What I learned at the movies

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Originally Posted By: dwendt44
Ventilation ducts are always big enough and strong enough to allow a hero a route to escape or access the villain or damsel in distress.


Unless those ducts are positioned over a bathroom stall, then they are never strong enough and always result in the person falling into the commode.
 
Auto-loaders are halfway out of lock-up before the bullet even exits the barrel. When you pump a shotgun that has been recently fired, a small fireball comes out of the chamber/shotshell.
 
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Another obvious one:

When being chased in the street, there is usually a fruit cart or people carrying a large piece of glass that beg to be disrupted.
 
All cars, no matter what the design, fishtail wildly around every corner, even FWD's like a Taurus. Brakes always squeak/squeal as a car comes to a halt. Huge luxury cars and Crown Vics can keep up with any other vehicle in the universe. If, however, a van or truck blocks the good guys, the pursuit is abandoned, with no further effort from the good guys, nor any radio call. Standoffs with everyone pointing guns at each other never end in anyone getting shot. The main characters enter situations with only basic vests, if any, no helmets, and carrying only sidearms, while the SWAT guys are dressed and armed for a small war. Good guys always telegraph coming around corners, either by shadow or showing their gun; by the time they turn the corner they could be shot multiple times. Oh, and one last thing-cops in suits and dress shoes can always outrun a skinny young street punk on speed.

What else, gang????
 
Originally Posted By: olddognewtrks
All cars, no matter what the design, fishtail wildly around every corner, even FWD's like a Taurus. Brakes always squeak/squeal as a car comes to a halt. Huge luxury cars and Crown Vics can keep up with any other vehicle in the universe. If, however, a van or truck blocks the good guys, the pursuit is abandoned, with no further effort from the good guys, nor any radio call. Standoffs with everyone pointing guns at each other never end in anyone getting shot. The main characters enter situations with only basic vests, if any, no helmets, and carrying only sidearms, while the SWAT guys are dressed and armed for a small war. Good guys always telegraph coming around corners, either by shadow or showing their gun; by the time they turn the corner they could be shot multiple times. Oh, and one last thing-cops in suits and dress shoes can always outrun a skinny young street punk on speed.

What else, gang????


are we limiting this to movies? because a lot of this looks like CSI:type stuff.
what I learned from CSI:
DNA analysis can be completed in seconds
any case can be finished/solved in one day
anyone can recover from any wound/injury (unless he/she's been written off the show)
investigators are also SWAT leaders, sharp shooters, SCUBA divers, archaeologists, etc, whatever is needed

but, it's just TV, if I want reality, I read the newspaper.
 
Uploads and downloads always have a huge graphical line bar indicator. When someone pulls the file on a thug there will always be a color driver's license photo, even in 1960's movies.

It, and other measures of time (ticking bomb) will warp for suspenseful purposes-- first faster, then slower.

Bombs will always have a 1" LED countdown indicator, and tick or beep.

Big lights, like stadium lights, always go on with a "thunk" from the switch.

Helicopters go down with a smoke bomb from the tail, list behind a hill or building, then you see an explosion from behind same. Heroes can fly helicopters, planes, etc, with no training, but they have to wiggle profusely for the first few seconds.

Girls in glasses with hair in buns are always smoking hot later in the movie.

Phones ring during a pause in the conversation, and actors never look the least suprised.
 
Originally Posted By: mechtech2
Another obvious one:

When being chased in the street, there is usually a fruit cart or people carrying a large piece of glass that beg to be disrupted.


And a stereotype who'll shake an angry fist once the chase goes by. Could also be a florist or a pile of cardboard boxes.
 
It is VERY easy to 'stumble' into a creepy, deserted town that time forgot - you're driving along the highway, and boom, there it is. It can be just 5 minutes from a major metropolis.

But, later, you can never get OUT of that town using the same highway, and that 'major metropolis' is nowhere to be found....
 
Originally Posted By: mpvue

are we limiting this to movies? because a lot of this looks like CSI:type stuff.
what I learned from CSI:
DNA analysis can be completed in seconds
any case can be finished/solved in one day
anyone can recover from any wound/injury (unless he/she's been written off the show)
investigators are also SWAT leaders, sharp shooters, SCUBA divers, archaeologists, etc, whatever is needed


CSI is the WORST! MY wife won't let me watch it with her anymore because I just laugh at most of it. NCIS is much better on the technical stuff but "The Unit" is tops. I remember one episode where they were trying to shoot a man in a crowd without overpenetrating into anyone behind him. They invented a trick round, and that part probably was a little stretched, but they compared it to a regular round on a range. One of the characters says, "Well yeah but that was against ball ammo." I almost fell off my chair! I never thought I'd see Hollywood bother to get a technical detail like that and it was just a little line that 99.9% of the viewers didn't even catch.
 
CSI decided a Ferrari (or name your exotic... I forget) was at a crime scene when they analyzed an oil drop and decided it was Agip. While pleased they dropped that brand name I was chagrined that they implied it could only be used on Ferraris.
 
I once watched a movie where I heard the train going "chug-a-chug-a-chug" down the tracks like a steam locomotive. I could see the train was obviously a diesel-electric.
 
A MAC notebook will run at 320x240 and give you a plethora of hacking tools seemingly at will, with giant over-obvious text.
 
Hmm... OK:
Dumb people are always smarter than smart people.

Younger people are always smarter than older people.

Poor misunderstood smart-a** teenagers(always played by 30-yr-old actors, it seems) are the smartest of all, and at the end of the movie always win the big game/contest/competition/something.


And here's something you'll never learn from a movie:

Smart and Glib are *Not* the same thing.
wink.gif
 
Crime labs are always very dimly lit.

The head scientist is always a guy that looks like he graduated last week and somehow gets to wear a t-shirt to work everyday. If it's a girl, she's usually gothic or either really hot. They're the kind of people who go to the club on weeknights.

The head computer guy doesn't own a comb and only has one ill-fitting t-shirt that has been on since high-school - which he graduated from two months ago. Extremely difficult computer hacking can be done in ten keystrokes or less and *never* fails.

Paperwork rarely ever needs to be done in an office setting and never in a lab or police office.

People roll short distances from desk to desk in roll-y office chairs when excited or when they have information.

If in doubt, ask the asian - they know.
 
Dirt Bike looking motorcycles can be either 2-stroke or 4-stroke in the same scene and need to be constantly shifted through their 15-speed transmission.

Even adversaries fly US built aircraft, just painted black.

dead end alleyways always have chain link fences at the end.

Janitors and maintenance guys are always creepy and should be the first suspect in any crime.

All small towns are full of hillbillies that don't appreciate outsiders for any reason.
 
-- In any chase scene, the vehicle is constantly accelerating and upshfting.

-- If one is truly determined, they can rebuild a car or some complicated machinery overnight, or study really hard in one night to make up for goofing off a whole semester... and pass with flying colors!, or train for an athletic event in just a few days. The movie industry calls this a "montage" segment.

-- Despite the engineer's calculations, the leading man always trumps the engineer or scientist when making snap technical decisions, and the outcome proves the leading man correct every time.
 
Watching a CS rerun now. So far this evening I've learned:

- When securing a scene to execute a search warrant, the female CSI tech goes in before the rookie Police officer.

- When finding a gunshot victim, backup should be dismissed to call it in while medical treatment is given - before securing the scene & determining if the perp is still there.

- Lawyers can only be present after the cops have met their quota of dramatic exchanges with the suspect.

- A chop shop uses grinders and torches to part out a new Mercedes.

- For cutting up cars, the rosebud tip works better on the torch than the cutting tip.
 
In old westerns, you can shoot 12 people without reloading your six shooter.

The A Team. No need to say more.
 
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