Film cliches you want to fuck off

[mothman]

That's just Indiana Jones, innit?

I'm sure there have been others. Definitely older films, which Raiders (etc.) were paying homage to.

[famethrowa]

A map overlaid on top of travel shots with a slowly increasing red line linking towns.

There was a funny bit on this in Married With Children, the line goes past a city and we hear Al Bundy shout out "who wants Pez??". Well you had to be there

Documentary cliche. The interviewee sits into frame and looks pensively down the barrel. Extra points if they say "Are we ready?" before the interview commences.

Yes! And also the smiles and relaxing and "are we done?" over the closing credits.

Snapping a laptop shut after reading an email / doing a web search / watching a few seconds of video instead of only just before packing it into a bag like everyone else.

In the Meaning Of Liff, the word "beppu" meant triumphantly slamming a book shut after reading the last page. Similar thing?

[olliebean]

Yes! And also the smiles and relaxing and "are we done?" over the closing credits.

"Have you got everything you need?"

[ImmaculateClump]

I felt like this was getting old the first time it happened in pig

Hello, can I get a pastries please?
What? I hate you! Fuck off, I'm on my period
It's for David Bigchef
click (sound of door being unlocked)

You don't need to keep doing it, we get the idea, he's a big deal. Am I supposed to get a chill up my spine every time and go "yay! Movietime!"

[gilbertharding]

Documentary cliche. The interviewee sits into frame and looks pensively down the barrel. Extra points if they say "Are we ready?" before the interview commences.

Where do you stand on the shots of Mick and Charlie in the editing suite in the Maysles brothers' Gimme Shelter (1970)?

I mean, firstly, I guess, it must be a such an early example of a documentary exposing its mechanics that it can't qualify as a cliche, and secondly, it delivers such an important impact to the film - presumably this is genuinely the first time they have seen and heard the footage, so their reaction to all of it - especially the Altamont stuff - is properly immediate.

[gilbertharding]

Hope this hasn't been mentioned yet - People rifling through medicine cabinets (the ones that no-one has; those thin ones attached to the bathroom wall with a mirror on the front) and clumsily spilling all the pill bottles out.

Was that a cliche in 1968?

[Mr_Simnock]

No one ever mentions Janus without pointing out that he's the two faced Roman God of whatever immediately afterwards upon finding his likeness or a bust or statue or something like that.

Or on Sean Bean!

I always thought that was just the weird name of those 1970's, 80's porn mags

[Magnum Valentino]

That's just Indiana Jones, innit?

Is there anything else in this thread that's only appeared in one thing?

[kalowski]

Indiana Jones is a deliberate homage to those old RKO and Universal series that were full of these tropes, they basically invented them.

[Dr Rock]

Janus is the god of doors and gates. Exciting role.

[mothman]

Like a Roman bouncer. "If your name's not downus, you're not coming inus."

[Magnum Valentino]

Delighted to have got this ball rolling

[Dusty Substance]

A voice-over, referring to a character on-screen: "That's me. I expect you're wondering how I got into this situation. In order for me to tell you, we have to go back a bit"

Cut to: Character being born or a dinosaur or the big bang.

Voice-over continues: "Not quite that far back"

[mothman]

The whole in media res thing (what would be called a prologue, in literary terms) has almost become a cliche in itself. It's always the same now. It's BAM and sound and fury and excitement and oh my gosh what's happening what has caused this, and then it's "three days earlier" or whatever.

[Twit 2]

The whole in media res thing (what would be called a prologue, in literary terms)

Huh? In media res is already a literary term. And it's totally different to a prologue, by definition; the former meaning "middle" and the latter "before". So a prologue would be something like the story of the ring in the 1st Lord of the Rings, which explains events before the main story and in media res (at the beginning of the film, but in the middle, not the beginning of the story) would be, say, Pulp Fiction.

But, yes, the technique (a 'cold open' as it seems to now be called in TV writing lingo) is way overused, presumably to stop people switching channels.

[mothman]

Sorry Twit. C in Eng Lit O-level. ;-)

[Twit 2]

How did I become this pedantic? Let's rewind...

[Blumf]

But, yes, the technique (a 'cold open' as it seems to now be called in TV writing lingo) is way overused, presumably to stop people switching channels.

A Cold Open is stuff that happens before the main titles, not necessarily a flash forward to later action, or even anything to do with the main story.

[Twit 2]

Good point. I think they're used as flash forwards more often than not, though. Someone should count.

[ProvanFan]

Those summers we'd spend 



I don't actually mind this, if anything I find the sound quite satisfying. Following it up with two friends lying on their backs in the grass though, with some pause-heavy dialogue about the future and staying best buds for life, that's a bit much.

[Bently Sheds]

The whole of The Tomorrow War is just packed with tropes and clichés, it's hilarious.

[dr beat]

Not really one I want to fuck off because I quite like it:

Hard-bitten journalist in olden days bashes out a scoop on an old-fashioned typewriter in seconds, rips paper out of machine, sticks their hand up and shouts 'COPY!'

[Sebastian Cobb]

Or include the clapperboard. Or even just clap their hands. Yes, we get it, this has been professionally recorded. We don't think the little person is talking to us directly from the little box they live in in the corner of our living room.

I liked it when they did a hand-clap sync on King Rocker in the middle of a high street as it made the whole thing look a bit amateur.

[Dex Sawash]

Not really one I want to fuck off because I quite like it:

Hard-bitten journalist in olden days bashes out a scoop on an old-fashioned typewriter in seconds, rips paper out of machine, sticks their hand up and shouts 'COPY!'

All of Jennifer Jason Leigh's part in Hudsucker Proxy is a fabulous trope.

[beanheadmcginty]

Not really one I want to fuck off because I quite like it:

Hard-bitten journalist in olden days bashes out a scoop on an old-fashioned typewriter in seconds, rips paper out of machine, sticks their hand up and shouts 'COPY!'

Stephen J. Cannell leaves thread in tears.

[Icehaven]

Loads of suitcases falling off a car roof.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Although it worked ok in the thing I was watching, a fairly well-trodden trope is someone getting into a sensory deprivation tank, spending some time in there then deciding to get out and stepping out into a world that slowly reveals itself to be a surreal hallucination.

[dissolute ocelot]

Documentary cliche. The interviewee sits into frame and looks pensively down the barrel. Extra points if they say "Are we ready?" before the interview commences.

This is generally awful and pointless, but the recent BBC Gods of Snooker used it very well to give a sense of the personality behind each snookerist - and being as you're dealing with snooker players, any way of revealing personality is good. So, reprieved for now.

[tourism]

most cliches are great; I'd be distraught if they fucked off

Documentary cliche. The interviewee sits into frame and looks pensively down the barrel. Extra points if they say "Are we ready?" before the interview commences.

that said this can fuck off

[An tSaoi]

Werner Herzog does a good version of this, basically the opposite. He waits until the interview is over, and leaved the camera running. His subjects don't know whether to stay still, or turn away and do a bit of business to wrap it up.

Here's an example with a wacky doctor in Grizzly man: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqDsq0GkY_o

He's clearly playing for the camera, and it's only at the end that he seems like a real person, all his "showyness" goes away, and the gravity of it sinks in.