Posted on 07/03/2008 12:21:50 AM PDT by Slings and Arrows
Hollywood goes with what works and, let's face it, there are a few things audiences like to see again and again in their movies. The underdog wins big, the loser gets his dream girl, Batman is awesome, etc.
But there are some themes that are either so wrong, stupid or harmful that they need to be retired once and for all. Such as ...
(Excerpt) Read more at cracked.com ...
Along with life lessons we have the movie cliches like every bomb will have a huge digital readout counting down to zero, and the resulting explosion will chase you down a narrow hall way.
6. The American military is full of corrupt, insane generals who want to kill everyone.
8. Prostitutes actually all have hearts of gold .
However, it made no mention of why "In The Valley of Elah," "Lions for Lambs," and other similar garbage is detrimental to our National Security.
PS... Bullet 4 is especially relevant to the rampant narcissism in today's public schools. The mantra of "everyone is a winner" is echoed in the classroom, and reinforced through cinema.
Someone once posted here about hearing a group of schoolkids singing,
"I am special, I am special, look at me, look at me!"
Such egocentric nonsense will yield some tremendously broken spirits once these kids realize how expendable/disposable they are in the real world.
Hollywood plays up this false sense of reality by the individual making some amazing accomplishments in exchange for doing next to nothing.
You beat me to it!
I agree.
What happened to #7?
Or more accurately, the remake of that Yankees movie
GETREAL
And Nuclear Bombs are very complicated... yet somehow they can be opened up in minutes with common tools. On the bomb there is always a digital LED counting the seconds down to detonation. And somehow it always comes down to whether you cut the red or the black wire.
Oddly, the first countdown was in a movie. Lang’s Woman in the Moon. It was later adopted by scientists...
That is intriguing and could lead off off into a stimulating thread upon its own. Oppenheimer quoted the Bhagavad Gita.
I think.., not there is anything wrong with that.., the scientists adopted that for their own.
don’t forget either that shooting a can of fuel will automatically cause a huge explosion.
I deployed my hidden, secret powers years ago. Now I’m homeless and sick. WTF?
jk
"The Incredibles" is a rare movie that plays against the stereotype of "everyone is a winner". Its a great animation too!
“Prostitutes actually all have hearts of gold .”
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I met a gal from Venus
her insides were lined with gold
she did what she did
said how was it kid
she was politely told
pretty good not bad I can’t complain
but actually
everything is just about the same
with apologies to John Prine who is left of me politically but is the world’s most amazing lyric writer
Michael Caine once said “If a whore had a heart of gold, she’d sell it”.
That is a great animated movie. I love when the dad is told by his wife that they have to go to their son’s graduation. He responds “he’s going from the 4th grade to the 5th grade! what graduation?” I think he even mentions how everyone rewards mediocrity.
I have a hard time watching disaster type movies now, I have become far too critical so I end up laughing at such absurdities as you point out. Even as a child I had this problem, I remember a long ago comic book in which Superman picked up a car full of crooks and flew off with them. The problem was he picked it up by the little metal channel that used to be between the front vent window (which no car has had for nearly forty years) and the main window on the front door. Young people may not be familiar with this but it is doubtful that that piece of metal would have supported even ten percent of the weight of a car.
Then there was the time that lovely Lindsay Wagner, the Bionic Woman, decided to push over a huge tree with her two hands. I suddenly collapsed into laughter causing my wife to look at me as if she thought I was nuts. I tried to explain to her that even if the woman had the strength of Superman or of a bulldozer she would only have pushed her own feet into the ground, you cannot exert tons of force with a 120 pound body unless you have something to work against. She seemed to think I was just being hard to get along with.
10. Western heroes NEVER have to reload.
And we shall not speak further of Joel Schumacher’s Batman....
11. Action heros hold their guns sideways.
Lang used the countdown as a dramatic device. Rocketeers used it to set a precise launch time. It is what it is.
There's a great clip on Youtube -- someone has spliced together scenes from "The Rifleman" with Chuck Connors in which our hero walks down the street and shoots his rifle about 60 times, killing dozens of people. Then he calmly starts to reload.
Must be ‘rabbit bullets’, they multiply.
The other one from the westerns is the guy “fanning” his pistol and actually hitting what he's shooting at. If you're holding the trigger down and pulling back and releasing the hammer with your other hand, you have NO ACCURACY!! The same with Lucas McCain's rifle. The action of levering and firing that rifle from the hip would shift the barrel all over the place.
But it's just a movie (or TV show), it ain't real.
"He was distrubin' my peace."
2. In an assault soldiers poke their heads up and fire.
3. Pistols can hit a man 100 yards away and knock him down.... while everybody with a machine gun misses from 5 feet away.
4. Prisoner in prison are just jokers with "hard times" but really deep down just need a second.... third...fourth... fifth...chance.
5. DNA evidence comes back in 3 hours.
6. If you get shot in the shoulder, it's going to take a bandage, sling and week "to be fine".
7. When you get shot in the belly or anywhere in the torso, the bullet knocks you down and you die instantly.... if you're the bad guy.... if you're the good guy, you get to look up and say something profound and then die.
8. All gay guys are nicer than hetero guys and would make great boyfriends..... except for that one little problem. ....oh and AIDS, Chlamydia, Syphilis, anal warts, Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C.... narcissistic, sociopathic tendencies,
9. Homeless people are just "down on their luck" and aren't alcoholic, drug using, shiftless, lazy, schizophrenic, bipolar, criminals that would attack, rape, rob and murder you.
10. Bears, cougars, mountain lions are afraid of people and if we'd just leave them alone or carry a whistle they will run away.....
11. . guns are also useless and good people don't own them. Only thugs (who are really cool guys that rap and smoke the chronic) or right wing Christians that would hang all your black, gay and Jewish friends and use their bodies for target practice.
12. Girls can get drunk at bars and nice guys will take them home and tuck them in bed..... and if they do have sex.. will actually be the man of her dreams and she will not get Hep C, Hep B, herpes, GC, etc....
Guys that get drunk in college all the time do really well after they graduate......
The best place to hide from a homicidal madman is in a dark cellar. Whatever you do, don’t EVER leave the house.
And the correlating rules of horror movies:
1 Whenever you hide, choose a spot with only one entrance or exit. That way, when the killer walks in the door, you’ll have nowhere to run.
2 If you’re somewhere with a group of people and something creepy starts happening, split up and have everyone go off alone. Then, when your token minority friend dies, you’ll know for SURE that something sinister is going on.
3 If you’re going into a dark room and something dangerous might be inside, don’t turn on the light, because otherwise you won’t have the spooky suspense of not knowing where it is.
3a Similarly, don’t take a weapon, or anything that could be used as a weapon. If you do, you might actually be able to defend yourself from whatever it is that’s so dangerous.
4 Overly friendly but somewhat creepy locals always mean well, and should always be trusted. Until two separate people die/disappear and they blow both incidents off.
5 Being sexually active will not put you at risk for contracting STD’s, getting pregnant, or having any of the other standard negative consequences. Even if it did, you wouldn’t have time to find out, because it almost guarantees you’ll be the psychotic murderer’s next victim.
And the correlating rules of horror movies:
My favorite, CUJO comes to mind.
#6. You hav a gun. You shoot the bad guy/animal with one shot. You save the rest of the ammo so you don’t use a follow up shot. You turn your back, bad guy/animal gets up and destroys you.
Pop him again dum bass!
Until they drive an Oldsmobile off a bridge.
Also a horror movie rule, no matter how fast you run, the killer will be able to catch you by walking a slow, menacing pace.
Also, while running the woman will ALWAYS trip and fall.
Also with computers in movies, one can hack into any security system using a few keystrokes and saying the line: “We’re in.”
I never bought the premise of the Bionic Woman and the Six Million Dollar Man. Even if their arms had fantastic mechanical strength, they were attached to a flesh-and-blood torso that couldn't possibly hold up.
“Calculon, a gunfight has broken out in the special effects warehouse! Get over here quick, before an explosion chases someone down a hallway!”
I'm afraidto ask, but let me guess: Sung to the tune of "Frere Jacque?"
The first time I watched it, my mouth actually fell open when Mr. Incredible talked about how stupid it is to make everyone special until nobody is. Never thought I'd see it in a mainstream movie aimed at kids.
One time my then 8 year old son suckered me while we were playing Halo, and blew my head off with a rocket launcher from about 300 yeads away.
When I respawned, I put a bullet through his helmet with a pistol from at least 100 yards out.
But that was Halo. :-)
Excellent list, BTW,especially item 12.
LOL...
Or any car crash at any speed will almost certainly end in a fireball.
My dad and uncle found the lowlife scum who almost raped my aunt (she ran) and then they ran away abandoning their blocked in vehicle. They put a gasoline soaked rag in the gas tank, lit it on fire, and pushed the truck over the cliff awaiting a HUGE explosion. No dice!!!
Another one: People in movies never finish their meals. They order in a restaurant and when the food arrives they jump up and run out. Kids never eat breakfast, but run through the kitchen saying "Gotta go!"
All I saw in my mind’s eye was calcium dust.
“The other one from the westerns is the guy “fanning” his pistol and actually hitting what he’s shooting at. If you’re holding the trigger down and pulling back and releasing the hammer with your other hand, you have NO ACCURACY!!”
There’s a guy on YouTube who is the fastes shot in the world. He shoots a revolver the way you mention, fanning it and shooting from the hip.
He can hit two targets with incredible accuracy in less than the blink of an eye.
Ed
9. Homeless people are just "down on their luck" and aren't alcoholic, drug using, shiftless, lazy, schizophrenic, bipolar, criminals that would attack, rape, rob and murder you.
Myth #1000: Everyone "different," period, is automatically cute & virtuous, with something profound to teach to "normals."
In fact, everyone who is non-male, non-white, and heterosexually challenged wears a halo. The rest are all mean & evil.
The bad guy goes poof and disappears in the explosion but somehow his empty boots remained undisturbed and upright LOL
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