One of the most famous tantrums ever from Mommy Dearest http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUkE9qaVgmo

[Joan stands over Christina's bed, shaking from anger. She holds a dress hung on a wire hanger.] Joan: No... wire... hangers. [Christina bolts up, instantly awake.] Joan: What's wire hangers doing in this closet when I told you: no wire hangers EVER? I work and work 'till I'm half-dead, and I hear people saying, "She's getting old." And what do I get? A daughter... who cares as much about the beautiful dresses I give her... as she cares about me! [Joan flings the dress at Christina.] Joan: What's wire hangers doing in this closet? Answer me! [Joan begins snatching dresses out of the closet, hurling them through the room.] Joan: I buy you beautiful dresses, and you treat them like they were some dishrag. You do. Three hundred dollar dress on a wire hanger. We'll see how many you've got if they're hidden somewhere. We'll see... we'll see. Get out of that bed. All of this is coming out. Out. Out. Christina: Please, Mommy! Joan: Out. Out. Out. Out. We're gonna see how many wire hangers you've got in your closet. [Joan pulls the last dress off its wire hanger and flings it away, keeping the hanger.] Joan: [weeping] Wire hangers, why? Why? Christina, get out of that bed. Get out of that bed. [Joan advances on her. Christina gets out of bed, but runs into the corner. Joan chases her down and begins beating Christina with the hanger.] Joan: You live in the most beautiful house in Brentwood and you don't care if your clothes are stretched out from wire hangers. Christina: Please, Mommy, don't, Mommy, don't! [But still the blows rain down...] Joan: And your room looks like some two-dollar-a-week furnished room in some two-bit back street town in Oklahoma!

There's so much more going on here besides one of the most over-the-top camp scenes ever filmed. Clues to Joan's secret fears come roaring out - the fear of getting old, of losing love, of not being valued. But when she cannot strike out at the world, Joan finds in Christina a suitable substitute. If Christina sees fit to torment Joan with wire hangers, then two can ride that horse in the rodeo, fellas.

I went on the hunt for a few particular video clips and came across this beauty :) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZg9evqG9e0&feature=player_embedded two of the scenes I was going for are in there, but I need to find the scripts (In Bruges when he flips out on the phone and yells at his wife and the Harold & Kumar drive through scene) The Citizen Kane one is awesome sauce! It's, like, the slowest, most self-contained, most dignified tantrum ever. hahahaaa...

I have long adored the blowout between the Marquise de Merteuil and Vicomte Valmont in Dangerous Liaisons (1988). The play and screenplay by Christopher Hampton are based on an epistolary French novel, Les liaisons dangereuses (c. 1782) by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos. See http://youtu.be/FUBVgfOgpA8 for this key scene in which Valmont (John Malkovich) loses his patience with the marquise (Glenn Close). Hampton has a remarkable way with period works, but this one required adaptation of a 200 year-old epistolary novel in a foreign language. He managed to capture all the sweet innocence of Cecile and Danceny and the cool, backstabbing viciousness of Valmont and Merteuil in such a way that actors of excellence wanted these roles. The audience can truly savor this morality play. See https://docs.google.com/document/d/1plPfS97vMtkEO63L3iURXZA7BxUQjB-rdTDOEhibFzI/edit?usp=sharing for a copy each of the scene transcript, the original French novel excerpt, and a very rough translation into English of the same. Reading a transcript (not the screenplay) of this scene, it is a marvel that what reads without additional screenplay direction as a cool exchange is so violently passionate. Reading from the original novel the last letter exchange between Valmont and Merteuil makes even more clear what a miracle of vision this was on Hampton’s part. Another fine adaptation of the same underlying novel is the eponymous film, Les liaisons dangereuses (1959), directed by Roger Vadim, adaptation by Claude Brulé and Roger Vailland, screenplay by Vailland. Brule and Vailland had different challenges with the adaptation and screenplay than Hampton; though working in their native French, they were challenged with creating a contemporary version which would crisply convey a conflict in spite of the great difference in modern morals from those of 1782. See http://youtu.be/yNqqe-Qy17U — go to the scene between 1:25:54 and 1:29:06. This is the same blowout between Valmont and Merteuil again, couched in modern terms. Valmont’s restrained violence is communicated in the snapping of the necklace, though he loses control as the scene progresses. Merteuil’s cool killer persona remains throughout in spite of Valmont's physical abuse, projecting a dispassionate acceptance the declaration of war though emotion roils beneath. Finally, compare the pared down the 1959 adaptation’s blowout with the 1988 adaptation; both incredible pieces of cinema, excellent pieces of writing, direction, and acting. Absolument merveilleux.