Things that annoy you about movies.

krudler

We all have them, those cliches and tired old plot devices that make us collectively :rolleyes: Saw Scre4m last night and the entire audience groaned and tutted when

Sidney knocks the killer unconscious, the cops charge in a second later and when she turns about 3 seconds later the killer has vanished, no sound, not a trace of where they're scuttling off to

its a ridiculous cliche thats in almost every horror movie.

So as this doesnt descend into a list thread, stuff that bugs me and reasons why:

Overuse of sound in horror movies Its so simple, silence is scary. so why why WHYYYYY must every jump and scare in a horror/slasher movie be announced with a shriek of a violin or out of nowhere clattering of noise on the musical score, its not scary! its just telling the audience, ok be scared......NOW! leave the music out and let the sound designer do their job.

Take this scene, if it was made today itd have some ridiculous tense music as the mother is wandering around the attic and it wouldnt be nearly as tense a scene.

budgemook

How you can easily pop a panel open, pull out a few wires, rub them together and hey presto, car is started. Fairly sure that's not possible.

Credit cards to open locks, what feckin locks can be opened with a credit card?

Bombs are always defused with 1 second to go. Think of something new.

Prom speeches.

abouttobebanned

I hate the sound of the "movie punch". When will they realise that the sound of a real punch just sounds more painful than the "rocky" punch?

Also, bad writing is creeping into more and more films lately...plot holes, poor character development and downright unbelievable scenarios that are just present to facilitate some ludicrus upcoming scene.

Wolflikeme

When there's a reveal (normally towards the end!) and they then treat the audience like idiots by reminding you through flashbacks who was doing what and why, even though you know, because they told you indirectly. :mad: I think it takes away from a film too.

krudler

abouttobebanned wrote: »

I hate the sound of the "movie punch". When will they realise that the sound of a real punch just sounds more painful than the "rocky" punch?

Also, bad writing is creeping into more and more films lately...plot holes, poor character development and downright unbelievable scenarios that are just present to facilitate some ludicrus upcoming scene.

The only ones I love are the Indiana Jones punches real punches do so way more vicious though, the ones in Rocky 4 sound like grenades going off :pac:

krudler

In a horror movie (horror movies are big culprits for sh1t cliches) anyone who has a nightmare will wake up and go to the bathroom, they WILL have a mirrored medicine cabinet and proceed to either open it to get their medication to stop seeing scary sh1t, or bend down and wash their face at the sink, when they close the door/stand up again there WILL be a flash of the killer/monster/clown/ghost/asian girl/mutant in the mirror, then they'll turn around, scream and it'll be gone. note to Hollywood, STOP DOING THIS!

krudler

There are no health and safety regulations ANYWHERE in the Star Wars universe, gaping chasms that you have to traverse on a walkway with no guard rails like on the Death Star, that thing was a workmans comp dream with all the injuries the stormtroopers must have had.

"Did you hear about Barry?"
"No?"
"Fell off the side of the tractor beam control tower"
"the one with the controls only accesible by walking around a 4 inch thick platform thats suspended over a bottomless pit?"
"the very one"
"poor bastard"

Magi11

Trailers that either tell the whole story or just show the best parts.

MJ23

Films with too much music, Inception being the worst culprit

Deisler

The divorced/separated cop always misses his kids recital/play/football game and p*sses off his ex missus even more.

Or..

After escaping the serial killer/psycho the potential victim jumps into their car and it never starts first tiime..

storker

MJ23 wrote: »

Films with too much music, Inception being the worst culprit

"Gettysburg" is a bad offender there. All the time the music seems to be saying, "See how dramatic this is?" Of course it's dramatic! It's a battle for crying out loud!.

The sounds of battle are all the music you need anyway ....



Stork.

jaykhunter

The hardass business man.....with the heart of gold
The deadbeat dad.....with the heart of gold
The ex-husband.....with the heart of gold

Matthew McConaughey can fúck right off!!

nyarlothothep

Anything that Christopher Nolan does, but definately his overuse of montage sequences + music, makes me wonder, am I watching a film here or just a very stylish but superficial trailer. Also dislikeable characters that we're meant to like because they're fiesty/fiery (ie assholes), the characters in Scott Pilgrim come to mind.

Mackman

When there's a kid shoe horned into the movie just to make it a family movie. And then the kid has to be rescued at least twice causing the bad guy to get away.

e.g. War of the Worlds

I hate kids in movies :mad:

Sad Professor

One thing that has really started to annoy me in films is overuse of close and medium shots. What I mean is the director shoots almost everything from the shoulders up, cutting out most of the actors body language. It also means the camera is never focused on more than one character at a time.

I know he has been mentioned twice already, but Christopher Nolan is especially guilty of this. He's a excellent director otherwise, but his use of camera angles is very poor. He shoots everything very close on the actor, even exposition scenes. It's the kinda thing you'd expect from a television director, not somebody who is making movies to be projected on a big screen. Ridley Scott isn't much better anymore, though his earlier films were.

Contrast this with Fincher whose camera work never fails to impress. Even in something like The Social Network he uses loads of interesting medium two and three shots. He never abuses or overuses the close-up, which means that when he does use it, it has a greater impact.

I read an interview with Aronofsky a while ago in which he called the close-up one of the great cinematic inventions - and he's right! But not when the whole bloody film is shot using it.

Latchy

abouttobebanned wrote: »

Also, bad writing is creeping into more and more films lately...plot holes, poor character development and downright unbelievable scenarios that are just present to facilitate some ludicrus upcoming scene.

Like in Dreamcatchers .....so laughable in parts, it's so bad and stretching credibility to new limits .

adrian hyde

I hate terrible extras. The one's that cannot help taking a peak at the camera, or glancing at the star. Or the ones that are just 'mouthing' rather than really talking.

phoenix0250

Well these five reasons are at the top definitely

alchemist33

Wobbly shaky cam. If I wanted to vomit, I'd have gone to Abrakebabra instead.

johnny_ultimate

Formulaic plot development when it negatively impacts on the film. There are plenty of examples when living happily ever after is the right ending for the film, but it often isn't. But when something is forced in to pander to "the audience" then I get pissed, and I'm said audience! Rom-coms are the most painful example of this in many cases, the endings ringing false or in many cases straight-up objectionable. Assholes ending up together is not a happy ending! Someday I want to see the rom-com where the despicable protagonists end up alone, because that's what half of them deserve (bitter much?). Source Code was another one where studio interference and test audiences interfered negatively. Listen: whoever this audience is, they're not worth listening to, because they are idiots.

Deus Ex Machina. I loved True Grit and Toy Story 3, for example, but there were one too many convenient escapes at the end. Didn't ruin either film by any stretch (and they nailed an emotional conclusion in both cases) but it's a common problem. Of course, this is the problem with all forms of narrative, so you can't really pick on film alone.

Stealth transport. My pet peeve in cinema, and I can predict it a mile off at this point. You know, the framing is slightly off and then BOOM, bus/car whatever. It may have been shocking the first time, but after seeing it in a ludicrous amount of films (including otherwise fantastic ones, including one by the Coen Brothers) it's annoying. They need to come up with more inventive ways of 'surprise' dispatching characters.

jaykhunter

Anything than more than one shot of a close-up with a wide-angle lens. It's like the laziest, most base attempt at being 'arty'.

Wanna have someone be more menacing? Wide-angle lens! Wanna seem like you're doing some revolutionary filmmaking? Wide-angle lens!

Also, the 'need' today to have twists in films. I'm fine with revelations (see : Fight Club) but twists for the sake of it are unecessary. How about a good story instead!

krudler

Stealth transport. My pet peeve in cinema, and I can predict it a mile off at this point. You know, the framing is slightly off and then BOOM, bus/car whatever. It may have been shocking the first time, but after seeing it in a ludicrous amount of films (including otherwise fantastic ones, including one by the Coen Brothers) it's annoying. They need to come up with more inventive ways of 'surprise' dispatching characters.

one of mine too, that people arent aware of their surroundings outside of the frame of the shot, it makes no ****ing sense! like you wouldnt hear a BUS about to plough into you.

krudler

makey uppy computer programs, or phones that have some kind of software that would rival a supercomputer in real life, retina scanners on a phone? really? why does nobody use windows in movies?

e_e

Sloppy romantic subplots, where they seem arbitrarily inserted in order to please a certain demographic instead of flowing naturally out of the story.

To be honest I didn't even realize that I liked romantic films until watching stuff like Annie Hall, Manhattan, Chungking Express, Punch Drunk Love and Whisper of the Heart.

Royale with Cheese

Endings that are open to interpretation. Overused and there's nothing clever about it.

syklops

krudler wrote: »

makey uppy computer programs, or phones that have some kind of software that would rival a supercomputer in real life, retina scanners on a phone? really? why does nobody use windows in movies?

Yeah, but if you didn't have makey-uppy brands in movies, otherwise you would have people on complaining about product placement in films.

As for super-computer abilities on cell phones, its probably to age-proof the film. In "The world is not Enough" James Bond figured out the route to take using a Sat-Nav. When the movie was released, that was cutting edge tech. I have that technology on my phone now.

krudler

syklops wrote: »

Yeah, but if you didn't have makey-uppy brands in movies, otherwise you would have people on complaining about product placement in films.

As for super-computer abilities on cell phones, its probably to age-proof the film. In "The world is not Enough" James Bond figured out the route to take using a Sat-Nav. When the movie was released, that was cutting edge tech. I have that technology on my phone now.

well ok thats a good point about the future proofing, but I guarantee you nobody will ever hook a macbook up to an alien mothership :pac:

syklops

krudler wrote: »

well ok thats a good point about the future proofing, but I guarantee you nobody will ever hook a macbook up to an alien mothership :pac:

We''ll have to wait and see.

Galvasean

krudler wrote: »

makey uppy computer programs, or phones that have some kind of software that would rival a supercomputer in real life, retina scanners on a phone? really? why does nobody use windows in movies?

I've seen it in a few movies and TV shows (prominent example: Enemy of the state) where they were able to rotate the image from CCTV footage as if it were a complete 3D rendering to get a view from another angle.
The mind, she boggles!

Magic Eight Ball

abouttobebanned wrote: »

I hate the sound of the "movie punch". When will they realise that the sound of a real punch just sounds more painful than the "rocky" punch?

Check out the final fight between Batman & Joker from Tim Burton's '89 Batman.
It's hands down one of the worst offenders for 'movie punches'.

Magic Eight Ball

Royale with Cheese wrote: »

Endings that are open to interpretation. Overused and there's nothing clever about it.

You prefer everything to be tied up in a neat little package?

minotour

Few things....

Hollywoods ongoing war on:

• New York City - Destroyed countlesss times, in countless ways
  
• Happy Families - Why must every hero be divorced? Married men can be heros too

Hollywoods ongoing promotion of:

• Nerds/Hackers - guys who can "crack" any system, War Games being the exception.
  
• School/College Jock types - it cant really be this way in the US can it? the closest we had was the GAA lads but they were an alright bunch, certainly werent bullies. If it is even half as bad as depicted its no wonder the US is falling on bad times.

Steamer

The "free spirited girl" who is like no one he has ever met! Never wants commitment etc blah blah blah. Just annoying!

murphym7

Movies about children being looked after by a father/Uncle/Mother/Sister they have never met before because their real mother is in Prison/Hospital/Dead.

Same story told a million times - will inevtiably be a heart warming story of self discovery by the father/Uncle/Mother/Sister. Blah blah blah

Same goes for Movies about sporting teams - will inevtiably be a heart warming story of self discovery by the team/Coach/supporters. Blah blah blah

Galvasean

I know it's a bit of a dead horse at this point but.... 'in 3D'!!!! :mad:
Had no idea Thor was going to be in 3D 'til I saw the trailer in the cinema. Sounds like another botched Clash of the Titans esque added in post rush job. EVERYTHING seems to be in 3D now from kids animation (much as I loved Toy Story 3 the 3D added absolutely nothing to proceedings) to heart warming stories with no action set pieces...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DO8Hk8zwYVw

I mean seriously, did that really NEED bolted on 3D effects?

pickarooney

The lack of three-dimensionality in the majority of female characters.

Royale with Cheese

Magic Eight Ball wrote: »

You prefer everything to be tied up in a neat little package?

Lol, you couldn't be more predictable.

Like I said in my original post. There is nothing clever about it. And that's what you're getting at there is it not? I want a definitive ending and therefore am stupid. I wouldn't mind if it wasn't used all the time. It's a cop out.

krudler

Galvasean wrote: »

I've seen it in a few movies and TV shows (prominent example: Enemy of the state) where they were able to rotate the image from CCTV footage as if it were a complete 3D rendering to get a view from another angle.
The mind, she boggles!

Ha yeah, or like on CSI where they have sh1tty CCTV footage of a number plate and they can zoom in and push ENHANCE and the previously unreadable number plate is now in 1080p HD and possibly 3D. if you zoom in on a sh1tty quality image, it gets worse!

Miguel_Sanchez

krudler wrote: »

makey uppy computer programs, or phones that have some kind of software that would rival a supercomputer in real life, retina scanners on a phone? really? why does nobody use windows in movies?

Galvasean wrote: »

I've seen it in a few movies and TV shows (prominent example: Enemy of the state) where they were able to rotate the image from CCTV footage as if it were a complete 3D rendering to get a view from another angle.
The mind, she boggles!

krudler wrote: »

Ha yeah, or like on CSI where they have sh1tty CCTV footage of a number plate and they can zoom in and push ENHANCE and the previously unreadable number plate is now in 1080p HD and possibly 3D. if you zoom in on a sh1tty quality image, it gets worse!

ENHANCE!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vxq9yj2pVWk

Sad Professor

Royale with Cheese wrote: »

Endings that are open to interpretation. Overused and there's nothing clever about it.

Can you give examples?

Nolanger

Why do they remake good films? Why can't they pick some interesting but bad movie and improve it?

FortuneChip

Nolanger wrote: »

Why do they remake good films? Why can't they pick some interesting but bad movie and improve it?

Agreed, the lazy approach, "Well, it worked the first time..."

I hate the slow motion save-the-dog scenes in movies as well. I've never had a pet, but still even if I did, I don't think I'd always be willing to the dog to survive whilst seeing hundreds of people dying around it. 2012 and Indendence Day both had the scenes, I think there may have even been a thread about it.

Maglight

American films have a strong moralistic vein that can best be summed up in the Dammed versus Saved dilemma.

If the main character is dodgy he/she has to recognise the error of their ways and try to make things good before the midway point in the film. If they wait until the second half of the film to repent, they can only redeem themselves by dying to save someone else.

There is no element of surprise in American films because the ending is pre-determined by the behaviour of the main character in the middle of the film.

Nolanger

I hate the way people only watch newer movies. Then when a Western or musical comes along everyone thinks it's great because they haven't seen the older titles which are usually far better.

johnny_ultimate

Nolanger wrote: »

I hate the way people only watch newer movies. Then when a Western or musical comes along everyone thinks it's great because they haven't seen the older titles which are usually far better.

Worse are those people who disregard everything new and only watch old films out of some misguided elitism.

We know you don't like new films. We get it. Stop dragging threads off topic with it.

Goldstein

FortuneChip wrote: »

Agreed, the lazy approach, "Well, it worked the first time..."

I hate the slow motion save-the-dog scenes in movies as well. I've never had a pet, but still even if I did, I don't think I'd always be willing to the dog to survive whilst seeing hundreds of people dying around it. 2012 and Indendence Day both had the scenes, I think there may have even been a thread about it.

That reminds me

Thermonuclear explosion-proof labradors:

A massive explosion wipes out the core of a city, with enough force to obliterate everything in a distant tunnel in an inferno of flame, but it can't manage to figure out how to go left.


As Johnny mentioned earlier, leaving conspicuous negative space in a shot which is obviously just about to be filled by something "startling". God that drives me nuts. You know, the car scene that shows just a little bit too much of empty window for no reason. Star Trek were murder for this years ago - you could always tell someone was about to beam in from the shot composition.

When people, especially women, kick in doors with ease. It's not that easy to do.

In many scenes where people have to be quiet to evade detection, there will be a dog/baby that makes noise or sneezes a nanosecond before they're in the clear.

Lens Flare added in post production.

Humanoid aliens.

Lost syndrome:
Bombarding people with so much information and crap on the screen to the point where the vast majority of viewers become so mentally saturated by it they actually forget that none of it, none of it, makes any sense. (New Star Trek movie / Terminator Salvation / Star Wars I-III / Transformers etc)

Nolanger

Hate the way a character says an unusual word he then goes on to explain it e.g. "he's a Jacobite and supports the political movement for the return of the Stuart Kings to the throne".
Or when Jim Carrey does a spoof scene from Midnight Express and then says that's it's from that movie!

SVG

I wish so many films of the past few years weren't so teal/orange. I can see why it's used but it's so overdone at this stage, I hope it goes out of fashion soon. It's an easy way to tell if something on the Guess the Screenshot thread is recent but otherwise I'm sick of it- sometimes I want to see other colours!



I also hate badly photoshopped movie posters- either get the actors together for a photoshoot or hire a competent designer!

Sad Professor

Nolanger wrote: »

Hate the way a character says an unusual word he then goes on to explain it e.g. "he's a Jacobite and supports the political movement for the return of the Stuart Kings to the throne".
Or when Jim Carrey does a spoof scene from Midnight Express and then says that's it's from that movie!

In Cable Guy? It's years since I've seen it but does he actually mention Midnight Express?

SVG wrote: »

I also hate badly photoshopped movie posters- either get the actors together for a photshoot or hire a competent designer!

+100

Exhibit A:



There's so much wrong with this poster I don't know where to begin. The images of the actors look like they were taken from pictures taken during costume tests. I mean they probably spent north of 60 million on this film and the poster looks like it was thrown together in Photoshop the night before.

Nolanger

Sad Professor wrote: »

In Cable Guy? It's years since I've seen it but does he actually mention Midnight Express?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAvnY5Uwd6A

Sad Professor

Yeah, you're right. There was no need for him to say it. It kinda ruins the joke. Still a great scene though.

I need to watch that film again.