4. A History Of Violence - The Hospital Scene
A History of Violence is David Cronenberg's elegant character study of Tom Stall (Viggo Mortensen), a small town diner owner. The movie also stars Mario Bello as his wife and Ed Harris as mobster Carl Fogarty. If you haven't seen this movie, stop reading this now (spoiler alerts ahead) and go rent it, it's worth your time. The movie begins with Tom Stall, a mild mannered man, with a loving family. Two robbers try to steal from his diner and he kicks their asses, which makes him the local hero. Carl Fogarty captures wind of this and swears up and down that Tom Stall is actually the violent Joey Cusack that he knows from the mob in Philadelphia. About an hour into the film, most people are thinking that Carl's fake eye is failing him if he thinks this is the same guy. It has to be mistaken identity, right? Up until Stall kills Carl, you start to have second thoughts. Then, in the pivotal hospital scene when his wife confronts him about his actual identity that we see, OH CRAP, he IS Joey Cusack, the killer extraordinaire. The killer who has a wife and two children. This confuses the crap out of his wife and his oldest son and makes you think -- you really have no idea who you are marrying no matter how much you think you know.