Lazy cliches and plot contrivances

conorhal wrote: »

I can't remember the number of essay's I used to write in English class in primary school that ended with the line "...and then I woke up, and it was all a dream!"

You sir, are (were) my Nemesis! I used to hate stories ending like that in primary school... What was the point of the story then? Also possibly because as a kid I would have dreams of my own and be disappointed to wake up.

But it can work well if done well (e.g. Futurama episode ).
The worst is when they get into a situation that seems ungetoutable and you can't wait for the brilliant bit of skillful plot-making that will resolve the situation, when they wake up and it was all a dream. I was really pissed off to find this in the otherwise brilliant episode of Star Trek: DS9, .

The last split-second rescue
This is the other cliché ending I hate, and can't believe it's still being used.

Our hero is put in a very compromising position. The villain has a gun to his head, we can see the finger squeezing on the trigger, oh no, how will he get out of this one, and... BANG!
The villain falls over dead as the camera pans out to reveal the bang actually came from the hero's side-kick who had just arrived on time to shoot the villain.

This is just awful. I couldn't believe it was being used in 24, it made me stop watching it as it marked its "jumping the shark" for me, but even worse in the X-Files which is supposed to be a serious movie. (OK not with a gun, but the point still stands).

The thing is, if we really are to fear for our hero's life, and feel the joy when he gets out of it, we want to see some brilliance in getting out, not the same scene we've seen in movie after movie. We're hardly going to get emotionally involved if we know "The bullet's still in the air, there's still time for a 'surprise' rescue by his friend/sidekick".

Variations include the villain being distracted by a loud noise or {hand-to-face} trying to catch something the hero throws to him! for long enough for the good-guy to bat the gun out of his hand...

It's distant cousin is the gun tussle where there is a struggle for control of the gun between the hero and the villain, and we can't see the gun, but we hear the bang... The suspense of who got killed? Except there's no suspense, we've seen this a hundred times before, of course it's the villain who's dead.

The comedy cliché I really hate is the Out-of-context Reference, and is used wayyyy too much in parody-comedies like "Scary Movie", "Meet the Spartans", etc., and is just not funny. It's when they take a reference to something (like another, more serious movie) and put it in a situation which is completely out of the original intended context. Like a film set in medieval times might have a reference to a modern ad you see on telly or something. And that's it. That's the joke. Off the top of my head I'm thinking of the African guy in "Robin Hood: Men In Tights" who talks like a modern-day African American and even has a pair of pump-up runners which were popular at the time the movie was made.

One cliché I don't mind actually, in fact it's a cliché to complain about it, is when in a horror film, the character goes to investigate the noise.
They don't know they are in a horror film!

Only the most jumpy people I know would freak out or run out of the house (as many an audience member would advise) if they heard a strange noise. Usually the cat knocked something over or the wind blew something over or it's the pipes shuddering with the hot water or something. Very rarely is it a burglar, let alone an a superpowerful immortal shatner-mask-wearing serial killer...

paddyirishman85 wrote: »

What I like to call the 'Q effect'. During the film (most likely action), the character is given something. Later in the film, the character ends up in a situation that seems possible to escape from. Luckily, that object they were given is the exact object they need to escape or perform some task.

Every James bond film before Daniel Craig, Bond would be given probably about 3 gadgets. And during the film, those EXACT gadgets are the gadgets he'd need to escape. Same with some other films.

It's called Checkov's Rifle. It's a technique which helps trip the fat from a story. In fact, most of the clichés listed in this thread have been used to brilliant effect in great films. That's the thing about writing: there are only so many stories; originality is in execution.

LittleBook wrote: »

That entire film is a how-not-to on screenwriting :pac:

...

Donald Kaufman: I'm putting in a chase sequence. So the killer flees on horseback with the girl, the cop's after them on a motorcycle and it's like a battle between motors and horses, like technology vs. horse.

Charlie Kaufman: And they're still all one person, right?

Brilliantly sent up in . Well, maybe not.

Adding to the "Car won't start" cliche, the "No signal" cliche.
took advantage of pretty much every cliche in the book.

The movie still freaked the crap out of me though

The new young police officer/old police officer about to retire who just have to go out on this dangerous patrol with the main characters and get shot and killed.

The young police officer shouldn't be taken out on a dangerous patrol like that as they are not experienced enough.

The old about to retire cop shouldn't be go out on a dangerous patrol like that simply because when asked to go out they would realistically say "No way, I'm retiring in two days"


Also, the "I've just been fatally wounded but just have enough time to reveal a secret to you which would have greatly helped you ages ago and I'm going to die right when I have finished telling it to you"

How to survive a war: DONT show the other guys pics of your pregnant wife, or have a half written love letter, or talk about going to work on your dads mill once you get done fightin', instant death right there, you wont make it out of the boat.

Killinator wrote: »

Add to this that nobody, NOBODY in movies or TV ever need to use a mouse!!!

Actually, a friend of mine worked for an investment bank. First day of computer training, they unplugged the mouse. Keystrokes are significantly faster for almost all operations.

-Characters who've used guns for a long period of time flinch when firing them. It's the actors not used to the bang but still.

-Dialogue obviously planted for the audience between characters who would already know if it was a real conversation.

It's worse when it's two family members: "As you know, your father, the king..."

Foreigners' "As you say in your country"s aswell.

paddyirishman85 wrote: »

Or sports films. Only 10 seconds left on the clock.... Down by one goal/point.... Let's pass it to the worst guy on the team because nobody will think we'd be stupid enough to do that and let's just pray he doesn't mess up, because even though he tries hard and loves the sport, he's just really bad at it. Which doesn't say a lot for us because we must suck if he managed to get on the team in the first place

Actually that's happened to me without the sport love. And no they didn't carry me on their shoulders after. :mad:

bnt wrote: »

it annoys me when Hollywood does the lose the glasses bit.

Not really a cliche, but it has become increasingly annoying the number of shows and films that have people wearing glasses with no fracking lenses in them. Maybe they are shooting against a green screen or something, and don't want to pay to filter the green reflection on the lenses but it is blatantly obvious to me and pulls me right out of the experience.

LittleBook wrote: »

Donald Kaufman: I'm putting in a chase sequence. So the killer flees on horseback with the girl, the cop's after them on a motorcycle and it's like a battle between motors and horses, like technology vs. horse.

Reminds me of this scene from Vanilla Ice's film "Cool as ice". It fits firmly in the "so bad it's good" category.



In regards to cliche's

The Bipolar disorder of electronic switches:

It seems that, depending on what the protagonist desires, an electronic switch will catastrophically fail in 1 of 2 ways.

If they want a door to open, merely shooting the switch/pulling out a rats nest of wires from behind it/hitting it with a makeshift hammer will achieve this goal.

If they want the door to stay closed, committing the same actions will also achieve this goal.

The only aspect that seems to change is what the protagonist wants to happen.

Nobody knows how to use a straight razor:

If a character in a show is using a straight razor, they will invariably cut themselves with it.

Deleted User wrote: »

This applies to movies and TV -

A couple is lying in a bed, supposedly naked. Next thing the phone rings/one of them remembers something, and they jump out of bed pulling on just pants - apparently nobody wears underwear.

Or the fact they've just had sex, usually on the first night they've met, probably had sex numerous times, and are lying just barely covered by the bedclothes. But when the girl gets up, she has to take the entire sheet off the bed and wrap herself in it so as not to show any flesh apart from her shoulders and walk 6ft to get her skimpy clothes which show off more than the bedsheet anyway