Movie Cliches

[christopher575]

Alan and I always talk about things that happen way too often in movies. I've decided to start posting them with an appropriate tag as I think of them. 

Person finds a flashlight and looks directly into it while turning it on.

Person on rooftop or balcony is shot by a person on the ground and falls forward off the roof or balcony instead of backward.

Kidnapped child needs medicine.

Semi driver honks his horn for no reason while driving through a parking lot, always as the scene opens. (dawnzerly noticed this)

Person answers the phone, is told to turn on the news, and the news item is somehow still playing.

Person is handcuffed to bed and abandoned.

Cell phone service is unavailable.

Comments

[blueberryjoe.livejournal.com]

the news item one always bugs me.

[badrobot68.livejournal.com]

The TV is always on the correct channel, and the news item is always just beginning!

[theropod.livejournal.com]

More often, what I see is: character turns on TV/radio, finding news story about themself (e.g., the bank robbery they commited an hour ago), and they turn the TV/radio OFF in mid-story.

Not me. If I happen across a news story about myself, I want to know EVERYthing THEY know.

[monsterbrain.livejournal.com]

Chick is sad so she sits on the sofa at night, watching TV/DVD and eating ice cream out of the carton.

[christopher575.livejournal.com]

My favorite one like that is Debra Winger's mega pig-out in Legal Eagles. Especially where she wipes the moisture off the uncooked hot dog and attacks it.

[badrobot68.livejournal.com]

Car runs out of control and hits a produce stand.

Person with a bag of groceries always has a large bread object sticking up out of it. (Ok, got that one from Roger Ebert.)

Woman changes clothes in front of an open window.

[salacious-pop.livejournal.com]

Ebert also coined the term "steam & sparks factory"

[badrobot68.livejournal.com]

People hang up phones without ever saying goodbye.

All phone numbers are 555-something.

[christopher575.livejournal.com]

The 555 thing is just so it doesn't end up being someone's real phone number, it's agreed upon and isn't really a cliche. Fascinating read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/555_(telephone_number) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/555_(telephone_number))

[scearley.livejournal.com]

A few movie writers say that you don't include the "goodbyes" in phone conversations, because if you wrote the conversation to be realistic, you'd end up with an extra 90 seconds of inane pointless dialogue per phone conversation in a movie.

[paranoiattaque.livejournal.com]

when someone breaks into a house/murderer is chasing someone, they always run upstairs. that bugs the hell out of me.

[cmorley.livejournal.com]

Truck sees a pedestrian in the middle of the street (usually our Damsel in Distress, or possibly an inattentive child). Instead of stopping, the driver just honks. A lot. Until the driver hits the pedestrian or a conveniently placed Hero knocks the pedestrian out of the way. So sad!

[scearley.livejournal.com]

And don't forget the variation - the full shopping cart.

[scearley.livejournal.com]

The "crime fighter turns retard" sequence.

Most often the crime fighter has been in control the entire time, stalking the "bad guy," outwitting them, then suddenly runs directly into the bad guy's base of operations with no lights and no bearings.

This is what completely ruins Silence of the Lambs for me.

[cmorley.livejournal.com]

Or a policeman walks into the bad guy's lair without calling for backup or even letting anyone know what's going down.

[scearley.livejournal.com]

Oh wait -

MONTAGE!

Of course that's too easy to just call that one out, so I will specifically name

SHOPPING MONTAGE where the ladies all try on clothes and at the 2/3 mark one of them wears something so undeniably zany that they all laugh. Isn't it so fun being a girl?

The other two that really drive me nuts are the

SPORTS PRACTICE MONTAGE where the player goes from walk-on to star in the matter of an afternoon. This will include a fat kid losing his breath and falling over backward from a sitting position.

and

PARTY CLEANUP MONTAGE where the house party is restored to nearly perfect. This necessarily requires some insanely incriminating evidence to remain, something so outlandish that not even a complete house re-build can eliminate the evidence of the one grease stain. Which the other characters help fix by deception and distraction of the parents.

And there is one cliche specific to Amanda Bynes movies, now that I am thinking about it:

Amanda Bynes, being the poor girl, has to borrow a dress from the snotty rich girl who is trying to make Amanda's life hell because she's....Amanda. So snotty rich girl loans Amanda a very ritzy yet dowdy dress, Amanda spiffs it up into something very fashion-forward if you are 14, and (this is where it becomes Amanda Bynes ludicrous) then appears at the top of a long staircase being introduced to an entire party. She is the last one introduced, everyone is amazed, and then snotty rich girl manages to somehow sabotage the dress, making it rip off of her but only enough to make a scene and not to actually expose anything. Which is embarrassing, and she takes it like a big girl and just leaves.

Off the top of my head this happens in both "Sydney White" and "What a Girl Wants." I don't think it happens in "She's All That" but that movie does feature the zero-to-hero sports training montage listed above.

[chulo-los.livejournal.com]

Don't forget the OH MY GOD! I LOVE MY BEST FRIEND MONTAGE. Protagonist realizes that the person they love has been in front of them the whole time as we see clips of earlier scenes in the movie and a few extras one of which is them washing something-dishes, car, dog and then getting into a soapy fight.

[scunnerred.livejournal.com]

Power cable breaks and there's a shower of sparks and the cable is snaking everywhere (a la the first Final Destination). THis doesn't happen.

[wring.livejournal.com]

"keep the change" to taxicab driver.

[theropod.livejournal.com]

Any gay man who sleeps with a woman ONCE, that's when he'll become a dad.

Any man who has any kind of job WILL miss his son's ninth birthday.

Star Trek characters always get the worst shit happen to them on their birthday.

In Star Trek (and in Disney films), every character without exception has at least one dead parent. As enlightened as Starfleet is purported to be, you'd think they would abolish the death penalty for having sex.

[chulo-los.livejournal.com]

And always a favorite, the LETS ALL DANCE scene. A song comes on the radio and everyone is so over come with joy and commraderie, they simply must DANCE whether it's around the kitchen, living room or stairwell running through the house. And all kids below the age of 14 for some reason know the lyrics to any baby boomer song.

[amznbert.livejournal.com]

If you are in a car and run out of gas you will run out in the worst possible neighborhood.

[frogger414.livejournal.com]

People watching tv at a tv storefront and there's an important news broadcast

[christopher575.livejournal.com]

And they can somehow hear it even though they're outside and the TVs are inside.

[chulo-los.livejournal.com]

Any crowd scence that is set in the 50's will have someone wearing a pair of 3D movie glasses for no particular reason.

[cajoje.livejournal.com]

Person on rooftop or balcony is shot by a person on the ground and falls forward off the roof or balcony instead of backward.

Ha! We call that 'Cowboy Rule #3: Don't be the guy on the roof'.

[weirdlovemaker.livejournal.com]

I like the "mysterious character disappearance". Some wise old character is telling some young dumb character what he needs to do to fulfill his destiny/obtain some cool object/find himself, but ends vaguely and starts walking away through a parking lot. The young character goes to ask him more, but a bus/train/van drives between them and once it has passed, the myterious character has VANISHED!

[christopher575.livejournal.com]

OH MY GOD HI MATTY

[lightningflash.livejournal.com]

Nobody ever eats in movies. They are always making or ordering delicious foods, and then the argument/upsetting revelation/major catastrophe happens and they never eat. I've heard from cast interviews and stuff that it's because if they ate everytime they ran that scene, they'd all weigh an extra 100 pounds. In fact, what they don't show is that after someone DOES take a bite, there's usually a crew member with a spitoon, and they spit out the food when the camera angle switches to the other person.

Still, it bugs me. All that delicious food going to waste!!!

[christopher575.livejournal.com]

Continuity is also such a bitch. Just watch anytime someone pours champagne. If I were directing a movie, all champagne-pouring shots would be done in one continuous take.

[meejies.livejournal.com]

i wonder how many of these have been identified at tvtropes.org (they do movie tropes too).

[christopher575.livejournal.com]

I will avoid looking because that will ruin my efforts to think of them. :)