Movie scenes you find personally offensive or irritating.

[Soviet Heavy]

Kevin Smith has never been a politically correct filmmaker. That's not to say he hasn't made some good films, just that you don't go into them expecting the guy to be clean cut and not raunchy.

That being said...

I watched Chasing Amy recently. It's definitely one of his better films, and it doesn't pull punches when it shows how relationships can go ugly incredibly fast. Overall, I really enjoyed the film, except for one scene, which I found absolutely disgusting.

For those of you who haven't seen the film, it's about a guy who develops a romantic relationship with a lesbian. There's one scene in the film where the girl is hanging out with all her lesbian friends, and she quietly brings up that she's dating the male lead. Suddenly, her friends basically turn ice cold to her, and pretty much cut her out of their circle. The scene is never brought up again save for one passing comment.

That scene pissed me off to no end. Without further context in the film, it just comes off as incredibly rude and inconsiderate to gay people, as if they are only allowed to be friends with other gay folk. The group of friends never really show up again, and the implication was that they all abandoned her after she decided to go back to dating men (she was revealed to actually be bisexual later in the film).

For a film that tried to show both the pros and cons of relationships and sexuality, that one scene stuck out as really rude, reinforcing all the negative stereotypes applied with gay people, and I hate watching it.

Any films that leave you similarly disgusted?

EDIT. Since I'm too lazy to respond to everybody yelling at me for looking too deeply into things, I'll put this here: I get it, okay? I know that assholes like the ones I described above exist in real life. That doesn't mean I don't find the scene really rude and insensitive, or that I'm trying to impose my views on anyone because I disagree with a particular scene in a movie. It's just one scene that ticks me off because it strikes a little too close to home with my ideals regarding friendship and trust.

Now can you please read that and move on before feeling the urge to quote me and tell me how wrong my opinion is?

 

[shogunblade]

The Creep factor of This means War, in which two spies (One being a Chris Pinewood Board and the other being Tom Hardy) vie for the affections of Reese Witherspoon. Of course, the whole movie could have been fun, but it ends up being rather... voyeuristic and uncomfortable, when you start to think about it. The two spies, with spying being their profession, decide to bug and wire cameras around her house.

I must add that Pine and Hardy are supposed to be the heroes of this story... one of which Witherspoon is supposed to end up with. The movie left me uncomfortable for the most part, because I couldn't get over that stalking equals love. I think that is something that bothers me more than anything else.

 

[dyre]

I don't usually get offended by movies, but there's a part of The Lone Ranger I found oddly distasteful (yes, I'm talking about the stupid Disney comedy). It wasn't even all that offensive; it just struck me as poor taste.

There's this one scene in which a Native American tribe attacks a railroad guarded by the US cavalry and gets slaughtered to the last man. The context of the scene is that by then most of the Native Americans had already been displaced or wiped out thanks to the Westward expansion and the tribe has adopted a somewhat fatalistic "this is the end for our people" attitude. So they perform one last attack to rescue the protagonists (who are being held at the railroad by the bad guys) and get killed, with the last guy dying being the elderly chief getting run through by the cavalry commander's saber. The scene is filmed in imitation of The Last Samurai with that "hopeless last charge" sort of feeling.

What struck me as distasteful was that immediately after that tribe gets slaughtered, the film reverts straight back to being a comedy and makes some dumb joke about a horse climbing a tree (the horse doing stupid stuff is a recurring joke in the film). It's hard to explain and doesn't sound very offensive on paper, but when actually watching the film the juxtaposition of the old chieftan and his tribe getting slaughtered followed immediately by the film's stupid jokes left a sour taste in my mouth.

 

[Queen Michael]

For those of you who haven't seen the film, it's about a guy who develops a romantic relationship with a lesbian. There's one scene in the film where the girl is hanging out with all her lesbian friends, and she quietly brings up that she's dating the male lead. Suddenly, her friends basically turn ice cold to her, and pretty much cut her out of their circle. The scene is never brought up again save for one passing comment.

Well, in his defense it must be must be mentioned that this is a thing that does happen. There are cases where a circle of lesbian friends get upset because one of them went bi. Not saying it's common, not saying it's okay, just saying that it does happen. Not Kevin Smith's fault.

Sure, it's not representative of the lesbian community as a whole. No movie can be. But that is a thing that happens. That it's unflattering doesn't mean it's not a truthful picture of something that really happens.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Broadly speaking I usually find it shockingly (yet surreptitiously) offensive whenever an outsider - typically the straight, white, male lead - becomes the savior of an "underpowered" culture. Dances with Wolves, The Last Samurai, Avatar... I think Avatar is probably the biggest offender, since the character ends up literally donning said culture's race in order to save it. Apparently white guys make the best blue guys. Adding insult to injury, it sees Native American garb is producers' go-to solution for wardrobe when creating a technologically primitive yet spiritually sensitive race of aliens. Riiiiiiiiiight.

 

[Erttheking]

Can I just say every last scene in the Wicker Man (New version) and call it a day? I say all of them because alone they're not that bad (In fact they're more funny than anything else) but when they all get put together...it becomes kind of a misogynistic mess.

 

[Soviet Heavy]

For those of you who haven't seen the film, it's about a guy who develops a romantic relationship with a lesbian. There's one scene in the film where the girl is hanging out with all her lesbian friends, and she quietly brings up that she's dating the male lead. Suddenly, her friends basically turn ice cold to her, and pretty much cut her out of their circle. The scene is never brought up again save for one passing comment.

Well, in his defense it must be must be mentioned that this is a thing that does happen. There are cases where a circle of lesbian friends get upset because one of them went bi. Not saying it's common, not saying it's okay, just saying that it does happen. Not Kevin Smith's fault.

Sure, it's not representative of the lesbian community as a whole. No movie can be. But that is a thing that happens. That it's unflattering doesn't mean it's not a truthful picture of something that really happens.

My annoyance stems from the fact that up until that point, Kevin Smith had been very fair in his representations of both genders. To have one of the girl's friends just outright declare "another one bites the dust" really pissed me off.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Broadly speaking I usually find it shockingly (yet surreptitiously) offensive whenever an outsider - typically the straight, white, male lead - becomes the savior of an "underpowered" culture. Dances with Wolves, The Last Samurai, Avatar... I think Avatar is probably the biggest offender, since the character ends up literally donning said culture's race in order to save it. Apparently white guys make the best blue guys. Adding insult to injury, it sees Native American garb is producers' go-to solution for wardrobe when creating a technologically primitive yet spiritually sensitive race of aliens. Riiiiiiiiiight.

I would agree with you, except that in Avatar the wardrobe of the "primitive aliens" was less Native American, and more-so African or Aboriginal in nature.

Native Americans didn't run around in loin-cloths nearly as often as movies would have you think.

edit: By "aboriginal" I meant Australian Aboriginal.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Broadly speaking I usually find it shockingly (yet surreptitiously) offensive whenever an outsider - typically the straight, white, male lead - becomes the savior of an "underpowered" culture. Dances with Wolves, The Last Samurai, Avatar... I think Avatar is probably the biggest offender, since the character ends up literally donning said culture's race in order to save it. Apparently white guys make the best blue guys. Adding insult to injury, it sees Native American garb is producers' go-to solution for wardrobe when creating a technologically primitive yet spiritually sensitive race of aliens. Riiiiiiiiiight.

I would agree with you, except that in Avatar the wardrobe of the "primitive aliens" was less Native American, and more-so African or Aboriginal in nature.

Native Americans didn't run around in loin-cloths nearly as often as movies would have you think.

edit: By "aboriginal" I meant Australian Aboriginal.

That's "technologicall primitive", but yes, Aboriginal makes more sense. Especially taking in consideration the feathers (they had feathers right?).

 

[TheYellowCellPhone]

Some scenes you can't really help getting offended at, because that's precisely what the reaction a director wanted to get out of you.

Like that skull scene from Django Unchained. Of course it was nothing but racist, but Tarantino and DiCaprio performed and perfected that scene so it would be as racist and offensive as they could manage.

And I don't watch movies enough to think of an offhanded rip that I felt offended at.

my people.

heh

 

[Cooperblack]

I don't get offended by racist in movies because racist does exist in real life (they are dumbasses but they do exist)
I don't get offended by lesbians turning cold over a friend turning Bi in movies because that can/does happen in real life.

In fact the only thing I DO get offended by in movies is a Deus Ex Machina dropping in the last 10 minutes in movies..with the notably exception of Donnie Darko.

 

[Blow_Pop]

I am offended by Rom Coms. They portray women as having to have a man and not just any man but the obsessed stalker man.
And it's offensive in the how normalised and accepted this behaviour is. Which it shouldn't be. And it's contributing to the idea that women are always straight and always want the obsessive stalker men and that they will be the best choice. When in reality that's just the key formula for abusive relationships. And as I have had relationships similar to them I'm offended on a level of this has happened to me and shouldn't happen to anyone.

 

[In Search of Username]

Ask yourself this: if it had been a circle of straight men, and one of them tells them that he's dating another guy and gets this very reaction, would it have offended you as well? If not, I'm afraid you're biased.

Lesbians don't have a history of institutionalising their personal prejudices towards straight people. Stop acting like it's a reasonable equivalence.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Ask yourself this: if it had been a circle of straight men, and one of them tells them that he's dating another guy and gets this very reaction, would it have offended you as well? If not, I'm afraid you're biased.

Lesbians don't have a history of institutionalising their personal prejudices towards straight people. Stop acting like it's a reasonable equivalence.

You'd be surprised by how much hate and infighting exists within the LGBT community. There's actually a significant portion of gays and lesbians that actively hate bisexuals and transgenders.

 

[The Bucket]

Ask yourself this: if it had been a circle of straight men, and one of them tells them that he's dating another guy and gets this very reaction, would it have offended you as well? If not, I'm afraid you're biased.

Lesbians don't have a history of institutionalising their personal prejudices towards straight people. Stop acting like it's a reasonable equivalence.

Lesbians are just people, prone to the same sort of prejudices straight people are. I've seen first hand how insular some LGBT communities can be, its like any subculture thats brought together by a particular strong shared trait. If you remove it, its very easy to suddenly find yourself pushed outside

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

Broadly speaking I usually find it shockingly (yet surreptitiously) offensive whenever an outsider - typically the straight, white, male lead - becomes the savior of an "underpowered" culture. Dances with Wolves, The Last Samurai, Avatar... I think Avatar is probably the biggest offender, since the character ends up literally donning said culture's race in order to save it. Apparently white guys make the best blue guys. Adding insult to injury, it sees Native American garb is producers' go-to solution for wardrobe when creating a technologically primitive yet spiritually sensitive race of aliens. Riiiiiiiiiight.

For two out of those three movies I'd say the white guy isn't the "savior" of that culture. Avatar, yeah, but the other two it didn't matter that the white guy sort of dissed his own people. He didn't affect any change, just found that his own culture was more in the wrong than anything and learned something new. In Last Samurai he witnessed the fall of the Samurai, in Dances With Wolves he ran off and became "one of them" in a sense but nothing either of them did altered the course of events significantly, nor did either of them save the culture.
And is it wrong to have a movie showing person representing the minority voice that says what his own culture is doing to others is wrong? I won't touch Avatar though, that movie was crap with pretty colors sprinkled on it from the get go.