Things you're tired of seeing in movies

[somerset fox]

I like how indexing your finger on a gun is now very common in Hollywood, so much so to the point where someone is holding a gun and threatening someone with it still has their finger off of the trigger. It's really bad when they're doing it with pistol either at point blank range or practically right up against someone's head.

I might have mentioned this before, but it takes me right out of a scene whenever I see indexing in older set movies, filmed recently. To see the finger placement on a WW2 rifle just looks wrong. Yes, modern weap discipline, but surely they ought to let it drop for period films.

 

[Strikerkc]

Any level of common sense in horror movies would be great really...

That's one of the main reasons I consider Alien the best Horror movie of all time.
1. Why don't you leave the haunted mansion you're in? - Because the cold vacuum of space.
2. Why don't you shoot the Monster? - Because we're a long haul mining ship, in a world where NO alien life has ever been found, and space piracy is near impossible. All we have are tools. Also there's a robot onboard that can pacify a crazy crew member if need be.
3. Why did you split up and go different places? - Because it's a ship, and that ship needs regular maintenance done by all hands, or else cold vacuum of space (see #1). If a person wasn't needed on the ship for maintenance, they wouldn't be on the ship. There are no "extra" people
4. Why don't you beat the monster up? - 10 feet tall, armored, acid blood. No.
5. Why did the one guy look at the egg? - Because occasionally people do silly stuff, and also, we've never seen animals that come right out of an egg in a mood to try and eat your soul.

They applied common sense in most every instance, and it still went badly.

 

[BTTUK]

The changing of history always gets my back up. I don't just mean small changes, but great big uncalled for ones.

Best example I can think of right now is U-571. I get the desire to appeal to certain audiences, but to completely revise and distort the history, just riles me up at times.

 

[Strikerkc]

... U-571 ...

What did U-571 do? I haven't seen it, but I've also never heard any of the folks who had say it changed stuff up. Was it based on real events, and they dramatized those to be different or something?

 

[PumpkinKing]

Another one I just thought of, which may have already been said, is hearing damage. Being a walking dead fan, I can’t count the number of times they have been in gunfights in small confined spaces, firing dozens of pistol and rifle rounds and never one mention of their ears or hearing loss. Every character on that show would be deaf or just about.

 

[BTTUK]

What did U-571 do? I haven't seen it, but I've also never heard any of the folks who had say it changed stuff up. Was it based on real events, and they dramatized those to be different or something?

It is a story very heavily based on the real life Operation Primrose. However instead of even trying to tell the story accurately in any way, it just distorted facts for no real reason I could fathom. Even using the designation U-571 was historically inaccurate.

To many it just struck them as another sort of "America saves the day" type of film, that ignored reality for no reason, when the real stories of those missions, told accurately would still have been fantastic to see on screen. Even the screen-writer said he regrets how the plot distorts the history so much.

 

[Riceball]

YES! That one irks me, too. People WAAAY too young for their ranks.

Or just as, if not more common, people too old for their rank. Case in point are Battle LA, Heart Break Ridge, and Full Metal Jacket where you have Aaron Eckhart playing what would be an ancient SSgt and in the other two movies, two very old Gunnys.

 

[Zombie_61]

The changing of history always gets my back up. I don't just mean small changes, but great big uncalled for ones.

Best example I can think of right now is U-571. I get the desire to appeal to certain audiences, but to completely revise and distort the history, just riles me up at times...It is a story very heavily based on the real life Operation Primrose. However instead of even trying to tell the story accurately in any way, it just distorted facts for no real reason I could fathom. Even using the designation U-571 was historically inaccurate.

To many it just struck them as another sort of "America saves the day" type of film, that ignored reality for no reason, when the real stories of those missions, told accurately would still have been fantastic to see on screen. Even the screen-writer said he regrets how the plot distorts the history so much.

I used to be the same way. If you want historical accuracy, read the top 10 to 20 books written about the subject. Take note of the parts of the story that are told the same in most (or all) of the books, and about half of that probably happened the way the writers say it did.

Regardless of how they market them, movies are for entertainment; nothing more. And quite often the "real" story, no matter how fascinating, doesn't quite suit the filmmakers purposes. Back in the late 1990s James Cameron's fascination with the Titanic's demise led him to make a movie about it. Over 1,500 people died when the ship sank in the north Atlantic on April 15th, 1912, but that wasn't dramatic enough for Cameron--he had to add fictional characters and a fictional story in order to get more women to buy tickets.

 

[DARTH ANIBAL]

Or just as, if not more common, people too old for their rank. Case in point are Battle LA, Heart Break Ridge, and Full Metal Jacket where you have Aaron Eckhart playing what would be an ancient SSgt and in the other two movies, two very old Gunnys.

I've seen some dusty, grizzled, old Sgts in my day, so that one bothers me less. It's just more realistic than seeing some babyfaced General, and doesn't immediately snap me out of the immersion.

 

[BTTUK]

I used to be the same way. If you want historical accuracy, read the top 10 to 20 books written about the subject. Take note of the parts of the story that are told the same in most (or all) of the books, and about half of that probably happened the way the writers say it did.

Regardless of how they market them, movies are for entertainment; nothing more. And quite often the "real" story, no matter how fascinating, doesn't quite suit the filmmakers purposes. Back in the late 1990s James Cameron's fascination with the Titanic's demise led him to make a movie about it. Over 1,500 people died when the ship sank in the north Atlantic on April 15th, 1912, but that wasn't dramatic enough for Cameron--he had to add fictional characters and a fictional story in order to get more women to buy tickets.

Yes I understand.
Making it more accurate by having it use the actual story facts like the name of the actual U-boat. The actual crew being British on a Royal Navy vessel. The dates being correct and actually following the history, wouldn't harm the entertainment value of U-571 as a film.

I'm not suggesting every film based on historical events, need to be correct down to the tiniest detail. Just that revising history in the way that my example film did, and to the extent it did was completely unnecessary, and bothered me.

 

[robn1]

Back in the late 1990s James Cameron's fascination with the Titanic's demise led him to make a movie about it. Over 1,500 people died when the ship sank in the north Atlantic on April 15th, 1912, but that wasn't dramatic enough for Cameron--he had to add fictional characters and a fictional story in order to get more women to buy tickets.

A movie about real events still have to focus on people, but if there isn't enough known about the real people involved you pretty much have to create fictional characters. And it's not uncommon, especially in war movies.

 

[Cephus]

Yeah, I'm not personally a fan of the genre. I think Scream is the last movie I watched that would qualify as such, and even with that what I most enjoyed about it was the intentional riff on all the common tropes.

I'm a fan of old-school slashers, but they don't make those anymore. Today, it's all gore-fests with stupid characters. No thanks.

 

[PumpkinKing]

I'm a fan of old-school slashers, but they don't make those anymore. Today, it's all gore-fests with stupid characters. No thanks.

What do you think about the remakes of old school slashers? Halloween (2018) Leatherface (2017) etc.

 

[Cephus]

What do you think about the remakes of old school slashers? Halloween (2018) Leatherface (2017) etc.

I don't generally pay much attention. The old ones had tons of atmosphere, new movies generally don't. It's a lot of jump scares and not a lot of foreboding dread.

 

[PumpkinKing]

I don't generally pay much attention. The old ones had tons of atmosphere, new movies generally don't. It's a lot of jump scares and not a lot of foreboding dread.

I think that is the biggest difference between today’s horror and decades past. Like the atmosphere of the original IT and the general cookie cutter nature of the remakes

 

[AJK001]

I don't generally pay much attention. The old ones had tons of atmosphere, new movies generally don't. It's a lot of jump scares and not a lot of foreboding dread.

That is why I loved the original Thing with James Arness as the monters. You saw him for a couple of minutes, at most, and then never got a good look at him. The terror in the movie was mainly supplied by the viewers own mind and didn't require a ton of blood and gore. I also loved Them with the giant ants from around the same time for the same reason. Both of these movies scared the hell out of me when I first saw them as a young kid back in the early 70's.

 

[Richard Baker]

What really impressed me in the original film 'Halloween' was one simple scene. There was one shot of the old dusty station wagon (I think an LTDWagon) parked on a neighberhood street with some kids playing nearby. This was a very typical scene repeated across the country every day, but the way it was filmed and presented created an enormous feeling of dread and foreboding.
Things like this elevate a film above the others- making something so common into something far greater

 

[Cephus]

That is why I loved the original Thing with James Arness as the monters. You saw him for a couple of minutes, at most, and then never got a good look at him. The terror in the movie was mainly supplied by the viewers own mind and didn't require a ton of blood and gore. I also loved Them with the giant ants from around the same time for the same reason. Both of these movies scared the hell out of me when I first saw them as a young kid back in the early 70's.

It's one of the things that I don't think most people pay attention to, but movies are inherently a product of their time. Star Wars was a product of the late 70s/early 80s. It was the way they wrote, the way they made movies, the way they did the cinematography and the effects, all came together to make Star Wars what it was. And unfortunately, they don't make movies like that anymore. So when Lucas came back in the late 90s with his prequels, it wouldn't have mattered what he did, unless he purposely created an anachronism, it wouldn't have been Star Wars. Granted, the poor quality of the scripts didn't help, but he couldn't have done better because he was paddling the canoe up stream against a torrential tide. The same was true of Crystal Skull. Indiana Jones had a particular feel and tone and look that simply couldn't be replicated 20 years later. Terrible movie aside, it never had a chance to be Indy. You can't recapture that magic in a bottle.

That's not to say that modern movies are going to be terrible, but they need to be part of their own time. They need to create their own identity based in today. In another 20 years, they will be impossible to replicate as well. If someone liked the 2018 Halloween and identifies that as the quintessential Halloween movie, then anything they make in another decade or two simply won't be Halloween to that person. It can't be. They won't make movies like that anymore. It's why all of these reboots and reimaginings need to stop. You can't compete with the original. You just can't.

 

[AJK001]

It's one of the things that I don't think most people pay attention to, but movies are inherently a product of their time. Star Wars was a product of the late 70s/early 80s. It was the way they wrote, the way they made movies, the way they did the cinematography and the effects, all came together to make Star Wars what it was. And unfortunately, they don't make movies like that anymore. So when Lucas came back in the late 90s with his prequels, it wouldn't have mattered what he did, unless he purposely created an anachronism, it wouldn't have been Star Wars. Granted, the poor quality of the scripts didn't help, but he couldn't have done better because he was paddling the canoe up stream against a torrential tide. The same was true of Crystal Skull. Indiana Jones had a particular feel and tone and look that simply couldn't be replicated 20 years later. Terrible movie aside, it never had a chance to be Indy. You can't recapture that magic in a bottle.

That's not to say that modern movies are going to be terrible, but they need to be part of their own time. They need to create their own identity based in today. In another 20 years, they will be impossible to replicate as well. If someone liked the 2018 Halloween and identifies that as the quintessential Halloween movie, then anything they make in another decade or two simply won't be Halloween to that person. It can't be. They won't make movies like that anymore. It's why all of these reboots and reimaginings need to stop. You can't compete with the original. You just can't.

I once heard a quote from someone saying that you could tell within a decade or so when a movie was made because of the style of the movie. No matter what era the movie is supposed to take place in you will always see attitudes, clothing and hair styles of the period it was made in. If you have ever watched a Roman epic from the 1950's you will notice that most of the actresses are wearing bra's, usually bullet bras, that did not exist in that time but that most actresses from the era would never go without, at least American ones. That is also why Carrie Fisher was bouncing all over the place in the original Star Wars, according to her George told her they didn't have underwear. Sticking with Star Wars you know it is a product of the 1970's-1980's from the hair styles of Mark and Harrison.

 

[CT1138]

I don't generally pay much attention. The old ones had tons of atmosphere, new movies generally don't. It's a lot of jump scares and not a lot of foreboding dread.

I think it also has to do with changing audience tastes. In 1931, Dracula got away with slow sweeping scenes, and bats on strings, because it was new and audiences hadn't seen it before. It was scary simply because it was unfamiliar. In 1973, The Exorcist, again, got away with long sweeping scenes, and little gore because it was a subject that Hollywood had previously been either unwilling, or actually prevented from touching due to the Hays Codes. It was not until this time period that movies like Rosemary's Baby (in 1968) and The Exorcist were able to get away with the subject of demonic possession and Satanism as a theme for horror. For one, the extremely pro-Catholic attitude that Joseph Breen brought to the application of the Hays Codes made deriding Christianity, either satirically, literally, or even by just the discussion of Satanic ritual rendered movies like Rosemary's Baby and The Exorcist completely unmakeable within Hollywood. In the 1980s, when slasher flicks became popular, it was just downhill from there. Once you introduced blood to the equation, the only way to go to satisfy the audience was with more, more, more, until you devolved into completely unnecessary gorefests that lack any kind of subtlety or intrigue like what we get today.

Sticking with Star Wars you know it is a product of the 1970's-1980's from the hair styles of Mark and Harrison.

Out of the original trilogy, Empire seems to be the least dated from a production design standpoint. The use of shined sets and costumes for the Empire contrasting against the Rebellion's makeshift looking hideout in the middle of a frozen wasteland was a very modern look for the movie. All of the sets and costumes for Empire were modern, really. Star Wars '77 had an extremely 70s spaceship look. Just looking at any of the computer terminals on the Death Star: the sparse use of knobs and switches and random flashing lights on flat, painted panels was a very popular look for that era. You saw it in Star Trek, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Lost in Space, etc. Those are all '60s era, but they all had that same look. And this isn't even getting into the massive sideburns present at the Death Star roundtable, and any of the other officers on the Death Star.

RotJ, too, had a very "early 80s" look. Not just in the production design, but in the way that it was filmed. The film stock itself looked very 80s. It's not polished and clean like Empire's was, or even as much as Star Wars was. It's got this grit to it. But as far as production design went, the thing that struck me as the most early 80s in the look of the movie was Luke's tunic that manages to pop open during the finale - as the same exact thing happened to Kirk's tunic in Wrath of Khan during its respective finale. And, in fact, many spacefaring science fiction flicks of this time period used tunics that, for some reason or another, would always seem to pop open.