# dumbest thing in a serious movie that PO ed you **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 28, 2001, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700 "2001-11-28T14:33:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Umbriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/9de053/32.png) [@Umbriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Umbriel)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2001, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/21 "2001-11-28T22:03:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Eve \* > \*\*I was right with you, Umbriel, till you said, "I think superficial performances were the rule back in those days, and actors less frequently reached deep into their characters’ psyches. " > > Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go lie down for awhile with a lilac-soaked handkerchief on my forehead . . . \*\* Sorry to inflict a case of the vapors on you, Eve 😉 I didn’t mean to imply that actors didn’t act before the '60s or '70s; Far from it. And its not that there’s any shortage of superficial performances today… I’m just tossing around the the idea that when movies were being ground out at a faster pace, there might have been more of a tendency toward literalism if an actor didn’t intuitively connect with a character at first reading. But suppose I shouldn’t generalize just to cover for Deborah Kerr dropping the ball in the scenes that should have been the emotional center of the movie. And I \*thought[i/] I remembered “Rancid Harvest,” but I was such a wee lad at the time… ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2001, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/22 "2001-11-28T22:39:11Z")
How about the “bookends” to _Saving Private Ryan_? Besides being overly sentimental and cloying, the opening sequence implies that the elderly Ryan is “remembering” events _that he never witnessed!_ (Everything from D-Day up to the point where Captain Miller and his platoon find Ryan.) The first “bookend” should be removed, and all the dialogue from the closing edited out (or changed). If the elderly Ryan still isn’t sure he should have been saved, then just maybe the mission WAS a waste. It would have been better had Ryan simply muttered a heartfelt, “Thank you,” in the direction of Miller’s grave. It’s silly to get angry over mistakes in cartoonish action movies. It’s like getting angry because Wile E. Coyote doesn’t die when he falls off a cliff. ---
**Author:** ![Spiritus\_Mundi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c68b51/32.png) [@Spiritus\_Mundi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiritus_Mundi)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2001, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/23 "2001-11-28T22:41:47Z")
Good movie. Almost a great movie. Then the “brilliant mathematician” with the “uncanny intuiotive grasp of number theory” concludes that the Jewish Mystics could have already pronounced every possible 216-letter name for God. Let’s see, assuming the mystics could speak a 216-letter name in 1-second, making them the kings of all fast-talking gibberish masters, that would account for, oh, 32 million names per man-year. So, if they never slept, and if there were about 3-million of them dedicated to the task it would only take them **100000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000 freakin’ years!** (spaces added for screen kindness). Hell, even if we allow 2 digits per letter (there are more than 10, right?) that only gets us to 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 000000000000000000000000000000000000 years. Aaaarrggghhh! How bloody brilliant a mathematician do you have to be to understand that 10^216 is a **REALLY BIG NUMBER**? Stupid, stupid, stupid line. ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2001, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/24 "2001-11-28T22:46:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Ethilrist \* > \*\*“Fast? You kidding? She can do the Kessel run in less than 12 parsecs!” \*\* What’s worse is that in the RPG, they try to pass this off by saying that the Kessel region has some sort of spatial anomaly that causes the routes through it to change. Sure guys. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/25 "2001-11-29T01:45:30Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jab1 \* > \*\*How about the “bookends” to _Saving Private Ryan_? Besides being overly sentimental and cloying, the opening sequence implies that the elderly Ryan is “remembering” events _that he never witnessed!_ (Everything from D-Day up to the point where Captain Miller and his platoon find Ryan.) The first “bookend” should be removed, and all the dialogue from the closing edited out (or changed). If the elderly Ryan still isn’t sure he should have been saved, then just maybe the mission WAS a waste. It would have been better had Ryan simply muttered a heartfelt, “Thank you,” in the direction of Miller’s grave. > > It’s silly to get angry over mistakes in cartoonish action movies. It’s like getting angry because Wile E. Coyote doesn’t die when he falls off a cliff. \*\* Are those two paragraphs connected, by any chance? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/26 "2001-11-29T02:11:36Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Derleth \* > \*\*Are those two paragraphs connected, by any chance? > > 😃 \*\* No. _Ryan_ is not a cartoonish action movie (c.a.m.). I was referring to the OP. Like other posters here, I was wondering how anyone can take a Stevie Seagull movie as serious drama? ---
**Author:** ![Kaitlyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/73ab20/32.png) [@Kaitlyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaitlyn)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/27 "2001-11-29T02:58:06Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jab1 \* > \*\*How about the “bookends” to _Saving Private Ryan_? Besides being overly sentimental and cloying, the opening sequence implies that the elderly Ryan is “remembering” events _that he never witnessed!_ (Everything from D-Day up to the point where Captain Miller and his platoon find Ryan.) The first “bookend” should be removed, and all the dialogue from the closing edited out (or changed). If the elderly Ryan still isn’t sure he should have been saved, then just maybe the mission WAS a waste. It would have been better had Ryan simply muttered a heartfelt, “Thank you,” in the direction of Miller’s grave. > > It’s silly to get angry over mistakes in cartoonish action movies. It’s like getting angry because Wile E. Coyote doesn’t die when he falls off a cliff. \*\* It does seem to imply it, but from about 20 minutes in, there are clues that this isn’t any one person’s memory. There are plenty of moments throughout the movie that Captain Miller wouldn’t have been privy to, most prominently just after the beach landing scene when we see the telegrams for the three Ryan boys. Also, most of the climactic battle. Which isn’t to say I liked the bookends. They don’t bother me much, but I do think their removal would improve the movie marginally. On the OP: SPOILERS FOR AMERICAN HISTORY X In American History X, a skinhead gun nut discovers some black youths burglarizing his car. He checks his gun before confronting them, kills one, wounds a second, and empties his gun at a fleeing third, before he can kill him. That he emptied his gun is an important plot point, because he has to take other measures with the remaining youth. Between the time he checks his gun, and it becomes empty, he fires 22 shots without reloading. Ordinarily forgivable, but in such a well made film, and in a scene in which the capacity of the gun is an important plot point, it is very annoying. ---
**Author:** ![Badtz\_Maru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e36b37/32.png) [@Badtz\_Maru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Badtz_Maru)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/28 "2001-11-29T05:42:07Z")
Not a good movie, but ‘Instinct’ had one part that was particularly annoying - the whole scene with the drawn cards to see who can go outside. It makes absolutely no sense, even the most corrupt mental institution wouldn’t risk the problems that would cause, it was only there to give the Hopkins character a reason to show what a bad-ass he is supposed to be. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 10:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/29 "2001-11-29T10:39:01Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by rjung \* > \*\*Can I nominate **Tomb Raider**? Halfway through, it suddenly becomes blatantly obvious to everyone that Angelina Jolie could save the world and go home early if she simply smashes a rock into little itty-bitty pieces. > > \*\* I was annoyed that virtually everybody in the universe, good and evil, knew her father. Man, did that guy get around. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Angel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d26b3c/32.png) [@Johnny\_Angel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Angel)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 12:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/30 "2001-11-29T12:11:57Z")
**Ethilrist** wrote: > [@](#): > > “Fast? You kidding? She can do the Kessel run in less than 12 parsecs!” I don’t have a copy of the film to review, but I do recall that Ben and Luke looked at eachother at this point, clearly indicating that they knew Han was full of shit. That’s how I always interpreted it, as a joke for the nerds in the audience. ---
**Author:** ![Mystery\_Dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f14d63/32.png) [@Mystery\_Dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mystery_Dog)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/31 "2001-11-29T13:47:41Z")
**SPOILERS AHEAD FOR "CHASING AMY"** > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Zanshin \* > **SPOILER** > But Holden’s decision about ‘all three of us have to sleep together to make things right’… that just made no sense whatsoever! The first time I saw **Chasing Amy** , that scene made me yelp, “Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?” (Which was probably not appreciated by the people sitting near me in the theater, but I digress.) > > Maybe it was supposed to be a sign of Holden’s deterioration, that he thought such a wild scheme would be a good idea. But even taking that into account, I still can’t imagine anyone ever reaching that particular conclusion. I know Kevin Smith needed a reason for Holden and Alyssa to break up, but come on, he could have come up with something better than that. Sheesh. \*\* I didn’t have a problem with Holden coming up with a cockamamie scheme like that. He was clearly desperate to keep all of the important relationships in his life from falling apart, and he would grasp at any straw that seemed to offer a chance to keep them together. No, the part I had a problem with was that Banky agreed to the plan! The idea that Banky would be willing to join another man in a menage a trois, when he had previously been shown to be somewhat homophobic, ruined the ending for me. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/32 "2001-11-29T14:00:24Z")
> [@](#): > > “Fast? You kidding? She can do the Kessel run in less than 12 parsecs!” A severe lack of imagination – on the part of anyone who thinks there’s something wrong with this. Sure a parsec’s a measure of distance in our universe. But Star Wars takes place “in a universe far, far away.” There’s no reason why a parsec couldn’t be a measure of time there. ---
**Author:** ![Zanshin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e274bd/32.png) [@Zanshin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zanshin)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/33 "2001-11-29T15:52:35Z")
**Mystery** , I see your point, but to me, Holden’s idea just made no sense whatsoever and I couldn’t see even a hugely desperate man coming up with something so patently lame. And as for Banky, the reason he’s so homophobic is that he’s afraid of any homosexual tendencies or thoughts he may have. He then reacts so violently to those thoughts that he goes the complete opposite direction – i.e., extreme homophobia. ‘Methinks he doth protest too much.’ But Holden’s suggestion gives Banky the opportunity to have a safe environment to experiment, which is why he agrees to the threesome. This is borne out in the end of **Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back** , where… **JaSBSB SPOILERS** IIRC, Hooper and Banky walk out of the theater together and Hooper makes a reference to having hooked up with Banky in a sexual way. So I guess it’s not that surprising that Banky would have agreed to the threesome. But that Holden suggested it in the first place… I still can’t wrap my mind around that, still makes no sense to me. YMMV. ---
**Author:** ![FriendRob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecc23a/32.png) [@FriendRob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriendRob)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/34 "2001-11-29T16:42:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RealityChuck \* > \*\* > > > [@](#): > > > > “Fast? You kidding? She can do the Kessel run in less than 12 parsecs!” > > A severe lack of imagination – on the part of anyone who thinks there’s something wrong with this. > > Sure a parsec’s a measure of distance in our universe. But Star Wars takes place “in a universe far, far away.” > There’s no reason why a parsec couldn’t be a measure of time there. \*\* Of course! Why didn’t I think of that? And a chair could be a creampuff, and a door could be a camel… wait… I’m starting to see it… the whole movie encodes the Meaning of Life, you just have to replace each word by its True Meaning in Other-Galaxy-Speak… yes… and the answer is… 42 ---
**Author:** ![barking\_frog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/96bed5/32.png) [@barking\_frog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/barking_frog)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/35 "2001-11-29T17:43:30Z")
In _Contact_, Jodie Foster tried to explain the events that happened by using relativity, thus saying that her short journey plus one day stay at another planet was only an extremely small fraction of a second on Earth. However, it works the other way around – short time spent at FTL speeds equals a LONG time on Earth. ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/36 "2001-11-29T21:02:03Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Johnny Angel \* > \*\ ***Ethilrist** wrote: > > > [@](#): > > > > “Fast? You kidding? She can do the Kessel run in less than 12 parsecs!” > > I don’t have a copy of the film to review, but I do recall that Ben and Luke looked at eachother at this point, clearly indicating that they knew Han was full of shit. That’s how I always interpreted it, as a joke for the nerds in the audience. \*\* I agree with you. It implies that Chewbacca is really the brains of their little operation; Solo is the PR guy or the salesman. Chewie obviously has difficulties speaking whatever language is standard in their galaxy, so Han handles the negotiations with Standard-speakers like Ben and Luke. And since Ben could evidently speak Wookie (he spoke with Chewie first), it’s unlikely that Luke could, being an insulated farm boy. So, the conversation was in Standard with Solo doing all the talking and he made a goof. ---
**Author:** ![Joe\_Cool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ecb155/32.png) [@Joe\_Cool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joe_Cool)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2001, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/37 "2001-11-29T21:35:18Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RealityChuck \* > \*\ ***eve** – most of the 2nd half of “An Affair to Remember” was Dumb with a capital D. > > As for “Event Horizon,” [Red Mike](http://www.sff.net/people/doylemacdonald/r_event.htp) covered it quite nicely. \*\* I’m not getting that link. It’s coming up dead…is the url right? ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2001, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/38 "2001-11-30T01:34:44Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jab1 \* > \*\* > > > [@](#): > > > > \*Originally posted by Johnny Angel \* > > \*\ ***Ethilrist** wrote: > > > > > [@](#): > > > > > > “Fast? You kidding? She can do the Kessel run in less than 12 parsecs!” > > > > …That’s how I always interpreted it, as a joke for the nerds in the audience. \*\* > > I agree with you… the conversation was in Standard with Solo doing all the talking and he made a goof. \*\* I would like to agree with you guys, really. But like I said, according to the RPG distances somehow change in the Kessel region on a regular basis. They _should_ have explained it as Han Solo being stupid, but there you go. ---
**Author:** ![Joe\_Cool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ecb155/32.png) [@Joe\_Cool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joe_Cool)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2001, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/39 "2001-11-30T01:57:43Z")
[QUOTE] \*Originally posted by sturmhauke \* \*\* > [@](#): > > I would like to agree with you guys, really. But like I said, according to the RPG distances somehow change in the Kessel region on a regular basis. They _should_ have explained it as Han Solo being stupid, but there you go. \*\* One of the novels (I forget which) gave a little detail about Kessel, and it’s a system surrounded by massive black holes. Different routes take different distances, but the shorter ones require more speed because they go closer to the black holes. Or something. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2001, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700/40 "2001-11-30T03:26:22Z")
> [@](#): > > I’m not getting that link. It’s coming up dead…is the url right? It’s working for me. Try [http://www.sff.net/people/doylemacdonald/r\_event.htp](http://www.sff.net/people/doylemacdonald/r_event.htp) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-thing-in-a-serious-movie-that-po-ed-you/95700.md?page=3)