Director moments that make you shake your head

(Insert Obligatory Spielberg/Happy Ending/War of the Worlds Bitchery Here)

Kathryn Morris being pregnant at the end of MINORITY REPORT is a bigger one for me, because I find it lazy and unpleasant to try and put a neat little bow on the suffering of a couple who've lost a child by simply giving them a new one. Even if it's a cryogenic fantasy cooked up by Anderton, it's still disturbingly pat.

That bothers me so much, the PJ slow mo thing that has been mentioned. I'd also have to point to PJ's use of stuttery under cranked slo mo for "atmosphere". It makes some scenes, like the Skull Islander's first attack, seem silly and fake

Pretty much every Tony Scott film of the last 10 years makes me shake my head. Washed out colors/over-edited/Denzel...ugh.

Cameron's urge to overly accentuate scenes. He's done it throughout his career, but the shit in Avatar was over the top.


Especially, the Marine Sgt. pointing out to the crippled guy about his legs. First talking about it, then with the mecha suit. Just in case the crippled guy forgot that he was crippled.

I thought that was a moving scene, how insensitive and manipulative Scar Face (or whatever he was called) was being towards Dunbar about his injury and his chances for a new spine


BTW, Just wanted to add Mr Zack Snyder to this thread, for his obnoxious visual tricks and gags that he stuffs into every film he makes.

The original, head-shakingly awful alternate ending of TITANIC

Quite possibly James Cameron's lowest point as a filmmaker. Hard to believe this was actually filmed, much less conceived & written.

The doves in John Woo movies. Enough, already.

I can't watch videos at work, but from what I can see, it's an alternate ending where the fact Granny Rose as the HOTO is not a secret and Paxton tries to prevent her from ridding herself of it.

Yes, it's awful... but it is in no way his lowest point as a film maker. I judge film makers by the films they make, and TITANIC does not include that scene. He clearly saw that it sucked and didn't use it. That's to his credit. From at least a thematic perspective, it does make sense to have written it and perhaps gave filming it a go. The way the film ends now is great, but it also kind of leaves Paxton's quest unresolved

Richard Kelly's use of books to explain goddamn everything.

"Mission Impossible 2" comes to mind...how the fuck did that dove get into an office/research buidling?

My favorite is Paycheck, when a side door opens at the end and . . . DOVES!

John Ford -Indians attacking. Enough already!

Pretty much anything in "Two Days in the Valley". One of the most inept directorial efforts by a professional I've ever seen.

Immediately thought of the ending of Jungle Fever. I have no idea what Spike Lee was thinking.

EDIT: Just realized this doesn't quite fit, as Spike Lee hasn't made a habit of ending movies with Wesley Snipes embracing crack whores and shouting to the heavens. So instead, I'll go with the loud jazz music that plays under important conversations in his films, particularly in Jungle Fever when Snipes confronts his estranged wife in the back of her work. You can hardly hear anything, the music is so loud.

Any editing decision that gave us less Paxton in that movie was the right one.

I'm just relieved he cut the scene of Brock Lovett furiously jerking off to Jack's sketch of Rose.

I've never liked the stilted slow-mo in the beginning battle of Gladiator. I like how a lot of the action is filmed in that film, but that first battle can be a headache to watch for me.

In reference to most films, this would be close to sacrilege, but you're fucking right about Titanic. He's awful throughout. I like to think he's playing Cameron.

That alternate ending is EVEN WORSE than the theatrical, which is still pretty awful.

Me too. Its a good battle too, until that overblown score and jerky slow-mo comes into play.

The scene in Avatar when the company's air-force is coming to destroy the remainder of the navi. As they are flying though the floating rocks, they come around a corner and the size of their forces are first shown to the camera there is an over accentuated zoom in that never fails to make me laugh and pushes me out the other movie.

Its as if I can hear Cameron's voice saying "See how F*CKING BIG they are."

HAHAHA!

That's....holy shit, it really defies words. Amazingly, jaw-droppingly bad.

And yeah, I normally love Paxton but he's horrid in TITANIC.

I've NEVER liked the way that sequence goes. The music is beautiful. The footage is great. But the way that battle goes fully dramatic never sat well with me. It's the first battle of a movie where we know almost nothing about anybody. The choppy slow-mo and the wailing music of infinite sadness make it feel like it's the glorious final stand at the end of a film.

Well MichaelM it seems you've been looking for quality in the wrong places!

My God that is embarrassing. Especially the way Paxton's still reaching out with his hand 10 minutes after the Old Rose drops the Diamond.

I only saw Titanic once, when it was in theaters, and now I never want to see it again!

Watching that alternate ending, I couldn't stop thinking of Jerry O'Connell's performance in Piranha 3D. And how much better that performance was.

I got CONTACT on Blu Ray last week and I'd only ever watched it once before. I remembered the ending was abysmal but just had to check. The movie works for me up until the 'going through the wormhole'' sequence where Zemeckis instantly kills the movie with it's sub-2001 pandering and the puke in a bucket 'humans are precious' bullshit from her Dad/Alien thingy.

It would have worked so much better if her 'visit' would have been unseen on camera and she just returned with everyone (including the viewer) unconvinced she had actually been anywhere. It wouldn't have worked for the 'happy ending' crowd but she had been fighting for acceptance the whole picture so she would be used to it.

For a while there, Spike also loved exterior conversation shots with two people walking along, only they looked like they were being pulled forward on wheels or something. It looked stupid. Then there was the entire sequence in Crooklyn filmed in non-anamorphic, non-adjusted widescreen that was supposed to be a disorienting effect but just gave me a headache. Kudos to Spike for trying different shit, but sometimes it's just epic fail. And yeah, I thought it was just my theater's sound system, but then I kept reading the consensus on Jungle Fever was that the music was cranked way too high.

When the man scores, though, he scores. Do the Right Thing, Malcolm X, 25th Hour: I would think any director would be happy to have any of those three on his or her resume.

As a young kid who visited relatives in South growing up, Lee's use of visual disorientation is an uncannily accurate representation of the sensation a Northern city kid would've experienced in the sweltering, stuffy, almost alien South.

I like the Snorricam shots a lot though, but I can't really defend them artistically. Just an aesthetic I'm fond of. But oddly enough, I think you do Lee a disservice by reducing Lee's career to his three best films (though I'm sure it wasn't your intention at all). There's so much amazing shit in She's Gotta Have It, Mo' Better Blues, Jungle Fever, Clockers, Get On the Bus, Bamboozled and Inside Man (not to even mention his documentaries) that even though they aren't entirely successful, they're just as sure signs of his talent as his more perfect films.

And I go back and forth on the aspect ratio fuckery in Crooklyn. On the one hand, it completely has the intended effect of making that section of the film stand on it's own, feeling claustrophobic and disorienting. On the other hand, it's annoying as shit. I've never heard anyone call it uncannily accurate, though, Art, so that's interesting to hear, and probably leans me closer to being for it than I was before.

It's not mentioned as often as Jungle Fever's ending, probably because the movie surrounding it isn't nearly as good, but this is probably the worst thing to appear in a Spike Lee movie.

God I wish I had enough disposable income to be able to buy films I'd seen once and didn't even like the endings of on blu-ray.

On the Cameron thing, that CPR scene in The Abyss goes on WAY too long. Enough already.

Came here to mention Zack Snyder, but I see Kate already beat me to it. Pretty much everything he does seems designed to rip you right out of the movie while you sigh, cover your eyes, and shake your head.

Spielberg's moments of child empowerment seem to alternate between charming and excruciating.

While I'm totally down for some Short Round antics or any kid-centric stuff from ET or Empire of the Sun, the raptor-punting gymnast in The Lost World and the Linux hacking scene from Jurassic Park are kind of unbearable. And them Hook Lost Boys? Oy.

Oh, god. Don't get me started on Spielberg and Hook. In what decade would the little boys body painting Robin Williams' shirtless body have not been utterly creepy? It's like a technicolor Powder.

Wow, couldn't even make it through that Titanic ending. But is worse than the original ending to T2?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=780llTKt3uM

I am a big fan and defender of Spike Lee, but he has made some really bad decisions when it comes to the way he closes some of his films. X? So over the top and out of place.

Which sort of reminds me of the closing to Schindler's List. Really not necessary. Let the film speak for itself. Don't tell us what to do and think at the end.

It was $4. Fuck you!

Cameron deserves shit for a lot of things, but that scene? You've gotta be fucking kidding me.

Jesus Christ. I'm betting that was filmed on the day someone put PCP in the crew's food. That would explain most of Paxton's performance.

Public Enemies, a film I liked, has some of Mann's worst decisions to date. Horrible audio to emphasize "being there"? Long close-up shot of a handwritten letter? Blurry interlaced video? I understand why those things are in there but they still suck hard.