from police custody. Callahan set out on his own to get the killer; plenty of gunfire ensued.

The film had three sequels and set the tone for several police dramas during the 1970s.

Answer: Chinatown

Released in 1974, "Chinatown" was set in 1937, using film noir and neo-noir cinematography techniques from the 1940s and '50s and a style of dialog from the hardboiled detective films of the 1940s. It was inspired by the California water wars of the early 20th century which were mostly political but involved a lot of intrigue and double-dealing. In the film, murder and infidelity are added to the water rights drama. Jack Nicholson, as private investigator "Jake" Gittes, becomes involved in the murder of the husband of Evelyn Mulwray (Faye Dunaway) and the maneuvering to acquire water rights while seemingly investigating a case of marital infidelity. The movie ends up in the Chinatown area of Los Angeles - the typically portrayed Chinatown, mysterious and inscrutable.

The movie was nominated for eleven Oscars at the 1975 Academy Awards but winning only Best Original Screenplay.

Answer: Casablanca

There are more guns in this movie than in a Depression-era Chicago gangland movie. One of the all-time classic movies, "Casablanca" starred Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman and Paul Henreid. Set in Casablanca, Morocco in the early days of World War II, Bogart, as American expatriate and cafe owner Rick Blaine, saw refugees, government officials and grifters come through his establishment. Some documents important to being able to travel through German-occupied Europe are central to the plot. Among the people wanting to get them are Blaine's former lover in Paris (Bergman) and her husband (Henreid), a Czech resistance leader. Much intrigue is involved in trying to get them out of Morocco.

The movie was written, filmed, edited and released in 1942. The Allied invasion of North Africa occurred while the movie was being edited so it was rushed to release to take advantage of media attention.

Answer: Fast Times at Ridgemont High

High school madness at its best! The movie was based on the book "Fast Times at Ridgemont High: A True Story" written by Cameron Crowe (who wrote the screenplay for the movie) after he had posed as a student for a year at a San Diego, Calif. high school. The 1982 movie covered the usual highlights of being in high school: studies, romance, cars, sports - or put more succinctly: sex, drugs and rock n' roll.

The movie starred: Sean Penn as Jeff Spicoli, who was more interested in surfing and drugs than school; Judge Reinhold as Brad Hamilton, who thought he had life figured out; Jennifer Jason Leigh as Stacy Hamilton (Brad's sister), who decided the time had come to lose her virginity; Phoebe Cates as Linda Barrett, experienced in love and ready to answer anyone's questions about it. Among the actors in the movie were Nicholas Cage and Eric Stolz, who made their film debuts.

The film opened to generally good reviews. The soundtrack album (a double album) reached number 54 on the Billboard 200 album chart.

Answer: Cool Hand Luke

"Cool Hand Luke" (1967) was a prison drama about a man who just did not want to follow rules. Paul Newman, as Luke Jackson, an army veteran arrested on a small charge and sentenced to two years on a chain gang kept trying to escape from the prison. The cruel warden (Strother Martin) cracked down on any misconduct by the inmates, setting up a contest of wills between him and Jackson.

As well, Jackson refused to observe the pecking order among the prisoners, earning some respect as well as enmity. The prisoners' leader (George Kennedy) eventually made peace with him and gave him the nickname Cool Hand Luke for his bluffing skills at poker.

Newman was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor for his role; Kennedy won an Award for Best Supporting Actor.

Answer: Ocean's Eleven

"Ocean's Eleven" was a 2001 remake of the 1960 film "Ocean's 11". The idea was to rob three Las Vegas casinos at the same time. Danny Ocean (George Clooney) hatched the plan after being released from prison and assembled a group of former associates. The idea was to cause a diversion while others opened the vault.

Revenge on the casinos's owner, Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia) was also part of the plot. Things got a bit complicated when the crew found out that Ocean's ex-wife (Julia Roberts) was now Benedict's girlfriend. There was double-play and sleight of hand involved. Somehow, no one got murdered. Oh, right, this took place in the 'new' Vegas.

Answer: Saturday Night Fever

This was THE disco movie! It was a cultural touchstone of the late 1970s. John Travolta starred in the 1977 film as Tony Manero, a young Italian-American from Brooklyn, New York who worked in a hardware store during the week and spent his Saturday nights as the king of the local disco. The love lives, as well as the dance talents of the local youth were examined in the movie, as were racial tensions and the nitty-gritty of urban life.

Travolta was known for his work in the TV show "Welcome Back, Kotter" but went on to superstardom because of the movie. Karen Lynn Gorney and Donna Pescow starred as Tony's dance partners but it was really all about him.

Answer: Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery

What if you cryogenically froze James Bond in 1967 and thawed him out 30 years later? Sounds a little implausible so make him goofy too! Austin Powers (Mike Myers) was a British spy who volunteered to be frozen after a master criminal escaped to space and froze himself, the idea being that if the criminal, Dr. Evil (also Mike Myers), came back there would be someone who knew how to deal with him. Powers had been quite the swinger in the '60s and wanted to continue it in the '90s, while maintaining much of his '60s jargon.

Dr. Evil performed just as an early "James Bond" villain would, with plans to disrupt, if not destroy, the world. Agent Vanessa Kensington (Elizabeth Hurley) was assigned to help Powers defeat Dr. Evil, as well as help him understand 1990s culture.

This movie wasn't just cool, it was "Groovy, baby!"