You've researched your friends' recommended films on IMDB, watched their trailers on YouTube, and finally made the decision to commit a few hours of your attention to a particular production. Whether you're sitting in a dark cinema or enjoying the comfort of your home, the bare minimum you expect is to experience it.
However, as one Reddit post shows, all of that preparation can go to waste in an instant. Created by user u/pickanamehere, it asked everyone "What 100% ruins a movie for you every time?" and people did not hold back on this one. From stupid overused story tropes to aggressive product placement, here are some of the most-upvoted answers.
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Having to constantly have my remote in hand to turn down the absurdly loud action scene, to then have to crank the volume for the next dialogue that is far too low.
I'm f*****g sick of it.
When the movie calls for an ugly guy, they get an ugly guy.
When the movie calls for an ugly girl, they get a sexy girl and dress her in dumpy clothes.
Remove glasses, change hair, apply make-up and you too will undergo a magical transformation. Awful.
When the trailers reveal most of the plot.
Overused female tropes. The angry black woman, plus sized women always being loud and clumsy, and of course, the manic pixie dream girl. This isn't some feminist soapbox, it's just lazy and uninspired writing.
The "strong & independent" girl boss that just walks over every obsticale with ease and is the most toxic person around...
"there's no time... save yourself!" when there's clearly ample amount of time for both characters to get to safety. made even worse by the fact that they usually waste a minute or more arguing about it, saying teary-eyed goodbyes, and making out before character 1 finally gets up and leaves
The bit where hackers take 20 seconds of furious typing to disable a countries infrastructure
When the premise for a major conflict in the movie is something that any sane person would have just said "oh no there's a misunderstanding" and they all have a laugh and go on with their days... But instead it turns into some convoluted drama.
The very strong/smart main villain turning weak/dumb in the end fight so the heroes can win.
I hate the generic final dialogue when the genocidal maniac goes: “You and me, we are alike/the same.” and the hero “surprisingly” replies - “I am nothing like you!”
When there is a timer and it takes longer to count down than the time that was called/shown. It drives me crazy.
Generic example, 50 seconds until a bomb explodes. Dialogue for 30 seconds. Timer is showing 30 seconds left. More dialogue for 40 seconds. Timer is at 5 seconds. Quick one-liner, bomb defused with one second to go.
When one character who's an expert in some field stops to explain the most basic concepts to another character *who's also an expert on the same subject*.
Unnecessary love scenes where the main character and a side character fall in love just cause, despite having known each other for like five minutes.
When there’s a 20+ year age gap between the leading actor and actress and it’s not addressed in the movie, especially when the movie pretends like they’re around the same age.
“We’re both experienced, leading scientists in our fields, even though I look like a grizzled war veteran and you’re fresh off the set of High School Musical.”
**Character A:** (Perfectly understandable explanation for something technical or scientific, that anyone who managed to dress themselves this morning could comprehend.)
**Character B:** "In *English*, please!"
**Character A:** (Extremely dumbed down version because screenwriter assumes audience are idiots)
I can often tell when actors carry fake (well, empty) suitcases, and even when they carry empty to-go cups. There's just something different in the way their bodies/muscles work then.
Jesus Christ, it's a 50 million dollar movie, how hard would it be to fill the cup and toss a couple of bricks in the suitcase?
Erich von Stroheim did this...and more: When his character wore a camera around his neck, there had to be a film in it, when there was a bell on the hotel counter, it had to be in working condition even when the bell wasn' t used in the scene.
Badly implemented product placement. Product placement itself doesn't bother me. If there's a character driving a Toyota, or eating a Pizza Hut pizza, I don't care. If there's a pointless shot in the movie that shows the f*****g Bud Light logo for 10 seconds, I mind
Maybe not 100%, but close to it.
Fight scenes where someone make a big blow(usually the villain), but instead of finishing the deal by smashing the brains out they start talking, bragging or some other cocky s**t. And woops, the fight is back on like nothing happened..
I ducking hate these villains who start talking. For freaking glitter unicorn’s sake, just kill the person and be done with it
A bad ending. If a movie was great but has a bad ending, then the whole experience is ruined.
Or an ending that's really just a teaser for the next movie in the series; can't really kill anybody, we need that character in the sequel. If there is one.
It was a dream
I can think of a few movies where "and it was all just a dream" would have improved them.
When things explode for no reason. “Vehicle had minor collision or simply rolls over and spontaneously explodes”
Wow great response guys! The hatred runs deeper when I think of how easily bad guys “hot wire” cars in movies also!
We in Germany have a decades long running show called "Cobra 11" about a fictional autobahn police - and you guess it, every damn car is a rolling bomb that explodes even if they get hit in the tire
Teenagers who sound like screenwriters trying to sound cool.
Never in the history of humanity have two 15 year olds randomly recited 18th century poetry to each other on the day they met, and all those snarky remarks makes the kids sound insufferable and annoying a lot more than clever.
Also notice that somehow every clever 15 y.o. always listens to music that was huge when the screenwriter was growing up, never something that is... you know... listened to by 15 year olds... as if there was no good music around presently.
PS. Also the whole sarcastic genius with no social clues...yes we get it Dr. House was a hit 20 years ago, now can we get Cumberbatch to play any other freaking role?
Well I did recite 19th century poetry at people at about 15... But they didn't return the favor and I was a pretty self ostracized socially awkward nerd that no one in their right mind would have made a movie about
When it's very obvious when someone isn't actually having a conversation on the phone. They just say their lines without giving enough pause for the other person to respond. I also hate when you're supposed to be looking at security footage but it's clearly just a previous shot that's had a filter put over it.
Just 10 seconds left before the bomb explodes. The hero is taking all the time in the world to kiss and hug his girlfriend a last goodbye before returning to deactivate the bomb..
F you! I'm about to save all humankind by sacrificing my life and I want my fu@kin SNOG! I am earning it!!!
When all you have to do is beat the boss and the entire army just collapses. Pretty much every alien and robot-using invasion has this hive concept.
Robot Chicken did a riff on this about Star Wars. Oh well, the rebels have blown up the Death Star, they've won...What? We still have thousands of ships!...No, no. They destroyed the Death Star, they've beaten us...We still have millions of troops! We control every planet!...No. They've won. Best go home.
They hang up the phone without any warning. Like "Bob, we discovered a nuke on it's way to Washington". Click.
Or someone answering the door within a couple seconds of knocking.
These thing completely break me out of the movie and are hard to recover from.
Sounds bad but an actor’s voice can really ruin a movie for me, so bad voice acting
Characters who are supposed to be badass but only act like a******s and endanger everyone because they "don't play by the rules". Like James Bond, Han Solo and sadly most other action Heros as well. It's not cool or atractive to be a d**k plus it is a really lazy and over used character trait for a main character to have.
Insane plot armor.
It’s okay for a main character to die.
Or have a toilet break, catch a cold, develop cold sores or a pimple, trip and break a leg, go for a hair cut. Also why not be an innocent bystander caught up in someone else's drama.
When the jokes are so forced. They're just trying is hard to be funny that it isn't. Or when they're offensive or just downright stupid. Totally ruins it. Unfortunately alot of comedy movies have tons of this so I tend to steer clear of comedies.
I've got six things get me every time:
1. Motivation. The antagonist has to have a motivation that the audience can understand, and perhaps even sympathize with. The cardboard, "I'm a bad guy, because I like being bad and being bad is good - GRRRRR!" is so tiresome. I'll even accept the "banality of evil" like your Adolph Eichmann's, but the ones who make a display of relishing being bad? Not so much.
2. Violence without consequence. Sure, the good guy got beaten within an inch of his life, but the next day he'll get up and mete out justice, where he would normally be looking at 3 months of PT/OT. I have friends who've been on the wrong end of a physical trauma. It's not pretty.
3. War without consequence. War is brutal and ugly, and lots of people die in it. This should include multiple key characters in your movie. Not just the "we'll give this guy screen time with the stars and he'll be the one we kill off". Saving Private Ryan was fantastic in this regard, because they were willing to kill off characters and you cared when they did.
4. Timing/monologuing. Nobody delays the start, middle, or end of a fight for a monologue. If someone is intent on killing someone, the moment that opportunity comes, they're probably going to take it without launching into a 3 minute speech and give them time to rally.
5. Guns and gunfights that defy physics. The pistol that launches a guy 3 feet backwards when shot. The gun with a suppressor that makes a sound like a mouse farting from across the street. The guy who dies instantly from a gunshot to the chest. The gunfight in a confined space where everyone isn't deafened at the conclusion.
6. "BASED ON A TRUE STORY" is so abused. There's time when you have so much to tell that you have to abbreviate it or change the story to keep the key elements. HBO's Chernobyl is an example where they had to consolidate multiple characters into Ulana Khomyuk, and that's fine. But when there's a tapestry of fiction to make the thread of truth interesting, I'm out.
Counter point: There are surpressors out there that can actually make guns really silent. They're basically rubber tubes attached to the barrel of a gun with no exit hole. The first shot is almost completely silent. The next 9 shots sound like a surpressed pistol in a movie. The 10th shot is no longer silent bc the surpressor is basically just ruined and no longer works. Counter point to my counter point: movies use the metal surpressors that don't work like the ones I mentioned
Action scenes with lots and lots of cuts, that make it obvious (or appear like) the actors can't do the fight choreography.
Note: this post originally had 36 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
When the movie is so dark you can't see what's happening. Why spend all that money on visual effects when you won't let people see them?
Came here to say this! Too many movies and TV shows (**cough** GoT **cough**) go for time of day realism, meaning they use no additional lighting for night scenes. They are impossible to see. It's bad enough in theaters, which are almost pitch black and have giant screens. It's awful on a TV, where there's probably surrounding light and the screen is measured in inches and not feet.
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When the villains have completely reasonable societal change proposals, but they need to make the audience not like them so they have them do something completely crazy out of left field to make people hate them and their opinions on society. It's a trope deeply rooted in propaganda, and it happens more than you think. (Looking at you, Marvel!)
Does no-one get PTSD in the movies? or develop problems with all the head trauma?
When they do, it's only part of the background story and added for drama. Psychological consequences aren't exactly portrayed properly...
Load More Replies... When the movie is so dark you can't see what's happening. Why spend all that money on visual effects when you won't let people see them?
Came here to say this! Too many movies and TV shows (**cough** GoT **cough**) go for time of day realism, meaning they use no additional lighting for night scenes. They are impossible to see. It's bad enough in theaters, which are almost pitch black and have giant screens. It's awful on a TV, where there's probably surrounding light and the screen is measured in inches and not feet.
Load More Replies... When the villains have completely reasonable societal change proposals, but they need to make the audience not like them so they have them do something completely crazy out of left field to make people hate them and their opinions on society. It's a trope deeply rooted in propaganda, and it happens more than you think. (Looking at you, Marvel!)
Does no-one get PTSD in the movies? or develop problems with all the head trauma?
When they do, it's only part of the background story and added for drama. Psychological consequences aren't exactly portrayed properly...
Load More Replies...