Desdichado
Hero
You're missing out on my favorite scene ever from a James Bond, then: the tank chase through the streets of St. Petersburg.
Come to think of it, that's one of my favorite scenes in any movie...
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Things I'm Sick of - Action Movie Cliche #39
- Thread starter Fenros
- Start date
Come to think of it, that's one of my favorite scenes in any movie...
jasper
Rotten DM
How about the old vampire movies
1. The girl who gets turn into one becomes a babe. Hair color changes and everything.
2. The adventurers generally wander around in the dark.
3. The boy friend halts before staking his dead girlfriend.
Use have about 15 but lost the list.
Now
Everything is Matrix or Jackie Chan action.
All women scientist are babes once they wash their hair or take the potion.
I still trying to finish Evil Dead 2.
I don't like games where I have backtrack 3 rooms to turn on the light switch. So I can activate the x machine.
Hate it when adventurers were text driven hate it now.
1. The girl who gets turn into one becomes a babe. Hair color changes and everything.
2. The adventurers generally wander around in the dark.
3. The boy friend halts before staking his dead girlfriend.
Use have about 15 but lost the list.
Now
Everything is Matrix or Jackie Chan action.
All women scientist are babes once they wash their hair or take the potion.
I still trying to finish Evil Dead 2.
I don't like games where I have backtrack 3 rooms to turn on the light switch. So I can activate the x machine.
Hate it when adventurers were text driven hate it now.
Zerovoid
First Post
Galfridus said:
Well, this is supposed to show that a hero is more merciful than his enemies, so that he can claim the high ground. And its not just a cliche of bad action movies. Think of Saruman's death in LOTR. Or Gollum's death in LOTR. It seems more like a classic genre convention to me than a cheesy cliche. The problem is, when I see these heros get all weepy for the big bad guy after killing tons of minions, it just about makes me sick. They killed all the minimum wage guys who probably weren't in on the whole evil plan bit, and couldn't find a better job if they wanted to, but then they go soft on the master mind behind it all, the person who's most likely to escape and kill more people later on.
Some guy from Ohio
First Post
Give me the cliche! Without them, you've gone to the theatre for the Discovery Channel or the evening news. There's nothing wrong with those choices, of course, but when I pay 10.00, I want the fun and the cheesy. 
I hate it when the lacky that battled the hero in the opening scene gets killed by the master villian for failing. It always has to be an over the top death too, and nine times out of ten, the villian will pretend to accept the lacky's apology and then *gasp* suddenly turn and kill him. Heat did a terrific job of setting up this cliche and then doing something else with it, but for the most part, it's in every action movie ever made.
Vampire movies: How come vamps always become stronger than their human form but the bones in their chests become jell-o???
Action/fighting in general: How come the hero is always fantastic in a fight until it comes to the big bad guy and then he gets his butt kicked by the lamest fighting techniques???
Bombs: Why do bombers always use timers instead of remote triggering devices? And why do the heroes always find out about the bomb seconds before its to go off?? Recent favorite scene countering this notion: The Chronicle TV series where they find the bomb, it seems to have seconds left on the timer and one character is all pumped to do something about it, when his friends show him that there's still two more hours that he didn't see and he was all shaky and coming off his adreneline and fear saying, "Oh good, let's call the bomb squad."
How come bad guys stay almost dead forever, rising up again at least one more time to fight, but the good guy cohorts always linger just long enough to say some cornpone. IF the good guy doesn't say anything and we're not sure he/she is dead, then he might help the protagonist by miraculously seeing someone sneaking up and shoot them dead from the ground, despite a near-fatal wound, a short barrel weapon, blood in the eyes...
Action/fighting in general: How come the hero is always fantastic in a fight until it comes to the big bad guy and then he gets his butt kicked by the lamest fighting techniques???
Bombs: Why do bombers always use timers instead of remote triggering devices? And why do the heroes always find out about the bomb seconds before its to go off?? Recent favorite scene countering this notion: The Chronicle TV series where they find the bomb, it seems to have seconds left on the timer and one character is all pumped to do something about it, when his friends show him that there's still two more hours that he didn't see and he was all shaky and coming off his adreneline and fear saying, "Oh good, let's call the bomb squad."
How come bad guys stay almost dead forever, rising up again at least one more time to fight, but the good guy cohorts always linger just long enough to say some cornpone. IF the good guy doesn't say anything and we're not sure he/she is dead, then he might help the protagonist by miraculously seeing someone sneaking up and shoot them dead from the ground, despite a near-fatal wound, a short barrel weapon, blood in the eyes...
Last edited:
Storm Raven
First Post
Zerovoid said:
Not that I disagree that this is a common convention, but I find your citation of Saruman and Gollum to be off point here.
In Saruman's case, the heroes did let him off and sho him mercy, but he wasn't killed because he turned around and attacked them and they "had" to defend themselves. He was killed by his own lackey Wormtongue. The heroes had nothing to do with his death.
In Gollum's case, Frodo doesn't spare Gollum to show he's a hero. Frodo is actually trying to actively kill Gollum when Gollum snares the Ring. (Sam doesn't try to kill Gollum because he can't get a clear shot at him without endagering Frodo). Gollum dies because he slips, ot because the hero then has to kill him in self-defense.
I just think those are poor examples to cite for the "hero spares bad guy but has to kill him anyway when treacherous bad guy tries to double cross the hero" cliche.
Dr. Midnight wrote:
I believe one can damage the undead dog using that kick. That's not really the problem I'm having with it.
I've seen it a lot too. Basically, Hong Kong cinema used the technique a lot in the eighties and nineties. So even by mid nineties it was getting way old over seas. So when I see it, even in HK movies, I roll my eyes. Many U.S. martial art films have used it too. Then HK Action blew up in the western cinema forum and now western directors are looking to add the same flavor. They stupidly think that all it takes is to copy moves rather than capture the creative process of choreography from HK. Its blatantly obvious. They also forget that 'cool looking' or not, a special move still needs motivation. (Although I can't really properly judge the motivation part in particular with RE because I haven't seen the entire fight sequence yet, but that critique applies more to the films I've already seen). That's one reason.
Second reason is because that style of fighting simply doesn't fit into the 'atmosphere' of the Resident Evil genre. That compounds the silliness of the decision making behind doing that kick in the movie.
I believe one can damage the undead dog using that kick. That's not really the problem I'm having with it.
I've seen it a lot too. Basically, Hong Kong cinema used the technique a lot in the eighties and nineties. So even by mid nineties it was getting way old over seas. So when I see it, even in HK movies, I roll my eyes. Many U.S. martial art films have used it too. Then HK Action blew up in the western cinema forum and now western directors are looking to add the same flavor. They stupidly think that all it takes is to copy moves rather than capture the creative process of choreography from HK. Its blatantly obvious. They also forget that 'cool looking' or not, a special move still needs motivation. (Although I can't really properly judge the motivation part in particular with RE because I haven't seen the entire fight sequence yet, but that critique applies more to the films I've already seen). That's one reason.
Second reason is because that style of fighting simply doesn't fit into the 'atmosphere' of the Resident Evil genre. That compounds the silliness of the decision making behind doing that kick in the movie.
buzzard
First Post
Re: Re: Re: Re: Things I'm Sick of - Action Movie Cliche #39
It's a damn shame this movie didn't do better. It was such a perfect send up of action films, especially those which Arnie himself is known for.
The fact that it was marketed as an action film, but was really a comedy is what likely did it in. Either that or the viewers were simply too stupid to see the humor. I hope it was the former.
Buzzard
Don said:
It's a damn shame this movie didn't do better. It was such a perfect send up of action films, especially those which Arnie himself is known for.
The fact that it was marketed as an action film, but was really a comedy is what likely did it in. Either that or the viewers were simply too stupid to see the humor. I hope it was the former.
Buzzard
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