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Scenes set round dinner tables, loaded with food, where no-one ever actually eats anything because they're too busy talking.
Related, scenes where people come down for breakfast, sit down, say 2 lines and then get up and leave again without actually eating anything and leaving an entire plate of food on the table/trendy kitchen island.
protracted gunfight where hero and anti hero are trying to kill each other. quite by chance they end up at point blank range, aiming at each other... and neither shoots.
Plot centric dialogue then ensues.
Any film involving archery…always done badly 🙁
Oh, yeah, this.
Jeremy Renner wouldn't need a bracer (other than Costume) if someone taught him how to hold his bow arm properly.
Crawling through air-vents, strong enough and big enough for a human with a map of their layout committed to memory, oh reaaaally
Lifts with hatches in the ceiling (which is 7ft up), hero somehow manages to climb up and hide, first has anyone, ever, been in a lift with a hatch? And secondly, why have no baddies seen any of the other million films where the goodie hides in the lift shaft?
The reason you don’t usually see Windows or whatever on computers is that the studio’s want Microsoft or Apple to pay for the product placement. If they did it anyway then they wouldn’t pay. When you do see a branded computer it’s been paid for. Apple did this in .oat shows and films for many years but have stopped recently. Same with cars, they usually have been de-badged and if they haven’t it features very prominently.
AFAIK Apple has never paid money for product placement other than supplying hardware and then they are fussy in what form it's being used or shown in.
Related, scenes where people come down for breakfast, sit down, say 2 lines and then get up and leave again without actually eating anything and leaving an entire plate of food on the table/trendy kitchen island.
Families that actually have time in the morning for a full on 3 course breakfast whilst they sit around talking and reading newspapers 🙂
Oh yeah. My first knowledge of MRI machines being somewhat less serene place than in films/TV was, obviously, in a real life MRI scanner…
GGGGGGHRRRRRRRRRNNNNNNNNNGGGGGRRRRRRR etc.
Anyone fancy riding alone in the woods with cromolyolly?
Me neither….😱
You don't know what you're missing. I bring Chianti, we have picnic. You bring the liver.
I was shocked at how loud and noisy an MRI machine is, I thought it was going to blow up.
People having conversations in helicopters.
Believe me, in real life helicopters are extremely loud so you can't have normal conversations or even conversations with a slightly raised voice.
Crawling through air-vents
Imagine the noise that would make.
Another one is the discharging of firearms either close to someone's ears or in otherwise confined spaces. These weapons are extremely loud and will damage hearing at least temporarily.
a map of their layout committed to memory, oh reaaaally
Cavers, climbers, autotesters, rally drivers, hikers, geologists... get really good at that. It annoys Madame when she can't find where we are on a map let alone tell me where to go then I look for 5 seconds and don't need to consult the map again.
On Her Majesty's Secret Service just started. Aston Martin pulls away on sand with screeching tyres. Doh!
Jeremy Renner wouldn’t need a bracer (other than Costume) if someone taught him how to hold his bow arm properly.
Don't waste your time telling us, you need to get on to those Olympic archers and set them straight.
Another one is the discharging of firearms either close to someone’s ears or in otherwise confined spaces. These weapons are extremely loud and will damage hearing at least temporarily.
At least Archer gets it right!
None of them have to work to have money to spend.
No full time job and not working.
In the fight scene I have never seen someone stabbed in the eyes. FFS!
Also why not make sure the person is absolutely dead before moving closer? Few more rounds will do.
Cheesy sound effects!
the studio’s want Microsoft or Apple to pay for the product placement.
"product placement' rarely something the product / rights owners pay for - its more often the case that they charge for it. There are exceptions like The Shopping Channel (The Bond Firm franchise) but where theres not active promotion like that going on then everything you see has had to be 'cleared'. There have been instances where errors by the art department in failing to get clearance for stuff has cost hundreds of thousands later down the line - Film / TV producers have to seek permission to feature anything thats featured prominently and its quite a minefield to navigate - it costs money and requires negotiation (and it requires research as you need to track down the rights owner of every single bloody thing) and some brand owners want to influence how their 'thing' is seen. The reason Apple appears a lot on screen is because they are actually very free and easy about the use of their stuff and don't place any really conditions of productions using it.
Whats fun at the moment is one of the major players in Film and TV production also has a sideline as a massive online retailer so theres effectively two levels of 'clearance' - one with the rights-owners of all the hundreds and thousands of 'things' that are littered about every set and one with the commissioning broadcaster who spit their dummy out if anything on screen is something that is sold by one of their competitors. We had a bit a of show down with over the contents of a vending machine in the background 🙂
People having conversations in helicopters.
Believe me, in real life helicopters are extremely loud so you can’t have normal conversations or even conversations with a slightly raised voice.
Ah yeah this reminds me of the surprise helicopter! Where nobody knows it's there until it just comes up 15 feet and then oh wow it's like right there but nobody realised until it came into frame.
I can hear police helicopters (live in that there London) when they're 3 boroughs away so just no.
Riding horses everywhere at a gallop. Poor things would be dead in an hour.
The Fort Knox scene in Goldfinger.
Blofeld presses the control panel to close the bank vault door.
The door closes automatically, but the sheer force needed to close any door by the hinges, let alone a colossal bank vault door…
Here’s someone closing one at the handle side:
I always love the swish sound a knife makes as it slashes through the air. Almost DEATHesqe.
Wetness. Nobody stays wet after getting out of water for more than 30 seconds!
Sea, swimming pool, river it doesn't matter, if your on camera your hair and makeup are perfect as soon as your out!
Never going to the toilet
In films where people die, an otherwise little-referred to character with little or no dialogue has a short but companionable interaction with a main character, thus conclusively indicating they're about to get killed.
A slightly more niche annoyance is the apparant inability of the producers of motor sport documentaries to always use the right audio for the cars (see: Senna, Schumacher, et al).
The door closes automatically, but the sheer force needed to close any door by the hinges, let alone a colossal bank vault door…
Do you not think that makes a good case for mechanisation? Hydraulics aren't exactly the stuff of sci-fi.
Another Die Hard one.
Hans (in German): Shoot the glass
Other baddie: ???
Hans then repeats "Shoot the glass", but louder and in English!
Hans (in German): Shoot the glass
Other baddie: ???
Hans then repeats “Shoot the glass”, but louder and in English!
Everyone knows foreigners all speak English between themselves when they don't think you can hear them.
Has anyone mentioned the amount of time a driver will spend with their eyes on the passenger rather than the road?
Fight scenes where the characters will take hundreds of punches to the face and shake it off. I think I could take one, maybe two and not be much use anymore.
Characters passing out drunk literally the second they have downed a shot.
The one that annoys me is in medical / ITU scenes where they ave the machine that goes "ping"
When working in ITU we always turned of the pings or bleeps ( not the alarms but the ones that ping or bleep with every heartbeat) ;cos it really irritating. also when the cardiac monitor flatlines it sets of alarms like fire alarms not just goes from bleep bleep bleep to bleeeeeeeeeeeep
"its an emergancy - fetch the machine that goes "ping"
The book "redshirts" by john Scalzi is a great book that rips the pish out of all the cliches you see in startrek / SF movies. Very funny
The Fort Knox scene in Goldfinger.
Frankly, if that's the worst you can find in Goldfinger you're doing OK - the film is riddled with plotholes and stupid things from both good and bad guys. And that's before you've dealt with the whole torrent of sexism running through it.
Everyone knows foreigners all speak English between themselves when they don’t think you can hear them.
Speaking English but with the common words like Yes / No / Sir / Madam etc in their mother tongue so that the audience can tell their nationality.
"Ah, Senor / Herr / Monsieur Bond, welcome to my country!"
Everyone knows foreigners all speak English between themselves when they don’t think you can hear them.
Badrons being lousy shots (see Daleks, Star Wars stormtroopers and James Bond's adversaries)
On the subject of baddies being bad shots what about Star Wars guns where the super advanced light ray they fire out moves slow enough that you can actually dodge it!
Old fashioned guns used to be bang you’re dead - now you can see a white ray heading towards you and dive out of the way…
Can’t believe no one’s mentioned air brakes!
Shouting "I'm out" in a gun battle, thereby alerting the enemies that they have no ammo and are basically defenceless.
I was shocked at how loud and noisy an MRI machine is, I thought it was going to blow up.
I've only ever been in one once, and the nurse warned me about how noisy it was. It was shortly after lunch, and I fell asleep 🙂
My pet hate is computing, particularly the effects they use in CSI when they're searching for a fingerprint in some massive database. Nobody would ever show each and every print on screen as they check them, that's just stupid and slow. That and the hero hacking into a system, I wish they'd let me know how they do it as it would make my life a lot easier.
Shouting “I’m out” in a gun battle, thereby alerting the enemies that they have no ammo and are basically defenceless.
One of the few programmes that did realistic small arms fire* was Strike Back, there's an article on it on Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strike_Back_(TV_series)#Training
The correct terminology is "changing" and it alerts your team-mates to the fact they need to do the covering fire stuff while you're reloading.
*realistic in as much as they were trained how to look like they knew what they were doing. Unrealistic in as much as they killed a dozen bad guys with every shot but never seemed to get shot themselves...
And no one ever goes straight to STW to find the answer to their totally obscure enquiry. I suppose if they did you’d lose at least an hour of the film.
I actually can't wait for the STW-directed movie.
Hero thinks to self: well, I slipped the baddie the sleeping drugs fifteen minutes ago, so I'll leave him an hour just to be sure.
Put the kettle on, that's an idea, make a brew.
I'll just have a look at my phone, oh heck the battery is nearly flat... where's the charger? I could have sworn it was? Oh for heaven's sake has the Mrs moved it AGAIN!? Ah silly me it was in the other socket all along. My goodness. Right, plug that in, oh why won't it plug in? Um, wrong way round, that's got it.
Now, pour that tea. In my special WFH mug. Ooh, that's a lovely cup of tea. Hot! Blow on it. Maybe give it a moment longer.
Hmm, let's check the news. But, hmm, yes, I need a poo. Yeah. Better go now, let me brew cool down.
<Toilet scene follows for 5 mins and 13s>
A gripping ten minutes of on-screen action right there.
A gripping ten minutes of on-screen action right there
What, no sudocrem cat?
No-one closes doors behind them when entering a house.
Old cars in period dramas / films are always immaculate and never dirty.
Which reminds me...
French and Saunders House of Idiot
Whenever a character needs to be incapacitated for however long the story needs them to be they are knocked unconscious.
Then minutes, hours, or even days later they wake up, say, 'Oh, my head!' and then jump right back into the next fist fight, car chase, bomb defusing, etc.
Where is the week of lying in bed with the lights out followed by months of avoiding loud noises and the long term (sometimes permanent) changes in temperament that normally go hand in hand with being knocked unconscious for longer than a minute?
I guess there's a lot of profession specific ones, but having worked on ITU the thing that gets me is the hero coming out his coma and immediately chasing after the bad guy (pausing only to kiss the pretty lady, obvs)
A stupid thing that I actually quite like is there was a time in TV and films when you could only have two types of car crash - one that would result in a graze to your temple and you'd live- 'I'm fine, its just my head' , and one that would result in a trickle of blood from your ear and you'd die.
Trickles of blood from the ear are a common film indication of impending death, usually from some horrific toxin, when in fact it would usually indicate a foreign body or a ruptured eardrum, both very much non terminal…
Henchmen have an off-switch which is allows them to be silently deactivated with a firm but authoritative whack on the shoulder when you're creeping about the the bad guy's lair - its very similar to the firm whack your grandad used to fix the tv when it was on the blink.
Have we done the one where someone put a weapon away and removes the magazine but never checks the chamber?
The manual override/emergency jettison/manual arm is located in an extremely inconvenient location and is a time consuming procedure.
I was listening to an interview with Patrick Stewart about Star Trek. He was asked why something exciting happened on every single planet they ever visited, surely that isn't realistic?
"Oh no, we found hundreds where it was just bare rock or the odd plant but we never showed those episodes, it doesn't make great telly."
.
.
Also running. How long people can properly sprint for, usually while looking over their shoulder every two seconds and often while injured and/or carrying something/someone, and still be able to talk/fight after the really long sprint.
And convenient cats or foxes to appear every time the hero makes a noise
And no one ever sings really badly (obviously, the whole cast went to drama school and learnt how to do it well)
Mevial wagons and ancient chariots going along rutted roads. No, the horses are in the middle, that's where it would get churned up, the middle would not be grass!
No two people ever have the same name. We all have lots of friends who share a name with other friends, never happens in films, just one of each.
Old cars in period dramas / films are always immaculate and never dirty.
Yes, its funny, its like they are brand new!?
No two people ever have the same name.
That's not true, there's at least one programme where many of the characters were called Dave, even the wives.
“Daren, Big Daren and Flu Strength Daren”
Motor racing championships are resolved at the last corner of the last race of the season.
No two people ever have the same name.