My top ten things that should be banned from all future movies:
Romantic moments accompanied by the swelling sound of very familiar Motown hit songs.
Computer geeks who look like supermodels.
Ultrahip bank robbers with five o’clock shadows in black leather trenchcoats who aim/shoot their guns sideways (totally WRONG from what my gun-nut friend tells me!) to the sound of technomusic.
Estranged/entangled couples yelling at each other while standing in the middle of a downpour.
60-something leading men in action movies romantically paired off with early 20-something leading “ladies.”
Hell, 60-something leading men in action movies.
Smart-alec kids who know all the answers and can solve all the problems of the adult characters with their naive, childish “wisdom.”
Very large explosions/disasters in which all the major characters manage to walk away from it with scorch marks and torn clothes, but not so much as a papercut.
any Star Trek crew.
Madonna, involved with a movie in any way, shape or form.
Sex is always done to death. No matter what the movie is, comedy, drama, science fiction, tragedy, most all films PG and up there is always sexual activity. Hell, even Forrest Gump gets laid.
Racial “fish out of water” comedy - There hasn’t been a good comedy about a black man riling up all the stiff upper-class white people since Eddie Murphy did Beverley Hills Cop and Trading Places.
If I hear one more Australian-accented actor portray a British person I shall scream. That goes double for tarts from Texas portraying British persons.
The ubiquitous fat kid whose sole contribution to the film is belching/farting/vomiting and/or getting hit in the balls with something.
The hip teens from different cultures/socio-economic backgrounds/parts of town/fashion genres who are continually warring until they are faced with a crisis/locked in a building and then magically discover that they’re actually not so different from each other after all, and if they just work together they can bring down the establishment/save the dance/get out of the building.
Any film that ends with someone shouting “Let’s party!” and fades out over a scene of people dancing in the streets while crappy 80’s “rock” plays in the background.
Any female character in a thriller/horror film who gets into a shower. It began with Psycho, and now the laws of Hollywood decree that every soon-to-die-horribly woman must meet her fate with freshly lathered boobies.
The rag-tag group of misfits who through hard work, determination, and the help of their unatheltic but secretly very cool/failed professional coach/teacher/camp counselor once again “beat the odds” and save the school/camp/rec center by pulling hilarious stunts on those snotty rich kids/uptight stuffed shirts.
Teenage girls/boys who lead totally normal lives until one day they discover a portal into another dimension/magic jewel and become pop stars/super-heroes/war-mongering beast-masters. (You anime fans know exactly what I’m talking about.)
Bride/husband leaves husband/bride at altar, goes on journey of self-discovery/wacky misadventure in which they discover they are actually meant to be with bride/husband/long-overlooked best friend/some guy/girl they just met.
Vampire/ghost/werewolf/supernatural creature of your choice is leading a tormented existence in which they feel isolated from all humanity/their own kind and long to be human/dead/straight/gay.
“Hilarious” send-up of black/white/Hispanic/Asian/culture of your choice sterotypes in which we all learn we’re not so different after all/it’s okay to be a racist as long as you’re witty.
Any film whose script was obviously written on a “Mad Libs” basis, in which all dialogue and action is left intact, and only names/genders/criminal occupations/sites of explosions change.
The Magical African-American Friend. The MAAF is a black person whose sole reason for being is to help, advise, counsel, loosen-up and funk-ify their pathetic white friend. Frequently the MAAF will have actual magic/psychic powers, but always they will have a soulful wisdom that an inauthentic white person cannot hope to match. Why the MAAF spends their time helping out loser white buddy instead of hanging out with other cool black people is a mystery. Frequently the MAAF will be killed just before the climax, giving the white friend a few last words of wisdom that they can build the rest of their lives around. The purpose of the MAAF is to symbolically forgive white writers, directors and producers for the crimes white people have commited against black people.
The good guy has been framed, and the cops have closed off the airport. There is no way to get out of town, so the good guy has to have a fight to the death with the corrupt sherrif/real estate developer. In movie reality, there are no roads leading out of town, no phones, no neighboring towns with uncorrupt police forces, no newspapers. It is impossible to simply get out of your car and walk a few miles across country to another town, and it is equally impossible to just hole up in a hotel room for a week or two until the whole thing blows over.
Good guy fights bad guy, decides to let him live. Bad guy attacks one last time, and slips and falls from a great height. Nope, we can’t actually slaughter our enemies in cold blood, but we must have revenge anyway. So our enemies must be made to commit suicide. Very convenient.
The idiot movie. This is a movie where the movie would be over in 5 minutes if only all the characters in the movie weren’t idiots. If the characters took a minute to talk to each other honestly and think things through for a minute there would be no movie. “By the way, my brother is in town so I can’t make it to dinner tonight.” “OK, see you tomorrow then.” “Bye, love you!” Movie over. No, instead I’ll lie about it, then force my brother to pretend he’s gay, then break into his girlfriend’s apartment to switch her diary for a fake diary, then lock the concierge in the broom closet, then hire a hooker to pretend she’s pregnant…
If we went by movies, most murderers aren’t junkies, hoodlums, gang members, or disturbed loners. No, your typical murderer is a real estate developer, businessman, scientist, priest, or politician. You cannot trust those scientists, who would kill a bus full of nuns just to prevent their precious theories from being disproved. Damn scientists.
I can’t believe no one has posted this CLASSIC overdone gimmick.
Good Guy and Bad Guy have done battle during closing minutes of the movie. Bad Guy has the upper hand. Good Guy is pinned and defenseless. Bad Guy is aiming gun at Good Guy. They have “the talk,” where we learn Bad Guy’s motivation or confession or some other such claptrap. Camera zooms to Bad Guy’s smarmily grinning face; gun is out of camera frame. Bad Guy says something like “S’long Good Guy. We could have been best friends if you weren’t so… good.” BLAM! BLAM!
Blood trickles from BAD GUY’S (!) nostril as he collapses. Oh my God! Bad Guy didn’t shoot Good Guy – Bad Guy’s GIRLFRIEND, who had been locked in the trunk of the car but who escaped just in time to overhear “the talk,” shot Bad Guy!
In addition to the MAAF, there is also the MGF, or Magical Gay Friend, who serves the same purpose, devoting all his time to whipping the leading man/woman into shape and dispensing kind-hearted words of wisdom. All evidence of the MGF being G will be based on effeminate speaking/walking styles, better than average knowledge of makeup/fashion/dance music, and an endless string of innuendo and double-entendres, as the MGF will never be shown involved in an actual homosexual relationship.
Any obviously deliberate shots of objects that have no immediate connection with what’s happening on-screen. It’s so obvious that it’s going to play a major role later on in the film that I have to stop myself from shouting “PLOT POINT!!” when watching with my wife.
Typical Dog Movies - The dog, regardless what breed it is, is smarter and wiser beyond all canine belief. The dog MUST grow up with an abusive and possessive owner, and optionally, the dog has to be vital to the survival of the owner. Dog escapes, runs into a troubled youth. The Troubled Youth must either come from a broken family, be bullied at school, is a loser, has no friends or any combinations of the above.
The movie will spend half an hour on how the Troubled Youth and the Genuis Dog enjoy their time together and eventually, either An Evil Greedy Materalistic Businessman or the Abusive Owner of the Dog turns up to claim the dog. There will be much crying, sobbing and snickering (on the villians’ part) as the Troubled Youth and Dog are parted. Finally, there is much rejoicing (or supposed to be) when the Troubled Youth was gloated into action, somehow winning back the Dog and beats away the Bad Guys Who Would Have Claimed the Dog.
Young girl becomes rich princess, usually after finding out they have a rich relative.
Group of 6 or more people set out to do something (save the world, isolated experiment in the ocean), less than half will return alive, if not just 1.
This is more of a peeve of mine, but I see too much of police shooting at fleeing unarmed suspects, destroying property and putting innocent bystanders in danger (if not just shooting them). The worst I’ve seen was Kiss of the Dragon, the cops killed people left and right and nobody even questioned it. Or Money Talks, when the cops find Chris Tucker in the Diner and just open fire.
Yeah, I love Godfather I and II, but it really bothered me that after the guy shot Hyman Roth in the airport, the shooter goes running through the crowd, and the police shoot INTO THE CROWD and hit ONLY the bad guy. I can’t imagine (a) that real cops would do that and (b) if they did, that they would be able to pick out one person running through a crowd like that. Of course it was also dumb that Michael sent one of the major players and not some expendable low-level one, but that’s a separate issue.
