Spoilers on old films

[bollocks]

This is a bit of a pet hate mine.
People thinking it's fine ruin a film because it's been out for a few years. It's not as though everybody is born having seen every film ever released. Citizen Kane may be an old film, but show it to a 10 year-old and it's still new to them.
What do you think? Am I being a whingebag?

[Keebleman]

No, not necessarily, but it is often impossible to discuss a film (or book or play) in any comprehensive manner without referring to how it ends.  Obviously, a whodunnit relies entirely on the conclusion, but as these are usually pretty shallow entertainments they don't repay serious analysis anyway.

Kane is an unusual case as the precise solution to the Rosebud mystery is, I would suggest, the one truly unguessable twist or surprise or whatever in movies.  I would love to put this to the test but it's hard to find people who don't know it already (I knew the answer years before I saw the film).  Of course, there is so much else going on that foreknowledge will hardly dent your enjoyment of the film as a whole.

[bollocks]

Fair enough, if I was in a proper film discussion (with Gregg Turkington, perhaps) I wouldn't have a particular problem as I'd know what I was in for, but when having a more casual chat I think a quick 'have you seen it yet?' wouldn't go amiss.

And true, Kane definitely is a weird example, I just chose it as it's the most obvious one I could think of, although knowing it doesn't really affect the film as a whole. I suppose a more esoteric film where specific plot points matter more would be a better example.

[Sebastian Cobb]

I think it depends on how well known the spoiler is culturally. The fact that 'Bruce Willis is a ghost' is a meme in itself means you probably can't get too upset about it; likewise The Usual Suspects.

[Gregory Torso]

I hate people who spoil films as much as anyone but having said that, I think if a film's worth hinges on whether or not you can see a twist coming then it's probably not a very good film. I mean I saw lots of films that I already knew the twists in - Sixth Sense, Star Wars, Titanic - and it didn't spoil my enjoyment of them. I do really hate fuckers who by having seen a film before you think that puts them in a position to tell you all the best bits in it. A friend of mine leant me Brazil once because I really wanted to watch it and announced as I was going "hey there's a great bit in it where Michael Palin ( is wearing a big Baby's head and torturing the main guy! )" cheers that'll enhance my enjoyment of it.

[saltysnacks]

Rosebud is a ghost.

[Bazooka]

Was about to watch Alien and some fucker spoiled it by saying an alien is in it, similar thing happened with Jaws, I thought it was about dentists.

[Brundle-Fly]

Talking about spoilers, I went to look at how much it would cost to rent Fear The Walking Dead S4 on Amazon and the accompanying promo 'poster' gave away a huge surprise for me and the missus. It's the same on Netflix, the promo picture for the final season for a certain thriller series totally gives a plot turn away for any newbies.

DVD/ Blu-Ray boxset individual seasons covers have a habit of giving subtle clues away too. Usually, the ones that have the whole cast in some sort of tableaux pose. "Oh fucking great, where's so and so? He obviously gets killed off in an earlier season and all this lot survive any peril the series episodes creates."

[Glebe]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwZRFA0cLaM

[Avril Lavigne]

Rosebud is a ghost.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QTViSkkWR8

[Churston Deckle]

Usually the DVD cover for Planet of the Apes has a massive spoiler.

I remember a leaflet included with one DVD movie, advertising other classics - It had a still of the last scene from The Italian Job, and a speech bubble containing the last line of the script. Not only a spoiler, but possibly very misleading at the same time.

[Wet Blanket]

Sometimes the cat's just out of the bag and there's no way of being surprised by a film the way its original audiences were: everyone knows Norman Bates' relationship with his mother, where the Planet of the Apes really is and what the woman in The Crying Game is hiding in her knickers.

It's a shame, maybe, but it doesn't bother me in the same way that reviewers of new films casually give away twists and plot developments before you've even got to see them. I was massively irritated by the way some bloggers casually gave away the mad developments of the new Lars von Trier film, reasoning it was okay because they hated it. The same thing happened a few years ago when loads of reviewers spat their dummy out over the handling of the abrupt dispatch of whatshisface, before the film had even come out.

I was surprised when I read Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde that it's the book's plot twist that they're one and the same.

[monolith]

I hate people who spoil films as much as anyone but having said that, I think if a film's worth hinges on whether or not you can see a twist coming then it's probably not a very good film. I mean I saw lots of films that I already knew the twists in - Sixth Sense, Star Wars, Titanic -

Is the Titanic sinking really a twist?

[Blumf]

I was surprised when I read Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde that it's the book's plot twist that they're one and the same.

Huh. So how does the narrative work in the book? Isn't the whole point of the story about Jekyll fighting his ugly side?

[Ignatius_S]

Huh. So how does the narrative work in the book? Isn't the whole point of the story about Jekyll fighting his ugly side?

The story is narrated by another character, who doesn't know who Hyde actually is but is trying to track him down.

[Icehaven]

Sort of on topic but I was mildly surprised recently when I read an article (possibly linked from a thread here) about how films at cinemas used to just play on a loop all day and it was completely normal to go in partway through, see the end before the beginning and leave when it got to where you came in. Apparently in 1960 Hitchcock insisted on no late entries to Psycho so the audience would see the plot unfold and feel the suspense as he intended, and that helped kickstart it to become more the norm to watch films from start to finish rather than not.
Films back then generally all had traditional linear plot narratives too so I can't imagine seeing the start after the end was ever a particularly enjoyable or rewarding experience but at least all those scenes in Mad Men where Don and Peggy wander into cinemas and sit down when the film's already playing make sense now.

[Blumf]

The story is narrated by another character, who doesn't know who Hyde actually is but is trying to track him down.

Ah, thanks. Has anybody done a film close to the original? Presumably without the giveaway title.

[Wet Blanket]

Sort of on topic but I was mildly surprised recently when I read an article (possibly linked from a thread here) about how films at cinemas used to just play on a loop all day and it was completely normal to go in partway through, see the end before the beginning and leave when it got to where you came in. Apparently in 1960 Hitchcock insisted on no late entries to Psycho so the audience would see the plot unfold and feel the suspense as he intended, and that helped kickstart it to become more the norm to watch films from start to finish rather than not.
Films back then generally all had traditional linear plot narratives too so I can't imagine seeing the start after the end was ever a particularly enjoyable or rewarding experience but at least all those scenes in Mad Men where Don and Peggy wander into cinemas and sit down when the film's already playing make sense now.

This went on long after Psycho (and had actually been a stunt for a few other films, including Les Diaboliques and Hitchock's own Vertigo). My grandad was notorious for not being arsed to wait until the next showing if he turned up early, and as a result when my dad went with him to see Bonnie and Clyde in 68 or whenever it was he saw the two outlaws get shot up before the rest of the film (which is arguably not a spoiler, but they don't half get shot to bits at the end of that film)

[Sexton Brackets Drugbust]

Ah, thanks. Has anybody done a film close to the original? Presumably without the giveaway title.

Fight Club?

[Ignatius_S]

Ah, thanks. Has anybody done a film close to the original? Presumably without the giveaway title.

Good question - I don't know but there has been lots! Having a look through here - http://www.robert-louis-stevenson.org/richard-dury-archive/films-rls-jekyll-hyde.html - the Gore Vidal and a 2002 version sound interesting.

I think SBD is into something (although it's being sneaky) but I think I would go with the Stan Laurel version.

[sevendaughters]

think spoilers are a fake idea, films work on more layers than plot, if they're any good

[saltysnacks]

think spoilers are a fake idea, films work on more layers than plot, if they're any good

But one important element of a film is how it reveals information. On a basic level, the tension of a scene can be increased if you genuinely don't know what is going to happen. And if we deal with experimental films, the shock of the new can be part of it. I think Pasolini's Salo depends upon that, unfortunately it has become associated with awful schlock like A Serbian Film and Cannibal Holocaust.

I do believe that spoilers are nowhere near as important as people make out, however.

[NoSleep]

think spoilers are a fake idea, films work on more layers than plot, if they're any good

Some films (and TV) work really well on how they reveal information to the viewer and considerable thought is put into this in a good film. The first time you see a film it's great to enter its world in the condition that the filmmakers must originally assume that everyone would; from scratch. And yes, some films can deliver more on a second or subsequent view, but it will never be the same as that first time. Had problems with this in Game Of Thrones threads, both here and elsewhere, where readers of the books had discussions about what was to come whilst promising they were not revealing anything, but just by mentioning a character's name, for example, we already knew that they would not die, etc.

[Famous Mortimer]

I think there has to be some sort of limit. If you're going to the sort of places where movies are discussed and you've not seen, say, Citizen Kane, then the fault has to rest with you. I'm not saying chuck spoilers around willy-nilly, but you have to expect some.

[Gregory Torso]

Is the Titanic sinking really a twist?

Sorry, I was trying to be a funnycunt.

[monolith]

Sorry, I was trying to be a funnycunt.

I think you were funny and I was just being a dense cunt.

[Attila]

Sort of on topic but I was mildly surprised recently when I read an article (possibly linked from a thread here) about how films at cinemas used to just play on a loop all day and it was completely normal to go in partway through, see the end before the beginning and leave when it got to where you came in.

Yep -- it was that way in the US, as well -- there were a number of times I went to the movies with family, especially when I went with my mom, and we'd just walk in to the cinema, watch the film from whatever point it was, then stay to see the beginning when it looped (the source of many sit-com jokes where characters will get up from a situation and leave, saying, 'This is where we came in.')

My brother and dad would time it so that we saw films from the beginning, but my mom spent all of her childhood & youthful (from the mid1930s til she was married in 1949) pocket money at Saturday movies, showing up when the theatre opened, and staying all day, seeing the same cartoons, shorts, and features til all of the older siblings showed up at supper time, flashlights in hand, searching for the little ones to drag them out and home for supper.

[itsfredtitmus]

Is it okay to ruin every single twilight zone twist for my friend

[itsfredtitmus]

Anybody ever notice the twist in the Alfred Hitchcock episode Triggers in Leash is the exact same as the second Steptoe ep

[Replies From View]

I hate the way The Crying Game DVD has a giant 3D cock on the cover.  Just because it's an old film doesn't mean I've already seen it.  That's why I'm buying the DVD! 

The same applies to a lesser extent to the DVD covers of the original Planet of the Apes, The Wicker Man, and Anal Acrobats 6.