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Roger Ebert’s list of movie cliches

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I suspect some of you have seen this list, but even if you have, it’s a good reminder of some cliches to avoid when writing a screenplay. Some personal favorites:

Bad Smoker Rule

In any cop movie made since the mid-’70s, the bad guys smoke, while the good guy is trying to quit.

Classic Car Rule

Whenever a beautiful classic car—usually the prized possession of an unsympathetic father—is introduced at the beginning of a film, that car will be wrecked by the end of it. (See RISKY BUSINESS, FERRIS BUELLER’S DAY OFF, COUPE DE VILLE, etc.)

Myth of the Seemingly Ordinary Day

The day begins like any other, with a man getting up, having breakfast, reading the paper, leaving the house, etc. His activities are so uneventful they are boring. That is the tip-off. No genuine ordinary day can be allowed to be boring in a movie. Only seemingly ordinary days—which inevitably lead up to a shocking scene of violence, which punctuates the seeming ordinariness.

Thanks, But No Thanks

When two people have just had a heart-to-heart conversation, as person A starts to leave room, person B says (tentatively) “Bob?” A pauses, turns, and says “Yes?” B says, “Thanks.”

“Wait Right Here” Scenario

The scene in a movie where one character, almost always a male character, tells another character, almost always a woman, “Now, you just wait right here in the car. Whatever you do, DO NOT follow me into that warehouse.” Inevitably, the dumb and helpless woman goes into the warehouse, is captured by the villain and rescued by the hero.

What are some of your least favorite cliches?

9 thoughts on “Roger Ebert’s list of movie cliches”

  1. ordinary day – ahaha! every time i’m driving along in real life and things seem so sunshine (especially if a bunch of us laugh and then sigh), I always say, “if this was a movie, we would probably die now.” :)

  2. Skitterbox, that’s awesome! Sometimes my life seems like it’s nothing more than a reference point an endless stream of movies playing in my brain.

    Dropped by your blog today. Saw you had a rough day. What’s your doctorate in? Hey, at least you’re not ABD (All But Dissertation).

  3. The cliche of that rich people are jerks and poor folk are good has been around along time, but I see this all the time, especially in romantic comedies, where the girl has to choose between guy A who is rich and a jerk and guy B who is poor and the salt of the earth. At the very end of course she realizes guy B’s the guy she has always been searching for. I would like to point out for the record that I have dated several poor guys who are jerks. That said, I should point out that I am poor and most of the time am not a jerk.

  4. Alissa, in all those 80s and 90s teen comedies and rom-coms, how many times was the preppie jock the jerk BF?

  5. Maybe if more preppie jock guys grew up to become screenwriters movies would look a whole lot different.

    Scott, thanks for this great blog. I just discovered it and have found it wonderfully informative as I toy with the idea of attempting to write some screenplays.

  7. Skitterbox, I often joke that writers need to ‘armchair psychologists,’ observing and interpreting our characters’ External World actions tied to the Internal World intentions. Do you think your background in clinical psychology benefits your writing?

    BTW, two of my best friends did post-grad work at the Jung Institute. One still works as a therapist, the other consults doing what I guess can best be described as ‘corporate psychology,’ analyzing psychological interplay and ‘health’ of corporate execs, structures, lines of communication, etc.

    Lob me an email if you want to continue a dialogue offline.

    scottdistillery@gmail.com

  9. Are you a wife having certain habits on bed. Just like feeling in the movie . Possession (2009) what really explain and shows from time to time how the sex changed a women. It also for me just a sex tape covered with nothing story. Make me feel sorry for the lady because she is the only straggle in the hole movie. If you still to see the movie better to watch I found it m self on http://www.80millionmoviesfree.com movie is filled with lot of views of life. Don’t know what really to gather from it.

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