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Common or lazy cliches in Hollywood films

Started by Saucer51, March 06, 2011, 09:25:52 PM

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SteveDave

Quote from: holyzombiejesus on May 07, 2013, 10:12:25 AM
The double dream sequence. Character has really horrible and surreal experience and either wakes up by sitting bolt upright or is woken by a loved one. Phew it was only a dream! OR WAS IT?! Monster then attacks loved one. Character wakes up. That was the dream. Phew!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ca_Xq6uqqDE&feature=youtu.be

holyzombiejesus

Quote from: Don_Preston on May 29, 2013, 09:14:08 AM
Bonus point if the gun-totin' live saver is an unlikely character. I.E, geeky sidekick, pacifist or timid love interest.

...or someone presumed killed in the fight leading up to the main character's moment of extreme peril.

Famous Mortimer

This is more a TV one, I suppose, but it also happened in "Defiance" - the last three minutes of a show will be a slowed-down cover version of some song, while all the main characters do moody stuff, having survived whatever craziness happened three minutes ago.

Lost Oliver

Dunno if this has been mentioned but what really pisses me off is when someone is trying to open a lock or something really slowly, and some brute pushes past and shoots the lock. Often accompanied by the dialogue "Or we could do that."

olliebean

When there's a big one-time-only practical effect, like a big explosion or a lorry overturning or what have you, and you get the same thing shown three times from different angles, presumably so as not to waste all the covering footage they got of their big expensive stunt. (You never see a big cgi effect repeated from multiple angles like that.)

lazarou

Quote from: Famous Mortimer on May 29, 2013, 06:07:12 AM
1. Aliens are never atheists - all aliens always believe in their wacky religion, despite every bit as little evidence for it as for ours
You could expand that to: all members of an alien race will have the same culture, ideals, outlook and beliefs. In the rare event that they diverge on any of these, they'll have fought a massive, bloody war over it.

...aand in the movies etc.

Kane Jones

Quote from: olliebean on May 30, 2013, 09:17:37 AM
When there's a big one-time-only practical effect, like a big explosion or a lorry overturning or what have you, and you get the same thing shown three times from different angles, presumably so as not to waste all the covering footage they got of their big expensive stunt. (You never see a big cgi effect repeated from multiple angles like that.)

I know I'll get shit from the Nolan haters for this, but that's why I love the collapsing bridges in Dark Knight Rises.  They could've made it spectacular, but the long shot of the bridges just collapsing into the river almost silently has so much class, taste and atmosphere.  You can really sense the severity of it.  See also the opening scene. When Bane and the Doctor escape from the plane, you just see the plane plummet towards the earth. That's it. A lesser action director (*Michael Bay* cough) could not have resisted showing the plane hitting the ground and exploding in dolby surround and from multiple angles in a shower of fireworks[nb]Another thing, why do explosions have fireworks in them now?  They never used to.[/nb].

Sony Walkman Prophecies

The Recruit is an absolute pirate horde of these sorts of cinematic ticks.

A brief summary of them: losing your job + girl = drinking beer and pizza in a motel, every time Colin Farrell realises something, visuals brake into slo-mo, important geo-political discussions take place over tables laid out with takeaway Chinese food, furious sex initiates at the point of girl taking off sweater and kicking off heels, Al Pacino (a cinematic tick in himself) does the Butch and Sundance thing of raising his gun to a field of marksmen in a fit of suicidal deviance. Also plenty of belt-tugging "we're in a different field of play since 9/11 gentleman" which occurs in any spy film from 2001-2010.

The only thing it's missing is Tommy Lee Jones as a cheery and bombastic Texan.

Famous Mortimer

I hate how when you see binoculars used in a film, they never make anything appear closer, just put a black border around normal human sight.

chand

Watched 'Double Jeapordy' last night, the film in which Ashley Judd is wrongly convicted of her husband's murder after he fakes his own death, and then hunts him down to kill him when she gets out. There was a scene where Tommy Lee Jones and a bunch of cops are following her into a rainy Mardi Gras crowd in New Orleans, there's loads of umbrellas in the crowd but hers is the red one. I said to my girlfriend "In a minute, they're going to grab a woman with short dark hair and a red umbrella, but she'll turn around and it'll be the wrong woman!". Was weirdly proud of myself when that exact thing happened about thirty seconds later.

Sam

A character has suffered some shock or endured something.

WORLD WEARY PERSON: Gimme a cigarette.

OTHER PERSON: But you don't smoke/you quit.

WWP: *shoots them a steely but world weary look*

OP: *registers look and solemnly hands over cigarette*

Works with whisky/alcohol etc.

QDRPHNC

Quote from: tothenakedrawedge on January 03, 2013, 04:47:43 PM
Character's self-defeating trait has symbolic object which embodies it.

Character goes to beach alone, pensive. Throws object into water.

Character is changed.

(Saw recently in This is England)

Wes Anderson did something similar in the The Darjeeling Limited, when at the end of the film,
Spoiler alert
the three brothers literally throw away the baggage they inherited from their father
[close]
.

Anderson had to know what he was doing there, right?

BritishHobo

The best was in Super 8, where the main character,
Spoiler alert
who was struggling to get over his mother's death, had a necklace/pendant with a picture of her in it. At the very end of the film, it starts to get pulled away by the big magnet that's putting the alien's spaceship together, and he has to literally let go of her.
[close]

I worry that this comes across as earnest. It's not the best.

momatt

I fucking hate it where the main character throws away their incredibly valuable necklace / wedding ring / insulin / police badge at the end of the film.

Why not put it on eBay you thick unrealistic cunts?  Grrrr.


neveragain

Next time you're at the checkout and you hear the four minute warning... think of the fun you could be having on- ah, forget it.

Frazer

The police car that's standing guard outside someone's home gets called away, allowing Bad Guy to do his shit.

biggytitbo

Some American men whooping and cheering in a control room.

the midnight watch baboon

A police procedural having a chief, partner, dog or sequence working their last job.

An easily irked chief o' police.

Ghosts that are smug.


Mark Steels Stockbroker

Quote from: biggytitbo on June 29, 2014, 12:03:31 PM
Some American men whooping and cheering in a control room.

That actually occurs all the time in real life.

Serge

I think most movies would actually be improved by inserting an Angry Police Chief into them, especially if they don't feature any other policemen as characters. I'd like to see one in 'Jurassic World'. And 'Paddington'[nb]Though, from what I've seen so far, it wouldn't surprise me if there is one in 'Paddington'.[/nb].

Blumf

Quote from: Serge on June 30, 2014, 11:02:05 AM
And 'Paddington'[nb]Though, from what I've seen so far, it wouldn't surprise me if there is one in 'Paddington'.[/nb].

There's probably a bit where Paddington picks up a pump-action shotgun and cycles it[nb]This will turn out to be true. Horribly, horribly true[/nb]

Andy147

Quote from: Blumf on June 30, 2014, 11:15:23 AM
There's probably a bit where Paddington picks up a pump-action shotgun and cycles it

"Goddammit, Mr Gruber was only 2 days from retirement..."

Blumf

"Looks like I picked the wrong week to give up marmalade sandwiches"