8 Iconic Movie Moments You Didn't Realise Were Taken From Other Films

8. Inglourious Basterds' Best Scene Is Taken Wholesale From The Good, The Bad And The Ugly

The Iconic Moment: It'd be negligent to do an article on movies whose techniques were heavily inspired by other movies without mentioning Quentin Tarantino. A graduate of the University of Life Film School, his entire filmography is built on an appreciation of cinema and chock full of pretty brazen replication of his favourite movies. The most notable example is Reservoir Dogs, which sees QT freely take plot points and set pieces from then-recent Hong Kong crime flick City On Fire as if plagiarism isn't a thing. That's pretty standard trivia though. Instead, let's look at another - the opening (and best) scene of Inglorious Basterds, where Hans Landa interrogates a farmer in a (successful and bloody) attempt to find the Jews he's harbouring. The Film It's Taken From: The entire scene, from the calm build-up interrupted by an approaching baddie through to the bloody climax, is a broad recreation of a scene from early on in The Good, The Bad And The Ugly. While the specifics vary, there's some very particular constants - both have the same imbalanced power play and the antagonist making a big meal out of a particular food/drink - that almost make it a Dogs-level imitation. Leone's western is Tarantino's favourite film, so it's hardly surprising he'd so clearly reference it so in depth here (as well as several points throughout the rest of his filmography).