In Wes Anderson’s comedy, Bottle Rocket, the character of Dignan is focused on performing the great robbery that will make his name and cause his dreams to come true. In the last three minutes of the movie, Dignan, who up until this point was an exaggerated loser whose pipe dreams filled his every waking moment, comes to a moment of completely sublime self-realization. When Dignan makes up a quick and complicated escape plan for Bob and Anthony to carry out, he ruefully smiles and walks into prison, completely aware of himself as few literary characters can ever really be, knowing what his past and present foibles are and embracing them with a little joke. Through his understanding of himself, Dignan switches from the exaggerated comic buffoon to the tragic hero in a single onscreen moment unparalleled by even Alec Guinness in Bridge Over the River Kwai.

--Austin Tooley