Suspension of disbelief

[dalekboy]

Films and tv shows usually rely on suspension of disbelief.

To me, if one is going to maintain the suspension of disbelief, you have to obey all the ordinary everyday rules that people know and understand. One can believe an massive alien invasion with giant biomechanoid floating death cannons, so long as the world rules beyond that are consistent. But if a human character, in avoiding one of these cannons, jumps off a ten storey building without any sort of aid, or interruptions to their fall, and land unharmed and run off - that's the deal breaker. One knows that's not possible, and suddenly one is left questioning that moment, and by default, the rest of the film.

I mentioned in a post yesterday that I hate it in films and tv when medics use the defibrillator paddles on a woman to try and restart her heart, and they are using them through material - bras, tank tops, etc. - rather than on bare skin. It pulls me right out of the moment, because I know it's not right.

I also mentioned hating when people can just break passwords when they have no information on the person, which has become really common in shows. Any computer whizz can break any password, within a relatively short time.

Another one I hate is when someone who is driving spends time looking at the their passenger rather than paying attention to the road. Quick glances are fine, but when they're maintaining eye contact for whole big chunks of conversation it annoys me. If you regularly did it in real life there's no way you wouldn't crash.

king_espresso mentioned that he hates when people don't wear ear protection on board military helicopters, which is a great one. Well, except now I'll be looking for it and getting annoyed by it.

kaths brought up the way people type madly on computer keyboards to do things that the rest of us would do with a mouse. We're in the internet age, everyone uses computers, we know they don't work this way.

kaths also mentioned the way they can zoom in on a small section of a photo, blow up that section, sharpen/clean it up, and suddenly have a incredibly clear and detailed picture. It's the equivalent of being able to blow up my icon for this post to read all the book titles.

So what about you? What regularly used, unrealistic film and tv conceits pull you out of the moment?

Comments

[sjl.livejournal.com]

kaths brought up the way people type madly on computer keyboards to do things that the rest of us would do with a mouse. We're in the internet age, everyone uses computers, we know they don't work this way.

Speak for yourself. I still make a lot of use of the command line, because there are some things that are far more efficient that way. In my first job, I'd do certain things through the CLI, and get them done far more quickly than my colleagues could do them with the GUI, even with the ridiculously excessively verbose commands the system forced me to use.

It does depend on the circumstance, though. And having said all that - somebody tapping on the keyboard, and not touching the space bar for hours? I think not.

[dalekboy.livejournal.com]

I also use a fair few keyboard shortcuts.

Her example is more to do with the stuff where a mouse is the obvious way it would be done. Selecting a part of a picture to crop and blow-up, for example.

[sjl.livejournal.com]

Point.

How about the ability (this is an extension of the infinite digital zoom mentioned earlier) for cameras to see around corners? Or through walls. Or BEHIND themselves. Or behind objects that are deliberately placed to block the camera's vision ...

[dalekboy.livejournal.com]

Got any examples, cos I can't think of any.

[sjl.livejournal.com]

Second or third hand, and I can't remember what it was in reference to. Sorry. (I remember the bitchfest about it, just not the subject of the bitchfest.)

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

yeah some of us do use the command line or keyboard shortcuts an awful lot, even for things most people would use a mouse for, but TV still manages to make it that little bit too much too be believable on occasion.

There is also the issue where anyone doing something technical and fancy, like hacking or breaking codes, usually has a big fancy display with lots of mysterious fancy graphics (Swordfish a particular offender here), when this is exactly the sort of thing that is done with a plain command line most of the time.

Weirdest example of them getting it sort of *right* - in Matrix 2, trinity breaks into a computer using an actual, real, known exploit to break in, and using (one real, one fictitious but plausible) command line tools to exploit it - which is just hilarious, becaue it would be realistic except she is just about doing a somersault as she types it in two seconds or something, making it still hilariously unrealistic.

Also, people that are supposed to be evil geniuses, or even the worlds smartest man (in Watchmen) seem completely ignorant of basic computer security, like choosing a good password.