Lyrical

Film I've just finished watching the annoyingly listless buddy cop comedy drama Hollywood Homocide in which Ron Shelton couldn't decide whether he simply wanted to tell a funny tale about two cops on an unusual beat or an actual detective story and somehow managed to do neither very well despite some nice performances from people like Harrison Ford and Josh Hartnett (and Eric Idle in a funny cameo). The best moments were when Ford and Hartnett were together so inevitably they were split up for the last twenty minutes of the film.

Every now and then certain phrases in the dialogue began to pop out as familiar. Here are three examples but there were many more:

"Don't call me sir, I work for a living."

Which seems to be an old military phrase, brought to prominance in the Ivan Reitman comedy Stripes (1981) (although here it is again in a 1985 episode of GI Joe). Also the title of a film.

"Fuck you very much"

Which was the one of the big phrases of rebellion from Michael Douglas's in Joel Schumaker's Falling Down. And is a song from, oh look, Eric Idle, which can be downloaded here. See also AFI's Crop Tub.

"He's lying to me."
"How can you tell?"
"His lips are moving."

Which Google argues has been knocking around for ages. Usually as a joke. Such as Q: How can you tell a politician is lying? A: His lips are moving...

I suppose the point I'm making is that in the most generic of films, scriptwriters don't often strive for something new and lyric. The familiarity extends to phrase coinage. But then this film also featured a car chase in which a police vehicle flipped over and one of the heroes drove into some boxes and I think a fruit cart so originality really wasn't something on someone's mind. Although the real estate selling and tantric sex were certainly unusual character traits. Beats lollipops, dirty macs and death wishes.