The Willing Suspension of Disbelief Metathread

[HaemishM]

Inception got a pass because the whole fucking film was about dreams.  And you were never sure the whole fucking film wasn't a dream itself.

Yeah, this. Inception was only "stupid" if you didn't buy the premise of the dream technology macguffin from the get go. If you did, there really aren't any rules you could break that meant anything because lol dreams.

[pxib]

Sure sure... now imagine a Syfy original movie of the same basic story. Most of those passes would immediately expire.

[HaemishM]

Sure sure... now imagine a Syfy original movie of the same basic story. Most of those passes would immediately expire.

Because it's SyFy and the execution would be utter shit - which it most certainly was not on Inception.

Some people just make movies better than others.

[pxib]

Because it's SyFy and the execution would be utter shit - which it most certainly was not on Inception.

If the storytelling and cinematic craft suck, nothing is forgiven. If they're spectacular, much is.

Indeed. That's all I was saying. People tend to forgive stupid stuff, even phenomenally stupid stuff, in stories which are well told. To summarize again, folks seem to ignore or forgive stupid things when the filmmakers:
1. Don't ask us to think about the stupid things.
2. Don't defy easily falsifiable everyday experience.
3. Don't otherwise destroy their credibility as filmmakers.

[HaemishM]

#1 is very important. If you are going to handwave explanations for things, you better be prepared to state as little as possible concrete about that thing or nerds will pick it apart.

[pxib]

I think Khaldun's example of Indy and the submarine is a good illustration. When Dr. Jones is being dragged behind the truck, we basically see the whole thing. Sure it's somewhat unbelievable that a guy could handle all that, but there he is handling it. It's easy to turn off our brains and let Spielberg and his crew show us what actually happened.

With the submarine, however, the movie just cuts to its arrival at the sea cave Nazi base. A cut like that implcitly hands the audience an opportunity to fill in the blanks... and they couldn't do it. We saw Indy on top of the sub, and now he's quietly crawling out of the water. Did the sub just never submerge? Can he hold his breath for several hours? Was the cave only a few minutes away? Thinking killed it.

[Venkman]

Thank you for this thread! Missed it last night.

This is where the virus at the end of ID4 falls down. If it were something that happened to get the characters information, that would be one thing... but it's the solution that takes down the unstoppable big bads.

Yea this. In fact, I wondered why they needed the virus at all. If Goldblum assumed the mother ship would tractor beam them in, they only needed to ferry the nuke to get there. They didn't even assume the virus would propogate across the whole network. I'm still not sure it was the virus that took out the shields or the destruction of the home node that powered everything. They could have cut all of that. But then, they'd have cut a main reason to have a prominent nerd lead maybe. Narrative wins again!

Third: Quality art direction and emotional resonance will obscure almost anything.

Kinda. But what set me off about Pacific Rim is precisely this. That was a gorgeous movie with a dumbfuck premise I can't get past the moment I allow myself to start thinking about it. But Inception worked for me as a premise and it was pretty, so that's ok.

To the original questions:

1) When is a film just fun and you don't care if it's plausible, realistic, etc.?
2) When or at what moment do you start saying, "Hey, wait a minute." Why?
3) When does "Hey, wait a minute" curdle into nerdrage and displeasure?
4) Is there any film ever dealing with fantasy, speculative or futuristic themes and motifs that has 100% withstood your most brutal skepticism? How come?

1. If it tries to explain anything and I don't find the explanation plausible even within the narrow context of the movie, that leads to #2. Normally I'm ok with stupiddumb if the movie asks me to just assume things are the way they are. Lightsabers and the Force just are. Midichlorians explain it too much.
2. When the explanation is so stupid you need to force yourself to unthink it to enjoy it. Back to the Future was a fun series, but that was some real dumb use of even stock linear time travel.
3. Direct relationship between the level of dumb and the amount of explanation behind it.
4. Star Wars original trilogy (we just assume a whole bunch of the premise without explanation), Star Trek II and III (because it had trek-style sci-fi that tied back to the series you were asked to inherit), Lord of the Rings (because it's specifically a moment in time within a much larger world that was conveyed well in the books and in the movies. You just assumed all the rules were established because shit be looking old even when it was new).

[Margalis]

Midichlorians are a great example of a nonsense explanation hurting a film. "The force is magic" is much better than "the force is science" followed by a bunch of stupid shit that definitely isn't science.

Edit: Regarding ID4, a large part of the problem with the ending (and the rest of the movie) is the abrupt tonal changes and the presentation. IIRC the virus has a cartoony flashing skull icon or something...the movie really didn't take it's own ending seriously. The ending was stupid but it was kind of stupid on purpose, in a way that didn't really work.

Edit2: ID4 has a lot of tonal problems - tons of people die, there are serious scenes, a sort of weird retrograde "always listen to the man he knows what's best" morality tale, then "Welcome to Earf, a computer virus with a silly animated gif, extremely hammy acting and broad characters...it's not a serious movie with scenes of levity, it's half serious movie and half really dumb extravaganza. To me neither half works because of the existence of the other half.

[lamaros]

Inception got a pass because the whole fucking film was about dreams.  And you were never sure the whole fucking film wasn't a dream itself.

Yeah, this. Inception was only "stupid" if you didn't buy the premise of the dream technology macguffin from the get go. If you did, there really aren't any rules you could break that meant anything because lol dreams.

There were a lot more reasons it was stupid. I am surprised that so many of you liked it, given the hate here for Lindelof.

Otherwise: Some good points have been made in the last page.

[lamaros]

Midichlorians are a great example of a nonsense explanation hurting a film. "The force is magic" is much better than "the force is science" followed by a bunch of stupid shit that definitely isn't science.

I'd say it's related to what others have expressed here: It is better to be vague than specific, because you will lose out on specifics to anyone whose understanding betters the presentation. When you go into specifics you either have to get it 'right' or risk losing your audience. Doing it 'right' is fucking hard - for a number of reasons. The trick of storytelling is suggesting a reality and letting the audience take you up on it, not telling them what it is.

It's why Agatha Christie most other mystery authors didn't/don't write solvable stories. You need to drive a narrative, not provide solutions.

IE: It's more important in the Matrix that Keanu is able to give an impression of martial arts skill and athleticism than the ability to act, as the former is much more central to the success of the film. While martial arts experts might come away going 'oh well, he was poor but gave it a shot' it would have completely ruined the movie if he couldn't even hold a pose.

/incoherence

[murdoc]

I am surprised that so many of you liked it, given the hate here for Lindelof.

What does Lindelof have to do with Inception?

Personally, as long as a movie follows it's own rules I usually buy in. It's when it starts changing things when it's convenient to the poorly written plot that I get annoyed. Good writing and acting can hide a lot of unbelievable things.

[eldaec]

I struggled with inception in believability terms, I could accept the dream invasion stuff, but the attempt to solve a business problem through inception seemed dumb. You could reconcile it all to 'maybe its all a dream' but not until later in the film.

That said....

As a piece of art it was good enough that it just didn't need believability any longer. Like a good play, you can transcend the whole 'making practical sense' thing if the film is interesting enough without having to worry about the plot. Summer blockbusters, which generally have nothing except a plot, don't get to do that because they force your attention onto the most prosaic aspects of pure story.

[lamaros]

I am surprised that so many of you liked it, given the hate here for Lindelof.

What does Lindelof have to do with Inception?

Something shallow that passes itself off as deep and meaningful.

Actually, I prefer Lindelof 9 times out of 10. The stupid in Prometheus was much easier to deal with/ignore.

[Khaldun]

Midichlorians are a beautiful example of the principle a couple of you have described. It's kind of like how I tell my students that when you stumble a bit in presentation, do NOT go back and correct yourself unless it's a mistake so big that everyone will be unable to focus on anything else. Generally correcting just makes it into a big deal and breaks your rhythm. When a film decides it needs to tell me a lot about something fantastic or unreal in a way that does not blend into or drive the action or characters (or actively contradicts the mood set elsewhere), then it poisons everything else that's going to follow.

You can buy the weird interrogation system Deckard uses to find replicants. It doesn't make a hell of a lot of sense but it's just underexplained enough to work in establishing setting and then it's used in smart, crucial, lightly explained ways to drive the dramatic action of Blade Runner forward.

You not only can't buy midichlorians--it's worse than that, because if you bother to take the concept even remotely seriously it changes everything about the Star Wars universe for the worse: it means that Jedi are a hereditary caste of mutants, not a meritocratic order of wizards whose power is something of a mystery to themselves as well as others. But nothing else in the stories or the setting seems to even remotely suggest this--so now you lose not just that one moment but almost everything. As you're watching you have a choice--are you just going to forget that happened or are you going to pay attention to it? Neither of which bodes well for the ability to enjoy the rest of the movie, even if the rest of it didn't suck donkey balls.

[Venkman]

Exactly. I really didn't want to dredge up the nerdrage Episode I created and which I sorta am glad preceded the existence of F13 (afaik?), but that's really the thing I hated most about that movie. And because it was never ever again mentioned ever, I assume they got the message and realized that throwing in the creatures just so they could use that stupid scanner was just dumb. The steampunk-esque force-detector device Luke resurrected from old Empire archives in the first Timothy Zahn book was much better at it, but even that assumes the narrative even required a force detector at all, which any half-asleep drunk writer would tell you it did not.

Anywhoo, the Matrix is a good example of something that worked, until they had to retcon it because of what I assume was business pressure to take a one off movie into a franchise. Interesting point about the martial arts bit. I always felt that was kind of exposition for the sake of. I mean really, with all the tech they could bring, the fighting felt like knives to a gunfight stuff. I think I read some deep analysis about the martial art sensibilities somewhere, but that all felt like neckbeard stuff. What I saw on screen was that old GAP commercial with some Mortal Kombat footage. And I was fine with that, as long as I don't think too much about it.

That it went into a 2nd and 3rd is why I'm so very glad there was never a sequel to Fifth Element, which also held together very well because it was just a normal action/heroes flick with fun use of sci fi elements, not entirely unlike Star Wars on that premise, though of course a different movie.

[lamaros]

Anywhoo, the Matrix is a good example of something that worked, until they had to retcon it because of what I assume was business pressure to take a one off movie into a franchise. Interesting point about the martial arts bit. I always felt that was kind of exposition for the sake of. I mean really, with all the tech they could bring, the fighting felt like knives to a gunfight stuff. I think I read some deep analysis about the martial art sensibilities somewhere, but that all felt like neckbeard stuff. What I saw on screen was that old GAP commercial with some Mortal Kombat footage. And I was fine with that, as long as I don't think too much about it.

That it went into a 2nd and 3rd is why I'm so very glad there was never a sequel to Fifth Element, which also held together very well because it was just a normal action/heroes flick with fun use of sci fi elements, not entirely unlike Star Wars on that premise, though of course a different movie.

I'm not a huge Matrix fan, but the first was well done. And the martial arts was central to the film in many ways. Most obviously it demonstrated the capacity of a character (Neo) to change and demonstrate expertise in something that was beyond the understanding of most of the audience in specifics, but was nonetheless still comprehensible. Which meant it stood in for for all the 'magic' crap he did, without the movie having to go into some sort of nerdrage inducing 'explanation' of how the world technically worked. Trying to do the latter would have buggered up a lot of things. Making him get good at fighting and then gain a mystical epiphany was much more comprehensible and narratively elegant.

Also more fun to watch.

[Ratman_tf]

I think Khaldun's example of Indy and the submarine is a good illustration. When Dr. Jones is being dragged behind the truck, we basically see the whole thing. Sure it's somewhat unbelievable that a guy could handle all that, but there he is handling it. It's easy to turn off our brains and let Spielberg and his crew show us what actually happened.

With the submarine, however, the movie just cuts to its arrival at the sea cave Nazi base. A cut like that implcitly hands the audience an opportunity to fill in the blanks... and they couldn't do it. We saw Indy on top of the sub, and now he's quietly crawling out of the water. Did the sub just never submerge? Can he hold his breath for several hours? Was the cave only a few minutes away? Thinking killed it.

I had never thought of the submarine thing until people brought it up on the internet. Decades later.

[Margalis]

I never really got the issue with that. Maybe the submarine didn't submerge. Maybe some guy came up out of the hatch and Jones knocked him out and climbed inside.

Old-timey submarines were safer surfaced (in terms of operational safety, not attack) and had to surface to recharge batteries fairly often. They may have been faster surfaced as well. The idea of a submarine not submerging seems plausible enough.

[Koyasha]

You not only can't buy midichlorians--it's worse than that, because if you bother to take the concept even remotely seriously it changes everything about the Star Wars universe for the worse: it means that Jedi are a hereditary caste of mutants, not a meritocratic order of wizards whose power is something of a mystery to themselves as well as others. But nothing else in the stories or the setting seems to even remotely suggest this--so now you lose not just that one moment but almost everything. As you're watching you have a choice--are you just going to forget that happened or are you going to pay attention to it? Neither of which bodes well for the ability to enjoy the rest of the movie, even if the rest of it didn't suck donkey balls.

While midichlorians were in fact stupid, it had always seemed to me like the Force and Jedi were hereditary; after all, it seemed like the entire story was set up that Luke and Leia were force-sensitive because their father was a Jedi.  Just from the original trilogy, I would find it difficult to believe if you try to tell me that the Force is not hereditary.  Especially after Yoda says that there is another, and then we learn he was talking about Leia, because she's Luke's sister.  I certainly never questioned the concept that being a Jedi was something you inherited, back when I watched the original trilogy.

[Khaldun]

See, I always thought that this is what made Luke and Leia so unusual and why Obi-Wan and Yoda were focused on them. It just felt to me like the Jedi should be a bunch of totally unrelated people for the most part and that the power was something you earned through training and discipline (and yes, some kind of affinity) rather than just being born with it. For the most part, that's actually what we see even in the prequels *except* for the horrible, horrible midichlorian scene. But in a way, Star Wars was better off (re: this thread) not trying to do too much world-building about the Jedi anyway--just set up the basics and go from there. I think that's kind of true for wizards who aren't the main protagonist in any fantasy narrative--only spend a lot of time building up "how magic works in this film/universe" if all the main characters are magicians and the mechanics of magic are crucial to the plot. Dragonslayer, for example, needed to do a bit of work with "how magic works" because that was important to its plot.

[Malakili]

Midichlorians were always the answer reason.  Lucas notes from 1977 which were published in the Making of Star Wars book that came out a few years back have notes on the idea.  He didn't have the time to explain it in the original trilogy.  The reason you don't see lots of kids of Jedi running around is because Jedi generally weren't having kids - being Jedi and all.  

I have no idea why I'm bothering engaging in this train wreck of a discussion.

edit: Also I feel compelled to clarify that midichlorians are not the magic itself, but give certain people the ability to access the magic.

[calapine]

Midichlorians were always the answer reason.  Lucas notes from 1977 which were published in the Making of Star Wars book that came out a few years back have notes on the idea.  He didn't have the time to explain it in the original trilogy.

If that is true that Lukas success basically stems from being lucky enough not to have enough time and budget to implement his crap.

[Malakili]

Midichlorians were always the answer reason.  Lucas notes from 1977 which were published in the Making of Star Wars book that came out a few years back have notes on the idea.  He didn't have the time to explain it in the original trilogy.

If that is true that Lukas success basically stems from being lucky enough not to have enough time and budget to implement his crap.

Well, I think we pretty much all knew that from how the prequels turned out when time and money were not an option, regardless of this one particular issue. 

[Venkman]

Midichlorians were always the answer reason.  Lucas notes from 1977 which were published in the Making of Star Wars book that came out a few years back have notes on the idea.  He didn't have the time to explain it in the original trilogy.  The reason you don't see lots of kids of Jedi running around is because Jedi generally weren't having kids - being Jedi and all.  

I have no idea why I'm bothering engaging in this train wreck of a discussion.

edit: Also I feel compelled to clarify that midichlorians are not the magic itself, but give certain people the ability to access the magic.

I love this post. Fact and embarassment for knowing and for being compelled for revealing 

The as-yet unmentioned additional issue with midichlorians is that nothing in the EU material from the 70s through ep 1 said anything about it. Yes, I get canon vs EU. But ya gotta remember the EU stuff wasn't all, nor even mostly, independent fanfic. These were licensed executions that went through a licensing approvals process. Either the notes you mention never got out to the general rank and file employee, or it did but was never enforced for whatever reason.

So you have a bad idea made worse by reveal 20 years into a franchise that had never mentioned any of it.

I imagine we'd all be fine with it had it been part of the original movies though, since we were all kids and not jaded by change for the sake of change. And neckbeards.

[RT81]

I never really got the issue with that. Maybe the submarine didn't submerge. Maybe some guy came up out of the hatch and Jones knocked him out and climbed inside.

Old-timey submarines were safer surfaced (in terms of operational safety, not attack) and had to surface to recharge batteries fairly often. They may have been faster surfaced as well. The idea of a submarine not submerging seems plausible enough.

True. U-boats were much faster on the surface. They were more boats that could submerge to hide than true submarines. U-boat commanders early in in WWII would often remain on the surface even while attacking to take advantage of their speed, albeit under the cover of night. It's plausible they stayed on the surface the entire time since it was peace time and there would be no reason to submerge.

I was always much more concerned about how Indie didn't have a heat stroke or at least end up with a bad sunburn.  

Really though, I just always assumed he found a way to stow away for the journey. They can probably hear him walking around up there.

[Khaldun]

One of the things that you see time and time again on these boards is that most of us have a mighty will to make something make sense--if we want to. Which is maybe one of the distinguishing things about geek culture's approach to films and TV. But we're not all willed to make the same things make sense, or to make them make sense in the same kinds of ways.