# Movies with blatantly stupid premises **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 7, 2006, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823 "2006-09-07T19:51:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Troy\_McClure\_SF](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troy_mcclure_sf/32/4150_2.png) [@Troy\_McClure\_SF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Troy_McClure_SF)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/101 "2006-09-08T18:42:02Z")
**The Day After Tomorrow** drives me apeshit. The father nobly treks through the cold and snow to find his dear son stuck in New York… _TO DO WHAT?!_ “Yay! Dad, thank god you’re here! Get the rescue choppers and we’ll load everyone in at get out! … Oh, well, then get the bus! … No bus either? Huh. Well, surely you brought food and blankets and water for us, right? … None of that either, huh? Well we didn’t really plan to entertain tonight, and we didn’t really prepare enough lamb for guests, but maybe one of these extras will die of the cold and you can eat him.” ---
**Author:** ![simster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/simster/32/1047_2.png) [@simster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simster)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/102 "2006-09-08T18:43:14Z")
[QUOTE=Gozu Tashoya] Not quite the same level of inanity (or maybe it is), but what was the procedure Vin Diesel’s character in Pitch Black (and sequels) had? They polished his corneas or something? :dubious: [/QUOTE] While Pitch Black was ‘enjoyable’, the Chronicles of Riddick has to be right up there with stupid premises… I mean, using Religion as a means to enslave a society, what kind of stupidity is that? Master of Disguise still wins the ‘worst/stupidest movie ever’ award in my book. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/103 "2006-09-08T18:49:56Z")
_Young Einstein_, starring Yahoo Serious. :smack: I might add-- :smack: :smack: :smack: From an Amazon Summary. > [@](#): > > Albert Einstein was really an Australian. An inventor his whole life, he constantly manufactures weird and wonderful inventions in his wooden shed in rural Tasmania. Finally perfecting a technique for putting the bubbles in beer, he decides it is time to share his invention with the rest of the world. His unique style, encompassing rock and roll, quantum physics, and apples soon draws the attention of scientists the world over, including the ravishing Marie Curie. In conclusion, :smack: :smack: :smack: :smack: :smack: :smack: ---
**Author:** ![mks57](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b9bd4f/32.png) [@mks57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mks57)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/104 "2006-09-08T19:06:35Z")
[QUOTE=Bosda Di’Chi of Tricor] _Young Einstein_, starring Yahoo Serious. :smack: [/QUOTE] I enjoyed it. Anyone who can split the beer atom is alright with me. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/105 "2006-09-08T19:15:27Z")
In order for the tidal wave to hit Manhattan that way, Long Island would have to be removed. Including most of Queens. ---
**Author:** ![slortar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6bbea6/32.png) [@slortar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slortar)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/106 "2006-09-08T20:21:16Z")
Going for extra-super-obscure: **The Idaho Transfer.** Low budget 70’s film by Peter Fonda about a bunch of scientists who build a secret time-travel program to avoid an upcoming holocaust of some sort. The only people who can survive the trip are teenagers. That’s not the stupid part, though, only the tip of the stupid iceberg. The stupid part is the reason behind the holocaust, which you only find out during the big reveal at the end: The 70’s energy crisis was only the beginning. Since humanity ran out of fossil fuels, they decided to start using humans instead as a fuel source. Do they do it in a cool Matrixy way? Nope, they just jump out of their cars (in their silver jumpsuits) whenever they’re running low on fuel, grab a convenient specifically-bred primitive human and stuff them into their tank, kicking and screaming. It’s all symbolic, maaaan. There’s quite a bit more stupid to be had in the movie, but that’s the most I can recall without enduring a pain-spike in my forehead. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/107 "2006-09-08T20:49:13Z")
[QUOTE=Push You Down] No need to. Considering we know fuck-all about why the aliens came to Earth in the first place, judging their reasoning is completely ridiculous. This isn’t like ID4 where we find out directly from the aliens why they are here. We have no information about the aliens other than they came to Earth and water kills them. We are not privy to the wherefores. You can dislike the movie for the directing or the story or the acting or hell, even the lighting… but disliking it because water is harmful to the aliens- That’s the stupidest reason I can think of. [/QUOTE] Consider this: How could a humanoid species, apparently evolved in an Earthlike environment, and capable of breathing Earth’s air (therefore definitely a carbon-based lifeform), possibly be vulnerable to water? This also applies to _Alien Nation._ ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/108 "2006-09-08T20:58:57Z")
[QUOTE=Push You Down] > [@Mangetout](#): > > I agree. And we’re talking about Signs, aren’t we? > > Cue overdefensive arguments about how it was all a metaphor for redemption, or love, or faithfulness, or some such. No need to. Considering we know fuck-all about why the aliens came to Earth in the first place, judging their reasoning is completely ridiculous. This isn’t like ID4 where we find out directly from the aliens why they are here. We have no information about the aliens other than they came to Earth and water kills them. We are not privy to the wherefores. You can dislike the movie for the directing or the story or the acting or hell, even the lighting… but disliking it because water is harmful to the aliens- That’s the stupidest reason I can think of. [/QUOTE] You’re right. Without knowing their reasoning, we can’t decide whether it makes sense or not. For instance, I was just thinking I’d like to take a vacation on a planet with oceans of hydrocyanic acid. It makes perfect sense. Wait, no it doesn’t. Visiting a planet covered with gigantic oceans of poison doesn’t make sense under _any_ circumstance! Particularly if you’re not going to take any precautions whatsoever to protect yourself. But the best part of why it’s a horrible movie is when Mel Gibson remembers his wife’s last words, and advises Joaquin Phoenix to “swing away.” Thanks, dude, because the idea of hitting it with a blunt object is such a wacky, far-out scheme that no one would have ever thought of it without supernatural assistance! What I never understand is why people feel so much need to defend this horrible movie’s horrible premise. I don’t get why people enjoy it at all. The “insights” the movie offered up were banal at best, the plot was absolutely unbelievable on its surface, what the hell is there to like about it? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/109 "2006-09-08T21:03:17Z")
Well, as has been pointed out, it was salt-water specifically that hurt the newcomers in _Alien Nation_ and their presence on Earth wasn’t voluntary. Why many of them settled in coastal Los Angeles instead of, say, Kansas, is I’ll admit a weakness of the film. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/110 "2006-09-08T21:05:02Z")
By the way, stupidest? _Total Recall_ has to be in the top ten. _Imposter_ was lame, too. Sometimes Hollywood does Dick good, more often they don’t. ---
**Author:** ![mr.jp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/48db29/32.png) [@mr.jp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mr.jp)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/111 "2006-09-08T21:13:14Z")
What does everyone think is the problem with face/off? The face exchange procedure? I know we cannot do that now, but it’s not unthinkable. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/112 "2006-09-08T21:16:58Z")
> [@](#): > > Quote: > Originally Posted by Push You Down > No need to. Considering we know fuck-all about why the aliens came to Earth in the first place, judging their reasoning is completely ridiculous. > This isn’t like ID4 where we find out directly from the aliens why they are here. We have no information about the aliens other than they came to Earth and water kills them. We are not privy to the wherefores. > You can dislike the movie for the directing or the story or the acting or hell, even the lighting… but disliking it because water is harmful to the aliens- That’s the stupidest reason I can think of. > > Consider this: How could a humanoid species, apparently evolved in an Earthlike environment, and capable of breathing Earth’s air (therefore definitely a carbon-based lifeform), possibly be vulnerable to water? > > This also applies to Alien Nation. Whjile I will gleefully point at **Signs** and laugh – and have, frequently on this Board – the premise in **Alien Nation** was that the aliens were genetically-modified organisms deliberately bred as slaves, and that this vulnerabiluity was a control mechanism. I find it hard to believe that even a power-hungry alien overlord race would go to such extreme lengths as throwing out a pretty basic and essential building block of organic chemistry as saline and making creatures have a bad reaction to it, but can buy it if I squint real hard. In **Signs** , though, the aliens and their motives make no sense at all. Naked aliens running around on a water-filled world, their only apparent weapons great strength and poison gas with a range conveniently shorter than a baseball bat? If you tell me that it’s not supposed to make sense, that it’s just a device and symbolic and all, and I’ll ask how come they didn’t make this a war movie or a western with equally improbable foes. I can’t help thinking it’s got a lot to do with the low regard people have for science fiction, or at least for its integrity. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/113 "2006-09-08T21:31:31Z")
Limited defense of **Signs** ahead. Why do we call the creatures we see in the movie “aliens”? Yeah, the characters believe they are aliens. But there’s no particular evidence of this. It seems more likely that they are bogey- or possibly booger-men. They are incomprehensible creatures who do incomprehensible evil deeds for the purpose of creating fear and terror. They hide in closets and shadows. They are defeated by magical incantations and hope and family values. Maybe they come from another planet, but the name of that planet is The Planet Of The Bogeymen. ---
**Author:** ![jsc1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/114 "2006-09-08T21:42:49Z")
[QUOTE=gigi] Ding! Ding! Ding! [/QUOTE] Took the words right outta my mouth. Any time I see a “stupid movie” or “annoying movie” thread, I open it to see if anyone’s mentioned Face/Off yet. ---
**Author:** ![jsc1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/115 "2006-09-08T21:50:31Z")
[QUOTE=Merijeek] The crook’s plan was also **TOTALLY UNNECESSARY** because getting the money revolved around the Air Marshal (ie. The Crook) phoning in the demands and collecting the money. The woman and the girl were completely unnecessary. Apparently, all an Air Marshal needs is a phone and collect his millions. [/QUOTE] I like how the plot required a conspiracy involving an air marshall, a flight attendant, and a German mortician.. What, did they just happen to bump into each other in a bar, and hatch a plot? ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/116 "2006-09-08T21:53:35Z")
It’s been years since I’ve seen this film, but since it was just released on DVD, I couldn’t help but think of how stupid the premise is, as well as I can remember it: _The Wizard_. This mentally challenged kid wants to go to California- except “California” to him is this place he went to with his dead parents so he can put their ashes there or something (of course, we don’t find this out until the end of the movie). So these two kids befriend him and take him on the road to California. So it’s a road trip movie, right? Wrong. It turns out that the kid is really good at video games, so when they find out there’s going to be a big video game competition in California, they decide to enter him in it. So it’s a road trip/buddy/competition picture that’s basically a drawn-out advertisement for Nintendo with a plot that barely makes sense. ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/117 "2006-09-08T21:56:23Z")
[QUOTE=Lemur866] It seems more likely that they are bogey- or possibly booger-men. [/QUOTE] I prefer Homer Simpson’s version: "I don’t want to alarm you, but there may be a bogeyman- or bogey_men_- in the house. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/118 "2006-09-08T22:34:24Z")
OK, another movie with a blatantly stupid premise. **Stigmata**. [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0145531/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0145531/) See, there’s this secret scripture, with an explosive message…that Jesus is everywhere, that a priesthood is not neccesary to intercede between the layman and the divine. Things like: > [@](#): > > _“I am the light that shines over all things. I am everywhere. From me all came forth, and to me all return. > Split a piece of wood, and I am there. Lift a stone, and you will find me there.”_ HERESY! Naturally this message must be suppressed by the Catholic Church at all costs…including murder. Because if people ever suspect that priests aren’t neccesary, they could break from the holy church! No one has ever had this thought before! This is the kind of thing that could cause priests to nail theses onto church doors! Dogs and cats living together! A massive, well, PROTEST against the Catholic Church! And of course Jesus intervenes to help bring this lost knowlege to the public…mostly by torturing and sexually abusing Patricia Arquette. And at the end the truth is revealed! This secret document really exists! It has recently been revealed! And the church is really trying to supress it! And this document is…the Gospel of Thomas! The document that will finally blow the lid off the corruption that is the Catholic Church. Discovered in…1945. Yep, this document has been around for 60 years, but the Catholic Church is so threatened by it that they would…well…what exactly has the Catholic Church done to keep the Gospel of Thomas secret, or hidden? Nothing? Wow, you mean this really real document that could destroy the church, so destructive that you imagine them murdering people to hide the truth…and in real life they do nothing? Lame. Damn, what a stupid premise for a movie. ---
**Author:** ![Autumn\_Almanac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d26b3c/32.png) [@Autumn\_Almanac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Autumn_Almanac)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/119 "2006-09-08T23:19:27Z")
[QUOTE=Troy McClure SF] "Yay! Dad, thank god you’re here! Get the rescue choppers and we’ll load everyone in at get out! … Oh, well, then get the bus! … No bus either? Huh. [/QUOTE] Remember the very end of the movie? He _did_ summon rescue shoppers once he found his son. ---
**Author:** ![Autumn\_Almanac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d26b3c/32.png) [@Autumn\_Almanac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Autumn_Almanac)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2006, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823/120 "2006-09-08T23:20:58Z")
[QUOTE=Autumn Almanac] rescue shoppers [/QUOTE] Rescue choppers even. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-blatantly-stupid-premises/371823.md?page=7)