Did you ever have an epiphany – the ultimate realization that a particular movie plot could have been solved easily if the characters in the movies communicated with each other/used a phone, or common sense for that matter? This article lists out some famous movies that can be all wrapped up with a bow on top in a matter of minutes.
Disclaimer: This article contains spoilers, almost as big as a planet-killing meteor heading towards Earth.
The movie begins. You sit there. You see a girl answering a phone call. It seems to be a prank call. Oh no, it’s not. There is a killer out there, trying to kill the pretty girl. Dammit! Why did she leave the back door open? After watching the story unfold and analyzing every bit of the shot, there might be a teeny-tiny thing that nudges you at the back of your brain, compelling you to pull the thread and watch the “sweater” (metaphor for the movie plot) unravel.
This write-up is a tribute to all such famous movies and some of their gaping holes that almost ruined their plots, and gave hundreds of people (including us) a chance to jabber about it on the Internet. Don’t get us wrong. We love these movies – absolutely and unconditionally. However, we can’t resist the urge to scratch the itch in our brain that was left after watching these cinematic wonders.
Take away from this write-up; be prepared to ruin some of the classic/popular movies for good. Or may be not.
Movie Plots that Could’ve Been Resolved Sooner
Speed
Close your eyes and imagine breath-stopping chases back-to-back; one on the streets of Los Angeles and the other one in the subway system. The first movie that comes to your mind is none other than Speed – a movie that lives up to its name and relentlessly entertains the viewers with explosive rides in the bus, train, and also an elevator.
Movie Plot
Jack Traven, a cop who nearly fits into the archetypal mold of John McClane, gets to play a game of cat-and-mouse with a mad bomber Payne. Ex-cop Payne comes with up a brazen plan to thwart our fearless cop and extort some money from the city in the process. There is a bomb in a bus which is roaming on the streets of the city. If the speed of the bus goes over 50 mph, the bomb will get activated. And after the activation of the bomb, if the bus goes below the 50 mph, then Kabooom! The bus ride will end with an explosion.
Plot Holes
After learning the evil plan of the extortionist, our hero must find the bus and stop it before the bomb activates. So, like any maverick cop who has to save a bus full of people, Jack finds the bus and tries to stop it. How? He shouts at the driver and asks him to stop the bus.
This trick may have worked if:
1. Jack was wearing a police uniform.
2. Bus drivers are particularly keen on stopping the bus in the middle of the road if a crazed-up person is shouting at them on top of his voice.
When the bus driver does not heed to the shouting, what is the next POA for Jack? Yes, it is some more shouting, this time louder. To our hero, hijacking another dude’s car and screaming at the bus driver seemed a much more viable solution to the problem.
Our Solution
Being a cop, Jack had a license to carry a gun, which he readily used to hijack a guy’s car. However, he could have used the same gun to shoot at the bus tires and deflate them, forcing the bus driver to stop. True, this radical method might have resulted in a minor accident; however, looking at the body count and the mass wreckage that occurs in the movie, this alternative sounds a lot better.
How about showing his badge when it’s absolutely necessary? That would have gotten the bus driver’s attention before the bus passed the 50 mph speed limit.
The Question that the Movie Begs You to Ask
Payne is clever enough to create devious plans that baffle the entire city police force. Then why did he use his own gold watch (retirement present from the police force) for the bus bomb, which eventually reveals his identity to the cops? Why not use, let’s just say, “not a gold watch” and maintain his identity as a mystery to the dismay of the police?
Our Take
The star of the movie was not wooden-faced Keanu Reeves, mad bomber Dennis Hooper, or star-in-the-making Sandra Bullock. It was the BUS, the bus which could fly over almost a 50-feet gap between the roads, survive deflated tires, and many more obstacles. We bow down in front of this magnificent beast of a bus.
Transformers
Hailed as an extravagant commercial of Hasbro (the company that launched transformers toys), Transformers is an explosion fest that pits good robots against bad ones, making Earth their battleground. The movie stays true to its main goal, i.e., imagining the audience consisting only of adolescent and preadolescent boys and providing lots of explosive robot fun. Surprisingly enough, it appeals to the kid inside all of us.
Movie Plot
Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) finds out that his explorer great-great-grandfather’s glasses that he put on eBay for sale contains the location of the lost Allspark (the life source for all Transformers). What ensues next is a 2-hour long battle between friendly Autobots and malevolent Decepticons, with Sam caught right in the middle of all that drama.
Plot Hole
In the beginning of the movie, Decepticons are shown to have infiltrated the complex cyber security system of the military and destroyed the mainframe. Later, a Decepticon pursues Sam and asks him if he is LadiesMan217 (Sam’s eBay account username). Apparently, the Decepticons found it easier to hunt down a teenager who was protected by Autobots, instead of just hacking eBay and acquiring the said item. Our suggestion to them: How about bidding on the item and buying it like rest of the lesser mortals? May be, they didn’t have a PayPal account. Yep, that explains it.
Our Solution
If we had made the movie instead of Michael Bay, it would have been like this:
The Decepticons hack eBay or buy the item in secret, without alerting Autobots → Lots of Megan Fox’s pouting scenes → Get the location of Allspark → Free Megatron, the leader of Decepticons → Attack Earth in a surprise move → Earth destroyed/enslaved → End of the movie
The Question that the Movie Begs You to Ask
Since the movie is called Transformers, can we have less juvenile humor and more transformers please? And what’s up with the painful patriotic speech that Optimus Prime is always spouting off?
Twilight Saga: The New Moon
This movie is a love triangle between a 108-year-old vampire who sparkles in the sunlight, a pasty-looking and melancholy girl, and a werewolf (who never leaves any opportunity to remove his shirt).
Movie Plot
As we consider this movie to be plotless, we take this opportunity to describe how a few of us felt while braving out the entire movie.
Bottomless Pits in the Movie Plot
Suicide may be the super-creepy way to profess your love for someone. However, Stephanie Mayer doesn’t think so. In this pseudo-romantic, cheesy imitation of Romeo and Juliet, a series of misunderstandings lead neck-biter Edward (Robert Pattinson) to believe that his ever-brooding Bella (Kristen Stewart) is dead. He calls her home to confirm this piece of news. However, Jacob (Taylor Lautner), our wolf boy, receives the phone and mistakenly confirms this misunderstanding. Believing Bella is “no more”, Edward tries to kill himself. What’s more, Bella goes all the way to Italy to stop him from committing suicide.
After going through the irrevocably pointless movie, you may wonder why didn’t Edward call Bella on her cell phone instead of the landline, like a normal teenager? Edward could have texted her or communicated via social networking sites like we do in this modern era, which would have solved the movie then and there. Moreover, from when did a vampire start believing the words of his archenemy, werewolf?
The Question that the Movie Begs You to Ask
Why is Bella’s upper lip constantly trying to eat its lower counterpart?
The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
Is it possible to make a book series come alive on celluloid medium, while remaining faithful to the fine details that make a book an epic drama? The correct answer is No. However, you can come close to making feature films with nerve and verve, albeit with a few plot holes, as evident in Lord of the Rings (LOTR) movies.
(Note: These plot holes can be easily explained by the bookworms. However, people who have not read this massive tome, might get perplexed by some of the cinematic liberties taken by director, Peter Jackson.)
Movie Plot
Fate bestows an epic quest to Frodo Baggins: He must travel to the Mt. Doom in order to destroy the all-powerful ring – The One Ring of Dark Lord, Sauron.
Plot Holes
This plot hole is brought up a lot in the online fan forums. If giant eagles can ferry the Hobbits from Mount Doom to safety, why didn’t they use these birds to go to the top of the mountain in the first place? That would have ended the movie in no time.
The Question that the Movie Begs You to Ask
In the first movie, the fellowship traveled…. then traveled some more… keeps on walking… almost there… nope, more walking. Then they meet the Orcs and the Balrog demon. Wait, before that, they halt to look at some dead bodies of elves. Why on Middle Earth did Gandalf stop to read the book which a dead elf was holding, when he knew that enemies were lurking around and they were almost near the mine exit? Was this literacy break worth it? It was not. FYI, Gandalf “dies” at the end of this movie.
Deleted Scene from LOTR Found
Gandalf: “We must destroy the Ring by throwing it in the Cracks of Doom.”
Frodo: “Yes, let’s summon your eagle friends and let them carry us to the top of the mountain.”
Gandalf: “No, that would mean, we won’t have to walk all the way to Mordor and go through all the pain and suffering, and no one will die. Of course, it would also not leave enough material for a novella.”
Frodo: “You are right. Then, hiking with my precious is our only option.”
Gandalf: “Yep, people dying in battles make an interesting read.”
Frodo: “Cool. Let’s get a grab something to eat first. I am starving!”
Back to the Future II
Though not as good as its first part, this time travel adventure does exactly what it aims to do – make people laugh with its high jinks. The story picks up where its prequel ends in 1985, after Marty McFly alters the space-time continuum in 1955 by accidentally meddling in his parents’ love story.
Movie Plot
In this movie, Marty and mad scientist, Doc Brown time travel to 2015 in order to save Marty’s future kids. As expected, slapstick ensues when multiple versions of a single character appear on the screen, along with over-the-top crazy future fashion and gadgetry.
Plot Hole
The movie begins with Doc appearing in front of Marty and his girlfriend, asking them to come with him to the future to save their kids. Apparently, their kids turned out to be all wrong and the only way to save them is to transverse the space-time continuum (and possibly endanger the existence of the entire universe), in order to stop the kids from making bad decisions like participating in a robbery or prison-breaking.
What Could have Solved the Movie Real Quick
Since any changes in the future does not cause any repercussions on the past, choosing to hop on the time machine (eh… car) and changing the future, doesn’t make any sense because these future actions have not happened yet. If you need to change the future, you change the past as shown in the prequel. Instead, Doc should have told the couple what would exactly happen to their kids, so that they could take adequate measures to alter the future reality, thus making this entire movie pointless.
Time Travel Paradox
Since we know altering the past changes the future, we are left to wonder how Old Biff managed to come back to the same future after giving his younger self a sports magazine from the future. When Doc and Marty go back to 1985 after saving the kids, they return to an alternative reality of 1985. This not only skewed the sequence of actions of 1985 in the second part, (Marty – are you getting this?) but also tampered with the actions in 1985 of the first part. That means there shouldn’t be any Marty trying to hook up his parents, as this meddling with time already created an alternate universe. Considering this movie had two time-traveling Martys and Docs trying to change events of 1955 in order to restore the original 1985, phew… we give up trying to wrap up our head around it.
The Question that the Movie Begs You to Ask
Why didn’t George and Loraine, Marty’s parents, notice that their son looks exactly like their high-school classmate, ‘Calvin Klein’, when he was the catalyst behind them coming together?
Indiana Jones and Raiders of the Lost Ark
This movie can be best described as a catalog of adventure, with lots of fist fights, sword battles, gunshots and of course, whips. Indiana Jones, an extraordinary archaeologist who is afraid of nothing (except snakes), is no doubt one of the most memorable characters in celluloid history.
Movie Plot
Indiana Jones is sent on a quest to find the long-lost Ark of the Covenant by the US Army. However, the Nazis are also in the search of this ancient artifact, which they believe would make their ‘storm troopers’ invincible. As if one ancient artifact hunt was not enough, our hero must find the headpiece of an artifact called the Staff of Ra. Though the actual Staff of Ra was apparently lost in the annals of history, the headpiece/medallion had instructions engraved on it to create a new staff, which could lead to the resting place of the much sought-after Ark of the Covenant.
Gaping Holes in the Plot
Indy Jones finds out that Nazis, who managed to make a replica of the headpiece, were digging at the wrong place. So, what should he have done? He could have just enjoyed the view in secret or shrugged off and said, “nah, let them waste their precious money and efforts, I will just go back to teaching my class/other rip-roaring adventures.” The End. Does he do that? No, nada, naught, zilch, zippo. He does exactly the opposite! He digs up the Ark himself, apparently in a place which was just walking distance from the Nazi’s digging site, in the hope that not a single one of the hundreds of Nazi hoodlums will notice him digging.
Well, that was not the only dumb thing Indy does in the movie, he also breaks the staff into two which should have been utterly pointless as the staff in itself was of no consequence; it was its height that mattered. However, as the IQ levels were running quite low in that particular area, the villains could not put the two pieces together and do simple math to find the exact length of the staff.
The most logical thing that could have totally solved this plot before you could even notice Ford’s smoldering looks was that, the Army does nothing – nothing at all to foil Hitler’s evil Ark of the Covenant plan.
Solution
Going by the face-melting side effect of the Ark, Army’s contingency plan should have been like this:
Let the Nazi minions unearth the sacred Ark → They take the Ark to their Supreme Commander → Nazi zealots in the vicinity of the Ark melt away → America wins the war (eh… that did happen in reality but we like this ending better)
The Question that the Movie Begs You to Ask
Coming to the infamous submarine scene, how did Indy manage to stow away a ride on the U-Boat when it was about to dive in the waters? Unless he is Aquaman or Percy Jackson, it seems quite unlikely for him to survive such a perilous journey.
Home Alone
If anything can bring christmasy feelings to you besides Christmas, then it is Home Alone movies (at least the first part). You can describe this movie as Christmas-bonhomie-meets-adorable-kid-who-takes-down-dangerous-thugs-while-home-alone. Wait a minute, the precocious kid was accidentally abandoned at home by his parents while two infamous thugs known as The Wet Bandits were lurking nearby to rob a house? Bad parenting much?
Movie Plot
Kevin, played by Macaulay Culkin, puts an end to the devious plans of two dim-witted villains by rigging his house with booby traps and survives a Christmas alone until his parents/police arrive to rescue him/the villains.
Solution
The movie rests on the implausible plot that the parents were not able to get a single person to follow through on their phone calls and come to Kevin’s aid.
Scenario I
When the parents send the police to check up on the kid, the cop knocks on the door once or twice and leaves without a care for the young boy. Any other cop would have at least investigated the doors of the house and realized that the garage door was open (which the robber used to enter the house in the latter part of the movie) and would have found Kevin, without much further ado.
Scenario II
At the end of the movie, Kevin (while pretending to be his neighbor) calls 9-1-1 to inform them that there are robbers inside his house. If Kevin called the police the first time Wet Bandits tried to break into his house, the movie would ended differently. Unlike any normal kid, he was not at all afraid of the robbers, but acted all scared when the police showed up.
Here’s an account of the evening of the robbery from Kevin’s POV:
It’s 7 in the evening. Time for the robbers to hit the house.
Kevin: I am going to lay traps all over the house, which would cause some serious injuries to the robbers.
No, silly. Just call 9-1-1 and open the door when they show up.
Kevin: Nope, my plan sounds a lot cooler. Plus, I get to set up a gamut of traps that only a Hollywood production team can come up with.
Scenario III
When the pizza guy shows up to deliver the pizza and hears gunshots inside the house, he could have reported the incident to the cops, like a law-abiding citizen. Movie over. We rest our case.
The Question that the Movie Begs You to Ask
If the phone line was supposed to be down at the time, then how did Kevin order a pizza for himself? Why didn’t the parents call up their neighbor, “Old Man” Marley, a.k.a. the shovel guy, to keep an eye on Kevin?
If a filmmaker tries to shoehorn a particular scene into the movie plot, most of the time it shows. However, there are times when you would rather inhale even a farfetched but interesting story, than excruciatingly dissect each and every detail. And sometimes, that’s the best thing you can do.