# What mistakes, inaccuracies, or cliches in TV and film DON'T bother you? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 18, 2018, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343 "2018-06-18T23:33:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2018, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/101 "2018-06-27T04:05:47Z")
When they get to the big firefight and all the thugs pull out full-auto weapons, I’m okay with that, even though it almost never happens here. ---
**Author:** ![Atomic\_Alex](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atomic_alex/32/175_2.png) [@Atomic\_Alex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atomic_Alex)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2018, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/102 "2018-06-27T13:10:23Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > I think _Star Trek_ did it in the first movie. When the V’ger cloud (before they know it’s V’ger) destroys a Federation station, crew on the Enterprise are able to watch the destruction from an external POV. > > The first place I noticed this was in _Rollerball_. There are times, during a game, when Jonathan and a teammate are holding on to the back of one of the motorcycles, and we get a camera shot of their faces and even some dialog between them. When we see the motorcycles, there are no cameras on them, but that doesn’t matter. As part of the movie, it’s great; it develops the characters, informs us of the strategy of this weird sport, etc. But later, everyone gathers to watch a television[sup]\*[/sup] retrospective of Jonathan’s career, and the characters in the movie are watching that same two-shot. How? There’s no camera on the motorcycles. > > I suppose now you could say that there are cameras on the motorcycles, just too small to be noticed. That wasn’t the case when I first noticed this, and really wasn’t the case when the movie was made. > > Is that clearer? Even in the world of movie nitpicks this is a pretty small thing to notice, and kinda tough to explain. > > - Technically “multivision”; those odd TVs with one big screen and three smaller ones. I think there’s something similar in the Schwarzenegger movie The Running Man where at the climatic scene footage of his character refusing to follow orders is shown on-screen to the in-movie characters, the same footage we the viewer saw at the start of the movie. I’m not sure why I found that jarring but I did. Its been a long time since I saw that movie so I may be mis-remembering. ---
**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:** [June 27, 2018, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/103 "2018-06-27T13:19:35Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > I think _Star Trek_ did it in the first movie. When the V’ger cloud (before they know it’s V’ger) destroys a Federation station, crew on the Enterprise are able to watch the destruction from an external POV. > > The first place I noticed this was in _Rollerball_. There are times, during a game, when Jonathan and a teammate are holding on to the back of one of the motorcycles, and we get a camera shot of their faces and even some dialog between them. When we see the motorcycles, there are no cameras on them, but that doesn’t matter. As part of the movie, it’s great; it develops the characters, informs us of the strategy of this weird sport, etc. But later, everyone gathers to watch a television[sup]\*[/sup] retrospective of Jonathan’s career, and the characters in the movie are watching that same two-shot. How? There’s no camera on the motorcycles. > > I suppose now you could say that there are cameras on the motorcycles, just too small to be noticed. That wasn’t the case when I first noticed this, and really wasn’t the case when the movie was made. > > Is that clearer? Even in the world of movie nitpicks this is a pretty small thing to notice, and kinda tough to explain. > > - Technically “multivision”; those odd TVs with one big screen and three smaller ones. I love the way that they lampshaded this in **Star Trek IV** where Uhura says “switching to external view” when they’re watching the whale hunt, and Gillian asks “How are you doing that?” Nobody answers her. In both the comic book/graphic novel and the movie **Watchmen** they actually do show you how Ozymandias sees Rohrschach and Night Owl “sneaking up” on him – he has hidden cameras that pop up out of the now. It’s arguably ludicrous (cameras popping up looking _out_[, away from his Antarctic retreat I can understand. Why the hell does he have cameras looking back in at it?), but at least the source of those camera shots is explained. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2018, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/104 "2018-06-27T23:50:53Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Haven’t you heard of Metronywood? Hell, remember when it was originally Metronywoodland?😃 ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2018, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/105 "2018-07-10T22:44:53Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > There are some mistakes that never bothered me until I started noticing them, and then I realized they’d been there all along. When we watch a TV show or movie, we’re kind of omniscient observers. the camera that is gathering the images for us isn’t a part of the action, it’s just our window into seeing a story. But there are times when the characters within a movie are watching something, and then the camera does matter. It’s like when the crew on the bridge in _Star Trek_ are looking at the viewscreen and see an image of the Enterprise facing off against two Klingon ships. There would have to be a fourth ship with a camera taking the picture of the other three. That bothers me when I notice it, but I suspect most of the time I don’t. > > (I’m not sure that _Star Trek_ has ever committed this particular sin, but that seemed the easiest way to explain it.) > [@Voyager](#): > > Star Trek never did this, unless you count the footage from “The Cage” in “Menagerie,” and that was shown in the briefing room, not the bridge. So I’m not getting you. I can’t think of an instance where the characters are shown watching an establishing shot which wasn’t done for comedic purposes. And the only instance of that was the beginning of “Hellzapoppin’” - great movie but hard to find these days. > Could you give an example? I just caught an example of this. In _Wink of an Eye_, Kirk is recording a message describing what has happened to him, expecting Spock to slow it down to an understandable speed. We (the audience) see Kirk in a lab standing at some sort of console, pressing buttons to start and stop the recording, and then slipping the tape into a console where McCoy will find it. Later, when Spock has slowed the message down and is playing it back, he’s watching Kirk on a screen. It’s pretty much the same shot that the audience saw earlier. It even tracks in on Kirk at the end. Based on some other clues in the scene, there’s really no way a camera could have been in that space capturing the video that Spock is seeing, and no reason for the camera to move dramatically toward the Captain as he finishes. So yes, it did happen in TOS. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2018, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/106 "2018-07-10T23:05:49Z")
That almost nobody talks about TV, movies, and current events, when in real life, everybody does. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2018, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/107 "2018-07-10T23:18:44Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Same-same courtroom action. Ever been in a real courtroom? It’s boring as hell. The truth of this is surprising. I attended a first degree murder trial and was startled at how boring it could be. This is life and death , and at times I found myself yawning. Over and over, little nitpicky questions and details. It went so slowly, not at all like on television. where a lot of stuff is cut out. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/108 "2018-07-11T00:54:19Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > I love the way that they lampshaded this in **Star Trek IV** where Uhura says “switching to external view” when they’re watching the whale hunt, and Gillian asks “How are you doing that?” > > Nobody answers her. Selective refraction of light rays, obviously. The same principle behind cloaking devices (invisibility screens). ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/109 "2018-07-11T03:07:22Z")
I’m perfectly fine with time compression, where long periods of time are covered shortly without any obvious cuts that would let it work. So, say, if we hear the bell ring at the start of class, and then hear it ring to end class a few minutes later, that’s fine. Same with time dilation, where they say we have X number of seconds left, and it lasts longer without any obvious slow-mo. I’m a computer nerd, but I don’t really mind when computers are used in a way that wouldn’t work in real life. I don’t even generally mind the whole “enhance” thing. And those two people on one keyboard just made me laugh–I assumed it was parody. (Music stuff, on the other hand, does bug me more. It shouldn’t be hard to get it right, without it affecting the story.) Oh, and I’m fine with incorrect early modern English when it’s used as an effect. Same with using too big words or certain words that sound old. It’s fine. And, yes, I’m fine with accented English substituting for a foreign language. Nothing else is coming to me right now that hasn’t already been said, but I’d say I’m okay with a lot of stuff that seems to really bug other people. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/110 "2018-07-11T03:45:47Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Same with time dilation, where they say we have X number of seconds left, and it lasts longer without any obvious slow-mo. Like in that episode of _ **Batman** _ where Robin has only 60 seconds to live, and it takes Batman five minutes to save him (and the clock is shown ticking in the corner). :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/111 "2018-07-11T03:51:11Z")
> [@erysichthon](#): > > I was a librarian for 30 years, and it’s never particularly bothered me to see stereotypical depictions of libraries and librarians in movies (old-fashioned buildings with high ceilings and long wooden tables, staffed by rubber-stamp-wielding women with their hair in buns). I had plenty of colleagues who were infuriated by that shit, but I’m happy to see libraries depicted as interesting, attractive places full of people reading and doing research. Pharmacists are always depicted as older men who wear those Nehru jacket-type things. Never seen one who did. In addition, on TV or in the movies, doctors always inform family members of a devastating diagnosis or a death in the parking lot, or a crowded hallway. :dubious: I recently saw a true-crime re-enactment program that was set in New Jersey, and the hospital building had palm trees out in front. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/112 "2018-07-11T03:53:13Z")
> [@Jim\_s\_Son](#): > > I don’t mind that series dealing with the Tudors or War of the Roses if the actors have better teeth or are heavier than their real-life counterparts were 500 years ago. Or if the clothes have zippers, if there is some attempt to conceal them. Or even some of the more mon dialogue, such as Anne Boleyn saying you can’t have three people in a marriage which echoes Princs Diana. > However, Catherine of Aragon having black hair, as everything did except the early 1970s “Six Wives of Henry VIII” which had her as the real blond-reddish hair, bugs me for some reason. I remember a Western movie from the 1970s, set a century or so earlier, where a woman was wearing large hoop earrings. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/113 "2018-07-11T04:05:04Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > I remember a Western movie from the 1970s, set a century or so earlier, where a woman was wearing large hoop earrings. It’s hairstyles that always bug me, like women with '70s do’s in pieces set during WWII, or boys and young men in Westerns with hair that’s been feathered and blow-dried. :smack: Styling hair with bowls and bacon grease, on the other hand, I find perfectly acceptable. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 1:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/114 "2018-07-11T13:12:40Z")
Another common place where time is distorted: When two people are having a conversation while walking. OK, that happens in real life, and it’s a nice cinematic technique for putting something on the screen while you’re going through the dialog. But in a movie, the scenery will usually change more than the amount of time would allow. Like, the conversation starts when one person walks past another’s office and asks a question. The other person gets up and follows, and starts answering the question as they’re getting on the elevator. Then the first person replies as they’re getting off the elevator, then they’re a few blocks away, then they’re downtown and pause the conversation long enough to order a hot dog from a street vendor, then they’re in a park, and so on, but the conversation is seamless. ---
**Author:** ![Enright3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/enright3/32/2897_2.png) [@Enright3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enright3)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/115 "2018-07-11T17:12:56Z")
In the 114 posts above this one, I’d say enough has been covered; so I’ll get a little more specific. I’m sorry, but it doesn’t bother me at all that Jack Reacher is completely different in the books than from Tom Cruise. I really liked the movies and [most of] the books. While I’m on Tom Cruise. I like [most of] his movies even though I think the Scientology thing is creepy at best. ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/116 "2018-07-11T17:20:31Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > There were no cliches. > > Just the facts. > [@digs](#): > > Ma’m. Oh man, this reminds me! Years ago I was helping out with office equipment and was asked to go investigate what was wrong with someone’s fax machine. When I arrived at the workstation, one woman announced to her friend, “He’s here to fix the printer and the fax machine!” This gave me the prefect straight line to deadpan, “Just the fax, ma’am.” ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/117 "2018-07-11T17:48:08Z")
> [@Wallaby](#): > > On the language thing - do foreign films (voiced in the foreign language) have scenes where they depict non-native speakers speaking the native tongue, but in an exaggerated accent of their own country… I can’t promise it’s never been done, but as far as I can remember, foreigners depicted in movies from Spain either: - don’t say anything at all, just use body language, - speak to each other in a foreign language, and may address the strange dark guy in the same or in English, - speak a few lines in tourist-Spanish, - or speak perfectly fine Spanish, with more or less of an accent depending on whether the movie wants to make a joke of it. This can include cases where people watching the movie completely miss that both the actor and the character are foreigners; it happened to most of my family with an American in comedy series Olmos y Robles (the actress has the tiniest little accent, the only ones who’d noticed it were Tourist-Office SiL and me, and we’re both used to spending a lot of time dealing with accents). Subtitles are normally not used: you don’t need subtitles to understand whether the cute blonde bikini-clad foreigner is telling the other cute blonde bikini-clad foreigner+ “my God, what an imbecile!” or “gosh, wish I knew what the heck is this guy saying”. - Sorry, I’m having flashbacks to those movies from the 1970s where Fernando Esteso spent a lot of time trying to hook up with Swedish tourists. Somebody help me! ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2018, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/118 "2018-07-12T04:04:54Z")
Many things about space are fine for me: Sound in space: necessary for drama, plus of course the camera’s “ear” is allowed to be perfect in regular movies and hear far away things, so why can’t it be pressed against the side of a rocket when in space? Ships encountering each other “face to face” and right-side up. “Shields at 20%”. It’s BS, but how else are you going to let the ship take damage while still maintaining a level of peril? “Transfer power from X” is stupid though, and I note that star trek stopped using it after a while. Dogfighting in space. In reality, getting close to something else in space, and then staying close, is no mean feat. And I know this from trying to make a 3D space battle game with realistic physics. I wish I had made the same creative decision as the movies 😕 Aliens being less diverse than humans, and basically sharing a personality trait and culture. And a planet of basically one climate. Otherwise it would be very difficult to write about aliens and tell short stories. However, if the aliens actually comment on it i.e. Find humans fascinating because of our diversity, that grinds my gears. ---
**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:** [July 12, 2018, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/119 "2018-07-12T13:24:42Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > I’m perfectly fine with time compression, where long periods of time are covered shortly without any obvious cuts that would let it work. So, say, if we hear the bell ring at the start of class, and then hear it ring to end class a few minutes later, that’s fine. Same with time dilation, where they say we have X number of seconds left, and it lasts longer without any obvious slow-mo. > > . One movie I saw where this was NOT the case was the original 1953 film _Invaders from Mars_. At the end of the film, they set timers for three minutes on the explosives they set aboard the Martian saucer. It seems an interminable length of time before the explosion – they actually used flashbacks and stock footage as “filler”. So I timed the length of the movie between the setting and the explosion, and damned if it isn’t just three minutes! It’s the only case I know of where they actually did match the times between what it’s supposed to be and how long it plays out on-screen in a movie\*. It’s also a lesson on how long three minutes can really be. Kinda like how long a minute is shown to be in the “When I’m 64” sequence in _Yellow Submarine_. _Or on TV, for that matter. The only other case I can think of on TV is the MA_S_H_ episode “Life Time”, where they had a clock timer in the corner of the screen to show you how much time remained for them to save a patient’s legs. The timer kept going even when you couldn’t see it, during the commercials, although thsat point may be lost in syndication. [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0638346/](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0638346/) ---
**Author:** ![Wheelz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wheelz/32/5718_2.png) [@Wheelz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wheelz)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2018, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343/120 "2018-07-12T18:15:19Z")
Another thing that seems to bother a lot of people is the fact that nobody seems to actually consume the food or drinks they order in restaurants and bars. I don’t mind because: - It’s OK to shorthand that “this scene takes place in a bar or restaurant” without actually showing everything people do in those places. - Dramatic exits are dramatic. Less so if we have to wait for everybody to finish the cheese plate. - Who wants to watch an actor sit and eat a meal on screen anyway? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-mistakes-inaccuracies-or-cliches-in-tv-and-film-dont-bother-you/816343.md?page=7)