YMMV / The Ruling Class

• Award Snub: Only received one Academy Award nomination, Peter O'Toole for Best Actor. He still lost, contributing to his string of nominations and no wins. Critics argue between this and his role in Lawrence of Arabia as his most deserving. To be fair, he was up against Marlon Brando in The Godfather that year.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: If there was ever a big lipped alligator movie, it's this one. Though some scenes manage to stand out:
  • Grace's entrance, belting out an aria from Verdi. A scene which apparently isn't a delusion of Jack's, but rather Grace's attempt to emotionally manipulate Jack. No word on how she was able to put together such a complicated plan in such little time, though.
  • McKyle's entire appearance, but especially when a gorilla in a top hat shows up to beat the crap out of Jack. Then tips his hat to the audience. This is seemingly some kind of symbolism about the illusions of civilization, but it's still very weird and out-of-place.
  • The fox hunt, with the animal stopping to urinate on a tree.
• Nightmare Fuel:
  • Jack hallucinating the House of Lords as decaying, cob-webbed zombies.
  • Jack's scream at the end of the movie is... unsettling, to say the least.
  • The entire sequence of the final attempt at psychotherapy to break Jack's delusion of being Christ. With Nigel Green's unsettling appearance as the High-Voltage Messiah, as Jack sees actual lightning from the Messiah's fingertips while an actual thunderstorm is raging outside. Combined with the screams and panic as Grace gives birth in another room, the scene devolves into a barrage of unsettling images from Jack's POV that would break any sane person's mind.
  • The look on Jack's face as he's sitting on the floor, broken, muttering "I'm Jack... I'm Jack..." With the following scene revealing that Jack from that moment on was convinced he's Jack the Ripper.
• One-Scene Wonder: Nigel Green as McKyle, the High-Voltage Messiah.

---