Movie Cliches

[welshcorgigirl]

I hate that New Yorkers are always portrayed as bitchy, rude, caffeine-addicted jackasses or ghetto street thugs. Not many people I know fit into either category.

[satellite]

Recent police thiller cliches:

Working class white guys from "gritty" neighborhoods almost always drive a reasonably well-maintained vintage Mustang. Because you have plenty of time to find and maintain a vintage car on a cop's salary, or if you're an asshole high school jock. No one cares about decent gas mileage or airbags, or anything.

Troubled male police officers will always get their psych evaluations/counseling from a beautiful female psychologist so sexual tension ensues.

Troubled female officers get counseling from an older paternal cop who was likely best friends with their father who was killed in the line of duty. Female officers are always single and childless, the better to start sleeping with their new partner/ primary suspect/ witness a.k.a. "the bad guy". They are also "lone wolf" types, so there's no best friend to question the idea of them sleeping with a suspect.

[WitchyPoo]

satellite said:

Troubled female officers get counseling from an older paternal cop who was likely best friends with their father who was killed in the line of duty.

Female officer then stumbles upon the truth behind her father's death. It was masterminded by paternal cop and now he must kill her. Of course, she (or her new detective boyfriend) kills him first.

All of the above's occupations, relationships and sexes are interchangable. The formula and results are always the same.

[kanding]

Here's one (that also doubles as a pet peeve for me):

The good girl, the one that the protagonist should marry, the sweet one, the one everyone likes? She is only shown having sex in the missionary position.

The other girl? Whether she's a raging bitch or simply becomes inconvenient, she will be shown straddling the man.

I just watched Match Point. During the scene where Chris has sex with Chloe, I paused the DVD, turned to my husband and said, "Just wait. If he has sex with Nola, she'll be on top." And whaddya know...

P.S. The sweet girl will also either be chomping at the bit to have chirren as soon as possible or she'll work in a profession that centers on children, preferably young children.

[chiqui]

Here's one (that also doubles as a pet peeve for me):
The good girl, the one that the protagonist should marry, the sweet one, the one everyone likes? She is only shown having sex in the missionary position.
The other girl? Whether she's a raging bitch or simply becomes inconvenient, she will be shown straddling the man.

And if there's a woman who's nuts or masochistic, she'll have sex doggy-style.

[RabbitEars]

The other sex cliche: Doing it while wearing a bra or teddy. Really? Isn't that movie rated R so you can show some skin?

The News Cliches:

1) Reporter and cameradude are on the scene, see something interesting, and reporter chirps, "Let's go live! Three, two, one... I'm Brenda Blahdeeblah LIVE at the scene of..."

Missing from this scene: any cables on the camera hooking it up to any microwave or satellite truck to send the video back to the studio, anyone in the studio or control room to take the live feed, any producers, any anchors, any TV station news director or general manager actually deciding to break into regular programming and potentially blow out some commercial breaks...

2) The unreadable news script, the ones with ten-cent words you never hear in a real news program.

3) The video-free newscast without a single picture or soundbite. Just one dude in front of the camera looking well-coiffed. It seems to always be a report about something HUGE that happened HOURS AGO, like a presidential assassination... exactly the kind of story that would not lack for pictures.

Hats off to 24 for making their faux-news look realistic.

[SluttyMary]

People who think they're gay, but turns out they're actually straight: You know...some guys pretending to be women for some reason, one of them befriends a girl, who thinks she just "so comfortable" with her/him, becomes strangely atracted and falls in love, thinking she then must be gay...but she's not! Because the girl is really a guy!!! Hooray. Happy ending. The sexes could also be the other way around. Offensive either way.

[tinyshoes]

rabbitears said:

The other sex cliche: Doing it while wearing a bra or teddy. Really? Isn't that movie rated R so you can show some skin?

True, but until they start having more R-rated male full-frontal, the women can leave the bras and teddies on. Equal titillation, you know.

[Deleted]

I'm not sure this belongs in this thread, but it's for movies and TV shows. I hate when a character is going off to college, but can't go because he/she didn't get a FULL ride (Anywhere But Here, Dawson's Creek) or his/her parents/grandparents aren't going to pay for EVERYTHING (That 70's Show). The character either ends up getting thousands of dollars from a friend (Dawson's Creek), their parents sell the family car (Anywhere But Here), or their grandparents/parents end up paying for everything (Gilmore Girls). My parents didn't pay for a cent of my college education. I had some scholarships, but I mostly paid through a combination of student loans, a work-study job and an outside job. I know that was the way for a lot of other students, so this expectation that others should just show up with a bunch of money for you kind of pisses me off. It's completely unrealistic for a lot of people.

[Deleted]

Oh, I love when Movie Cliches pops up! Here are some (and sorry if at some point I've mentioned them, but these really get to me):

**When someone gets some surprising news and slumps over so you can't see their face. They begin shuddering and gasping and the news-bearer is all concerned, thinking the person is sobbing. Then the person slowly looks up and it turns out that they are actually convulsing with laughter (due to some irony involved with the news).

**When 2 people rush up to one another both saying excitedly, "Guess what?" then go through the whole "You first!" thing. Finally the first one gives her big news which unknown to her, nullifies the second person's news. She says, "So, what were you going to tell me?" and the second person says quietly, "Oh, it was nothing. Never mind..." and the first person just accepts this and rushes off again. Shouldn't she be at least a little bit curious about what had her friend so excited that suddenly in the space of seconds became of zero importance?

**When a husband comes up behind his wife while she's doing house-hold chores and starts nuzzling her, if she says "I can't right now!" you just know the marriage will be over by the end of the movie because she's a bitch. On the other hand, if she's simply delighted to drop what she's doing to have sex, you know it's a great marriage (and also, that she'll probably die soon).

**The receptionists at hospital admissions tend to be belligerant and hostile to the point of abusiveness where you think, "In real life, that person would lose their job in a heartbeat." (This is more a t.v. cliche.)

I love movie cliches!