# Movies with complicated, hard-to-follow plots **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 31, 2006, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217 "2006-12-31T15:58:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2007, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/61 "2007-01-03T01:58:28Z")
There is one movie that haunts me to this day. I forget what it is called, but it is a Norse Myth or Saga put to film. A particularly cruel and clever Psychologist played it for us once on VHS. It was a circuitous and crazy plot that involved Rapunzelian romance mixed with Herculean feats replete… and I think there was a hag…lybranthine, confusing (I really can’t remember through the mists of Ragnarok). It was a very dark movie, as if Bergman had done a modern Viking movie. The plot was literally incomprehensible. Has anyone seen it? I’d like to know what it was called. The movie was probably made late eighties, early nineties. It was a newer film, Scandanavian production. Musta been 3 or 4 hours long… ---
**Author:** ![Phantom\_Dennis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/51bf81/32.png) [@Phantom\_Dennis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Phantom_Dennis)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2007, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/62 "2007-01-03T02:31:09Z")
A belated thanks to **Gaderene** and **Campion** for the _Brick_ links. Fascinating stuff. ---
**Author:** ![Wee\_Bairn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/90db22/32.png) [@Wee\_Bairn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wee_Bairn)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2007, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/63 "2007-01-03T02:49:17Z")
Out of the Past with Robert Mitchum- great flick, labyrinthine plot. Ditto any Raymond Chandler type noir- Murder My Sweet, Farewell My Lovely, etc. Much below the above two in quality, Ditto all Mamet plots, epsecially those that revolve around people spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on a con that falls apart if the “mark” looks at his watch before he takes a sip of his Drambouie, or whatever the hell goes on in those epics of his. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2007, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/64 "2007-01-03T05:53:18Z")
[QUOTE=Reloy3] **The Spanish Prisoner** - Good flick, though, if you can get past the stilted, clipped dialogue style. [/QUOTE] I came here to mention The Spanish Prisoner. The twist is so subtle, it took me a whole day to realize I had been suckered. Mamet doesn’t dumb anything down for anybody. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2007, 6:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/65 "2007-01-03T06:24:25Z")
[QUOTE=Caridwen] I’m embarrassed to admit it but I still don’t know what in the hell the second and third Matrix movies were about. Not that I didn’t like them, but I just don’t get it. [/QUOTE] I get what they were about. I just don’t like them. ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2007, 9:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/66 "2007-01-03T09:44:57Z")
[QUOTE=Alice The Goon] I’d always heard about _The Usual Suspects_, and determined to watch it one day and it was going to be really good. Then a couple of weeks ago, I finally popped it in. I could not follow that sucker to save my life. I kept asking my boyfriend, “Is that that one guy?” and “What’s going on, now?” I was pretty distracted throughout the whole thing, but I’ll never know if the movie is really that hard to follow or if it was just me, because I don’t want to try it again. [/QUOTE] Once you get to the end of \*The Usual Suspects \* I think you an realise what the plot was all about. But then when you start thinking about it the last twist makes it all nonsense. How about _Last Year at Marienbad_? ---
**Author:** ![Illuminatiprimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/illuminatiprimus/32/11520_2.png) [@Illuminatiprimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Illuminatiprimus)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2007, 9:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/67 "2007-01-03T09:47:56Z")
[QUOTE=Skald the Rhymer] I get what they were about. I just don’t like them. [/QUOTE] Each to their own. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2007, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/68 "2007-01-03T10:14:55Z")
[QUOTE=Cicero] Once you get to the end of _The Usual Suspects \* I think you an realise what the plot was all about. But then when you start thinking about it the last twist makes it all nonsense._? [/QUOTE] Not really. The last twist reveals that Kevin Spacey’s character has woven an elaborate tapestry of bullshit that ensnares the cops and allows him to escape. Anything that happens in flashbacks, which is the majority of the movie, is unreliable. ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2007, 10:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/69 "2007-01-03T10:47:18Z")
[QUOTE=sturmhauke] Not really. The last twist reveals that Kevin Spacey’s character has woven an elaborate tapestry of bullshit that ensnares the cops and allows him to escape. Anything that happens in flashbacks, which is the majority of the movie, is unreliable. [/QUOTE] If ever I master spoilers I’ll answer 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2007, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/70 "2007-01-03T18:56:04Z")
Illuminatiprimus: > [@](#): > > I’ve seen this film twice now and I still have problems trying to work out how the scenario that starts the main plot off could actually be engineered by someone (in the movie I mean, not the writers). > > I mean, just how could Cruise’s boss actually have made the precogs witness a future that he was in effect faking? Surely sticking some guy that the main character has never met and doesn’t even know exists in a room with lots of kiddie pics isn’t enough to lead directly to Anderton confronting and shooting him without knowledge of that future initiating it. In fact, the more I think about it the more I think that what the film shows is in effect a paradox as the effect generates the cause. He engineered the plot by inducing the victim to get himself shot by Anderton even if Anderton didn’t really want to do it. It was a promise to provide for the guy’s kids, I think, and the victim himself couldn’t do that, at least not very well. So yes, the effect generated the cause - both Anderton and the DOJ guy looking at the pre-crime program realized this - but the effect was ensured by the guy’s promise to get himself killed by Anderton no matter what. ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2007, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/71 "2007-01-03T22:54:57Z")
[QUOTE=Cicero] If ever I master spoilers I’ll answer 🙂 [/QUOTE] End the text with [/spoiler] and start it with [spoiler]. Hit preview before you submit. ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2007, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/72 "2007-01-04T00:23:54Z")
Regarding the general concept of _Minority Report_ Sending information backward through time, which is in effect what the precogs did by “seeing” the future, is sufficient to result in a causality paradox, or a closed causal loop, which is really what _Minority Report_ depicts. ---
**Author:** ![Selkie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbce88/32.png) [@Selkie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Selkie)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2007, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/73 "2007-01-04T06:14:17Z")
I’m surprised no one’s mentioned [**Layer Cake**](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0375912/), which is a very good film with a plot that definitely requires one’s full attention. Regarding **Brick** - which I loved - I _highly_ recommend watching it with the English subtitles on. There’s so little dialogue that even subtitle haters don’t usually mind, and the movie’s a lot more enjoyable when the words aren’t muffled. ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2007, 8:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/74 "2007-01-04T08:54:54Z")
[QUOTE=sturmhauke] End the text with [/spoiler] and start it with [spoiler]. Hit preview before you submit. [/QUOTE] Sturmhauke, thanks for the help, but even with your tips I can’t get it to work. Maybe I m missing spaces somewhere- probably between my ears. ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2007, 9:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217/75 "2007-01-04T09:32:30Z")
Possibly you’re _adding_ spaces, specifically between the [brackets]. Make sure there aren’t any. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-with-complicated-hard-to-follow-plots/386217.md?page=3)