# Stupid stupid stuff in an otherwise okay movie **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 22, 2000, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279 "2000-08-22T07:00:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Crunchy\_Frog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ebca7d/32.png) [@Crunchy\_Frog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crunchy_Frog)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/141 "2001-08-13T02:55:38Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Number Six \* > \*\*And don’t bring up the Academy Awards. \*\* Hey, I did say that the Awards didn’t mean anything and cited last year as an example. \*\* > [@](#): > > So that this isn’t a total hijack, consider “Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid” my new nomination, with the sequence described above being the stupid part. \*\* I was trying to think of a bad part in BC&SK so as not to have a complete hijack, but I couldn’t come up with it. I’d forgotten all about that “Raindrops Are Falling on my Head” scene. Maybe because I always skip over it when I’m watching the movie. I agree with you. It doesn’t advance the plot, it’s out of place, and it doesn’t do anything really except establish that Butch and what’s-her-name really like each other, and I’m sure they could have accomplished that in a better way. I blame the director, not Goldman for that bit. (Even if Goldman had written in a montage like that, the director could’ve chosen to edit it out.) ---
**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:** [August 13, 2001, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/142 "2001-08-13T03:25:35Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Rossarian \* > \*\* > > > [@](#): > > > > \*Originally posted by Fiver \* > > **Raiders of the Lost Ark: We’re given to believe that Indy is able to ride the back of a U-Boat all the way from the mid-Atlantic to the island of Malta, without the sub ever submerging (during a secret mission) and drowning him, and without any Germans in the conning tower seeing him.** > > I used to wonder about this, but at that time, submarines were far more efficient on the surface. They would cruise to wherever they were going and then submerge to attack. They couldn’t stay submerged all that long without running out of battery power. So the U-Boat would have stayed on the surface the whole time, especially since this was prior to the war, and thus there was no reason to hide from anyone. \*\* Yeah, pre-nuclear subs usually had diesel engines which could only run when on the surface (for obvious reasons) and batteries that they ran on underwater. You could only run the engines a certain amount of time underwater, were limited to about 10 knots at best, and had to run your engine on the surface hours to recharge the batteries afterwards. I learned all this from some old sub simulator, I believe it was called Silent Hunter or something like that. ---
**Author:** ![Atreyu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@Atreyu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atreyu)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/143 "2001-08-13T15:37:15Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Badtz Maru \* > \*\*I learned all this from some old sub simulator, I believe it was called Silent Hunter or something like that. \*\* I bet you’re thinking of **Silent Service** , which I played on the Atari ST computer that I had in the 1980s. God, I loved that game. I’d kill to find a really good submarine warfare simulation today. ---
**Author:** ![Ranger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Ranger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranger)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/144 "2001-08-13T15:45:35Z")
Atreyu, yeah, I used to play that on my Commodore 128 too. I wish they’d come out with a Windows version. Who needs all the fancy schmancy graphics and stuff, huh? ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/145 "2001-08-13T18:54:47Z")
I wish I could name all the otherwise great fantasy and science fiction movies that were ruined by a bad piece of special effects. ---
**Author:** ![Scupper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b9bd4f/32.png) [@Scupper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scupper)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/146 "2001-08-13T20:09:51Z")
Spoilers!!! _ **Unbreakable** _ Fine movie that totally blew it with the America’s Most Wanted “this is what happened to the two characters” titles at the end. Now Dunn is a superhero and Price is revealed as a maniac so he just calls the cops and they throw him in a mental hospital? It would have been a thousand times better if it had simply said “Based on an anonymous tip, the police discovered evidence of multiple acts of terrorism, but Elijah Price is still at large …” Or, better yet, just had Dunn’s reaction of horror be the finale without tacking on the text. _ **The Abyss** _ A miraculous rescue of our heroic crew by … a giant, ugly, plastic soap dish. _ **Four Weddings and a Funeral** _ “Is it still raining? I hadn’t noticed.” The entire audience groaned. _ **The Matrix** _ Thermodynamics, shmermodynamics. Conservation of energy is for losers. _ **L.A. Story** _ The traffic sign scenes. _ **O Brother Where Art Thou** _ Babyface Nelson machineguns some cows - jarring and unneccessary. We already know he’s nuts just by the way he acts. Didn’t wreck the movie, but seriously hurt it. _ **Shawshank Redemption** _ The “good to see you old buddy” scene at the very end. The movie should have ended with Redd’s narration “I hope” and left the actual reunion to our imaginations. _ **Singin’ in the Rain** _ The entire “Broadway Rhythm” bit where Gene Kelly keeps blasting out “Gotta Dance!” What the hell is that even doing in the movie, much less taking up a good fifth of it? _ **Shrek** _ “All Star” by Smashmouth. How many more movies are going to subject us to this crappy song? ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/147 "2001-08-13T20:10:00Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Number Six \* > **I still think that “The Princess Bride” is his best screen work.** If I had to be stuck on a deserted island with just one movie, it’d be a close call between _The Princess Bride_ or _Toy Story 2_. And where **is** that link to the William Goldman/_Saving Private Ryan_ diatribe? I wanna read it! ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/148 "2001-08-13T20:33:13Z")
How about the Dr. Know sequence in **A.I.**? ---
**Author:** ![Daowajan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@Daowajan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daowajan)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/149 "2001-08-13T21:02:46Z")
The cow-killing scene in O Brother is supposed to be an inside joke. There’s another movie where the actor who plays Babyface Nelson is playing an escaped convict. He’s walking through a field and finds a herd of cows. Then he yells “Cows! If there’s one thing I love, it’s cows!” and hugs one of them. ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/150 "2001-08-13T21:19:27Z")
> [@](#): > > _Originally posted by Scupper \* > Shawshank Redemption_\* The “good to see you old buddy” scene at the very end. The movie should have ended with Redd’s narration “I hope” and left the actual reunion to our imaginations. That’s the way Stephen King’s novella ended. This was from _Different Seasons_, which also had _Apt Pupil_ and _The Body_ (which translated into the movie title _Stand By Me_). I haven’t seen either of the latter two movies, and I don’t think I will. A lot of Stephen King’s best work includes a lot of psychological tension and interior monologues that don’t translate well to the screen. _Apt Pupil_ was an especially disturbing story, much more so than any “supernatural” thriller. I don’t intend to ruin that story for myself by seeing it trivialized in the form of one of them thar flicker shows. ---
**Author:** ![Crunchy\_Frog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ebca7d/32.png) [@Crunchy\_Frog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crunchy_Frog)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/151 "2001-08-13T21:44:59Z")
Speaking of _Stand by Me_, I’d like to add the scene where the boy tells a story about the fat kid participating in a pie eating contest only to throw up all over the place as a means of revenge. It’s an incredibly stupid story to begin with, it drags the film to a screeching halt, and to top it all off it has nothing whatsoever to do with any other part of the film. Reiner should have edited it out. Better yet, he shouldn’t have filmed it to begin with. ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/152 "2001-08-13T22:17:54Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Scupper \* > _ **L.A. Story** _ The traffic sign scenes. I saw this movie again last Saturday on the tube. The joke is the sign has been telling people mundane information all this time, but now it’s decided to tell a select few stuff they REALLY need to know. (The first time Steve Martin sees the sign, there is a forlorn-looking guy holding a briefcase standing at the foot of the sign, looking up at it.) > [@](#): > > _ **Singin’ in the Rain** _ The entire “Broadway Rhythm” bit where Gene Kelly keeps blasting out “Gotta Dance!” What the hell is that even doing in the movie, much less taking up a good fifth of it? Kelly’s character has an idea for a musical number. (Or was it a whole movie?) Anyway, he’s pitching it to a producer. We’re seeing what he’s describing. (However, _Singin’_ takes place in the late 1920s, so the movie-within-the-movie would NOT have been filmed in Technicolor!) ---
**Author:** ![Kaitlyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/73ab20/32.png) [@Kaitlyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaitlyn)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/153 "2001-08-13T22:29:54Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Scupper \* > \*\*Spoilers!!! > > _ **L.A. Story** _ The traffic sign scenes. > > _ **Shawshank Redemption** _ The “good to see you old buddy” scene at the very end. The movie should have ended with Redd’s narration “I hope” and left the actual reunion to our imaginations. > > _ **Singin’ in the Rain** _ The entire “Broadway Rhythm” bit where Gene Kelly keeps blasting out “Gotta Dance!” What the hell is that even doing in the movie, much less taking up a good fifth of it? > > \*\* The parts of LA Story and Shawshank Redemption both work well for me, but that’s a matter of taste. Long Answer: The “Broadway Melody” section of _Singin in the Rain_ shows us the new plot of “The Dancing Cavelier”. The scenes we see describe the framing story for the picture. The already filmed cavalier scenes are to function as a dream sequence after the protaganist gets hit on the head, much the same as the dream sequence in “The Wizard of Oz”. Short Answer: Gene Kelly was primarily a dancer. This was his big dance sequence. ---
**Author:** ![obfusciatrist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/4af34b/32.png) [@obfusciatrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/obfusciatrist)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/154 "2001-08-13T22:31:22Z")
**Crunchy Frog** : Sounds like you read the article I am talking about. It also tore into the other three best picture nominees that year. **Lux Fiat** : The article was written for _New York_ magazine, but I can’t give you the date (the book I read doesn’t give the information). However, you can read the article in a book titled _[The Big Picture: Who Killed Hollywood? and Other Essays](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1557834067/)_. The essay is titled “The Emperor’s New Fatigues (and Other Stories)” and is on page 245 of the hardcover edition. (The archives at [http://www.nymag.com](http://www.nymag.com) may have this article but they were unavailable when I just tried it) ---
**Author:** ![Rmat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/85e7bf/32.png) [@Rmat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rmat)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2001, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/155 "2001-08-13T22:45:34Z")
Field of Dreams and Goodfellas are both fine films, the latter especially so, and it would take a lot to ruin either, but that’s damn near what happened in both: 1. The scene in which Amy Madigan’s character (wife of the Costner character) gets on her high horse in the school gymnasium and then carries her dreadful performance into the nearby corridor–one of the worst acting performances I have ever seen in any movie. 2. The courtroom scene toward the end in which Henry Hill (played by Ray Liotta) steps out of character to describe what’s going on. Not that there’s anything wrong with the acting in his case. It’s the writing. The flow and rhythm of the entire film is irretrievably disrupted. Horribly, horribly jarring. ---
**Author:** ![dasceder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3d9bf3/32.png) [@dasceder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dasceder)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2001, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/156 "2001-08-14T01:04:38Z")
The part in “showgirls” when she barfs by the side of the car. sheesh. and SPOILER I thought the end of “Swiming with Sharks” was horrendous. Specifically the part when Frank Whaley’s friend comes into his office and explains exactly what we know (probably) happened. It would have been much more effective had we gone from Keven Spacey’s home after the pistol shot, to F. Whaley’s office when Spacey pokes his head in the door. …and so it is written ---
**Author:** ![CrankyAsAnOldMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crankyasanoldman/32/11670_2.png) [@CrankyAsAnOldMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CrankyAsAnOldMan)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2001, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/157 "2001-08-14T01:10:34Z")
I forgot this one. I don’t by any stretch of the imagination think this movie was academy-award winning stuff, but I bring it up because I found this one detail so jarring and wrong I could not get over it. I’m talking about the movie “Days of Thunder.” Nicole Kidman’s character is a neurologist. She treats two drivers in the movie for their injuries after head trauma. But later in the movie, we see her riding on the back of a motorcycle _without a helmet_. A neurologist on the back of a big bike with no helmet. ---
**Author:** ![Outrider](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9d8465/32.png) [@Outrider](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Outrider)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2001, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/158 "2001-08-14T14:47:28Z")
**The Straight Story** - Richard Farnsworth’s daughter saying “What’s the number for 911?” in the beginning of the movie made me wince more than any other scene in any other movie that I can think of. That is _not_ a good way to illustrate that a person is slow, Disney movie or no Disney movie. Come to think of it, that whole movie frustrated me to no end. Farnsworth’s acting was superb, and there was some gorgeous cinematography, but all the overbearing sentimentality and Sissy Spacek’s godawful attempt at a speech impediment made it very hard for me to really enjoy the movie. It’s currently rated #108 on IMDB so I guess there are plenty of people who adore it, and I respect their opinion, but I’m not one of them. P.S. I think this is the first time that I’ve had two posts in a thread that were made a year apart. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2001, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/159 "2001-08-14T14:53:47Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Ranger \* > \*\*Atreyu, yeah, I used to play that on my Commodore 128 too. I wish they’d come out with a Windows version. Who needs all the fancy schmancy graphics and stuff, huh? \*\* Well, howdy stranger! I have **Silent Service II** for DOS, but stopped playing because it didn’t work too well on my 333mHz. Now that I also have a 166, I’ll start playing again. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2001, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279/160 "2001-08-14T16:14:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Doghouse Reilly \* > \*\*I would have enjoyed Gladiator more in retrospect if I hadn’t viewed the outtakes. At least one of the outtakes seemed important to the plot (Oliver Reed telling Maximus that he is an “entertainer”–why else would Maximus be shouting to the crowd in the final version that “I am not an entertainer”!) and one or two that would have really added to Commodus’s character development (especially one where he confronts a statue of his father, begins by attacking it with a sword and ends by embracing it and weeping much as he had when he murdered the old guy at the beginning of the movie). I wish that those scenes had been left in. \*\* On the other hand, I am rather glad the ‘firing squad’ scene was removed. While we’re on Gladiator let me just say: “Crossbows? Let alone whirling 4 barrelled crossbows? And Iron armored carriages? I don’t think so Ridley.” Other than that, I liked it a lot. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-stupid-stuff-in-an-otherwise-okay-movie/30279.md?page=9)