10 Cinematic Clichés That Must Live!
by Don SurberJames Hudnall had a right-on post about 10 Cinematic Clichés That Must Die!, which he followed up with 10 more. I agree, but I offer my list of characters to replace them.
1. The Crazed Vietnam Vet. It started in the 1970s when Hollywood wanted a character whose violence could be excused as the work of the government. The original “Rambo” movie was actually this very cliché.
Far more interesting is the character Noah, played by Chris Klein in “The Valley of Light,” about a World War II hero who comes home to find the family farm sold off, his parents dead and his brother is in jail. Very quietly, he puts to great use the maturity he had tempered in war, and the movie (spoiler alert) ends with him letting the catfish go.
I have had the pleasure of meeting a few real-life Noahs. I haven’t met a Rambo yet.
2. The Professional Bitch. Hudnall pointed out that successful people in business are not divas, but rather charming and witty. Outside of show biz, divas don’t make it. But it is difficult to write dialog for charming and witty people when you are neither charming nor witty.
In real life, these women wind up as Bill Lumbergh, never quite rising above entry-level management.
Nancy Marchand as Margaret Pynchon on “The Lou Grant Show” came the closest to being a humanized woman in power. I suggest Hollywood writers spend a few hours watching Marchand.
3. The Evil Christian. Wrote Hudnall: “Christians are always shown to be hypocrites and phonies. They’re never good people. They’re exposed as pious frauds when their ‘true colors’ are revealed.”
Amen. Except for a few old “Davey and Goliath” episodes and of course, the excellent “Miracle Of Our Lady Of Fatima” movie, Christians get a worse stereotype in Hollywood than Indians did in those old cowboy movies.
Strangely enough, the fairest TV show to Christians these days may be “The Simpsons,” who still go to church on Sunday — even Super Bowl Sunday — and who live next-door to the annoying but sincere Ned Flanders. His backstory of being the spawn of beatniks who spanked him continuously for a year, is in itself a denunciation of permissiveness. Also, underneath those sweaters, he is a hunk.
4. The Stupid Dad/Male. Yes, it is time to give Homer Simpson a few IQ points. After all, the man is supposed to be a nuclear engineer, although he never quite made it to college.
Andy Griffith as Andy Taylor succeeded because Andy Griffith grew up around plenty of Andy Taylors. Griffith and Don Knotts and their writers fleshed out great characters that were based on real life, not something they saw in the cinema.
5. “The Magic Negro.” Spike Lee is credited with coining this phrase. The problem is two-fold. First, why does the storyline need a magical human to begin with? The fairy godmother is a lame plot device.
The second problem is that the story is written by some white person who probably has no contact with black people and is afraid of being offensive. The result is another stereotype. Here’s an idea: Spend more time with people who aren’t like you.
6. The Pedophile Priest. Well, they exist. But so do pedophile rock stars and pedophile liberal talk radio hosts. Or how about that atheist clown, John Wayne Gacy?
If Hollywood is going to take on pedophilia, how about taking on NAMBLA? Or Jeffrey Dahmer? Otherwise, it is just more anti-Catholicism.
7. The Traditionalist Hypocrite. Everyone is tired of this. How about the hippie liberal who’s a closet racist? There was one such character in “Hair,” wasn’t there?
8. Evil Republicans. I tried to think of one movie that cast Republicans in a good light in the last 30 years — 20 of which had a Republican in the White House. All I could come up with is Reese Witherspoon as Elle Wood in “Legally Blonde.”
Unfortunately, in the sequel, she became a dime-a-dozen liberal. Originality is punished in Hollywood. As in any other company town, those in Hollywood must conform, conform, conform.
9. Wise Trashy People. Hudnall is no fan of “Good Will Hunting,” or “Down and Out in Beverly Hills,” and so on. The last honest portrayal of bums on TV may have been Arte Johnson as the Dirty Old Man on “Laugh-In” — oh wait, I forgot Damon Wayans as Anton Jackson on “In Living Color.”
10. Flyover Losers. It is pretty difficult to get people to see a film when you brand them as losers.
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58 Comments
“6. The Pedophile Priest. Well, they exist. But so do pedophile rock stars and pedophile liberal talk radio hosts. Or how about that atheist clown, John Wayne Gacy?”
This will appear to many to be quibbling for the sake of being anti gay but here goes.
Pedophilia is defined clinically as the physical love and/or sexual attraction of an adult to PRE pubescent children. Girls as well as boys are as likely to be the victims of pedophiles. Psychiatrists point out that it is among other things, the non or presexuality of young children that drives a pedophile.
According to the research done by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, over 80% of the molestations were with post pubescent boys. This is not pedophilia, for the adolescents it fits the clinical definition of pederasty. In a substantial number of cases it was older boys, high school age. It is man-boy love, homosexuality in a very perverse incarnation, and later it becomes plain old homosexuality with minors not yet at the age of consent or as the law refers to it, statutory rape. These are not men who as many bogus stories claim, are typically heterosexual. Insofar as there are good homosexuals, these are not them. Even so, the continual reference of the problem in the Catholic Church and elsewhere as “Pedophilia” is incorrect and probably purposefully misleading by persons who dont want to admit that homosexuality, like all sexualities has a very dark side as well.
Sorry for hijacking your movie thread!
#9: Steve Martin was a great bum in The Jerk. He stunk to high heaven and had a very lovely Thermos.
M COLINS:
Perhaps a phrase from “Animal House” will suffice:
“Forget it. He’s rolling.”
“8. Evil Republicans. I tried to think of one movie that cast Republicans in a good light in the last 30 years”
Gran Torino
Ike – Countdown to D-Day
Forrest Gump
the Incredibles
Team America
Ghostbusters (okay, this is a stretch, but it has a delicious send-up of the typical Democrat bureaucratic wonk)
It’s hard. Very few films go out on a limb with characters who say, “I am a Democrat,” or “I am a Republican.” Usually such films are overtly political, such as An American President or Primary Colors, the latter of which was a pretty nasty skewering of the Clintons personally, but not their politics, per se.
Then there’s Gladiator: “Rome shall be a republic again.”
Most portrayals of heroes with testicles (police and firefighters and athletes), it’s a fair bet these folks are Republicans.
#2 . . . i can’t get enough of professional bitches. Actually, I can’t get enough of women in film in general, yet, most of the major studio films made are about stories driven by males. OH WELL!
P.S. Thanks for mentioning Marchand. I loved her on “The Sopranos” and know that she got Emmy attention for her work on “Lou Grant” and will netflix her right now!
Forrest Gump was a Republican? Who knew?!
@ Mr Blifil
“Sigh. First of all the Rambo remake tanked, so I fail to see how it serves as an example of a cliche that won’t die. The movie died! Doesn’t this suggest that people rejected the cliche?”
Uh, I think the post was about cliches that should “live,” right? Surber offered (the original) Rambo as an example of a H-wood stereotype “crazed veteran.” What should live is the seasoned, reasonable, matured and more realistic and reality-based (in the true sense) military or war veteran who is family man, humble, strong, and pro-America.
So, pay attention, Bilfil.
LOU GRANT IS NOT AVAILABLE ON DVD!!!!!
Blasphemy!
I meant not available on Netflix, sorry.
So Blifil, stories should only be told with characters that only meet a certain threshold in the population. How about this? An irritating contrarian obsessively posts replies to blog posts. People around him know he has a problem but they can’t get him to admit it. They’ve tried an intervention but it doesn’t work. So they hatch a clever scheme to spike his coffee with a cocktail of Zoloft, Serequel and Paxil. Slowly, he becomes disenfranchised with posting replies. His feelings of emptyness provoke him to look elsewhere to try a variety of things. Soon he realizes there’s a world out there and discovers there’s more to life than posting replies and he finds happiness and people actually start to like him.
OK. It’s a rough outline but details can be filled in later. It certainly fulfills the population threshold *you* set.
I always though The American President was a great movie that stereotypes Republicans.
Congratulations, Don.
Nice to see you’re expanding onto another blog.
Christians are always shown to be hypocrites and phonies
Applies only to white Christians; nonwhite Christians, like blacks and Hispanics, are still good people, and blameless for their beliefs, since culturally they’re victims of centuries of Christianist domination.
Blifil, you don’t work at this blog. Quit acting like you do. You are just a troll.
“My objections are aimed consistently at tired right wing notions like those plied here 7 days a week.”
I invite you to take your own advice and find somewhere else to go if you don’t like what’s posted here. What the hell is with you lefties and your authoritarian obsession with quashing freedom of choice?
#2 – Nancy Marchand more than made up for her “humanized woman in power” bit on “Lou Grant” with her star turn as Livia Soprano.
Best. Female. Villain. Ever.
RE:::Mr Blifil – January 29th, 2009 at 8:55 am
“Sigh. First of all the Rambo remake tanked, so I fail to see how it serves as an example of a cliche that won’t die. The movie died! Doesn’t this suggest that people rejected the clich..”
THAT IS TOTALLY NOT TRUE…YES THE RAMBO SEQUELS WERE GARBAGE BUT WHAT ABOUT THE BORNE Movies, or Universal Soldier movies…The plot keeps returning…
ALSO If I was an abused alter boy I would not want to be constantly reminded of what happened…
As far as the stereotype of the pedophile priest goes: studies have proven that your average public school teacher is statistically much more likely to be a child molester (in whatever variation you wish) than a Catholic Priest or any other member of the clergy.
I don’t know how anyone could say that the Rambo stereotype isn’t popular any longer. It’s actually two stereotypes together… the insane vet plus the loner cop (or military guy.) Both stereotypes are alive and well. It will be Gulf War vets now instead of Vietnam, what with everyone wanting to prove that they are pro-military by taking PTSD seriously. And the notion of the cop or vet who isn’t and can’t be a team player… there is no way that will die any time soon.
Rambo (the remake) didn’t “tank”
With its overseas gross it more than doubled its production budget. It wasn’t a huge hit, but it didn’t “tank.”
“Tanked” would be anywhere from 0 – $50 million total world-wide grosses.
There are many movies and TV shows that have prominently featured Gacy or Dahlmer-like characters.
Hell, it’s practically a weekly thing on SVU.
Oh, I’m picking out a thermos for you,
Not an ordinary thermos for you,
but the extra best thermos that money can buy,
with vinyl and stripes, and a cup built right in,
Oh, I’m picking out a thermos for you,
and maybe a barometer too,
Oh what else can I buy, so on me you’ll rely,
a rear-end thermometer too.
It does have an end! That’s from memory, so it might be a little off.
Wow, Navin. I don’t know whether to be impressed or disturbed.
Hollywood liberalism is just so tiresome. Yesterday I watched “Eagle Eye”, which besides being generically awful was stamped right from the left-wing playbook: scruffy chinless crybaby loser of a man, empowered single-mom woman doing all the heavy lifting, driving, and shooting.
But it’s hard to top the horrible remake of “The Hitcher”, which introduced a NEW female character to take the man’s role, turned the man into a woman, and had the skimpy, skinny, model-like female become the action hero, barging out of a blown-up van guns a-blazing.
Save us from the stupidity of liberalism.
Oh horsefeathers and hossenfeffer. Daddy Warbucks is brough[t] ’round through his association with a friendless orphan to revise his avaricious lifestyle entirely, not unlike his forebear Ebeneezer Scrooge. And FDR appears as the deus ex machina.
Indeed, the crux of it comes from the song “We’d Like To Thank You Herbert Hoover”. The term “hooverville” itself is an invention of Charles Michelson, who was a publicity chief for the DNC at the time. There were shantytowns before the Great Depression, and the numbers exploded during FDRs reign. In fact, the DNC invented other cutsy terms after Hoover, such as the “Hoover Blanket”, the “Hoover Flag”, et al.
When my son was four, we were going to see some Disney movie, and he asked me if this was going to be another “dead dad” movie. I wasn’t sure I heard him right, but we started talking and we came up with a whole list of “uplifting” Disney films that falls into one of two categories:
If it’s a Dead Dad movie, then the father dies in the movie (e.g., Lion King, Cinderella, Snow White, Angels in the End Zone)
If it’s a Dead Mom movie, then the mom is usually long dead (e.g., The Little Mermaid, Finding Nemo)
Then there’s exception–Bambi–where Mom dies in the movie.
And don’t get me started on orphan movies!
The movies end up being uplifting only because they make kids so sad in the beginnning. Let’s have this cliche die instead.
“M Colins,
As I pointed out in my thread, in case you missed it, pedophile priest is how they frame it in the movies I complain about. They use that term. I’m aware that it’s a more complicated issue than that. Complexity is not Hollywood’s forte. They like everything reduced down to simple terms.”
Sorry I didnt mean to imply you were purposefully trying to further the misconception, just that if we adopt the false lexicon I see being used here, we end up also promoting the idea behind it.
I agree that complexity doesnt compute well with mainstream Hollywood, but I dont attribute that to this conflation of pedophilia and pederasty. Molesting homosexuals simply falls outside of the Leftist narrative which seeks to characertize gays only as commited, well adjusted oppressed and noble. Therefore the willful confusion of the two by which they can make the incredulous claim that molesting priests are pedophiles therefore heterosexuals. Sorry gay folks, these guys are yours.
“I tried to think of one movie that cast Republicans in a good light in the last 30 years”
Must have missed Charlie Wilson’s War. Thank You For Smoking.
Just a quickie (you should pardon the expression). Pedophiles are sexual predators on prepubescent children. They have their preferences, but since it’s the vulnerability and asexuality of children that attracts them, either sex will do. Pederasts likewise prefer the young, but it also has an element of teaching and mentoring, and refers more to the means of getting to the youngster than to how old he or she is. The term for the most commonly reported perversion among priests (and other clergy as well as teachers) is ephebophilia. There, the sex of the child is almost exclusively male or female (more often, male). And these are not young children, they are young teenagers, post-pubescent and sexually functional, but emotionally not developed. Vulnerability, physical, emotional or both is the key to the ephebophile, as to the pedophile. Ephebophilia is strongly sexual in nature, whereas pedophilia usually results in some sort of “guilty” sex that is driven by the pedophiles “love” for the child. All things considered, NAMBLA is largely ephebophile. Both disorders are serious mental illnesses, but as a Christian I also view them as sins. That said, as a mainstream Lutheran I am sick of the constant movie depiction of Catholic priests as repressed rapists and/or pedophiles-ephebophiles. I can only imagine how my Catholic friends feel about it. Did you hear the one about the priest, the pastor and the rabbi who weren’t sexual deviants? Either have I.
Don Suber, I agree with your article and the liberal have controlled the content of what we all see. I made a film over 20 years ago a Vietnam film, there is no crazed Vietnam vet,I don’t have the magic negro, the white trash or evil christian. My film was blackballed by Hollywood because I went against this type and showed a mix group of guys called ‘Americans’ as heroes. I don’t even show the Russians as Hollywood does. The late Ashley Boone of MGM the only black President of distribution of any major studio, told me he was impress with my film because I didn’t have any stereotypes and he like the way I portrayed the two black characters in war. ‘Just a couple of regular guys’ I don’t bring any 60s bullshit into FORGOTTEN HEROES its just an old fashion war film that honors all of our Vietnam Vets. check it out , I have been fighting this nonsense since the early 80s when most people on here making films today were in high school if not even born yet.
Don Suber, I agree with your article and the liberal have controlled the content of what we all see. I made a film over 20 years ago a Vietnam film, there is no crazed Vietnam vet,I don’t have the magic negro, the white trash or evil christian. My film was blackballed by Hollywood because I went against this type and showed a mix group of guys called ‘Americans’ as heroes. I don’t even show the Russians as Hollywood does. The late Ashley Boone of MGM the only black President of distribution of any major studio, told me he was impress with my film because I didn’t have any stereotypes and he like the way I portrayed the two black characters in war. ‘Just a couple of regular guys’ I don’t bring any 60s bullshit into FORGOTTEN HEROES its just an old fashion war film that honors all of our Vietnam Vets. check it out , I have been fighting this nonsense since the early 80s when most people on here making films today were in high school if not even born yet.
Don Suber, I agree with your article and the liberal have controlled the content of what we all see. I made a film over 20 years ago a Vietnam film, there is no crazed Vietnam vet,I don’t have the magic negro, the white trash or evil christian. My film was blackballed by Hollywood because I went against this type and showed a mix group of guys called ‘Americans’ as heroes. I don’t even show the Russians as Hollywood does. The late Ashley Boone of MGM the only black President of distribution of any major studio, told me he was impress with my film because I didn’t have any stereotypes and he like the way I portrayed the two black characters in war. ‘Just a couple of regular guys’ I don’t bring any 60s bullshit into my film its just an old fashion war film that honors all of our Vietnam Vets. check it out , I have been fighting this nonsense since the early 80s when most people on here making films today were in high school if not even born yet.
So… is a Dead Dad actually good story-telling, or is it, like the always popular Child At Risk, an easy out, a cheap way to get an emotional response?
Perhaps the truth is that children with two parents never have problems and can’t have adventures?
I don’t think so.
Rambo was a big hit movie, but I don’t see how the crazed Viet Nam vet is a Hollywood stereotype. Perhaps Mr. Surber doesn’t want to admit that there are real Viet Nam vets living on the street and in shelters.
And it isn’t fair to say that Hollywood created Rambo. It was really the work of Sly Stalone, a star big enough to get the backing to do whatever he wants, just like Eastwood.
Critically, Rambo seems to be the doppelganger to Rocky, the darker side of the same personality. Both men are trained to fight, but unlike Rocky, Rambo doesn’t have an arena in which to fight his battles. He is without a legitimate war.
Rocky is a romantic hero and Rambo is a tragic hero, a tragedy in the after math of Viet Nam. Perhaps that is what right wing ideologues don’t like about Rambo. The movie does not glorify the Viet Nam experience. But Rambo the soldier is noble and that is why audiences connected. He is a classic underdog and Americans love underdogs.
Flashing for the warrior
Whose strength is not to fight
Flashing for the refugee
On his unarmed road of flight
And for each and every underdog
Soldier in the night
We gazed upon the chimes
Of freedom flashing
Marvin, Rambo is a symbolic representation of the stereotype, not the definition. And I can’t think of anyone who wants to glorify Viet Nam.
And maybe you’re right that the crazed vet isn’t a Hollywood stereotype but it certainly is a liberal one. I don’t just imagine the breathlessness that greets any news that supports that stereotype of the broken, drug addled, messed up killer. I saw it with Scott, “Oh, he really tells it like it is!”, Beauchamp, or this latest guy, Joshua Keys, I think his name is. Anything that shows soldiers as disciplined or well adjusted is judged a white-wash because it doesn’t play like Hollywood Viet Nam, which is *highly* romanticized, just not in a good way. People are actually *disappointed* if our guys aren’t cold blooded murderers or junkies or rapists. They want this fantasy of barbarism to experience vicariously and they don’t like that fantasy world threatened.
PTSD is serious, of course, but in general terms the most common manifestations are ignored by television, the watchfulness or the flinch, getting nervous in public places with too many people, nightmares, those sorts of things. And what we see on television is the fellow walking down the street entirely unable to tell where he is, babbling on about combat stuff in some sort of never-ending flashback.
It doesn’t have to be a white-wash. But it would be nice to have more representations of veterans who strengthened by the experience, which is every bit as true, if not more-so. More representations of very young men who have that maturity of experience and responsibility that their civilian peers lack.
In Random Heats with Harrison Ford and Kristin Scott Thomas, she is pretty fairly and sympathetically portrayed as a conservative Republican. I only remember it because of how flabbergasted I was at the time. In one hysterical scene when they’re obviously about to make love, she tells him if he’s a liberal she has some books he should read.
I am informed that there are more straight pedophiles than gay pedophiles. So that must be true. Priests must have been straight pedophiles abusing young boys for sex?
Wait a dang minute…
“They went after Tyler Perry for his anti-union views, so they are trying to shut him down.”
No. “They” — that is the Writers Guild of America — went after Tyler Perry for his anti-union (and anti-writer) PRACTICES. They weren’t trying to “shut him down” but to pay residuals and a fair market value for the labor of his writers.
And when Perry signed a WGA contract, that was it. Perry can think and say whatever he wants, as long as he pays his employees fairly.
Why is that so hard to understand?
Kit and Lola
Thank you for taking the time to point out to me what uplifting means. My point is that if a 4-year-old can see that the same plot point is being used to death, then it’s a cliche.
After “Air Force One” came out, I remarked to someone that the President (Harrison Ford) in the movie was probably a Republican because Democrats don’t have a foreign policy. After thinking more on it, if that President were a Democrat, he probably would’ve tried to sit down for a nice chat rather than kill the terrorists and take back the plane.
My favorite cliche is the dumb criminal. This one is rooted in truth.
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