# Things in movies that really bug you ... **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 16, 2000, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466 "2000-11-16T16:00:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![SSgtBaloo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ac91a4/32.png) [@SSgtBaloo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SSgtBaloo)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2000, 9:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/141 "2000-11-30T09:07:38Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Welfy \* > **…There are many Italian-Americans in western Pennsylvania. In fact, one of the town’s other names is Little Italy, I believe.** Err… Welfy? Are you in a movie? > [@](#): > > _Originally posted by bserum_ > **- That any metropolitan city has streets so empty during the day to facilitate a car chase.** _LOL!_ What you’d see if it was handled realistically:[ul]_Two cars are motionless in a sea of other cars. The blare of horns and the inarticulate cries of frustrated drivers can be heard over the murmer of idling engines. The occupants of leading car nervously look out the back window of their car…_ Driver: [Leans heavily on horn.] “Get outta the way, dammit!” Passenger: “C’mon! They’re getting closer!” Other passenger: “How can you tell?” _Meanwhile, in the following car…_ Passenger: “So… Why don’t we just get out and walk?”[/ul] ~~Baloo ---
**Author:** ![DavisMcDavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dfb087/32.png) [@DavisMcDavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavisMcDavis)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2000, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/142 "2000-11-30T17:06:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by even sven \* > \*\*I really hate when they use exessivly graphic computer displays for programs that would never, ever, be displayed like that. Programmers have better things to do than think about amazeing graphics for their hardcore program. My example is the whole 3D menu setup in Jurrasic Park. \*\* I just noticed this when they played it on TV over the weekend. That irritating child says, “This is a UNIX system! I know this!” and it’s like a big 3D menu that you fly around in for some reason. A simple directory would take less time but be far less cinematic. Why not have a big, unstructured drawing with randomly placed 3D squares? “The door-locks? Hang on, I’ll pilot my cursor over there, we should land in two minutes and I’ll be able to lock the doors. Gee, this menu is much more fun than plain old ‘press 1 to lock the doors,’ ain’t it?” ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2000, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/143 "2000-11-30T20:25:14Z")
**DavisMcDavis** : You’re not going to believe this – I didn’t believe it myself at first – but that 3-D maze of buildings on the UNIX workstation in _Jurassic Park_ is a REAL PROGRAM!! I’m even co-workers with the guy who wrote it! It’s a filesystem viewer – a UNIX shell, if you will – called “fusion”. It takes advantage of the built-in 3-D rendering library that comes with Silicon Graphics [TM] workstations (so it won’t work on a non-Silicon-Graphics machine). The miniature “cities” shown in the program represent directories on the locally-mounted filesystem, and each “building” represents a file. The height of each building represents the file’s size, and the color of the building represents how old the files are (red buildings are files \>1 year old). “fusion” is useful for finding groups of large, old files (tall red buildings) so you can purge them and free up hard disk space. ---
**Author:** ![Mauve\_Dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ad7895/32.png) [@Mauve\_Dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mauve_Dog)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2000, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/144 "2000-11-30T21:09:58Z")
Isn’t it interesting, then, that a kid would a) know about “fusion” in the first place, and b) know how to use it? I guess she spent a lot of time around SG workstations in her youth :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2000, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/145 "2000-11-30T22:39:10Z")
**Mauve Dog** : “fusion” is available for free download at [http://www.sgi.com/fun/freeware/3d\_navigator.html](http://www.sgi.com/fun/freeware/3d_navigator.html). Of course, you need an SGI Workstation running an IRIX version between 4.0.1 and 5.3 to use it, but (A) the girl in the movie had rich parents who might actually give her such a toy for Xmas, and (B) she _was_ a curious little hacker who might’ve been inclined to try something like this out on her own. ---
**Author:** ![AWB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/bb73d2/32.png) [@AWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AWB)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2000, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/146 "2000-11-30T23:51:35Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by nineiron \* > **There was a Schwarzenegger film which used this (I think it was “The Last Action Hero”). The hero is stuck in an imaginary movie world, and one bit of evidence to try to convince him of this is that all the numbers in his world start with 555.** That’s what area codes are for! :D:D ---
**Author:** ![Hanna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b3f665/32.png) [@Hanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hanna)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2000, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/147 "2000-12-01T00:06:35Z")
…are always neighing loudly. We can see the horses on the screen, isn’t that enough? In real life they don’t neigh at every step! Horses usually only neigh when it is feeding time or if they are separated from the rest of the herd. ---
**Author:** ![KJ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b2d939/32.png) [@KJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KJ)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2000, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/148 "2000-12-01T00:20:13Z")
[hijack] > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by tracer \* > **Explosive decompression is a lot tamer in real life than it is in the movies. The wind trying to blow Ripley out into deep space would have been gale-force, or possibly on the low end of the hurricane-force spectrum, but that’s not enough to rip her arm off.** Okay, but I do remember seeing something on TV about airplane cabin depressurization. They showed a video clip of a test dummy being suddenly sucked out of the little airplane window. What’s up with that? Is it because of the pressure difference, or could it be due to (let’s see if I remember the name right) Bernoulli’s Principle? Or maybe I’m just remembering it wrong. [/hijack] ---
**Author:** ![Uniball](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Uniball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uniball)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2000, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/149 "2000-12-01T01:41:33Z")
Crickets chirping in the night. In movieland, it’s not night unless there are crickets. ---
**Author:** ![bwk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e79b87/32.png) [@bwk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bwk)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2000, 7:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/150 "2000-12-01T07:54:01Z")
Names. Characters are always calling each other by their names, even if they are face to face or are the only two people in the room, on the planet, or in the movie. “Jack, you know how I feel about this. It’s important to me, Jack. If you really care about the situation, Jack, you’ll help. Don’t walk out on me while I’m talking, Jack. Jack. Jack! Come back here, Jack!” I hate that. A bunch. Continuity errors. Sheez, it takes four gazillion dollars to make a movie, the least they could do is spend a few hundred to get someone to check it for these errors. Ugly dudes. I find a great many actors ugly. The women are all quite pretty, usually, and the dudes are just not – it doesn’t make it believeable to me. ---
**Author:** ![bwk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e79b87/32.png) [@bwk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bwk)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2000, 7:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/151 "2000-12-01T07:58:21Z")
Oop, forgot one, sort of related… Old dudes and young, beautiful women. One example is ‘entrapment’ which is really dumb anyway, but there is cath z jones, all young and radiant, and sean connery who is at least a hundred and two. and they get together. yuck. but apparently she is into old, ugly dudes, ha ha. But that does bug me a lot in movies. ---
**Author:** ![Danimal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bb73d2/32.png) [@Danimal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Danimal)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2000, 8:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/152 "2000-12-01T08:57:27Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by bwk \* > \*\*Oop, forgot one, sort of related… Old dudes and young, beautiful women. One example is ‘entrapment’ which is really dumb anyway, but there is cath z jones, all young and radiant, and sean connery who is at least a hundred and two. and they get together. yuck. but apparently she is into old, ugly dudes, ha ha. > \*\* There’s another thing that annoys a lot of people that I don’t mind. In fact, I openly approve of it. Go Sean! Go Catherine! Go Jack! Go Helen! What does bother me is that we don’t see any older-but-still-beautiful women hook up with younger guys. Let Fanny Ardant and Isabella Rosellini in on some of the action! ---
**Author:** ![nineiron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/e56c9b/32.png) [@nineiron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nineiron)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2000, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/153 "2000-12-02T12:55:47Z")
This is more of a TV issue than a movie one… 1. If people are shown playing chess (a game that normally takes quite a while), you can count on a quick call of “checkmate” within twenty seconds of the scene’s start, right after a smug opponent makes his move. 2. If people are playing poker, the first person will have a great hand, and then (again) smugly start to rake in his winnings. The next person will say, “Not so fast,” and show an even better hand, to the dismay of Mr. Smug. 3. In any “Battle of the Sexes,” the females will always win, despite the (you guessed it) smug attitudes of the men. A good example is the famous Marcia-beats-Greg-in-driving-contest episode of The Brady Bunch. ---
**Author:** ![Tzel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Tzel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tzel)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2000, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/154 "2000-12-02T22:42:02Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by spooje \* > \*\*I, for one, am tired of seeing gross bodily functions on the screen!! How many times do I have to actually _see_ a character vomit? Can’t they just give me a sound effect? And I don’t need to see any character urinate! In ‘Rob Roy’ they needlessly showed Tim Roth relieve himself into a chamberpot and Jessica Lange squat and go next to a stream. > > For the love of God, why??? \*\* I think this is a good thing. Adds some realism to the movie and some humanity to the characters. I find it much worse when movie/TV characters seem to never need to use the bathroom, cough, or whatever. ---
**Author:** ![Tzel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Tzel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tzel)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2000, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/155 "2000-12-02T22:54:33Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by nineiron \* > \*\* > 2. If people are playing poker, the first person will have a great hand, and then (again) smugly start to rake in his winnings. The next person will say, “Not so fast,” and show an even better hand, to the dismay of Mr. Smug. > \*\* And no one every wins a poker hand with, say, three of a kind. They usually draw mostly full houses and four of a kind. ---
**Author:** ![Tzel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Tzel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tzel)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2000, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/156 "2000-12-02T22:55:44Z")
Er, “ever,” not “every.” ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2000, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/157 "2000-12-02T23:22:22Z")
Danimal wrote: > [@](#): > > What does bother me is that we don’t see any older-but-still-beautiful women hook up with younger guys. Let Fanny Ardant and Isabella Rosellini in on some of the action! Why, didn’t you know? Older men are sophisticated gentlemen, while older women are dried up old dirtbags. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![DavisMcDavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dfb087/32.png) [@DavisMcDavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavisMcDavis)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2000, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/158 "2000-12-05T17:11:26Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by bwk \* > \*\*Oop, forgot one, sort of related… Old dudes and young, beautiful women. One example is ‘entrapment’ which is really dumb anyway, but there is cath z jones, all young and radiant, and sean connery who is at least a hundred and two. and they get together. yuck. but apparently she is into old, ugly dudes, ha ha. \*\* Additional examples: 1. Many of Audrey Hepburn’s films - the reasoning I read was that they’d bring her in to add virility to a fading male star, for example, Fred Astaire in “Funny Face,” where it’s downright creepy. Audrey looks about 25 and he looks 50, although he’s quite spry for an old guy. 2. I assume this is what happened in “Autumn in New York” with Gere and Ryder, but I obviusly stayed away from that one, along with the rest of the country. 3. Ron Jeremy. **Tracer** - I stand corrected. I still hate that irritating little girl, though. I was hoping she’d get eaten and she never did, just squealed away for the whole film like a stuck pig. I hate that. That reminds of another thing I hate - kids in movies who just yell “Whooooaaa!!!” all the time. This was a key feature in the “Punky Brewster” cartoon series and it irritates me enormously when it surfaces in a film. “Whoaaa! I stepped on a skateboard! Whooooaaa! I’m rolling down the hill!!! Whoooaaa! I’m heading towards a streetlamp! Whooaa! This movie sucks!!!” ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2000, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/159 "2000-12-05T17:30:58Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Tzel \* > \*\* > > > [@](#): > > > > \*Originally posted by spooje \* > > **I, for one, am tired of seeing gross bodily functions on the screen!!** > > I think this is a good thing. Adds some realism to the movie and some humanity to the characters.\*\* I’m afraid I have to go with **spooje** here. I get enough realism from, well, _reality_. The characters are all human (unless it’s Sci-fi or fantasy). Since they are human, it’s a given that they have bodily functions. We don’t need to see the functions to know they have them. OTOH, it was funny in the movie _Pleasantville_ to watch the girl from reality visit the TV show restroom only to find there was no toilet. (But even _Pleasantville_ had its limits. All those scenes where the TV characters discovered sex, yet there was no nudity.) ---
**Author:** ![Mauve\_Dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ad7895/32.png) [@Mauve\_Dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mauve_Dog)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2000, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466/160 "2000-12-05T20:29:35Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by tracer \* > \*\ ***Mauve Dog** : “fusion” is available for free download at [http://www.sgi.com/fun/freeware/3d\_navigator.html](http://www.sgi.com/fun/freeware/3d_navigator.html). > > Of course, you need an SGI Workstation running an IRIX version between 4.0.1 and 5.3 to use it, but (A) the girl in the movie had rich parents who might actually give her such a toy for Xmas, and (B) she _was_ a curious little hacker who might’ve been inclined to try something like this out on her own. \*\* It is certainly _possible_ that a kid might know about this nifty program, but there is really nothing in the movie to indicate that she should be able to immediately recognize it as a UNIX GUI. I don’t remember explicitly from the movie, but I don’t recall there even being mention that Lex was a hacker to begin with (heck, in the book, it was the boy who was the computer geek). That, and we have no information about her parents at all. We know she had a rich _grandfather_ - maybe he saw the nifty gizmos that the computer techs were using at the park at bought his granddaughter one. At any rate, based on the movie itself, I don’t think enough information is given to the viewers to actually convince them that Lex _should_ know what she’s doing. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-that-really-bug-you/41466.md?page=9)