Things that film makers and writers do that piss you off.

[GrimTuesday]

Ok, so I just watched and wrote a short report on the movie Spartacus, the classic 1960 Kirk Douglas film about the slave rebellion that kicked off the Third Servile war. Now, I'm a history buff, so historical inaccuracies annoy me greatly, but there is one thing that annoys me more than that, and that is shoehorning in love interests. In real life, we don't really know whether or not the real Spartacus had a wife, though it is entirely possible and likely when considering the fact that Plutarch mentions that Spartacus did have a wife who was some sort of prophetess to whom Spartacus had been married to since before they were slaves, though this is corroborated by no other source. But in the movie Spartacus is a gladiator, and having won a fight is sent a serving girl to "entertain" him. Of course, Spartacus is far too noble to take advantage of this poor woman, and refuses to rape her[footnote]which I might add is ridiculous in and of itself. Women were not treated well in Ancient Rome, they were seen more as property than actual human beings.[/footnote]. It goes on even after the slaves have thrown off their chains, with Spartacus making the woman (Varinia) his wife and them having a child. The whole first part would have been fine, it establishes Spartacus as a good guy who is noble despite the circumstances, however, the rest of it just feels stupid and forced, as the movie is about Spartacus and his war against Rome, not about Spartacus and his relationship with some woman.

SO what sorts of things bother you about movies? Specific examples and general complaints are both welcome in this thread

 

[Eddie the head]

I ***** about this almost every time but. You take off your helmet in space, your head freezes solid. I hate that. I just hate it.

 

[SckizoBoy]

which I might add is ridiculous in and of itself. Women were not treated well in Ancient Rome, they were seen more as property than actual human beings.

Not really... true, in general they had little by way of 'rights', but (and this extends to slaves as well) depending on their husbands, they could be treated with a great deal of respect. The above stereotype is basically fulfilled by Cato the Elder. Virtually the entirety of his political opposition were also his social opposition in this respect as well.

OT: Contriving reasons why (in conflict) one side won or lost... and usually for personal gratification for what they write. Now, sometimes it's OK, because it's either plausible or understated, but at other times (read: most of the time), it smacks of ill-conceived revisionism that borders on rewriting history... it is, quite simply, infuriating.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Basically, any revisionist history, unless it's way over the top and obvious.

Changing a rela life person's ethnicity to "appeal to a wider audience"...blech.

I ***** about this almost every time but. You take off your helmet in space, your head freezes solid. I hate that. I just hate it.

You hate that they show it, or you hate that they don't?

It could go either way, depending on things.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Women were not treated well in Ancient Rome, they were seen more as property than actual human beings.

Meh? Compared to most ancient or medieval societies, Women were treated very well in Ancient Rome. They could own land, represent themselves in court, get divorced and reclaim their dowries, lend and borrow money, etc. They couldn't hold political office or join the military, but they were educated and had a surprising amount of freedom of movement in society. Husbands did not "own" their wives, and domestic abuse was illegal.

I mean, it's clearly nothing compared to the rights and freedoms women enjoy in North America or Europe today, but it was a hell of a lot better than other cultures at the time, and frankly it was arguably better than some cultures TODAY.

Sorry that's crazy OT though. Uh...things in movies that bug me...

I hate it when the bad guy gets the drop on the hero, and stops to give a little speech, giving the hero critical time needed to disable him.

 

[SonicWaffle]

SO what sorts of things bother you about movies? Specific examples and general complaints are both welcome in this thread

When a character totally fails to take the obvious path to a solution. For instance, I was watching the original Superman the other day, and got really annoyed at the bit where he flies around the world fast enough to go back in time. Now, I don't mean the actual impossibility of it; this is a film where a guy flies around using x-ray vision on things that aren't titties, after all, so suspension of disblief is already firmly in place.

No, what got me angry was the fact that he goes back juuuuuust far enough to save Lois from the landslide [footnote=1]Which, while we're on the subjec, surely means he let everyone in that town die? The whole reason he didn't save Lois originally was because he didn't have time, being too busy damming the river. If he went and saved her inside, then presumably every single person we were shown in that town drowned. Way to go, Supes[/footnote], and then we get the happy ending. Didn't he think to keep flying back in time so he could prevent the missiles from firng? Hell, go back further, catch Luthor and throw him in prison before the whole plan gets off the ground? Get to the lump of Kryptonite first and bury it at the bottom of the ocean so Lex can't use it against him?

No, instead all he does is save his annoying love interest. Good job, ya fuckin' moron.

 

[Casual Shinji]

I hate how Christopher Nolan's movies are 80% exposition. Someone needs to get that guy an editor with a hedge trimmer.

Also shaky cam and teal 'n orange.

 

[Twyce]

I hate how 95% of the time, when an actor is given a drink...THEY DON'T DO ANYTHING WITH IT!
"You want a drink?" "Yeah, sure." "OH LOOK IM JUST GOING TO HOLD THIS AWKWARDLY UNTIL THE SCENE ENDS."

It bugs me to no end, I'm not even sure why.

 

[Vault101]

double standard involving gener that I'm too tired to list......

hollywood moralising YOUR FAMILIY AND CHILDREN HAVE ABSOLUTE PRIORY REGARDLESS OF THE COST,
that and the fucking "chrismas spirit" in christmas movies... Christmas with the Kranks is where a sociopathic neibourhood straight out of 1984 terrorize a couple an example of both

 

[porous_shield]

I hate that the cups or glasses or whatever they are using always have nothing in it. It's so easy to detect a weightless cup or glass. I understand that if they were suppose to be drinking coffee the actor/actress would have to drink whole lot because of retakes or the coffee would get nasty after a a very short time, but it breaks my immersion to have people drinking from empty vessels.

 

[Olikar]

Complaining about historical inaccuracies in Spartacus is silly, Spartacus does not attempt to an accurate portrayal of Spartacus' life it uses Spartacus as allegory for the Civil rights movement.

 

[mechashiva77]

I would have to say the things a lot of comedies/romantic comedies do that have turned me away from the genre completely. When one guy does something that we see is innocent, but the woman lead takes this the wrong way and is CRUSHED. She goes off and decides to be emo forever, but not once, ONCE did she go back and try to talk it out or get his point of view. Now if she had walked in on him consenually (really chrome? Is this really not a word) having sex with another woman or something else that was OBVIOUS enough to implicate him as doing something wrong, ok that's understandable. But the all the shit I've seen, ugh. Let me just give my most irritating examples.

40 days and 40 nights. Guy gives up sex for Lent. Meets awesome girl. They start dating. At the end of the period, guy has REALLY hard time resisting sex, so he ties himself to the bed. Vindictive ex comes in and has sex with him. While he was asleep and unable to give consent. So ya know, she was BASICALLY RAPING HIM. And guess who gets the blame for it? That's right the boyfriend! HE has to apologize to HER for daring to have had sex against his will! But it's ok! At least they got together even though we never see the ex again! No telling off! No charges! NOTHING! Now isn't that the most awesome writing you ever did see?! 8D

Also one episode of Sex and the City (leave me alone it was 2:00 am and nothing else was on). Woman is dating man who is a very distant lover. They get into a fight about how she wants to spend time more time with him. Guy turns around and PAPS, her on the cheek. It was the lightest touch you could imagine. The way the scene is set up, it just looks like she walked up to him, he didn't see her coming and turned around (as slow as possible mind you) and bumps into her. Of FUCKING course the woman overreacts, acts as if he punched her across the room and leaves him. Never sees him again, and it ends with one of her whimsical muses about love and relationships.

Ah romantic comedies. I've tolerated you for so long, now you can just kiss my black ass.

 

[Guffe]

It annoys me greatly when film makers make bad movies, seriously? How can it be so difficult??
[sub][sub]my comment is slightly sarcastic for those not understanding that[/sub][/sub]

 

[burningdragoon]

It begins with a C and ends with... (to be continued in my next post)

 

[Canadamus Prime]

The Hollywood portrayal of Love being one or two steps above porn.

 

[anthony87]

Sex scenes.

I'm not against them in a prudish way or anything like that, I just don't see what they accomplish most of the time. That's not to say they can't be done right, Monsters Ball for example is pretty fucking explicit as far as movies are concerned but there's an awful lot of emotional undertone that goes along with it.

Other than that it's just mostly "OOOOOOOOOOOOH SIDEBOOB NIPPLE!!!" and I fail to see the point of it.

 

[Uszi]

I thing Characters doing stupid things, or pointless things.

Roll reversals, where one character should do something, because it fits their character, but instead a different character does it and it no longer makes sense.

Also, everything that happened in the movie, Prometheus.

 

[Squilookle]

I just hate the way any American made WW2 film just impulsively feels it has to take a dump on whatever Allies they are unable to completely ignore. Not even the brilliant Band of Brothers or Saving Private Ryan were able to resist pointing at the British and gaffawing a bit, and the Pacific's token treatment of Australia was completely unnecessary and really pissed me off.

Mention U-571 in particular to most war buffs and be prepared to reap the whirlwind of what the rest of the world thinks of the blatant 'Muuurica vibe in Hollywood war movies. It's not the 1930s anymore- it's time tinseltown just grew the hell up.

 

[deathzero021]

The Hollywood portrayal of Love being one or two steps above porn.

this is true. it seems in the majority of movies, the love is always played out like a competition. Even if it's not an action movie, you can see it's all about "winning the girl". As if it's some holy relic or some shit. They almost always choose the guy as the lead role and they have to jump through hoops to win over the girl's impression. Even if the movie is from the girl's POV it usually seems even worse at how they portray these women. A female role in a romance/comedy movie is terrible. I always hate the character, every time.

Speaking of romantic comedies, i'm really annoyed at how they are the only form of comedy you get now a days. it seems so far that a pure comedy like Hang Over comes out. (not saying it's the best comedy or anything, just that it was pure comedy in the genre sense) Literally think back to MOST the comedy movies you have seen and try to pick out the ones without love or heavy drama in it. It's pretty hard. I've given up on most comedy films because they're always advertised as "being so funny" when only 40% of the movie is weak comedy and the other 60% is drama and romance. usually passing the 45 min mark of a movie, it drops all comedy and goes into romance land, usually by this point the main character and the girl are already hooked up, so this is where something dumb happens and she ignores him for now.

This all comes down to my most hated thing about film making. Cliches for the sake of it. Tradition and overall uncreative writing. I'm tired of seeing the SAME EXACT THING over and over again. movies with the same plot, different names. Cinematography that is so similar to what we have already seen. we see the same stuff WAY too often to be reasonable. it almost seems as if they go out of their way to copy their peers. to do whats expected and make a movie that's already been done before. Don't give me that shit that "everything has been done" like hell it has. I can sit here and come up with 20 decent ideas that have not been done before. Stop with the damn superhero movies already and make something original.

 

[HardkorSB]

One guy kills one cop and deals some drugs and he's the villain.
Another guy kills dozens of people, breaks dozens of laws, destroys property worth millions and he's the hero because he killed "bad people".

Quick cuts and bad editing, especially in action movies.
I can't enjoy the movie if the shot changes every second. The worst offender in modern cinema is Christopher Nolan. Watch the action scenes in Batman Begins and most of the shoot outs in Inception. The camera men have Parkinson's and the editor has ADHD.