I also don’t mind that ships show up on their viewscreen facing the same way. Meaning, with no up or down in space, ships could face any which way and be fine. They always encounter ships who have the same horizontal plane as them.
Of course, there would be no point not to have this.
The “Letters of Transit” in Casablanca. Their absurdity bothers me no more than whether Rick’s Café is west of the airfield or east of it. (Yet for some people it seems to be a big deal that spoils the movie. :dubious: )
The clichés in Dragnet (the tv series) never bothered me. In fact, they were the only reason I enjoyed the series.
I agree with the ‘exact model’ thing, with one big exception - if they make a big deal out of the exact model or its properties, then they have to get the detail of that model right.
I don’t agree with ‘a gun is a gun’ - they need to get the basic types right for the time period, and I think most people find highly anachronistic guns off-putting. If you did a movie like Indiana Jones or a 40s detective flick where everyone was using single-action revolvers and lever-action rifles (cowboy guns) or glocks and M-16s (modern guns), it would throw almost anyone out of suspension of disbelief. A Vietnam movie where the distinctive silhouette of an M-16 never shows up would just feel wrong, and during the inevitable combat scene if the squad was cocking lever-action guns instead of firing bursts it would seem absurd.
There were no cliches.
Just the facts.
Ma’m.
I don’t mind unrealistic results of gunshots, ie people flying backwards when they get hit by a shotgun blast or large caliber rifle. It’s totally unrealistic, but it looks more dramatic and is a way of dramatizing how heavy a caliber they’re getting shot with, so it doesn’t really bother me that much.
Also in the vein of guns, I don’t mind when people cock the gun menacingly because it sounds cool. Or that cliche sound of a sword sliding out of the holster, either.
I don’t mind gravity on spaceships. Yes, there are ways to film microgravity realistically. That’s not going to happen on a weekly TV show. Acceptable break from reality, because logistically there’s no other way.
But if you have cheap artificial gravity, at least make it part of the series canon. Don’t just ignore it.
Of course, there are a lot of inaccuracies that I don’t mind simply by virtue of being unaware of them. Like, if my nerdity extended to cars or fashion or whatever, it probably would bug me to see people wearing or driving things that didn’t exist at that time… but it doesn’t, so I have no clue, and can blissfully ignore it.
Chronos, you’re right, of course.
There are many, many errors that don’t bother me because I don’t notice them. This can be because I don’t know enough about a particular area or because the other elements of the movie hide or overpower the error. In some ways, movies are like performances of magic, full of misdirection and designed to create a particular illusion. The directing, writing, acting, cinematography, production design, costumes, makeup, special effects, sounds and music are all part of that illusion. Small errors in any of those areas can detract from the illusion, if you notice them. And it’s practically impossible to “un-notice” them.
If I do notice, my reaction depends on the type of movie. The more serious the subject treatment in a movie, the more likely that a mistake or inaccuracy will bother me. I don’t have expectations for accuracy in a light-hearted comedy or animated fantasy but I do for a historical drama where almost all the characters are people who actually existed and the movie depicts events that we know actually happened in a particular place at a particular time.
Also, my reaction will depend on how much I am “swept away” by the story.
I don’t mind errors in labwork except in two cases: when they affect safety/sample handling (goddamnit with the motherfucking makeup and jewelry!), and when they’re part of a very long expository paragraph. Analysis which take minutes instead of months, it’s unrealistic but necessary for the “crime of the week” stuff; detailed descriptions which are there just to make it clear the character knows a lot of long words and the meaning of not a single one, are definitely unnecessary.
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.
It wasn’t just Jayne who was wrong. In the commentary track, Whedon grumbled that the expert they had hired told them firearms need atmo.
I mean, it’s a pretty easy fanwank to just say that it was just that one type of gun needed atmo to fire.
I’ve given up on being annoyed by “zoom and enhance” scenes. The shows that usually feature it are unrealistic to begin with, so does it really matter?
OK, so Joss Whedon was, in actual fact, wrong. I still don’t mind it, because it can be easily explained away as just being Jayne.
Similarly for Han Solo’s parsecs, which I interpret as just Han being an idiot. And it doesn’t hurt that Alec Guiness rolls his eyes at the line.
Have you seen the show Barry on HBO? There’s a funny take on the zoom and enhance trope.
I understand why most of the aliens in Star Trek/Star Wars are just humans in costumes and make up. Its just cheaper and easier than dpeicting the exotic forms extraterrestrial would probably be.
Well, the idea of chambering a round just to show you really mean business does bother me. Of course, unless you are a idiot, you already have a round in the chamber.
I give a pass to the medieval films who usually show the stars without helmets* (which would get them killed, fast). I mean, you hire Kenneth Branagh, you need to see him act.
*or they have open face helmets
