Look, we don’t want to shock you or anything, but the things that happen in the movies and TV shows you watch aren’t real. However, that doesn’t mean that the lessons they teach us or the way the narratives that are told don’t have value. Quite the opposite! When we go to the cinema or we turn on the magic light -and-sound box in our living rooms, we know we’re often in for a dose of fiction. But we’re willing to suspend our sense of disbelief for the sake of experiencing the story as though it were real.
So film creators have some leeway in terms of how they shape the story. Unfortunately for them (and fortunately for us, the audience), they have to adhere to some rules. Even in a fictional setting with fictional problems, the events on the screen have to be believable and the characters have to appear real, in the context of the story. In short—things have to make sense and follow certain rules of logic. We wouldn’t blink twice about a character from Looney Tunes surviving a nuclear blast by hiding in a fridge; but we think it’s very odd when Indiana Jones does it.
Though pretty much everyone has some minor quibbles that never fail to end their immersion in the plotline. Redditor u/xwhy started up an interesting thread on r/movies after asking people to share the dumbest things that end their suspense of disbelief in films. We’ve collected some of the most interesting answers. You’ll find them as you scroll down.
Bored Panda got in touch with the author of the thread, writer Christopher Burke, aka u/xwhy. He was kind enough to answer our questions about the limits of the suspension of disbelief. You'll find our full interview with him below! Christopher is the author of the book 'In A Flash 2020,' a high school math teacher, and webcomic creator.
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#21
This is very niche, but as a professional musician “whiplash“ pissed me off. The scene where Miles Teller is practicing his drums until his hand starts bleeding is absolutely detrimental to his technique. If he does that regularly, he’ll be lucky if he can hold a pen let alone play the drums by the time he’s 40.
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161points
#22
I was really surprised and taken out of the movie 3 Kings to see people hauling duffel bags of gold bars like they weighed nothing. It is not just one scene, the whole movie they are tossing around, carrying while running, passing from person these duffel bags we're supposed to believe are full of gold bars. One gold bar is 25 pounds so these bags would be easily be hundreds and hundreds of pounds
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157points
#23
Anyone in a NYC apartment that doesn't immediately lock their doors after entering. That is, unless the character grew up in the suburbs. In that case, they're too dumb to live in a city.
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153points
#24

Hollywood's insistence that getting shot with a shotgun will throw you back several feet.
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151points
#25

When 102 pound actresses dispatch a room full of dudes that look like Dave Babtista without taking a single knock in the process. Same can be true with make actors too.
151points
#26
“The Dark Knight Rises”. Ok, so no one has seen Batman OR Bruce Wayne for seven years and then they BOTH show up in Gotham at the same time but no one notices the coincidence? Not even “Robin” because he says he figured it out by looking into his eyes. Took me out of the movie and that happened at the beginning. Oh and let’s not forget that Commissioner Gordon couldn’t figure that part out either but could all of a sudden remember a tiny conversation he had with a very young Bruce Wayne to put it together. Dumb.
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144points
#27

When things are conveniently silent: Talk about someone in a normal voice when they're three feet away. "Can I have a word with you for a minute?" Steps to the other end of the couch for a long conversation about something secret.
Or, sneaks into the back of a car when someone is right there. Car doors make a lot of noise.
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139points
#28
Aliens in Sci fi films that look and talk like modern Americans, and even share their same values and human biology. But they have spots on their face so they're definitely alien.
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133points
#29

I love Mean Girls, but that scene where Regina George gets hit by a bus, while actually being very funny, also completely takes me out of the movie. She's standing in the street for a long time before a bus, that somehow doesn't see her, plows through her at full speed, all while making no sound whatsoever before it hits her
133points
#30

Indiana Jones in a refrigerator being flung hundreds of yards by a nuclear explosion, fast enough to pass a car going full speed, and being unharmed.
In a movie with aliens, a teenager swinging from vines with monkeys fast enough to catch moving vehicles and alien ghosts.
130points
#31

This is a dumb one I know, but it irks me that everyone overslept in Home Alone 2.
There was no household power outage, and I'm supposed to believe that NOBODY had set an alarm clock besides Kevin's parents?
129points
#32

In 'End of Days' the movie goes out of it's way to show that the main character's life is in shambles and he basically doesn't care about anything anymore. He's a drunk who eats garbage and almost never leaves his apartment.
The problem? The main character is played by Arnold Schwarzenegger, so we're supposed to believe that this guy who doesn't give a s**t about his health has the body of a guy who puts roids in his cereal and spends 4 hours a day at the gym.
RegHater76, https://www.filmstories.co.uk/features/the-battle-to-get-end-of-days-made-for-the-end-of-1999/
Report127points
#33

As a Mexican , it’s the fake Spanish accents in movies. Or when a Mexican American actor tries to speak Spanish but they have a very thick English accent and just doesn’t fit the character
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125points
#34

Prometheus: The ship arrives in another solar system. One of the characters says (something like): "we travelled millions of miles to arrive here." Me: so, you are, like, close to Mars? That's not even our backyard, dude. That's our living room!
120points
#35

Okay The Kingdom of Crystal Skull has been discussed a lot but for me it wasn't the scene where Indy gets into the refrigerator. That did cross a certain line of disbelief but I could live with it. For me, it was the scene where Mutt (an awful character) learns within minutes how to swing on vines from the monkeys, has enough arm strength to keep going at it and is so fast he can catch up with a speeding car.
110points
#36
The way most movies very inaccurately portray teenagers, especially with the lingo or slang. It’s always either outdated or feels so forced and unnatural. I always think, oh my god KIDS DONT TALK LIKE THIS . .. why can’t writers spend time with some youth to see what they’re actually like
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110points
#37
Any example where there’s a race against time that requires being somewhere in 5-10 minutes that would clearly take 30-45 *minimum*.
I understand that mechanically it’s probably easier to build a sense of momentum when the race against time roughly corresponds to the runtime itself, but whenever someone says “I’ll be there in 5 minutes,” I can’t help but get distracted thinking how it’ll take them that long just to get going and on the road, let alone cover the 45+ minute commute between locations.
It’s not something so egregious as to ruin the film/episode, it’s just something I immediately notice and therefore necessitates an active suspension of my disbelief.
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104points
#38

In The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, they escaped the Goblin King's lair by scooting down a chasm on a physics-defying rickety tower that somehow always stayed upright while bouncing off rock faces. That was Looney Tunes-level silly
92points
#39
In Avatar when the element "unobtainium" was shown. The dialogue in that scene and the name just sunk the movie for me. It's too ridiculous.
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90points
#40

In the movie Van Helsing it was the grey Gap sweater that Hugh Jackman wore. Like, everyone else had a vaguely Victorian steampunk looking outfit and his sweater was straight off the clearance rack. We made fun of that choice for YEARS.
79points


