Raucous laughter filled the lounge as Home Body made a big show of laying his father Some Body's antique cuckoo clock in the center of the room. Grinning broadly, he then proceeded to turn several very acrobatic back flips over the timepiece, flying through the air over and over again. His guests’ laughter redoubled at his antics.
“I’ve… I’ve got it!” Scarlet Letter gasped, holding her sides tightly in an attempt to calm her hysterics. “It’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest!”
“Exactly right!” Body said cheerfully, ceasing his gymnastics.
His guests applauded him as he gave a quick bow and wiped a bit of sweat from his brow. They had been a bit skeptical when he’d suggested they all play a game of charades, but it was proving to be more fun than they’d anticipated.
“I never liked that movie very much,” Peacock Poppycock said, fanning herself with her hooves to cool off from her laughing fit, “Way too depressing for my tastes.”
“But a classic of suspense and psychological thrills!” Professor Plum Pudding cut in, wiping first his glasses and then his tearing eyes.
Home Body returned the antique cuckoo clock to its home on the mantle place and turned back to the group. “OK, so who wants to go next?”
“Oh, definitely me!” a pony said, bouncing up from their chair and going over to the side desk, where a top hat filled with little slips of paper lay. They dug around for a bit before removing one and frowning at the scribble written on it.
“Remember, you’re only allowed to use one item as a prop!” Home reminded them, sitting down in his favorite chair. The other five ponies nodded and leaned forward eagerly, waiting for the next round to begin.
The pony dropped the slip of paper into the desk’s drawer and then dashed across the room to where they had been sitting, pulling the wrench out from under the chair. They swung the wrench in two short chops, as if they were hitting a bell. The pony then dropped the wrench and hopped back onto their hind legs, ducking and weaving while shooting quick jabs at an invisible enemy.
“Too easy!” a pony shouted jovially, gesturing with the lead pipe, “Rock Eye, one of the greatest boxing movies of all…”
But the pony was shaking their head, indicating the guess was wrong. They made two quick slashes with their right hoof and, when that only elicited puzzled looks, held up both their hooves instead.
“Rock Eye II!” both unicorns in the room cried at once, and the player smiled and nodded. The room gave them a round of applause as the pony collected the wrench and returned to their seat.
“My turn!” one of the unicorns said, picking up a piece of paper at random and levitating it across the room. They studied it before magicking it into the drawer with the rest.
The pony thought for a second before running over to the window and leaning against one of the wall-length curtains. They ran their hooves through their mane slowly several times with their eyes closed and their head tilted back.
“Bathing? Taking a shower?” Home Body said, trying to remember which movies had famous cleaning scenes.
The unicorn’s horn lit up and the knife floated silently across the room, approaching the acting pony in a menacing manner. The knife made stabbing motions at them and the pony shied away from it, miming a silent scream.
“Psycho, the masterpiece by Hitch Crop!” Peacock Poppycock shouted, hoping out of her chair in excitement. The acting pony and the levitating knife both stopped and gave the correct guess simultaneous bows, provoking a round of laughter.
“Good one,” Green Mail said, leaning over to bump hooves with the winning guesser, “I was just about to guess that myself!”
“I’ll go next,” said the next pony, taking a slip from the hat and holding it up to the light. They thought for a second before pulling the whole desk into the center of the room. They knocked the hat onto the floor and placed the revolver in the exact center, and then they apparently started to go mad. The pony ran around the desk, occasionally stopping to point angrily over it and shout silently.
“Er, I don’t think this is the kind of movie I usually watch…” Colonel H. Mustard muttered, scratching his mane in confusion.
The pony with the wrench leaned forward. “It looks like a lot of ponies… arguing? A debate, or maybe an angry family dinner?”
“Rambling Lampoon’s Hearthswarming Vacation?” an earth pony guessed, tapping the rope thoughtfully on the arm of their chair, “No wait, The Godpony!”
Plum had been counting to himself, paying close attention to how many times the pony had stopped around the small desk, and he suddenly jumped out of his seat. “I’ve got it! Twelve Angry Stallions!”
“Yes!” the pony said, brushing her mane out of her eyes as she gratefully sat back down. “I didn’t think anypony was going to get that one! You and I should have a movie night some time, Professor!”
“Ok, OK, stand back. It’s my turn!” the pony with the candlestick said. After pushing the desk back to its original spot, the pony picked a slip from the hat and groaned out loud. “Oh come on, let me pick another one!”
“You’ve got to do it!” Body pressed, and the others nodded eagerly.
The pony sighed, then straddled the candlestick around their hind legs and started hopping around the room. They flapped their fore legs, making it look like they had wings, and pretended to cackle. Every pony fell out of their chairs laughing at how silly they looked, and the pony stopped.
“No… talking…” the pony with the lead pipe said between bellowing laughs, as the player opened their mouth angrily, “It’s against… the rules…”
The pony closed their mouth and pouted for a second, then placed the candlestick onto the desk next to the hat. They planted a candle in it and lit it, then stood behind it so the light made them look bigger and more menacing. They moved a hoof out from their head, as if they had a horn, and flapped their fore legs, as if they had wings, and started making exaggerated speaking motions.
“The Alicorn of Oz!” a pegasus, the pony with the wrench, and a stallion shouted at the same time. The acting pony nodded curtly and flopped down into their seat, blushing furiously at the laughter still surrounding them.
“It’s definitely time for me to try!” a mare said, reaching into the hat.
They read the slip of paper and pumped their hoof in victory, leaping eagerly from their seat. They brandished the rope and snapped it into the middle of the room like a whip.
“Daring Do and the Temple of Disaster!” the pony with the wrench shouted, flapping their wings in excitement.
“Really?” Scarlet Letter said, arching her eyebrow, “You liked that one? I prefer the first movie.”
But the acting pony was shaking their head, implying that they weren’t on the right track. They snapped the rope once again and this time managed to loop the end of it around the room’s modest chandelier. And then, before anypony could stop them, they leapt onto the rope and swung around the room pretending to howl.
“Watch out!” a stallion shouted, tipping back over in his chair as the pony nearly clipped him in the head. “It’s Vine Rider! Vine Rider of the Apes! Stop swinging around like a maniac!”
“Got it right!” the pony said cheerfully, dropping down and skipping to their chair. The two pegasi flew up to the chandelier and retrieved the rope for her.
“Guess I’m up,” the last pony said, striding over to the hat. The pony squinted at their piece of paper and then lifted the lead pipe to their mouth. They pretended to take nibbling bites out of it, while rotating it around in their hooves.
“Eating… corn?” a unicorn said, shifting the revolver in their lap, “Oh! Is it Fillies of the Corn?”
The pony lifted their hoof and wiggled it, implying that they were close. They then stood up and held the lead pipe upright in their fore hooves, taking a wide swing as if trying to strike something. But the lead pipe accidentally slipped out of their hooves at the apex of the swing. Everypony watched it in silence as it flew through the air and smashed straight through Some Body’s antique cuckoo clock, shattering it into hundreds of pieces.
There was stunned silence for a few heartbeats, before a voice coughed and broke the tension. “Um… is it Field of Dreams?” the pony with the knife asked, earning their fourth correct guess of the game.
Who killed the cuckoo clock?
And here's a map if you need it.
