Things that irrationally annoy you in films?

[Soubriquet]

I’ll start

Brand new baby born...size of a 3 month old, wide awake and smiling

Always annoys me

In Whodunnits there's always a person who rings up with important information but they can't say what it is on the phone.
No, they have to meet up in a remote location at an unearthly hour.
They're obviously the next victim.
Just tell them now!

People who go to bed with full make up on and not brushing their teeth!

Picking up suitcase to go on holiday that are so obviously empty. You could at least pretend there's something in it!

In a singing part of the film when they’re so obviously not singing it at the time. Now I know nearly all musical films the songs are recorded in a studio and not actually sung on set but in some films (Christmas chronicles 2 I’m looking at you) they’re standing on a wind swept beach and the singing is soft, crystal clear and just looks completely ridiculous. I know they’re not going to film them actually singing on the beach because you wouldn’t be able to hear it but at least make it sound a bit more realistic. Throw in a seagull or something

@KatherineJaneway

People always answer the door immediately. How often are you right next to the door when someone knocks / rings.

My next door neighbour seems to think I live in the hallway; ring, 3 seconds, ring, knock, knock, knock. It's been so peaceful this year.....

Oh yes another thing, people arrive unexpectedly to dinner and there is always enough food for them. In our house we cook what we need and an uninvited dinner guest would be snarled at - and not just by the dog.

Mine are more TV. Period settings that are totally over-lit. Try lighting two or three candles then turn out all the lights. British TV productions that use American slang/idioms. Ending a phone conversation with the phone nowhere near their mouth. Driving without moving the wheel or looking left or right. X-Rays upside down, drip feeds not turned on. Getting knocked-out with a bang on the back of the head (that would cause a serious head injury). Fights with just a bit of blood on the lip (your teeth would get knocked out, your mouth would swell up massively and you wouldn't be able to open your eyes). Getting shot at point blank range with no trace of blood anywhere, or very little. Cuddling-up after having sex with your bra still on. Never having to wait to get served in a pub. Always a place to park right were you need to get out. Forensic and toxicology results back in hours, (they can take weeks) and famously in Poirot the murderer confessing knowing he/she will go to the gallows. A police friend of mine told me nobody admits to anything voluntarily, in fact a lot of suspects don't say anything at all.

The young lone female, usually very attractive, going into a large empty, dark, house at night, preferably, a disused large rambling mental hospital, with just a torch.
I doubt in real life, any female would do so

@milveycrohn

The young lone female, usually very attractive, going into a large empty, dark, house at night, preferably, a disused large rambling mental hospital, with just a torch. I doubt in real life, any female would do so

Wearing a white satin nightie....

milveycrohn

The young lone female, usually very attractive, going into a large empty, dark, house at night, preferably, a disused large rambling mental hospital, with just a torch.
I doubt in real life, any female would do so

Wearing a white satin nightie....

Over her bra and knickers

Peering at the telephone.
It rings.
Peer at it as if you can see who is inside
Pick up receiver: peer into it
Put to ear and have conversation, end conversation
Peer into receiver before replacing it.

Why? No one ever does this in RL.

Those triangular bedsheets that are higher on the woman’s side of the bed.

I loved the Swedish series “the truth will out” for its little details:

One of the characters has sciatica and then has to lie on the floor, or brings her dog in/with her. When she goes on a date weekend, someone needs to take the dog for her. Things like that (she’s also middle aged and overweight and not very fit yet super cool imo)

The tropes you all mention can stop you identifying with the characters, when it’s all those little things that make you warm to a character ;things like not finding your keys, having a puffy face in the morning, having indigestion/sciatica/whatever

When they use the word “vagina” to show it’s a hilarious film with loads of edgy humour.

Unnecessary nudity - always for the female actors. Does seeing her tits really advance the plot?!

Also any scene with coding which doesn't involve any amount of troubleshooting/ realising they forgot a comma/ switching it off and switching it on again. Just one I want to see the IT expert in a film suggest they switch it off and back on again.

Women never get a sore place on their chin from the man's bristles rubbing or frayed lips after a bout of passionate kissing. Or is that just me ?

2 more!

1. Period furnishing from just that one period. For example a typical house in the 1920s, doesn’t just have 1920s furniture. There are also hand me downs and other family heirlooms from an earlier age. Just as a house today isn’t totally furnished by things from just this century.

1. The number of women in north American films who have sex with their bras on.

Humongous houses, kids in fair to middling income houses have bedrooms the size of my whole ground floor

This.

Unless it's key to the plot that someone is very poor (in which case they will live in a tiny highrise covered in graffiti or possibly a trailer) everyone lives in huge houses in leafy suburbs or enormous swanky appartments. This is regardless of what the character (or character's parents) does for a living or how expensive the area that they supposedly live in. This is the same with TV programmes.

Yes, if it’s January 1st 1970 everyone’s house is a riot of orange, yellow, swirly patterns and everything 1970s. Whereas in real life most houses would have been 1950s/60s style for a good few years, with a hefty dose of wartime Utility furniture and battered Victorian bits that were still solid. In fact watch any 1960s/70s film and see how sparsely furnished most houses were.

Weddings can be organised at any random building at short notice - I know laws are different in America but UK buildings need to hold a licence. See also the number of weddings and funerals held on Boxing Day.

More TV than film:
In The Rookie the female love interest doctor did every job in the hospital from taking blood donations to emergency surgery.

Specific to Great British Bake Off:
The missing raspberry on the chocolate cake in the opening credits (there’s a space for it!)
None of the contestants with long hair tie it back so it’s always flopping in their faces and probably into the bakes.
They often don’t roll their sleeves up and wear jewellery on fingers and wrists.
They often touch their faces and hair.
Then they sit or lie on the floor to look into their ovens!
Hygiene is not high in that tent.

Running upstairs in horror movies....

Leaving with a tiny bag of clothes.

Pushing delicious food around a plate and not eating any.

Obviously empty beverages.

Ordering things e.g. coffee and never paying.

Wearing impossibly high heels and walking around comfortably all day.

Professional looking Christmas decorations in a big standard house.

@MoreDrunkThanBlessed

Weddings can be organised at any random building at short notice - I know laws are different in America but UK buildings need to hold a licence. See also the number of weddings and funerals held on Boxing Day.

More TV than film:
In The Rookie the female love interest doctor did every job in the hospital from taking blood donations to emergency surgery.

Specific to Great British Bake Off:
The missing raspberry on the chocolate cake in the opening credits (there’s a space for it!)
None of the contestants with long hair tie it back so it’s always flopping in their faces and probably into the bakes.
They often don’t roll their sleeves up and wear jewellery on fingers and wrists.
They often touch their faces and hair.
Then they sit or lie on the floor to look into their ovens!
Hygiene is not high in that tent.

As regards long hair, Charlie Dimmock in Ground Force! She spent all her time pushing her hair back-I felt like sending her a hair band.

When a character is on the phone trying to find something out and they pause for all of two seconds whilst the person at the other end presumably speaks, then they hang up and say: “Yeah they know the guy, his name is Brandon Willoughby and he usually hangs out at a bar called The Prancing Pony on Thursdays after work. They say if we get going now he’ll probably be there. He’s wearing a green flannel shirt and he drives a red Pontiac”. The other person literally had time to say yes or no.

Using the wrong breed of dog or horse for the time period or country. For example, in one drama about Guy Fawkes there was a scene where he was pursued by guards with...Rottweilers! Absolute rubbish seeing as the breed didn’t even appear in Britain until the 1930s. Howling here!

Also, when something funny or crazy or interesting or just slightly out of the ordinary happens, you never hear a character telling their mate about it, and then someone new walks in and they say “Tell them what happened to you earlier” so they tell it all over again. I mean, I understand why this doesn’t happen, it would waste an entire 25-minute episode whilst one character repeatedly told all the others about their hilarious mix-up at work that day, but in reality it is what you would do.

Seinfeld could have pulled this off, actually.