My Favorite Bit Parts
These are movie characters who are so minor to the plot that most of them aren't even given names. And yet, the parts they play in the movies, or the way they affect events, are so crucial or fascinating that the movie would have taken a different (inferior) course without them.
List activity
1.2K views
• 0 this weekCreate a new list
List your movie, TV & celebrity picks.
12 titles
- DirectorRobert ZemeckisStarsMichael J. FoxChristopher LloydLea ThompsonMarty McFly, a 17-year-old high school student, is accidentally sent 30 years into the past in a time-traveling DeLorean invented by his close friend, the maverick scientist Doc Brown.Marvin Berry (Harry Waters, Jr.)
He played an integral role in my single favorite moment in movie history. After George pushed the red-headed bully to the ground and began to kiss Lorraine, Marty stood up, suddenly feeling better. Meanwhile, Marvin Berry glanced over at Marty (his replacement guitarist) with a smile on his face, as he hit the crescendo to "Earth Angel." A perfect moment. - DirectorPaul WeitzChris WeitzStarsJason BiggsChris KleinThomas Ian NicholasFour teenage boys enter a pact to lose their virginity by prom night.I'm including two entries from this movie. (Or three, if you'd like.)
The "MILF" guys (John Cho and Justin Isfeld)
Long before there was any sense that they were coining a new term, these two guys had enough genuine charisma on their own to make what was otherwise a throw-away scene into one of the most memorable moments of an incredibly memorable movie.
The Assistant Coach of the Lacrosse Team (Markus Botnick)
This guy was the ultimate 'yes man,' parroting everything the head coach said like it was scripture, and standing there looking dumb when the head coach wasn't talking. He only uttered a few lines, but he hilariously embodied a meathead with what he had. - DirectorJames CameronStarsLeonardo DiCaprioKate WinsletBilly ZaneA seventeen-year-old aristocrat falls in love with a kind but poor artist aboard the luxurious, ill-fated R.M.S. Titanic.The Employee with the Keys
As the ship is sinking, and Kate and Leo are trapped behind a locked gate, an employee runs by, sees them, hesitates, and runs away. And then, in a moment that reminds me of myself, we see a look come over him as his conscience chases him down. He turns around, pulls out the keys, and tries to find the one. He eventually gives up, but not before leaving the keys behind, allowing Leo to unlock the gate himself. - DirectorAlan J. PakulaStarsJulia RobertsDenzel WashingtonSam ShepardA law student uncovers a conspiracy, putting herself and others in danger.The Offensive Line at Mardi Gras (Codie Scott)
As Julia Roberts is being chased by an assassin through the crowded New Orleans streets during Mardi Gras, she runs straight into a 300-pound college guy who could easily be a lineman. He takes one look at the terror on her face, looks up to see the assassin running at her, pushes her behind him, and takes on the assassin himself. Of course, the assassin can handle himself in a fight, and he takes down this lineman who's easily twice his size in about five seconds. But that slows him down enough for the guy's buddies - the rest of the offensive line - to swarm in and take the assassin down. Julia Roberts escapes into the crowd. - DirectorMike FiggisStarsNicolas CageElisabeth ShueJulian SandsBen Sanderson, a Hollywood screenwriter who lost everything because of his alcoholism, arrives in Las Vegas to drink himself to death. There, he meets and forms an uneasy friendship and non-interference pact with prostitute Sera.The Other Prostitute (Mariska Hargitay)
She only had two scenes in the movie, but a pre-fame Mariska Hargitay found herself in a fascinating moment. In her first scene, the rivalry with Elizabeth Shue's prostitute was made clear, but it was the second scene that made me wonder what was going on in her character's mind.
A self-destructive Nicolas Cage hooked up early with Elizabeth Shue in an emotional affair based entirely on need. But he refused to have sex with her. Then one night, while she was out walking the streets, he picked up Mariska Hargitay and took her back to Shue's apartment. Hargitay had no clue about their relationship, or whose apartment she was in. When she saw Shue enter from a distance, she knew it was time to leave, but didn't realize until she got closer that it was her rival whose boyfriend she was with. The stunned look on her face as she silently walked past Shue and left made me desperately want to find out what she was thinking in that moment. - DirectorCameron CroweStarsBilly CrudupPatrick FugitKate HudsonA high-school boy in the early 1970s is given the chance to write a story for Rolling Stone magazine about an up-and-coming rock band as he accompanies them on their concert tour.Sheldon, the Front Desk Clerk at the Arizona Hotel (Eric Stonestreet)
William Miller, the main character, is a teenage journalist on the road with a 70's rock band. His mother is an intense woman, and VERY SERIOUS about him not taking drugs. When they arrive at the hotel for the night, a guy behind the desk calls him over and hands him a note, telling him it's from his mother. He opens it, and there, in all caps, it says, "DON'T TAKE DRUGS!" But it's the angry and stressed out look on the actor's face as he says "she freaked me out" that really sells the mother's intensity. - DirectorMartin BrestStarsAl PacinoChris O'DonnellJames RebhornA prep school student needing money agrees to "babysit" a blind man, but the job is not at all what he anticipated.Manny the Chauffeur (Gene Canfield)
Kinda like the other prostitute in 'Leaving Las Vegas,' I wanted to get into his head to know what he was thinking as he was dragged into the middle of a relationship between two others. It was brief but somehow powerful, the moment when he was leading Colonel Slade into the auditorium and he signaled discreetly to Charlie. He had a few other good scenes, all of which made him one of the most fascinating minor characters I've ever seen in a movie, but that fleeting moment stays in my memory, in all of its trivial glory. - DirectorJohn HughesStarsMatthew BroderickAlan RuckMia SaraA popular high school student, admired by his peers, decides to take a day off from school and goes to extreme lengths to pull it off, to the chagrin of his Dean, who'll do anything to stop him.The Garage Attendants (Richard Edson and Larry Flash Jenkins)
The Star Wars music comes up, we see the Chicago skyline in the distance with an empty road in the foreground, and the Ferrari comes down from above in slow motion, doing about 100 miles an hour. The shot cuts to the two garage attendants, who "borrowed" the car for a test flight, both with looks of uninhibited jubilation on their faces. One of my favorite moments in movie history. - DirectorBrian De PalmaStarsAl PacinoMichelle PfeifferSteven BauerIn 1980 Miami, a determined Cuban immigrant takes over a drug cartel and succumbs to greed.Ernie (Arnaldo Santana)
Ernie is hired muscle who has just watched Tony Montana (Al Pacino) and his guys violently murder all of his bosses. Tony had forgotten he was there, and began walking out of the billiard room. Then, Manny, one of Tony's guys says, "What about Ernie?"
Tony turns around, and after a few seconds of mounting tension, asks, "You want a job, Ernie?"
Ernie, of course, says yes.
"Hey, man. You got a job!" - DirectorFrancis Ford CoppolaStarsMartin SheenMarlon BrandoRobert DuvallA U.S. Army officer serving in Vietnam is tasked with assassinating a renegade Special Forces Colonel who sees himself as a god.Roach (Herb Rice)
Kinda because he's a spaced-out badass, but mostly because of the following bit of dialogue:
Captain Willard: Hey, soldier. Do you know who's in command here?
Roach: Yeah. - DirectorKathryn BigelowStarsPatrick SwayzeKeanu ReevesGary BuseyAn F.B.I. Agent goes undercover to catch a gang of surfers who may be bank robbers.The Gas Station Attendant (Jeff Imada)
It's possibly the biggest no-brainer decision any character has had to make in movie history. But when Patrick Swayze soaked him in gasoline and then turned the gas pump into a flamethrower, followed by the lines, "Don't do it, man! Don't be stupid! RUN!", it really came as no surprise that he immediately turned and sprinted away.
In spite of all of that, I just loved that scene, and his part in it. - DirectorPenny MarshallStarsTom HanksGeena DavisLori PettyTwo sisters join the first female professional baseball league and struggle to help it succeed amid their own growing rivalry.The Black Woman at the Edge of the Field
In a movie that focused on women getting to live their dreams in a time when that was rare, I was so distracted by it that I didn't think of sub-groups who were still being excluded. So when a black woman in her best Sunday dress at the edge of the field picked up a ball and threw a frozen rope to the far end - still with enough heat on it that the catcher had to yank off her glove - I was caught off guard. And yet it was so obvious, another barrier to tear down.