Editor’s note: This article was first published in June 2014; the remark about Manhattan rents reflects conditions at that time.
Films, consumed sensibly, can inspire us, but to some extent they can also confuse us. Although we may not realise it, they can distort our view of the world with a lot of stereotypes that stick in our minds and keep us from seeing reality as it is. The things we are going to go through below are quite varied. They come from a question that came up in a Quora thread, from which we have picked the best answers and added a few of our own. I suppose some of them may be of genuine interest, while others are just for fun.
Action scenes
1. Burly fighters trading punches straight to the face. In real life, a single blow of that calibre to the face is enough to break the jaw and even cause serious brain injury in the person who takes it, to the point of leaving them in a coma or killing them. As a rule, in real life a big person only has to land one good punch on the opponent’s face and the fight is over.
2. Indoor shoot-outs. It seems perfectly normal for our hero and everyone else involved to exchange hundreds of shots inside a room without suffering serious hearing damage. In real life, after an indoor shoot-out you would probably be practically deaf for 24 or 48 hours in the best-case scenario. In the worst case, you could be left deaf in one or both ears for life. Likewise, firing a gun inside a vehicle could leave everyone travelling in it permanently deaf.
3. Shots with a silencer. In films, when someone uses a silencer you hear a sort of quiet “spit”. In real life, a shot with a silencer would make enough noise to wake up the neighbours next door: what you hear is a gunshot, just at a somewhat lower volume. It is quiet enough not to damage your hearing, but loud enough that you can tell it is a gunshot.
4. When an armed man gets shot. We usually see an armed man take a bullet in the chest or stomach and fall to the ground, or even get thrown several metres backwards. In real life, an armed person can take more than 10 shots and still empty the magazine into whoever is shooting at them, unless the shot hits a spot that kills instantly or causes such extreme pain that they end up writhing on the floor. That is why it is not a good idea to shoot at an armed person if you are not under cover: even if the person eventually dies, before that happens they may have enough time to finish off everyone in the room. In some cases, a person does not realise they have been shot once or several times until they see themselves bleeding.
5. A typical film scene is the one where, during a fight, someone is knocked out for one or several minutes and then gets up fresh as a daisy. In real life, if a blow has knocked us unconscious, it is quite possible we have serious head injuries that need immediate medical attention to prevent problems later on.
6. We don’t doubt that James Bond can keep his balance on top of a moving plane, or even come out unscathed with 100,000 soldiers shooting at him. What is not possible is to ski at 4,000 metres and go scuba diving on the same day, as it could kill him on the spot. According to the experts, you have to let at least 24 or 48 hours go by for the body to adapt.
Love scenes
7. The simultaneous on-screen orgasm. If you pay attention, in the big romantic and erotic scenes the leads always climax at the same time. In real life this rarely happens, and our real-life bedroom scenes are none the worse for it.
8. Sculpted bodies and flawless skin. A body without a single wrinkle, freckle or mole is the result of the dozens of filters used when a film is edited. Most actresses and actors, just like most ordinary people, have blemishes and moles, and even the odd love handle, wrinkle or stretch mark. This perception of movie bodies is what confuses us and keeps us from appreciating the natural beauty of normal, ordinary, unfiltered people.
9. Speeches with a soundtrack. Real-life speeches and words of thanks to our partner are not as beautiful as in the movies, but then in real life there is no soundtrack playing just the right music in time with our proposal.
10. The girl in trouble is always a knockout, and she is single and available, just waiting to live a romantic love scene with the hero. In real life, this is rarely the case.
Other curiosities
11. Women can run, fight and even move with great agility, all in high heels. Any woman knows that is impossible.
12. It seems normal for a waitress or a shop assistant to live alone in a loft in the middle of Manhattan, when the rent would be out of reach even for the average executive.
13. The hero who has taken down dozens of expert martial artists, skilled giants and even group fights against 15 opponents always struggles with the villain, who is usually a scrawny, elderly little man, yet who still stands up to him and gives him a hard time in hand-to-hand combat.
14. In haunted houses, the scared bombshell always goes alone to see where the noise is coming from, and often in her underwear (“better dead than plain”).
15. When a group of friends faces a serial killer, they always somehow manage to split up and make things easier for the killer. In real life, the advice is to stick together.
16. For some reason, detectives only solve the toughest cases once they have been suspended from duty.
Anything else worth mentioning?
Featured image: Sdkb, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
