Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

HUGE potential topic here, but I'm really curious here about what others think in various movies over time that stick out in their minds as mistakes that were particularly very easy to fix.

In non-rant form.

There are many times when all of us see a story unfold and are jarred by what we consider to be a plot mistake, whether it's an inconsistency or simply just not a sensible thing to have happen.

Most recently I thought of this in two movies:

(movies are older, so I don't think spoilers are necessary).

Django: Unchained:

Two scenes I would have changed. The story of Shultz would not have ended with a silly "I couldn't resist" when he clearly had a 2nd bullet in his sleeve-gun. Simply a head-scratcher. PARTICULARLY when he knows that would condemn Django and Hildy back to slavery and/or death.

Didn't make any sense.

I could see the story enfolding better as Butch Pooch looking and ready to shoot Hildy with King Shultz diving in the way to protect her while shooting him (Pooch) at the same time. At that point him dying would at least make some sense.

Also the ending was too campy for me. He could never possibly carry enough dynamite to level the house all at once. Blowing up Stephen would have been enough.

Small nit: Using later century terms in the 1800's was distracting to me. I'm willing to let it go 'cause, well, Tarantino and it's almost a superhero style movie anyway. If you're interested, see attachment.

The Godfather: Part II:

Great movie, and it's a waste of time even saying that; no one with more than one brain hemisphere working would disagree. And one scene caused disagreement back and forth among my friends; they're split 50/50 about the following:

IMO, there's only one knuckleheaded plot silliness. Having Michael kill Fredo doesn't make any sense. He was clearly too stupid to truly know it was a hit, and he seemed believable when he said it. In GF1, killing Carlo made sense to me and the story. Killing a capable brother would make sense. Not Fredo though. He's far too ineffective a threat.

Since a Tarantino film has already been referenced, I will go ahead and say that if it had been up to me, I would have deleted Christopher Walken's scene in Pulp Fiction. I understand that Tarantino wanted the viewer to know how important the watch was to Butch, but the scene went on WAY too long and I think the film could have survived without it.

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

As with the first couple of posts it's difficult to find fault with some of the most celebrated and beloved movies of all time. But here is one from a movie that I've yet to meet anyone who hates. And it isn't so much a plotline, but a slight editorial choice - to cut the final scene from:

The Shawshank Redemption

At the risk of spoiling, cutting the last 30 seconds or so from this movie would have made it absolutely perfect. The film finishes with Red (Morgan Freeman) walking along the beach toward where Andy (Tim Robbins) is working on a boat. It's a nice moment, and a satisfying conclusion but there is a way the film would have been made even better, by cutting that one final scene.

Prior to that Red has made up his mind - to get busy living, or get busy dying. As he makes the conscious decision to skip bail he talks about hoping the Pacific Ocean is as blue as it is in his dreams, hoping to see his friend,and finishes with the words "I hope."

For a film that is all about hope, that is the perfect note to finish on. Having the credits roll at that moment would have left the viewer uncertain... Hoping that Red can make it across the border, hoping that he can meet up with friend, hoping that nothing has happened to Andy in the meantime. Left with a degree of ambiguity... but filled with hope.

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

Personally, I never understood what purpose the live action scenes serve in End of Eva except a distraction so yeah, I think it could have survived without them.

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

But the whole point of The Godfather Part II is that Michael's gotten so ruthless during his time as the Don that he would go so far as to kill his own brother - we can believe that Fredo didn't know it was going to be a hit, but it's the fact that he would go against Michael like that (and he clearly goes through with it because he feels resentful about being "stepped over") that informs Michael's decision to disown him and ultimately have him killed. It's consistent with Michael's psychology that he feels the need to eliminate any potential threat, even one as supposedly ineffectual as Fredo. It doesn't matter if we the audience can see how this "doesn't make sense" from a purely logical standpoint because the character/film does not operate on that level. Likewise, Django Unchained makes sense given the character's psychology and the events of the film where he is pushed to a breaking point by the antagonist.

It's why I tend to regard the idea of "changing" certain plot and character developments with a certain skepticism - it's one thing to be critical, but trying to think up preferable alternatives doesn't seem like an especially effective form of being critical about a film's faults.

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

Also... if I remember correctly, Fredo's not completely ineffectual. Wasn't it his selling out the family that enabled rivals to try to commit the hit on Michael and his family (Fredo's own niece and nephew) at their Lake Taho residence? If so, then Fredo could be considered a liability and a danger.

To the first, the simplest answer is he let his anger cloud his judgement. People do dumb things without thinking quite often, and in the west, shooting someone out of anger was quite common. Regardless of the consequences.

The second instance regarding Fredo:
Michael realized that, although his brother was used, he showed a severe lack of judgement, and as such, couldn’t risk having it happen again. Another issue was that there was some doubt he wasn’t complicit, especially since he lied about it to begin with, and couldn’t be trusted. If he allows him to live under those conditions, he would be perceived as weak, and that’s fatal to a mob boss.

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

You beat me to it as I was typing out my response haha. I share the same sentiment.

Completely agree.
Tarantino has a habit of overwriting certain scenes, where they become a little drawn out.

Interesting. I never would have thought that anyone would object to that scene....I actually thought it was great, and the fact that Walken was pulled in for such a quirky cameo seems far too Tarantino to remove. Walken is one of my favorite "icky" actors (an actor that always seems typecast into someone off-putting). He's always got that thing about him that somehow always puts me just a little on edge.

The scene I always fast-forward past is the stupid dancing thing (the twist, at the restaurant).

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

I should specify I wasn’t agreeing about that scene in particular, but rather Tarantino’s penchant for overwriting a scene in general. A few scenes in Kill Bill, the bar scene in Inglorious Basterds, and more.

Fair enough. But I suppose as dumb an initial move as it was, I'm not quite as much at odds with him losing his temper and shooting Candie. After all, Tarantino made sure that we saw how he was tormented by remembering the graphic shredding of d'Artagnan----it's clear that he's thinking emotionally.

It's immediately afterward that bothers me: Him not using his obvious high-speed killing ability to shoot Pooch (who has a shotgun). Given everything we knew about him to that point, it didn't make sense to me. He's got 2 bullets in that sleeve gun (as we saw when he killed Willard Peck).

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

The last 10 years of my life.

That's what crappy sequels are for. Just make it TV-MA this time, and fill it with the eye-candy girls...

It's OK, nobody agrees with me about the Christopher Walken scene

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

As much as I loved Annihilation from a year or two ago, the ending is still somewhat unsatisfactory for me. The audio and visuals were astounding, but the actual source of the madness was much more alien and abstract than I was hoping for. Maybe something more....bacterial?....would have made me feel better....I think I remember hearing there was some kind of alternative ending

OMG, you're the first person to agree with me on this.

LOL. Which is it?

I actually read the disagreement before I read the agreement.

Ha. I’ll raise you for 20. :rolleyes:

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

I know someone has already posted but the point of Michael taking out Fredo is to show how despicable he has become, cruel, selfish, paranoid beyond belief and mad with power. This is the final nail in the coffin and should have ended the saga....bring him back in Godfather Part III and trying to get us to root for him was massive mistake and one of the major reasons I dislike that film.

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

OOPS...and I will add in one of the changes I'd like to see.

Just recently watched Marriage Story and I surprisingly liked it...for anyone who hasn't seen it, there is a spoiler below!

The scene where Nicole arrives in Charles apartment to talk but they end up having a massive row should not have ended in Charles wishing her dead, then breaking down and crying at her feet. It is completely out of line for his character, even though I understand how these arguments can turn out, it just seems so out of place. In fact, any scene where the two are overly friendly yet Nicole is willing to take so much from Charles just seems odd and makes for an imbalanced movie.

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

⬆️ Totally disagree. The scene was powerful & true. Two nice people who turned into monsters & hurt each other. That’s what happens in a divorce, which many people will say is the worst experience they ever went through.

I always wished the had left the end of Frailty more ambiguous, letting us decide if the whole thing had been the work of Angels or if it was insanity on the part of both the Father and Son.

You seem like someone that appreciates the art of openendedness. Many do. My film history instructor in college always did, explaining as we went frame by frame through scenes. Personally, I don't. It always makes me feel uncomfortable and like the movie pulled a "fast one" on me by leaving me with unresolved feelings.

For instance, I'm still a little irked when in Brokeback Mountain, they never made it clear which of these 3 scenarios were true:

1. That Jack's wife was relaying what she wanted to tell others about what happened to him but that she knew the truth (beaten to death). The scenes were then what was in Ennis's mind as she relayed it.

2. That the story was indeed what really happened (tire explosion), and the scenes were (again) in Ennis's mind.

3. That it really happened that he was beaten to death and that the wife was only told the tire story by kind authorities.

The actress playing the wife said in an interview that they still didn't know, and that the wife was to play it multiple ways. The script didn't change, just the feelings shown between versions.

I'm still irked by it.

I'm not always a fan of ambiguous/open-ended movies as sometimes it just seems that the filmmaker doesn't want to make a decision, where as with the end of Frailty it was more that the movie was leaving an air of ambiguity through right up until the end where they just go "no they definitely had Angels tell them to do this".

I don't it might just be I don't like the end going with religion is real

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

I guess Breaking Bad comes to mind off the top of my head. Everyone feels it has the perfect ending but I think the ending could have been improved though, and felt it could have had even more dramatic consequences, than what they had. I also felt that

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

Speaking of ambiguous endings, the most ambiguous ever must be the final scene of The Sopranos.

I Am Legend.

Oh for it to be possible to axe these 3 things. Let's call the creatures "zombies" for short.

1. The knuckleheaded idea that the woman would be stupid enough to "find bacon" and assume it was free to just grab and cook during a zombie apocalypse.

PS. Side reference to a fun movie with characters playing themselves and poking fun at themselves the entire time: This is the End. If you saw This is the End, you'll probably guess the scene.

2. The entire idea that a zombie-leader would have a zombie-mate, when it's completely antithetical to the unthinking nature of these things? They could have made a different attack motive.

3. The ending bothers me. I didn't see a clear-cut need for him to choose death; it truly wouldn't stop them all from following the girl. It wasn't about him either, it was about the "mate". Unless they fleshed out more that he was just sick of life, it was something that didn't "follow".


Titanic.

I'm reticent to mention this, because it's so ubiquitous a complaint that it's become an international meme. Did Jack really have to try only once to get on that stupid "raft"?

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

Everyone mentions the raft in Titanic but Jack tried to get on, didn't work, so he didn't want to increase her hypothermia. Why do so many have a hard time wrapping their heads around that, but then all these other potential plot holes in other movies are just fine with others?

They're not zombies, they're vampires. In the source novel and previous film adaptations they were even capable of speech and other displays of intelligence. The 2007 version makes them more animalistic but they're not completely mindless either (such as when they manage to rig one of his own traps against him).

The ending, though, I'll grant is stupid, especially since it totally ruins what made the book so good.

I saw that alternate ending you mentioned. I felt that it was better, slightly, but not great.

Thanks: I had no clue at all that they were vampires.

Because she risked her life (passing up a lifeboat?) to save him, and this was certain death for him making her life-risk in vain. Why would there not be more than one attempt? "Increasing her hypothermia" seems.....odd.....they might be keeping each other warm, at least to a degree. And at least would need them both up there to assess how bad it was first.

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

thank u

Speaking of ambiguous endings - it's what hurt the otherwise excellent No Country For Old Men (2007) for me...

I don't know I bought so that him attempting to get on and it sinking was enough to sell me that it was going to sink if he tried again.

No kidding huh?

Ermagerhd. That scene bothered me soooooo much. Especially after I felt like HBO had yanked my chain endlessly by pushing off season after season. I should have cancelled and then binge-watched everything.

Just remembered now. That final @#$%ing scene of Castaway totally irked me too. For the love of Mike, go and get the girl!

In the Departed:

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

Passengers (2016)...


Instead of starting the movie meeting Chris Pratt... start the movie with Jennifer Lawrence waking up.


You then follow her into the ship, and you meet Chris Pratt who says he's been awake for a year, and you learn there's something wrong alongside Jennifer Lawrence.


Then, the scene when the barman drops the bombshell... would turn the movie into a psychological thriller, even pushing into the horror genre, and get the viewer thinking whether Chris Pratt is a psycho or not.


You'd be watching the movie from Lawrence's point of view, rather than Pratt's. Only after all the psychological stuff would you see a kinda of flashback showing Pratt's torment during the year he was alone, and have Fishburn's character appear and give the viewer and Lawrence the backstory.
It'd be a totally different movie.

I agree, I think it's one of the movie's best scenes. It reinforces my belief that as hurtful as the behavior between Charlie and Nicole becomes, they are still in love with each other, despite being in deep denial about it.

I'll concede that the movie breaks with formula - which is usually a good thing. Surprises are usually good. But...

Yes, precisely.

It was an empty ending for the character.

Looks like I'm due for a rewatch... as I just don't remember a lot of the details.
(And who knows what state I might have been in when I first saw it!) ;)

Nice that the spoiler containers don't hide images, lol...

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

I guess there's the assumption that, if he's capable of putting it there in the first place, then he can clean it up if necessary.

Anyway, the movie version of Doom changes the monsters' origins so they are not demons from Hell like in the games but are now the result of humans being mutated by an ancient alien virus, which definitely makes it a bad adaptation (not least its third-act twist).

Others seemed to agree with this, so I wanted to take some time to think about it.

The reason I don't think this justifies it is because Fredo had already proven himself completely ineffectual in the time afterward until his mother's death. The guy was a mental mess, but I still can't imagine him ever making that mistake again.

I thought we'd been over this. The fact that it can't be justified is the point.

I think I'm due for a rewatch of Part III, if only because I get the impression we're not supposed to actively root for him but still want to see what happens when he actually tries to make an (almost certainly doomed) attempt to redeem himself.

And what about it? You're supposed to feel that same level of uncertain anxiety that Ennis does and understand why he would assume the worst upon finding out about such a sudden and violent death (especially when the sheer variety of possible scenarios - maybe it was a tire, maybe it was a beating - and people's reluctance to even talk about it, including his own, means he would never get that particular closure).

Anyway, another one I just thought of - Alison getting the makeover in The Breakfast Club.

So "we're" going over it again.

If you read the part I quoted (the part I was responding to) you'd see that I was addressing this (IMO) errant notion that Fredo was still somehow a threat just by being alive.

I explained "what about it", but I guess I'll repeat then. I myself pointed out the interview where the director had the wife act it both ways (same script). It's just not something I'm comfortable with. To me, leaving the audience hanging, intended or not, is an uncomfortable movie ending.

One would think.
But in the scene where Michael officially announces his break up with Fredo, Fredo confesses how disenfranchized he always felt from the family - which drove him to colluding with the family's enemies.
So (from Michael's POV) someone who feels that way (and had already turned on them once) could never be trusted or considered loyal, and might again get to the point where they stab the family (or those they perceive passed them over) in the back out of a sense of revenge.

Romantic films oftentimes end on a sad note whereas you wish they ended happily, and vice versa. Not that I watch many romances, and if I do, they're Asian, because nobody wants that half-assed American crap, besides I need to have a bunch of unseen ones to watch with my future girlfriend (okay, who are we kidding - to watch as an old bachelor)... but... but there's a strong trend of such endings in those I've seen, which led me to believe perhaps the screenwriters subversively toy with viewer's expectations, which is fine, I guess, but I prefer films that play out 100% the way I wanted them to. It's incredibly rare, but there is such a film, and it's Postman Blues - needless to say a tremendous masterpiece by the one and only SABU, but also a film, that played out exactly the way I anticipated, and if I was a director, I would've directed it just like that!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rETRsQSR6w

Oh, and possibly the best romantic drama (along with The Road Home, because the Chinese are the best at this game) is Romancing in Thin Air. It escapes the issue I described above by subverting the borders of its genre in one of the most unexpected yet satisfying twists in history of romances.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmWYj1CabLU

Those are two masterpieces I recommend to everybody. But what are actual films I wish I could change? Dunno, I'd rather blabber about those I wouldn't.

I think we are certainly meant to root for Michael in part 3, it is pretty obvious in the way they represent him trying to grow close to Kay again, in his love for his daughter, in his willingness to let his son do his own thing AND to really pull himself out of the criminal world, once and for all. It is meant to be designed as a story of redemption.

Re: Storylines you wish you could change when thinking back.
 

That sense of redemption is still tempered by how we expect him to either fail or succeed at a great cost, especially considering that the previous films were about him ultimately getting away with various crimes but at greater costs to his humanity before