re: In your opinion, what's the greatest set-up and pay-off in cinematic history?

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I am Iron Man. Same line 11 years apart.

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This is probably it. And it was more than just that line.

“You’re not the type to make the sacrifice play. To lay on the wire.”

“I think I’d just cut the wire.”

Strange knowing the 1 way they won the entire time and struggling to hold back the info from Tony.

Downey plays it so well when right before he takes the stones and snaps, the look on his face as he’s working out everything that has happened and what he has to do. Cinema.

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Would the Sixth Sense fall into this category?

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Admittedly, the thread went a different direction than I envisioned, but there's still a lot of great examples.

By "set-up," I was thinking more along the lines of an isolated scene or line of dialogue which the viewer doesn't think much of at the time, but then comes full circle later in the film.

As excellent storytelling examples as they are, I wouldn't consider movies where the entire plot is leading up to a twist ending as a "set up." But maybe I'm just being too myopic in my definition.

I do think Shawshank Redemption (Andy's rock hammer and posters) qualifies under what I was thinking. That may be the best I can think of after reading this thread.

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By "set-up," I was thinking more along the lines of an isolated scene or line of dialogue which the viewer doesn't think much of at the time, but then comes full circle later in the film.

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Another example of that is in "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood":

1. The scene from "The 14 Fists of McCluskey" with the flamethrower.

2. Just after, the flashback scene of Rick Dalton (Leo DiCaprio) training with the flamethrower.

3. When Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) goes into the shed to get a tool belt, wire and gloves to fix the TV antenna, in the background you can see the flamethrower up against the wall:


4. At the movie's climax, Rick jumps out of the pool, runs to the shed and dramatically comes back with the flamethrower, burning Sadie Atkins (Mikey Madison) to a crisp just after she aims a gun at him.

The setup:

The payoff: >

Kelly's Heroes. I f'luved the ending even though it had no actors I was much of a fan of. My mind holds on to so many of the scenes at the end. that they are my equivalent some nights of counting sheep to fall asleep.

I wish Dogma was available on BluRay.

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William Munny walks through the stormy night and kills the men who decorated their bar with his friend Ned.

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“You just shot an unarmed man!”
“He shoulda armed himself if he’s gonna decorate his bar with my friend.”

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Strange knowing the 1 way they won the entire time and struggling to hold back the info from Tony

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There’s a theory that there were more ways that they could win, but Strange couldn’t see the wins that would require him to die and stay dead. There’s also a lot of theories that he saw many ways to defeat Thanos but too many heroes would be sacrificed or they would defeat Thanos but not kill him/leave themselves vulnerable to another threat or just general chaos.

Not saying it’s the greatest, by my personal favorite from recently is Upgrade (2018).



Excellent, unexpected ending and when you re-watch it, it all makes sense.

Watched Jaws this weekend and thought of this thread.

When Brody accidentally unties the wrong knot causing Hooper's air tanks to fall, Hooper yells at him and briefly explains what might happen with the compressed gas. The tanks are shown here and there for the rest of the movie until Brody throws one in Jaws' mouth and says the famous "smile you son of a bitch" line then hits the tank blowing up Jaws.