I'm doing a column on jarring mistakes that shock you out of your movie experience, and I could use help to get the best ones. I wrote the column on recent movies, but my editor suggested I go back and replace some of my current examples with the biggest ones from older movies. Excerpt with examples:
"I'm ready to believe in a blind superhero with impossible martial arts abilities, but not in one that can plummet 30 stories and bounce off a fire escape without cramming his boots up between his ears ('Daredevil'). I can deal with a mercenary archeologist who displays Olympic-level talent in anything at all she encounters while still remaining fresh and carefully made-up, but not in one that effortlessly uses a shark as an escape route ('Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life'). I can accept three supremely talented female investigators cracking into a Mongolian military base and dodging bullets, but not that the bleak, remote base has a mechanical bull ('Charlie's Angels 2: Full Throttle'). I'm not talking about disappearing cigarettes, or changing car upholstery, or other minor errors in consistency and accuracy that plague every movie. I don't care about magical makeup that's impervious to everything up to and including hurricanes and mud wrestling. I don't even care that none of the many, many smashed late-model cars in 'Bad Boys II' had working air bags. I mean things like wondering why Michael Keaton's 'Batman,' supposedly the world's greatest martial artist, would step outside his the Batcave wearing a costume that completely prevented his head from turning. Filmmakers, please! Movie magic is one thing, but we're not idiots."
My recent contenders include Neo fighting 100 Smiths with little problem but being stymied by four thugs with pointy things, Wolverine not being able to identify Mystique at very close range in the second X-Men movie when he smelled her from five feet away in the first one, the amazing "yank it off" necklace from 'Pirates of the Caribbean' that magically breaks and hooks again, over and over, and most of 'Charlies Angels 2.'
What are some good bonehead mistakes in movies, ones that, logically reasoned, would undermine significant portions of the plot or even make the climactic ending unnecessary? What have you seen on the big screen that made you go "oh, come on!"
I will, of course, shamelessly steal your ideas and use them myself, but I'll thank you a lot when I win an award for it. I'll use the code words "little people."
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Tom Sawyer flipping a convertible, being trapped underneath it while the building exploded around him, and then walking up one minute later without a scratch or his hair messed up.
Posted by asQmh (Member # 4590) on :
quote:the amazing "yank it off" necklace from 'Pirates of the Caribbean' that magically breaks and hooks again, over and over
Okay, I'll make a post later helping you with your article, but for what it's worth, I've got a necklace like that. It's essentially a breakaway clasp.
Also a popular design in the lanyards many people use to carry around work or school I.D.s
Heh. Later I'll post something useful. ^_^
Q.
Posted by Godric (Member # 4587) on :
I don't know if this is what you're looking for, but almost all of Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt (his personal favorite) was entirely unnecessary. A couple minutes into the film, a couple of police detectives stop the antagonist and exchange a few words with him before letting him go on his merry way. Then, towards the end of the film the authorities decide they're going to arrest him without any further evidence ever being obtained. Of course, by that time the lead detective had fallen for the girl who was the antagonist's niece and for her sake decides to let him leave town before arresting him and then the action ensues...
Also, although this is merely along the lines of a "minor error in consistency," I absolutely love Chuck Norris' movie Firewalker. Watching the villan's eyepatch switch back and forth between his right and left eyes is hysterical...
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Remembered one: in Citizen Kane, the movie revolves around his dying word, "Rosebud." He died alone. How does anyone know what he said?
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
In Anaconda, there was that part where the entire movie sucked.
Posted by Godric (Member # 4587) on :
Well, all but some rear portions of it... Posted by Dan_raven (Member # 3383) on :
the Mummy: Mummy sucks the juices out of bad American's to regain its power. As long as he's not at full power he is scared of a cat. Why didn't last bad American superglue a freakin cat to his chest?
The Scorpion King: Everything.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
'Die Another Day's' ice floe surfing scene. I laughed and laughed...
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
Of course, any James Bond movie is full of errors and inconsistencies that you could use.
Posted by Jacare Sorridente (Member # 1906) on :
It would take me a while to think of the really ridiculous ones, but here are a few:
Tom cruise and bad guy drive at each other at >40mph on motorcycles and jump into each other yet fall to the ground unscathed (MI2)
A robot probe is sent through the stargate to see where it leads to. There is no communication through the stargate. So how exactly do they track the probe to a distant galaxy? (stargate)
A brilliant scientist finds the cure for cancer but is too damn stupid to realize that the important ingredient is only present when his samples are contaminated with bugs. The whole audience figures this out the second the problem is presented (medicine man).
The Klingons use some trickery to get the shield frequency for the enterprise and proceed to blow the hell out of it. On about 50 Star Trek episodes various people simply suggest they change the shield frequency to prevent such things from happening. (Star Trek Generations, I think)
Posted by slacker (Member # 2559) on :
I think you're forgetting the Ed Woods movies. I've always loved the way you can see cards in the background of an ancient graveyard, or the way that the monsters would bump into walls and have the wall move.
Also, if you look carefully at the sky in the first episode of Band of Brothers, you'll notice contrails in the sky as the planes are lifting off.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
Yah, but Ed Woods movies are classics for those reasons. Besides, was anyone ever involved in the movie enough before something like that happened?
Hobbes Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
How about in Twister when to make sure they aren't sucked into the tornado they tie themselves to plumbing on the inside of a building made out of wood, rusty nails and glass?
Hobbes Posted by slacker (Member # 2559) on :
You can always use the "unix" interface from Jurassic park.
Edit: another movie idea.
[ July 28, 2003, 03:35 PM: Message edited by: slacker ]
Posted by TheTick (Member # 2883) on :
Highlander 2's "let's invent a stupid sci-fi plot device so we can have another movie" technique is at least an honorable mention.
Posted by slacker (Member # 2559) on :
Ok, found it.
I've never seen Swordfish, but from what I've read, a guy was able to have a gun pointed to his head and have oral sex being performed on him, was able to break a code that should have taken a very long time.
What about when the main character shoots the other guy at the begining of the movie but at the end the guy is alive?!(Momento)
Posted by Doug J (Member # 1323) on :
How about when in Commando Arnold hits a telephone pole at over 40 MPH without a seatbelt and gets out of the car without even being sore.
In a Knights Tale he gets stabbed in the arm and can't hold the damn lance but if you strap it to his arm he has enough power to unhorse the other guy?
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
So far my list is Batman, Die Another Day, Citizen Cane, Darth Vader in general, Matrix Reloaded, Independence Day, and X2. Still going...
There's a classic Mystery Science Theater episode where they're watching a horrible movie about a post-apocalyptic world. The hero has to get to a castle or something in time. He swiftly disappears behind a rock and viola, he soars out from behind it on a hang glider. The bots' only response is a tortured "What?"
That's the feeling I'm looking for. I've actually got plenty more to choose from, but I don't want to miss any really good ones.
[ July 28, 2003, 03:52 PM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
Posted by Head Ditch Digger (Member # 5085) on :
When Superman in the original movie caught Lois after falling from the helicopter. He catches her. The film show her instantly changing from falling to moving up. She would have been crushed in his arms of steel.
Posted by Dan_raven (Member # 3383) on :
What he wants are specific instances not when minor mistakes occur, but when human behavior, probability or the laws of physics react beyond our credibility. Not filming mistakes but plot holes.
For example, Huck Finn. Boy tries to free slave friend by rafting into the deep south.
well, that's not a movie problem is it.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
Well on that score The Matrix ReloadedMinor Spoilers is even worse. Trinity would've been killed if she hit the car but Neo coming in a past super sonic speeds and instantly changing her direction is fine? And then the same thing when he save Morpheus and the key maker.
Hobbes
[ July 28, 2003, 04:20 PM: Message edited by: Hobbes ]
Posted by Sopwith (Member # 4640) on :
In The Mummy (more recent remake, not the original), the Mummy takes the eyeballs out of one of the Americans and puts them in his own eye sockets. Of course the eyes come from the one and only American wearing thick glasses in the movie, but the Mummy can see just fine...
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
I'll have to watch Superman again, but I thought I remembered him dropping slightly when he caught her.
No, what bugged me in the Superman movies was how he could reverse time and save Lois, presumably letting the town he saved the first time die the second time. Or the end of the second movie, where suddenly Superman displays brand new powers he hasn't had in his 40+ year history at that point, such as the dreaded S frisbee. Much, much worse is the 3rd one, when he reveals his identity to Lois, flies her around the world, and then does the hypnotising kiss again. What, he does this every weekend? Grrr.... The stupidities of the 3rd and 4th Superman movies were many, but that one actually angered me.
Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
Hobbes:
quote: The Matrix Reloaded Minor Spoilers is even worse. Trillian would've been killed if she hit the car...
Trillian? Do you mean Trinity? Or were you thinking of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Reloaded?
[ July 28, 2003, 04:21 PM: Message edited by: Speed ]
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
Woops. Thanks Speed, this isn't the first time I've done that.
Hobbes Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
And then there was that part in Air Force One where the strike force rode inside a modified stealth fighter. There's no way you could seat six or eight guys in there (unless, of course, you removed some vital things like the fuel tanks and had them sit on top of the engines, which is apparently what they did).
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
My favorite line fom Star Wars is when Obi Wan Kenobi is looking at the burn marks on the Jawa's van: "Only Imperial Stormtroopers are so precise." Funny, the rest of the movie they couldn't hit the ocean from a boat...
Posted by Potemkyn (Member # 5465) on :
Windtalkers, Nicholas Cage ran, dived and fired off four shots with his pistol, killed four Japanese soldiers, and didn't get shot by them.
Nope. Just can't happen.
Also, the new Tomb Raider was bad.
Laura Croft said, "Finding Pandora's box will be the greatest find since the discovery of the Pyramids." WTF? Who "discovered" the pyramids? Can't you see some 10th century Arab waking up one morning and looking out his window and saying, "Woah...what is that...hey Achmed...you see those before?"
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Oh, that's perfect, thank you.
I have plenty of problems with the Tomb Raider movies, but first and foremost is the utter lack of any emotional commitment in the character. I know that's how she acts in the game, but I don't get to control the character in the movie, I've got no interest. Or, as I described the first one, it's like watching someone else play a video game on God mode.
Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
Speaking of John Woo, what about Face/Off? Of course, there are the requisite parts about ten machine guns being fired at someone and missing, or how a person can do a shoulder roll and take out five extras a hundred feet away, but then unload a clip at the main hero/ villain from ten feet and hit nothing.
But the part I really hated was when the bad John Travolta, masquerading as a head of the FBI (if I remember correctly), sent an army of federal agents to the house of an unconvicted drug dealer with orders to murder everyone inside (including a small child) and he got praised for it, rather than fired and imprisoned. What? Constitution? Never heard of it.
[ July 28, 2003, 06:18 PM: Message edited by: Speed ]
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Ok, all of these were amusing, but this one deserves a special mention.
quote: Can't you see some 10th century Arab waking up one morning and looking out his window and saying, "Woah...what is that...hey Achmed...you see those before?"
ROFLOL!
Sorry I can't add any, but all that is coming to mind are plot holes from TV episodes, not movies. :shrug:
Posted by AndrewR (Member # 619) on :
There is always the classic Ed Wood drama, “Plan 9 from Outer Space.” I understand it include scenes where the characters get in a car to go to a cemetery, and then arrive there in a different model car.
Or where the Air Force General is talking about military plans on a map labeled “Santa Fe Railroad.”
But my personal favorite is an Italian stinker named “War Between the Planets.” A Scifi mish-mash that had the classic stupidities:
- The spaceship stops dead in space. The clamps in front open, and the landing vehicles slips out.
- One character remarks, “The planet is completely frozen. Even the atmosphere is frozen!” Three scenes later they are on the planet, walking around without any spacesuits on.
But looking for scenes like those in stinkers is like shooting fish in a barrel. If you don’t find them, you haven’t been paying attention!
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Well, isn't the all time classic (modernday) the scene in Independence Day where Jeff Goldblum uses an Apple laptop to upload a virus to a completely alien computer system...and it works!!!
Also in Blair Witch Project they run out of every possible resource except batteries for their video camera?
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
I can't believe I never thought of that before. Good point Bob. Not that this make up for not meeting me when you came to Denver.
Pick a movie -- any movie. I can almost guarantee that some sort of problem like that will be mentioned for it.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
How about Raiders of the Lost Arc win Indiana Jones put's a small bag of sand down to copmensate for a really large gold statue. I believe that it was calculated that the thing he picked up would weigh close to 100lbs.
Hobbes Posted by ludosti (Member # 1772) on :
I couldn't figure out why the guy in Die Another Day didn't have the diamonds removed from his face? They can't have been comfortable or difficult to remove. And why did he keep a necklace of diamonds around his neck if he was going to keep a bunch stashed in his face?
Posted by Toretha (Member # 2233) on :
Pirates of the Carribean
how come they can be killed in the fight scene in the town, but never after that?
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Already got the Independence Day laptop, as well as the fact that a buncha tourists with a half-hour training could fly fighter jets against the aliens more effectively than the Air Force pros earlier in the movie.
In Pirates, the pirates killed in the town don't die. Remember, the one that Orlando axed showed up again and startled him just before he got clubbed.
Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
quote: How about Raiders of the Lost Arc win Indiana Jones put's a small bag of sand down to copmensate for a really large gold statue. I believe that it was calculated that the thing he picked up would weigh close to 100lbs.
If you remember, though, after he put the bag of sand down, the traps went off. So it didn't really compensate. It may have shown that Jones wasn't as smart as he thought, but it wasn't a plot hole.
Speaking of Die Another Day , did anyone wonder how a bone marrow transplant can make someone into a completely different human being? It even wiped out the guy's accent. My grandma had a bone marrow transplant when she got cancer. I guess that explains why she came out of the operation as a large burly black man.
And did it seem odd to anyone that the only thing separating North Korea and South Korea in the James Bond universe was a mine field? Oooh, if we could only figure out a way to get past the mines... then we could take over the world! Bwahahahaha!
And don't even get me started on the giant space magnifying glass. Gees, if the plot points in that movie didn't take you out of the film, I have a copy of Wild Wild West I'd be willing to sell you.
Posted by Ryuko (Member # 5125) on :
The thing that cracked my suspension of disbelief was the scene in Pirates of the Carribean where Orlando Bloom is stuck in a rapidly sinking boat, and the bad guy shoots a cannon at it.
The boat explodes, everybody cries, and moments later, Orlando Bloom climbs back onto the boat, none the worse for wear.
WHAT THE HECK!? How in the world did he get out of that mess?
Oh well, that was the worst moment from that movie, like a piece of coal in a field of shining gems... ^-^
Posted by littlemissattitude (Member # 4514) on :
There is this silly movie called Custer of the West, made in 1968. Of course, since it is about G. A. Custer, it recreates Custer's Last Stand. This recreation is fairly long, detailed, and involved. And nobody has any blood. Except for one Native American, who has just a little. I saw it at a Saturday matinee (anyone remember those?) when it first came out, and I just thought that was the oddest thing.
Also, I guess this is a pretty minor thing, but it completely jarred me out of the mood of the movie when I saw Jurassic Park the first time and one of the characters makes the statement, in connection with the idea that all theme parks have their little bugs to be worked out when they first open, that Disneyland opened in 1956. Well, it opened in 1955. As I recall, this bothered me so much that I shouted out, in a full theatre (as this was the day after the film came out), something like, "It opened in 1955, idiot." Well, it wasn't my finest hour, I guess but, man, that bugged me.
Oh, and Sopwith...to be fair, at first the mummy seems to have a little bit of trouble focusing the eyes, if I recall correctly.
Posted by eslaine (Member # 5433) on :
I hate to say it, and I know I will regret saying it here, but Armageddon was great until the moment that they went into space. Unfortunately for me this was early in the picture. Everything they did in space was wrong. My family just couldn't undertstand how I couldn't suspend my disbelief, but it was wrong everywhere! Gives SF a bad name! Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Was that the one where it was somehow easier to train drill operators to fly the space shuttle than to teach highly educated astronauts to operate drilling equipment? Or was that the other asteroid movie?
Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
That's awful. I just wrote this all out, and accidentally closed the window. Grr.
Okay... fast rundown.
ID4 - Using a laptop to interface with alien technology - Crop duster pilots flying fighter jets - An alien space ship that took forever to get to Area 51 after it somehow made it across the Galaxy at ridiculous speeds - Everything else in that movie
I won't even go into Dungeons and Dragons or Matrix Reloaded.
Men in Black - How'd that cockroach thing fit inside the Edgar suit? I mean, really. And, the way it unfolded, its head would have been in the human body's feet.
Raiders of the Lost Ark - - So the best defense against the Ark of the Covenant is to close your eyes? The ostrich method of supernatural defense? Why didn't anyone else ever think of that?
Ghost - - Patrick Swayze can't push a bottle cap cuz he's so incorporeal... yet floors or stairs aren't any problem... nor are moving trains, apparently.
Planet of the Apes - the whole ending.
Blair Witch - throwing the map away? eh?
S'all I can think of right now. I'm sure there are more. I'm constantly finding major fault with screenwriters and directors. It's one of my less endearing qualities.
Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
Again, I'm going to defend Raiders of the Lost Ark. I think the point was that the contents of the ark were sacred. God would punish those who profaned them by opening it. Since Indy & co. were unwilling participants, if they respected God enough to keep their eyes closed, thus refraining from gazing upon the sacred relics, he would not strike them down.
I only saw Independence Day once, but it was one of the worst experiences of my life. In fact, if I ever say anything stupid on this forum, you can blame the mind-sucking effect of that movie. Two of the things that still stick with me, of the ones that have not been mentioned, are as follows:
I remember two people being stuck in a tunnel. A huge explosion takes place and a wall of fire comes at them, threatening to vaporize them and anything else in its path. As they can't make it out of the tunnel, they step into a shallow recess in the wall and escape unscathed.
I also remember an army of gargantuan ships hovering over every major metropolis in the world. Then Jeff Goldblum and the Virus o' Death disable the ships, and it shows them crashing in mountains and wilderness. Isn't that convenient?
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
That's true speed, the "alarm" went off, but Jones still managed to throw a 100lbs idol across a very respectable chasam, and it was caught easily on the other side.
Hobbes Posted by filetted (Member # 5048) on :
chris,
interesting question but what do you mean by "movie experience"?
flish
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Planet of the Apes:
1) The humans have lost the ability to speak. Why? 2) Something on the order of a half-dozen species of primate all become sentient at the same time and rule the world collectively. 3) Two artifacts from the human era survive -- a bomb cared for by a bunch of worshippers (okay, makes sense it would be intact since they took care of it) and the Statue of Liberty, which is sitting on the seashore, totally exposed but it's arm is still intact holding the torch. Yep. This is the same arm that nearly fell off years ago.
Superman I, and various other movies that use the "go backwards around the Earth (or the sun) to turn back time" effect. I'm sorry, but time pretty much goes forward even if you spin around really really fast.
Jurassic Park -- Scientists may someday be able to extract DNA from bugs in amber, but...red blood cells lack nuclei, so it'd be a tough thing to clone from. Maybe reptile hemoglobin is different, but at least mammalian RBCs do not have nuclei. May want to double check the reptilian blood cell thing.
Of course, it'd be petrified anyway, so what's the point?
In Total Recall, the oxygen generators on Mars at the end of the movie work really, really fast. Why? Would it be necessary for an alien engineer to set up a system that would explosively generate oxygen when a more leisurely pace would do? And the silly turn-on mechanism? A handprint?
Posted by TheTick (Member # 2883) on :
quote:Well on that score The Matrix Reloaded Minor Spoilers is even worse. Trinity would've been killed if she hit the car but Neo coming in a past super sonic speeds and instantly changing her direction is fine? And then the same thing when he save Morpheus and the key maker.
more spoilers Hobbes, I didn't think it was the fall that killed her in any case. Remember, she still 'died' after Neo saved Trinity, due to the bullet.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Filleted:
When I go see a good movie, I'm in a sense surrendering my brain to the director. I'm in their world, being pulled or pushed along by their pacing, their events, their twists. Anything that jars me into editor-mode during a movie ruins that fantasy.
Granted there are plenty of movies where I just shut off my disbelief entirely before the opening credits, but some are just consistent enough to believe in, and then wham! Something stupid and inexplicable happens. Sometimes it's a minor thing, like in Spider-man when Mary Jane hangs up on Harry, revealing him to have the world's only cellphone with a dial tone. Sometimes it's major and movie-crippling, like in Commando when the yellow Porsche is completely totaled on the left side, until Arnie drives away, whereupon it's miraculously restored.
[ July 29, 2003, 11:25 AM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Quick fact check: amazingly enough, I have never seen the movie It's a Wonderful Life. A friend pointed out that at the end, when everyone chips in to raise the money, wouldn't George still have to explain what happened to the first 8 thou?
Can anyone verify and/or explain this?
Posted by Lerris (Member # 3530) on :
Blade 2 had my favorite scene. The light bomb thingee goes off and they actually duck out of the way of the oncomming light "explosion." They actually see it comming.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:. . . It's a Wonderful Life. A friend pointed out that at the end, when everyone chips in to raise the money, wouldn't George still have to explain what happened to the first 8 thou?
I always assumed that while there might still be some explaining to do, it would be fairly minor. They tend to be a lot less upset about possible embezzlement if the money is replaced. And didn't the examiner show up, and say there were no hard feelings or somesuch? In any case, now we're talking explanations -- not losing the Trust & Loan, or jail time, etc.
[ July 29, 2003, 05:41 PM: Message edited by: rivka ]
Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
Two more things that bother me:
I hate it when people are driving away and people behind them are shooting at them, and the bullets shatter the back window, but leave the front and side windows intact. I'm also bothered when people run through a hailstorm of bullets and all of them miss by inches. Or when people are shooting at the protagonist in an open space, and the bullets hit just inches from their feet. How bad are those shots? I think the car window thing is the worst, though.
I also hate it when Joe Average has to speak to a crowd, either in a courtroom or a political convention or some such situation. They always start off with a disclaimer about how they're not very smart or educated or well-spoken, and then they proceed to give an impromptu speech that Churchill would have had to spend a couple days preparing. Everyone is convinced by their well-crafted "down-home" logic, and the day is saved. That takes me out of the movie something fierce.
Posted by Black Mage (Member # 5800) on :
In Ben Hurr you can see the camera truck for a moment on the racetrack.
Posted by MoonRabbit (Member # 3652) on :
X-files: Fight the future (or whatever it was called).
I can believe that there is a vast alien plot to breed human-alien hybrids.
I can believe that a huge alien vessel lies below the antarctic ice (or wherever it was).
I can believe the governments of the world all know about it and can all keep it so secret that no member of the press has ever found out about it.
What I can't believe is that the aliens were so stupid as to hinge the success of their plot on honeybees pollinating corn. Corn is a grass, and any 8 year old farmboy from Nebraska knows that corn is wind-pollinated, not bee-pollinated. Corn offers no nectar and no attractants for honeybees.
Sorry to keep harping on this, but botany is a seriously underrepresented science in science fiction.
Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
I've thought of something else that bothers me. I know the column is long done, but I love this thread, so I'm going to resurrect it.
I hate it when people have to get into a secure room in a building with incredibly sophisticated security, so they climb through an air duct or remove a ceiling tile, which always gives them unobstructed access to anywhere they want to go. Everyone knows that it doesn't work that way in real life even in buildings with relatively little security, but for some reason it's a staple of the written-into-a-corner scriptwriter, and it's made many an otherwise good movie seem much cheesier.
As a corollary, I hate it when people are in an elevator and they have to escape so they climb up through the conveniently placed ceiling hatch that no one else seems to notice. I've ridden in hundreds or maybe thousands of elevators in my life. I always look for the ceiling hatch and it's almost never there. I've seen a couple old cheap elevators with them, but they're always fairly securely locked. But in the movies they're always present, and they're about as secure as your average doggy door.
That's all for now.
Posted by Dan_raven (Member # 3383) on :
Hobbes, maybe it wasn't solid gold?
My vote for movie plot holes--"True Lies" with Arnold.
If there is any doubt about Arnold's view of women, see this movie.
He lies to his wife the entire length of the movie, and laughs about it.
Then he believes his wife is possibly considering an affair, which she doesn't go through with.
What does Arnold do? He kidnaps her, terrorizes her, and demands she perform a sexy strip dance in front of the cameras.
Is this where we got our Iraqi prison training film?
However, that is my personal beef with the movie's philosophy.
There was the point where he drops an automatic weapon down a flight of steps, and kills 10 or so badguys as it starts shooting.
Then he nukes a section of the Everglades, but that's OK as long as we get the bad guy. No radiation warning, no EMP problems. Just have to grab the next attack helicopter so he could blow up the building where all the Arabs--er--terrorists are.
Of course, the one good muslim sounds like a cross between Gunga Din and Uncle Tom and is killed.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Read this thread through now that it's resurfaced and I've got a few things to add.
Re: the Independence Day joke where Goldblum's laptop can interface with the alien ship? I saw the (slightly) extended version, with an extra 9 minutes, and it makes a bit more sense. Still a stretch, but more emphasis is given to Goldblum's analysis of the initial satellite signal and how they use his discoveries and what they've learned from the ship in Roswell to extrapolate accurate frequencies and connection protocols. I would've been much happier had that been left in.
I heartily recommend What Lie Did I Tell? by William Goldman. He has a largish section on this kind of movie shorthand crap, which he explains as all being due to the same thing: time. He reprints the classic "Things I Learned From Movies" e-mail and says that every single one of them is because they're time-savers. Things have to happen quickly in a movie. His example is Mel Gibson pulling up to a building and finding a parking space right in front, which is unlikely as hell but speeds the movie along. He makes his point with four pages of script depicting Mel circling the block, trying to find a spot...
Posted by lem (Member # 6914) on :
How comes in Star Wars Han can fly the falcon upside down in the environment and not feel the effects of gravity, but in space sharp turns send them back and forth?
Posted by Han Solo (Member # 3336) on :
There are more limitations to the inertial compensator in the Falcon than there are to my flying, buddy-boy.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Also, good pilots keep the inertial compensator turned down a little so they can feel acceleration.
Posted by sndrake (Member # 4941) on :
Did anyone mention how Jake and Elwood pulled off a truly magical feat by repeatedly racing through long empty stretches of road in and around Chicago in The Blues Brothers ?
[ January 14, 2005, 12:21 PM: Message edited by: sndrake ]
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
Suitcases in all movies are light and can be tossed around like they're filled with feathers. Suitcases are never like that!
Posted by jeniwren (Member # 2002) on :
I'm a costume geek, but I had to see Mel Gibson's Hamlet three or four times before I could actually watch the movie and not get totally distracted with the schizophrenic costuming. Armor that either never existed, or was mixed with different countries and centuries. The creative use of knitting sewn to leather...and Glenn Close's blue sideless surcote with celtic knotwork? It was bizarre, like the costumer couldn't quite make up her mind what she was doing, and so threw together elements that seemed interesting to her. It was very distracting.
But my favorite costuming comedy is First Knight. When Sean Connery showed up dressed in something that looked like it had been salvaged from a sofa, I lost it. Julia Ormond's costumes were just as bad, especially that stuffed, feathery looking thing. It's such a bad movie anyway, but with the costumes, it took it to a whole new level of awful. I laughed SO hard the first time I saw it. I still love to watch that movie just for the costumes. Cracks me up every time.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
quote:Speaking of Die Another Day , did anyone wonder how a bone marrow transplant can make someone into a completely different human being? It even wiped out the guy's accent. My grandma had a bone marrow transplant when she got cancer. I guess that explains why she came out of the operation as a large burly black man.
-o-
I'm sorry, but the thought: Botany, Sci-Fi's Underrepresented Science made me snort as well!
-o-
This thread has come and gone and it's not what Chris was looking for, but have you noticed that in Bad Boys, there is one latino in the entire city of Miami (he is a drug dealer), and in Bad Boys II there are three (one is a drug dealer, and the other two are gay)? Did you notice that not a single one (of the four Latinos) was Cuban?
Just like South Florida, neh?
-o-
This is a problem with the book (I hear) as much as the movie, but if Harry Potter had just listened to the grown-ups in the first movie and left everything alone, nothing bad would have happened, because the bad guys needed him to get to their goal. (Hey Huck, if you had just leftt Jim at home, he would not have been sold!) Oh, and hey! It's a good thing Harry's hands can burn off evil people's faces now. Who knew? Oh, hey, that's the power of love! This came close to ruining altogether a movie that, up to that point, I had thoroughly loved. I still like it okay, but it's a shame they couldn't wrap it up more neatly.
-o-
You ever notice how, in the original Star Trek movies, William Shatner has spoken lines? Why couldn't they fix that?
-o-
I wish I could remember the two movies I spoiled for Bob upon their completion. Those would have been perfect for this thread! Posted by MEC (Member # 2968) on :
I have a few but I can't remember them. One I do remember though is in Die Hard 2. When Bruce Willis' character is trying to explain to some police chief or something that the general facked the whole attack thing with blanks he proves his point by firing the blanks at him...IN A ROOM FULL OF POLICE OFFICERS WHO DON'T IMMEDIATLY SHOOT HIM YET STILL DRAW THEIR WEAPONS.
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
quote: Did anyone mention how Jake and Elwood pulled off a truly magical feat by repeatedly racing through long empty stretches of road in and around Chicago in The Blues Brothers ?
Stephen - I certainly thought that same question when I was stuck on Lower Whacker drive (is that the right name of that street) this past fall in Chicago..
FG
Posted by sndrake (Member # 4941) on :
quote: You ever notice how, in the original Star Trek movies, William Shatner has spoken lines? Why couldn't they fix that?
Yeah, but to be fair, he was killed - twice - in Star Trek: Generations.
Twice, mind you, for those of us who wouldn't be satisfied with just one. (wipes away nostalgic tear at the memory)
PS - it's the same all over Chicago, Farmgirl, so it could have been one of the Whackers or almost any other major thoroughfare around the city.
[ January 14, 2005, 04:21 PM: Message edited by: sndrake ]
Posted by punwit (Member # 6388) on :
dkw,
quote: Was that the one where it was somehow easier to train drill operators to fly the space shuttle than to teach highly educated astronauts to operate drilling equipment? Or was that the other asteroid movie?
This was exactly my thought while watching the show. I can usually suspend belief but this particular idiocy was so blaring that I was irritated during the rest of the movie.
Posted by MEC (Member # 2968) on :
How about in the revised star wars where greedo shoots first? He's a ****ing bounty hunter at near point blank range, he wouldn't miss.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Wait a minute, they didn't teach the drill operators to fly the space shuttle. They taught them the basics to survive in space and checked them out on the portable drilling rigs. That was actually the only believable part to me - drilling isn't simple.
Posted by JonnyNotSoBravo (Member # 5715) on :
To be fair, in Armageddon they had the real astronauts flying the shuttles...the oil drillers were just along for the ride and just had to be taught how to do basic physical things in space.
[ January 15, 2005, 12:56 AM: Message edited by: JonnyNotSoBravo ]
Posted by Goody Scrivener (Member # 6742) on :
quote:Speaking of Die Another Day , did anyone wonder how a bone marrow transplant can make someone into a completely different human being? It even wiped out the guy's accent. My grandma had a bone marrow transplant when she got cancer. I guess that explains why she came out of the operation as a large burly black man.
ROFLMAO I LOVE this line!!!!
Posted by Trisha the Severe Hottie (Member # 6000) on :
Seeing as we're a bunch of sci-fi geeks, I am surprised no one has mentioned how the Klingon warship had an entry on humpback whales in its database. Even if you assume it has been undated with federation info (which would invalidate all the whining about the Klingon technology they do) why would that info be in there?
quote: That's true speed, the "alarm" went off, but Jones still managed to throw a 100lbs idol across a very respectable chasam, and it was caught easily on the other side.
I chalk this up to the guy who caught it being Doc Oc. :drifts off into magical movie mixed metaphor land:
Posted by punwit (Member # 6388) on :
Well, it's been quite awhile since I saw the movie but I distinctly remember thinking it was goofy to send the roughnecks into space instead of teaching the astronauts to drill. Perhaps I was uninformed concerning the difficulty of drilling but I'm still not convinced that this is how it would be approached in a real life scenario.
Posted by MEC (Member # 2968) on :
In spiderman 2, wouldn't Doc-ock's metal arms be so heavy he wouldn't be able to walk. He wasn't exactly one of the most fit men I've seen.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
There a very light-weight alloy. Really.
What I did like about that was that he braced two of his arms on the ground when he lifted heavy things. In the comics, and especially the cartoons, there are instances of him holding a car up with all 4 arms, meaning his back and legs are bearing the entire weight of the car.
Dagonee
Posted by Kwea (Member # 2199) on :
How about in TTT, when at the end of the movie Frodo walks up to a Nazgul and almost hands him the One Ring.....but then Sauron can't figure out what they are doing with it, even though they are right across the river from Mordor....
Even worse, in the extended edition of ROTK, the Witch-King of Angramar is so powerful he breaks Gandalf wizard staff by simply raising his sword of fire.....and then, when he has Galdalf the White, head of the White Councuil and the largest thorn in the side of Sauron throughout the ages, completely in his power....he leaves, because some horns are blowing.
I threw popcorn at the screen at that one, it pissed me off. Both of them did, I was swearing in the theatre during TTT becaue of Sauron saw Frodo at all the game was up....and then he found a hobbit wandering through Mordor but cound't figure it out? lol
Kwea
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Yeah, in the book it's clear Gandalf is at least able to go toe to toe with the Nazgul, although we don't get to know who would have actually one. The witch king leaves before they come to grips in the book - much more believable, because the book is clear that the fear of the Nazgul is the major motivating force of the dark army. So he's needed on the field, and he's not sure he can beat Gandalf.
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And then the same thing when he save Morpheus and the key maker.![[Embarrassed]](redface.gif)
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Not that this make up for not meeting me when you came to Denver. ![[Wink]](wink.gif)
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