Narm Charm / Film

Film - Animated

• The LEGO Movie runs on Narm Charm. It plays almost everything for laughs, and operates on Rule of Funny, so the dramatic moments hit hard when they occur, even if jokes occur within them. Only a movie like this can make a line like "Then I just spray them with the taco!" into something horrifying, or make us cry about someone who drops dead with crossed out eyes and a quick "bluh". And it can cheerfully jump from dramatic to funny again in the span of two seconds, without feeling jarring or disrespectful.
  Christy Lemire: You know that old cliched response after walking out of a movie or a play: “I laughed, I cried”? This time, it’s really true. I laughed my ass off — and then I cried. A 3-D, animated movie about a bunch of tiny pieces of plastic made me cry.
• The game of peek-a-boo famously played during the Grendel fight in the film of Beowulf (unless anyone out there can think of a logical reason for fighting an insane, man-eating giant whilst in the buff).
• Toy Story: "YOU ARE A TOY!" It Makes Perfect Sense In Context
  • Toy Story 3's ending. Watching a college student play with a toy cowboy has never been so heartwarming.
• Eric Idle's over-the-top Villain Song in The Secret of NIMH 2: Timmy to the Rescue. It's the most idiotic thing one can do right after the supposedly dramatic twist that the villain is the hero's brother, but the song is so entertaining.
• Cars 2 has Lightning's responses to Mater trying to get away from him in England, thinking that Mater is still sore about their fight when in reality it has nothing to do with that. Power of Friendship and how over the top the film is as a whole makes it work.
  Mater: Stay back if you get close to me, you're gonna get hurt real bad!
  Lightning: I know I made you feel that way, but none of that matters, because WE'RE! BEST! FRIENDS!
  • Lightning goes as far as to attach himself to Mater's tow cable to keep up with him. The following lines are exchanged twice:
  Mater: Mcqueen Let go!
  Lightning: NEVER!
• In Disney's take on Sleeping Beauty, Maleficent awesomely delivers the line "and now shall you deal with ME, oh prince, AND ALL THE POWERS OF HELL!"
• Fievel and Tanya's rendition of "Somewhere Out There" in An American Tail has this, because they had Fievel's VA sing it himself^note Phillip Glasser, voicing Fievel, was 8 years old at the time - Tanya was sung by Betsy Cathcart rather than her VA, Amy Green. But despite their voices cracking at points, it adds a genuine feel to the song that is missing in Linda Ronstadt and James Ingram's version, which also gives it a more romantic tinge.
• In Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, having Spider-Ham deliver the hard truth about superheroism that "you can't always save everybody" to Miles shouldn't have worked, but the fact that it adds more depth to Ham and John Mulaney's delivery makes it work anyway.

Film - Live-Action

• In Alita: Battle Angel, the scene where, after Grewishka impales Alita's dog, she crouches down, takes its blood and uses it as war paint. Alita's Tranquil Fury turns what could have been over-the-top melodrama into a legit Harbinger of Asskicking.
• Batman films have a fair amount:
  • Certain scenes in The Dark Knight, less by not killing the drama and more for injecting a little realism — and mention pity. Not everyone can bellow their beloved's name and sound bereaved and heroic, you know.
    • And the Joker's socks when he's sitting in his cell. Helps that both they and Heathy are Made of Win.
    • Batman's infamous "Bat-voice". In a lesser movie it would end up killing the drama of every scene Bat's talks in. However, The Dark Knight is so well staged that it's not uncommon at all to joke about Batman's voice and yet still highly praise the film.
  • Batman Returns: "The heat's gettin' to me... I'll murder you momentarily after a nice cup... of... water" The Penguin dies right then and there, but what really makes it work is the guard of penguins doing the burial and Danny Elfman's score. You'd think something as ludicrous as penguin pallbearers could never be taken even remotely seriously, but the phenomenal music and knowing that the penguins really loved their master makes you take the scene completely seriously and even feel sorry for them.
  • Naturally Batman: The Movie continues the campy glory the series was known for.
    Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb.
    • The above scene is so well-known that the climax of The Dark Knight Rises almost seems like a deadly-serious version of it.
    • The shark. The exploding, foam-rubber shark.
  • Speaking of The Dark Knight Rises, there's Bane's voice to some people. His voice is full of Vocal Dissonance and is quite silly, but at the same time it can still roll into a horrifyingly unexpected variation that utilizes Narm to its advantage: the Narm of it all makes you have to tell yourself that Bane is an Ax-Crazy Knight Templar with a false politeness that can really catch you off guard if you don't look past the Narm.
  • A lot of the enjoyment found in Batman & Robin is from this and Freeze's puns.
  • Most of what's likable about Batman Forever is also due to this. The studio was aiming for something that looked dark, but was a bit more akin to the campy 60s version than the Darker and Edgier Tim Burton films. Casting Tommy Lee Jones and Jim Carrey as the main villains didn't hurt.
• When the protagonist's wife in Burning Man gets cancer, she hides her hair loss under a very cheap and unruly wig. It would seem silly in any other context, but here it only drives home how badly she's handling the situation and that some things will inevitably be gone forever.
• In Cast Away, Tom Hanks's reaction to a volleyball floating away would ordinarily be utterly (and unintentionally) hilarious. However in the case of this movie? It's considered a Tear Jerker.
• Many of the classic Universal Horror movies. Dracula is this trope at its finest. If it wasn't for Bela Lugosi's hammy, heavy-accented, over-the-top performance as the Count, the film would have surely drifted off into obscurity as a boring old vampire movie (regardless of its place in cinema history). Lugosi delivers every line with such intensity and charm, it makes you wonder if he even knew what he was saying, but it makes the character and the film all the more memorable, and not only made the film and character such classic pop-culture touchstones, it also helped bring the horror genre into the mainstream from the film's success. He also had some help from Dwight Frye and Edward Van Sloan's scenery chewing performances as Renfield and Van Helsing.
  • Frye himself embodied this trope with pretty much every performance he gave, such as Fritz in Frankenstein, Karl in Bride of Frankenstein, and other crazy roles in many, many terrible thirties horror films. He's the only reason some of them are even watchable.
  • It's alive. It's alive. IT'S ALIIIIIIIVE!!!!!!!!!! - One of the best examples of this trope!
• Every line delivered by Schuler Hensley as Frankenstein's monster in the 2004 movie. Van Helsing is full of win.
  • Richard Roxburgh's Dracula is the same, to a slightly lesser degree. His massive hamminess makes him so, so entertaining.
• BRIAN BLESSED has fans who consider his Large Ham acting to be the best part. That was the whole point of his portrayal of Richard IV in The Black Adder.
• The... same applies to... FANS... of... William Shatner.
  SFDebris: While Shatner is often mocked as a ham actor, the quiet way he expresses [his grief] shows that while, yeah, sometimes he's the guy that screams 'Khan,' sometimes he's the also the guy that can scream even louder without going above a whisper.
  • Him screaming "KHAAAAAAN!" seems like narm, unless you remember what Khan said to prompt that. And the fact that He was Narming it up on purpose to trick Khan. Though comical, it was Shatner playing Kirk badly acting..
  • Used to absolutely AWESOME effect in Lemon Jelly's song '64 aka Go. Nobody monologues better than Shatner.
  • Zachary Quinto's Spock shouting the same line in Star Trek Into Darkness also qualifies.
• The Evil Dead (1981) had a few Narm moments that were nonetheless forgivable because it was a student film and otherwise well-made. Evil Dead 2 and Army of Darkness actively cultivated Narm.
• A lot of moments from the Spider-Man Trilogy may qualify. (Surprise surprise, they were directed by Mr. Evil Dead himself, Sam Raimi.)
  • Such as the Green Goblin bombing the Parker residence and demanding Aunt May finish her prayer ("deliver us... deliver us... from evil!").
  • Or when Peter embraces a normal life to the tune of "Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head."
  • "We'll meet again, Spider-Man!!" Corny? Oh yes. But somehow incredibly appropriate for a Spider-Man movie.
  • Many a viewer waited reluctantly for the typically-cheesy scene of a dying family member (Uncle Ben, in this case) giving an inspirational speech to the protagonist before kicking it. But instead of a speech, all we got was "...Peter..." While still cheesy in its own right... damn.
• Enchanted is essentially a combination of this, Willing Suspension of Disbelief, and Camp, with two heaping tablespoonfuls of Affectionate Parody for spice.
• Flash Gordon: Take the gloriously campy source material, throw in Max von Sydow, Timothy Dalton, and BRIAN BLESSED, add a soundtrack by Queen, and you get enough delicious Ham and Cheese to feed half of humanity.
• First Blood: Stallone's inarticulate Inelegant Blubbering at the end sounds ridiculous, but considering the man's having a full-on emotional breakdown while recounting the horrific death of a comrade in Saigon (who was blown to pieces by a parcel bomb, but didn't die right away from it), most viewers are willing to cut Rambo some slack.
• For a Few Dollars More:
  • In the wonderful shooting contest scene, Monco walks around Mortimer, glaring at him; Mortimer walks around Monco, glaring at him; Monco steps on Mortimer's shoe, getting it muddy; Mortimer does the same to him, et cetera — until Mortimer proves himself to be the better shot by perforating Monco's hat, but up until then it's hilarious. Two little boys hang a lampshade on it: "Just like the games we know!"
  • Another one from Mortimer, when he spots a wanted poster of his nemesis. And looks at it very hard.
• There Will Be Blood's very popular line "I. Drink. Your. MILKSHAKE!" Someone who watched the movie solely to hear the meme might be shocked to find the speech comes just before Danny bashing in Eli's head with a bowling ball.
  • Arguably, anytime their conflict turns physical is somewhat ridiculous. It makes sense in the context, though: Daniel doesn't want it to look cool, he wants to bitch-slap/kill the fucker!
• In general, Arnold Schwarzenegger should be extremely narmful all the time because of his incredibly thick Austrian accent, but people have got so used to hearing it it barely matters anymore. To quote Jack Slater in Last Action Hero, "Vot accent?"
• Parts of the 1973 film version of Jesus Christ Superstar are rather corny today, yes, but the corny lines in no way detract from the rest of the movie.
• The Lord of the Rings:
  • "I am no man! AAAAAAAAAA!!!"
  • In that exact same scene: The Witch-King's ridiculously large mace. Everyone from the prop designers to the actor who had to swing it all thought it was the largest, heaviest, most ridiculous part of the scene.
  • Denethor's death scene (where he goes nuts, lights himself on fire, and jumps off a cliff) in The Return of the King. Then again, the last part is movie-only, as in the book he calmly burns himself in the Steward's tomb.
  • The Two Towers: "I withdraw you, Saruman, as poison is drawn from a wound!" would sound irretrievably silly said by anyone except Ian McKellen, but he lends it such power its no wonder Theoden crashes back in his throne.
  • Boromir's rant at Frodo on Amon Hen in The Fellowship of the Ring is pretty silly when seen by itself, but the context of Boromir's Sanity Slippage and Sean Bean's acting makes it work.
• In the Czech movie Kolya, Louka ends up taking care of 5-year- old Russian boy, Kolja. When Kolya's grandmother dies, Louka tells him that she is only sleeping. Later in the movie, Kolya is in the bath and uses the shower head like a telephone and tries to speak with his grandmother. It seems a bit ridiculous, but is genuinely sad because of how very upset he was.
• Lost Highway: The infamous "tailgate speech". What should be a terrifying moment instead becomes pure over-the-top narm when Robert Loggia decides to pile on the ham.
• X-Men Film Series
  • Ian McKellen's delivery is full of this.
  • The Wolverine:
    • The freaking bear.
    • Logan jumping over the guy on the bullet train, whilst screaming.
    • During the climax, Viper chases after Wolverine and Mariko, and hisses as she does so.
  • The 1973 scenes in X-Men: Days of Future Past may look a tad colorful and flamboyant if not outright dorky to a 21st Century audience. But they really do give an authentic '70s feel and even add to the tension.
  • In Logan, Laura quoting Shane at the end, during Logan's burial service. A little girl using quotes from a movie that came out decades before she was born as an epitaph is a bit incongruous, but it fits the movie's "aging gunfighter" theme very well, and the scene is legitimately moving.
• Godzilla. The 1998 American version, even more so.
  • The international dubs for the japanese movies are hilarious and charming in their own way. To a lesser extent, there's also the official english dubs produced for some of the movies' original theatrical releases.
  • The American version of Godzilla 2000 was intentionally given a Gag Dub as a homage to said dubs.
  • Speaking of the 1998 movie, any movie by Roland Emmerich such as Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow and recently 2012 will apply. He gets most of the facts wrong, but you can't help enjoying stuff getting destroyed through awesome visual effects.
• Godzilla: King of the Monsters! (1956), the American version of Godzilla (1954), has completely pointless scenes^note Pointless within the film itself; the reason was to add an American actor and market him as the star of the film, in order to garner an audience who would have likely otherwise discounted it as a foreign film not worth seeing of Raymond Burr adding running narration and commentary to the film which, while quite silly and even arguably out of place, actually makes a version which indeed has some merit. While the original plays out more like a Film Noir, the dubbed version begins with the aftermath of the incident and then cuts to before feels more like watching a televised broadcast of a real event as if Godzilla actually happened and you're watching the aftermath on TV, which for better or for worse makes it work on an entirely different level. This is aided by Burr's absolute committment to the role due to him greatly respecting Godzilla's haunting metaphor for nuclear weapons.
• Nero in Star Trek (2009) tends to be ridiculously over the top (see: his introduction as "Hi, I'm Nero" and "SPOOOOOOOOOOOCK"). It just makes the movie more fun. "FIRE EVERYTHING!"
• Before Nero, there was Kruge in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock. One of the more diabolical villains in Star Trek, and Christopher Lloyd does his best to play the part with intensity, but he's doing it with Doc Brown's voice, so you keep expecting him to exclaim "Great Scott!" or ramble about "One point twenty-one jigawatts of electricity!"
• Star Trek Beyond has during the climactic battle a swarm of alien ships being foiled through loud music - namely The Beastie Boys. Consensus is that no matter how silly this sounds, it works.
• Galaxy Quest: "By Grabthar's hammer... by the suns of Warvan... you shall be avenged." Though in that case the original line was trying to be silly in an Affectionate Parody sort of way for Star Trek. The context the line is delivered in is genuinely badass and makes up for it. It helped that it was Alan Rickman saying the line.
  • It also didn't hurt that a visibly long-suffering Rickman had earlier delivered the variant "By Grabthar's hammer ... *sigh* ... what a savings" in meticulous deadpan while doing a publicity appearance at the opening of some Big Box Mart.
• G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra. Over two hours of every action movie cliche turned up to eleven and Christopher Eccleston and Jonathan Pryce, clearly enjoying themselves. Joseph Gordon-Levitt embodies Ham and Cheese in that movie, apparently deciding to play Cobra Commander as "Starscream, by way of Darth Malak, with a touch of Dr. Strangelove." The cast gets in on this, Ray Park manages to do it without ever saying a single word, that's impressive.
• Logic doesn't get in the way of the narm-charmtastic climactic scene of the 1966 Italian film Dio, Come Ti Amo! The heroine Gigliola, played by Eurovision Song Contest winner Gigliola Cinquetti, taps into the p.a. system of an airport in order to sing a love song to Luis, her boyfriend who is departing on a plane that is on the runway about to take off. Her song is broadcast not only through the airport, but, in a quirk of Italian electrical engineering, also into the headsets of the ground crew and the pilots of Luis' flight. Sure, in reality the pilot, the ground crew and the airport's p.a. would probably not all share the same system, but that's besides the point. Adding to the inexplicit absurdity of the scene is the fact that her love song is also audible to the passengers on the departing plane, one of whom is Luis who disembarks from the plane to return to Gigliola. Yet for all of the gaps in plausibility, your heart can't help but be moved when Gigliola and Luis kiss on the tarmac.
• 300. Especially, Gerard Butler's delivery of the iconic This! Is! Sparta! line.
• Scarface (1983): "SHAY HELLO TU MY LEETLE FRIEN'!"
• The entirety of Conan the Barbarian (1982) simultaneously manages to be incredibly cheesy and incredibly moving and beautiful at the same time.
• Dario Argento's films run on this trope and Gorn Charm.
• Titanic (1997) may have the typical movie cliches on the book, but it is so silly, yet so romantic! Chicago Tribune film critic Michael Phillips once called it "the worst-written movie I ever happily saw twice".
  • Even with lines like "You must do me this honor, Rose. You must promise me to survive" - toward the end of the second half of the film audiences will be dreading Jack's inevitable demise.
  • Speaking of James Cameron, while certain scenes from Avatar may be narmy whenever Neytiri gets pissed off or cries (like when Jake revealed his secret to her, causing her to lose her trust in him), they are actually quite sad.
• Gran Torino: The phrase "Get off my lawn!" may sound like a typical senior citizen phrase, but Eastwood being Eastwood, boy did he make it work.
• Heritage Minutes: Part of what's made them such cultural touchstones for Canadians.
• Big Fish: "You become what you always were... a very big fish."
• Most of the werewolf scenes in the remake of The Wolfman (2010), starting with their decision not to change the werewolf appearance from the black and white original.
• A lot of The Road Warrior is Narm but especially this scene with Wez, the Lord Humungeous' dragon has Narm Charm. After the Feral kid's razor boomerang kills his lover, Wez goes nuts "NO! WE GO IN! WE KILL! Humoungous puts him in a sleeper hold to subdue and says "Be still my dog of war! I understand your pain! But we do it my way! We do it MY WAY!" Wez: "Losers! Losers wait!" before becoming unconscious. It should be just funny but it's somehow funny AND awesome. Even when the audio was used years later in South Park episode, "Eat, Queef and Pray" when a woman demonstrates a "Road Warrior Queef"
• The Hellboy films have quite a bit of this in small doses throughout, but they pull it off with deliberate bravado in the second film when Abe and Hellboy get drunk and sing the incredibly cheesy song, "Can't Smile Without You." Who hasn't gotten drunk with a friend and sung bad music to try and get through the blues?
• George Bailey's friends and family spontaniously bursting out into Christmas carols at the end of It's a Wonderful Life should be Narmy ... but really isn't. At all.
  • It might be more accurate to say that since Narm is what the movie is made of, this scene doesn't stand out as particularly Narmy in comparison until the kid pops off with the line about bells and angels, which is pure distilled essence of Narm.
• The Mummy Trilogy. All three of them. Largely due to John Hannah.
• In the original The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), the robot is less than convincing.
• The Street Fighter movie, due in large part to Raúl Juliá's performance as General M. Bison. "OF COURSE!"
  • Among his gems: "Every Bison Dollar will be worth five British pounds. For that is the exchange rate the Bank of England will set once I've kidnapped their Queen."
  • "For you, the day Bison graced your village was the most important day of your life. But for me, it was Tuesday."
  • "Something wrong, Colonel? You come here prepared to fight a madman, and instead you found A GOD?"
  • "You still refuse to accept my godhood? Keep your own God! In fact, this might be a good time to pray to him! For I beheld Satan...as he fell from Heaven... like lightning!" Then he flies at Guile the exact same way five times or so.
• In Night at the Museum 2, Octavius tends to come across as almost constantly narmy, taking himself way too seriously and dramatically shouting/growling every other line. And he becomes all the more brilliant for it.
• Fully half the movies scored by Ennio Morricone have a moment where first you think: "What the hell is this music," and immediately afterward, "Holy shit this is awesome!"
• Peter Pan: "I do believe in fairies! I do! I do!"
• The Rocky Horror Picture Show is entirely about the great enjoyment one can have at the late night double feature picture show, a classic way to see the best in B-Movies.
• The B-movie Zombie Bloodbath is so cheap and cheesy, with an almost nonexistent plot, by every definition it should be terrible. But the fact that it was produced by hundreds of town locals who volunteered to do it for fun makes it incredibly heartwarming to watch as zombies crack up while running.
  • What keeps Zombie Bloodbath from being so bad is the fact that it was a community project in which practically the whole town volunteered to take part completely for free, because they all liked the director's silly movies so much. We ended up with zombies stumbling around with their little zombie children, people trying not to crack up while they're being eaten, and people doing kung fu roundhouse kicks to zombie nuns.
• It (1990): "Oh yes, Georgie! They all float! And when you're down here, with me... YOU'LL FLOAT TOO!!" It's easy to overlook how silly that line is when it immediately precedes one of most frightening scenes in the movie.
  • Viewers who had read the book beforehand had to be cringing in their seats as soon as George asked, "Do they float?" knowing what was coming next.
• The King's Speech had this moment where Bertie is encouraged to talk about his childhood, and he tries to... but because of his stammer, he has to make himself sing parts of it. Hearing him suddenly sing something instead of speaking would almost be funny if he wasn't talking about how he was abused by a nanny, who would deprive him of food and hit him so he'd cry in front of his parents, and that his parents didn't notice what was going on for years.
• Some of the actions in the fight scenes of Ip Man can easily be mistaken for slapstick. However, the choreography was so good that such scenes fit right into the fights.

• General Zod in Superman: The Movie and Superman II is made of this. He's a titanic ham with lots of dialogue that could have been very painful, but he tends to come of as genuinely deranged and dangerous rather than goofy considering on that Earth, he can cataclysmically make good on his threats with his bare hands, or simply by blowing. It also helps that he can bounce back and forth between Large Ham and dangerously understated almost at will, as his introductory scene shows.
  • This continues in Man of Steel with its version of Zod and his Madness Mantra at the beginning at the film, leading to this lovely shout.
  I WILL FIND HIM!
  • Likewise, Superman's lines like "Don't thank me, Warden. We're all part of the same team!" for almost any actor would have come off as naive and trite, but Christopher Reeve had the consummate acting skill and sincerity to make it feel charming.
• According to the people who cast the film, the role of Buttercup in The Princess Bride was given to the only actress they found who could deliver the line "You mock my pain".
• The live-action 2007 Transformers film. "I SMELL YOU, BOY!"
• Transformers: Age of Extinction:
  • When Cade asks Savoy if he has a warrant Savoy replies with "My FACE is my warrant!" The line is incredibly stupid, but after saying that you're not gonna mess with Savoy.
  • When Cade asks Optimus if they'll see each other again, Optimus replies with "Whenever you look to the stars, think of one of them as my soul." The line is so ridiculous it wouldn't look out of place in a Disney film, but Peter Cullen delivers it with such dignity and conviction that it sounds awesome.
• Al Pacino's first scene with Johnny Depp in Donnie Brasco was noted on the Director's Commmentary as one that could have been pathetic, but worked due to Pacino's skill. Lefty's line, "In all the five boroughs, I'm known. I'm known all over the fuckin' world. Anybody asks anybody about Lefty from Mulberry Street..."
• The only actor in history who could deliver the line "If it had to happen to one of us, why did it have to be you?" in An Affair to Remember was Cary Grant. Combine this with the explosive chemistry between Grant and co-star Deborah Kerr, and what could have gone down as one of the sappiest, glurgiest movies ever produced is instead one of Hollywood's most epic love stories.
• The Syfy B-Movie Meteor Apocalypse has just what you'd expect of a B Movie — low budget, bad script. But for film shot in only 12 days, the acting (even through the badly-written dialogue) is actually pretty good.
• The final scene of Dead Poets Society is almost universally considered to be a very powerful and moving ending to the film. But think of how it would sound written down on a script and what one would think it would end up like...
• Troy: Achilles' captive Briseis wakes him up with a sharp knife to the throat. After imploring her to "do it" ("we all die some time") he grabs her and has his way with her, prompting her to drop the knife slowly out of her hand... Yeah. As one reviewer said: "Only Brad Pitt could do this (old-style Hollywood) scene and not have the audience burst into laughter."
• Young Neil in Scott Pilgrim vs. The World was cast because he could deliver "He punched the highlights out of her hair!" with the perfect mix of rage, disbelief and conviction. He went on to ad-lib several hilarious moments throughout the film.
• The Neverending Story: When Artax starts sinking into the Swamps of Sadness, Atreyu's reaction is shameless and over the top... but damn if that isn't the key to making that scene work without viewers wondering what the horse has to be depressed over.
  • It's a little less Narmy when you realize the actor got caught in the elevator that was lowering the horse and nearly drowned. When they brought him back up he was already unconscious, had to be rushed to a hospital, and took two days to recover.
  • Also, Bastian's over the top reactions to what he's reading.
• Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance is entirely composed of this trope. Nicolas Cage can take the credit for much of that.
• Let's face it: Both the Harry Potter books and films can be quite narmilicious... but the thing is, the quality of it is just so good, it can easily be forgiven. One particular example is the ending of the fifth film when Harry gives his "Reason You Suck" Speech to Voldemort; which boils down to "I have The Power of Friendship. You don't. I pity you (though I still want you to die)". This, coupled with the shots of Voldemort's kind of goofy poses in the visions Harry sees during the film, could be extremely Narmy... but it's not. The reason being that when you've spent all this time reading the books and/or watching the films, you really do understand what Harry is saying no matter how corny it might be. This is doubly true for the movie, which also shows clips from all the previous ones before it, most of those clips being of other Narm Charm moments from the series.
• Starcrash is Narm Charm. The endearingly bad acting (thanks in no small part to Joe Spinell as the villain Zarth Arn), the obvious fake ships, the ridiculous clothes, and the never-ending sound effects make it tons of fun to watch from start to finish.
• Eight Legged Freaks lives off this with corny characters and cornier monsters (Seriously, the spiders make grunts and squeaks and throw in a 'wee' at times) but it's all extremely good fun.
• The Wizard of Oz. The backgrounds are obviously painted backdrops, everyone's in rather silly costumes, and the villain is defeated by pure Deus ex Machina but for some reason none of that matters because the acting has such pathos and a lot of people grew up watching it. It's to the point where no film studio has the guts to do a remake (though other Oz movies have been made).
• Pacific Rim: "TODAY WE ARE CANCELLING THE APOCALYPSE!"
  • Just the names make this film overblown. When telling a story where STACKER PENTECOST tells his men to assemble at THE SHATTERDOME to power up GIPSY DANGER so it can battle KNIFEHEAD, one can either mock that to death or take it completely seriously. Pacific Rim takes the latter approach, and thus is all the better for it.
• The Basil Rathbone-Nigel Bruce Sherlock Holmes films have a bit of this. Some of the plots are a bit ridiculous, and Bruce's comedic portrayal of Doctor Watson can cross the line into buffoonery at times. (Memetically so.) Yet they're still classics of Holmes on film with memorable performances from the lead actors and genuine suspense.
• Somewhere in Time has a ridiculously improbable plot, really cheesy lines, MANY plot holes supposed to be handwaved because of The Power of Love that transcends space-time. And yet the movie still somehow works and gets some tears outta the audience, specially when Richard and Elise are Together in Death. Guess casting Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour (Actress) was the key....
• Godzilla (2014):
  • The Muto courtship scene, where the male offers the female a nuclear warhead, comparable to the Spaghetti Kiss from Lady and the Tramp. Yes, it's kind of silly and clashes a bit with the mood of the film, but it also shows a more sympathetic side to the monsters.
  • Some of Godzilla's mannerisms make him come off as less an unstoppable juggernaut acting on nature's behalf and more a grumpy old man who simply wants everything to be done with. Surprisingly, this sort of works; his bouncing between the two gives him a large amount of sympathy and personality while reminding the audience he's a walking engine of chaos, both frightening and endearing the audience.
  • In the aftermath of the monster battle, the news banner declaring Godzilla to be "Savior of our City?" can feel a bit over the top, but what takes the cake is some San Francisco people cheering Godzilla. It doesn't last long, but it seems more like a reference to the cheesy films of the 60s and 70s, rather than the grim 1954 original that inspired the rest of the film.
• Considering Kingsman: The Secret Service features over-the-top fight scenes with gadget umbrellas and blind shooting, a villain played by Samuel L. Jackson who lisps and dresses like a swagger, a Tarantino-esque henchgirl with knife legs and a protagonist who is a chav, this could easily be one of the campiest movies in recent memory. However, it can be argued that it is precisely its greatest point: the film's unrepentantly goofy spirit not only makes it somehow work as a semi-serious action flick, but also sends it directly to dive into the awesome field.
• "Giants In The Sky" and Dan Huttlestone's lisp in Into the Woods got some people laughing, but also people calling it "adorable."
• Avengers: Age of Ultron:
  • "There are no strings on me". If it were anyone other than Ultron saying that, it would be complete Narm, but James Spader manages to make it sound terrifying. Not so much when the actual song plays whilst an army of killer robots is waking up.
  • Sure, Wanda and Pietro's accents may feel kind of iffy, but they're accurate and they still sound cool.
• Rise of the Planet of the Apes: Coming immediately after a very forced and gratuitous Call-Back to the original film's most famous line, Caesar giving a Big "NO!" in reply is either this or a Moment of Awesome.
• Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. It's a real testament to the skill of the writers and the actors that they can make audiences take the apes' Hulk Speak and No Indoor Voice seriously, and even at times make it very threatening. Take this scene, for example.
• Ant-Man could be titled Narm Charm: the Movie and nobody would notice. Guy with silly name and power? Actually pretty badass and useful. The villain laughing over a tiny little lamb? Actually intimidating given how his previous Shrink Ray attempts caused the lamb to explode. Lingering on the wing of an ant killed by a bullet? A bit of a Tear Jerker. A keychain turning out to be an actual tank? Badass.

• John Wick centers around a man who fights a one-man war against The Mafiya because the boss's idiot son killed his dog and stole his car, which sounds almost cartoonish when we put it like that. However, the dog was helping him cope with the loss of his dearly beloved wife and was really goddamn cute, so you'll find no shortage of people who empathize with John's murderous anger.
• The Last Witch Hunter is not nearly close to being good cinema, it's full of campy lines and the CGI of it is sub-par, but it's pretty obvious that Vin Diesel is having a time of his life on the set, and his enjoyment is highly infectious.
• Jupiter Ascending has Eddie Redmayne, whose ridiculous performance as the film's Big Bad saves what could have been a disaster piece and pushed it into So Bad, It's Good territory. He performance clearly steals the show, with such lines as: "I CREATE LIFE... and I destroy it.." "GO!" and the epic: "YOU WANTED ME TO DO IT!" His over the top performance of speaking in almost a whisper to suddenly shouting is a sight to behold. It also doesn't hurt that the movie is also legitimately stunning, wall-to-wall concept art porn.
• Many of the musical numbers in The Polka King. A chubby heavily-accented guy in sequins singing about Immigrant Patriotism backed by a polka band and a dancer in a chicken costume could easily have been Narm incarnate, but Jack Black's showmanship sells it.
• Some of The Muppets movies (Mostly the films, occasionally the The Muppet Show) would try to do action scenes with the titular Muppets. During scenes in which they attack people or are sent flying, it looks like they threw the muppets across the room. It makes some of them quite hilarious, especially when they tackle actual people.
• The Show Within a Show in Son of Rambow is an eighties action movie pastiche created by preteens, and the Stylistic Suck only makes it more realistic and endearing.
• Wonder Woman (2017):
  • Ludendorff and Dr. Poison's giggling while killing people in one scene. Many saw this as adding personality to the villains, an endearingly vicious scene reminiscent of the boyish glee of Two Face and Riddler played by Tommy Lee Jones and Jim Carrey 22 years prior.
  • Perhaps only Wonder Woman, not even Superman himself, could get away with lines like "I believe in love. Only love will truly save the world." But it rings true to her character.
  • For even a mild history buff, Diana searching for Ares to end WWI can come off as silly, but even still, there's something about it that's so adorable. Plus, it's all building up to Diana's heartbreaking loss of innocence about the true depths of horror humanity can reach without any kind of godly help.
  • The effect of the iconic lasso of truth's golden glow has been described by some viewers as looking too "cartoony" for a modern action film. However, its imperfection also makes it more memorable.
• Like Rocky Horror listed above, Repo! The Genetic Operais another send up to sci-fi B-movies. A rock opera set in the future where people's organs are repossessed, complete with over-the-top performances and the most bizarre casting choices imaginable. (including Paris Hilton, of all people). And yet, that's exactly why it's fans love it.
• Hocus Pocus revels in this. The film's campiness and the Sanderson sisters' delightfully hammmy performances have made this a staple of Halloween.
• Snakes on a Plane runs on this. It's the reason why Samuel L. Jackson agreed to the film in the first place. He even threatened to walk if the producers changed the title.
• The 1986 British fantasy film Highlander is, make no mistake, a very, very cheesy movie. It was cheesy when it was first released, and it has aged like... well, a piece of cheese that got stuck behind the radiator next to the fridge and forgotten for over thirty years. It also has Clancy Brown as a fantastically hammy Big Bad, Sean Connery as a foppish, Scottish-accented Egyptian swordfighter who becomes The Mentor, some banging Queen songs, a massive Tear Jerker scene between The Hero and his mortal wife that would make any viewer who believes Living Forever Is Awesome think again, and of course, lots of cool sword fights. It also introduced the classic Badass Longcoat/Katanas Are Just Better combo beloved by RPG players the world over. It's a Cult Classic for a reason.
• Sonic the Hedgehog:
  • 2020's Sonic The Hedgehog is an amazing modern example of this. The idea of The Power of Love and The Power of Friendship normally would be a finger-gagging saccharine overdose that would make any filmgoer groan. However, what makes this so effective is that Sonic has been running for his life and his existence ever since he was 3-4 years old, and never on any world he has gone to has he been able to make any friendships or connections with any of the inhabitants, so he is understandably extremely lonely, which he shows early in the movie when he plays baseball by himself, and when he hits a home run,... no one is in the stands to see it. Cue the tears when he starts to run around the bases at increasing speed in sheer heartbroken fury. Plus, at the end of the movie, Tom Wachowski gives Robotnik a short but satisfying "The Reason You Suck" Speech about how cold and heartless he became only having his robot creations as companions.
  • The emotion continues in Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022): Same deal, but this time Sonic wants to be someone, something great, but he is being irresponsible in trying to look for it and force it. He finds friendship with Tails, and later, Knuckles. The connections? The beneficial oddities with Sonic and Tails (Super Speed and Twin Tails, respectively), and Knuckles losing his entire family/civilization, much like Sonic lost his guardian, Longclaw. The film also never forgets to treat the main trio like children, unlike other movies that treat the child heroes as adults in a child's body. Plus, again, what would normally become a finger-gagging cliché actually becomes Fridge Brilliance when one considers the circumstances: At the climax of the movie, the Master Emerald shatters, with Sonic being unable to use its power. Just when all hope seems lost, the Chaos Emeralds that were once contained inside react to Sonic's love for his friends and family, allowing him to transform into Super Sonic. In the games, the power of the emeralds indeed are enhanced by The Power of Love.
• The Five-Year Engagement has Violet and Suzie get into a heated argument over whether Violet and Tom should get married while both of them are speaking in the voices of Cookie Monster and Elmo, respectively, in front of Suzie's five-year-old daughter. It's absolutely ridiculous, but it's that sheer ridiculousness that makes it one of the funniest scenes in the entire movie.
• The most memorable scene of Hereditary has Toni Collette's character having a breakdown on the dinner table and yelling at her son. One line, "that fucking face on your face" does ruin the mood just a bit, but it is also the kind of thing someone would say when flustered and angry, and does not detract at how startling and intense the whole moment gets.
• They/Them (2022): Molly's "Respect, Renew, Rejoice, REVENGE!" is cheesy as all hell, but it's immensely satisfying to hear the Whistlers' motto be completely turned against them.
• The Prince of Tides contains a climactic scene where Tom recalls an extremely traumatic childhood memory to Susan, causing him to break down into tears as she tries to comfort him. It's certainly very melodramatic and the contrast between Nick Nolte's Chewing the Scenery and Barbra Streisand's attempt at a more restrained performance can add some unintentional hilarity, but it still manages to be utterly heartbreaking. Plus, the childhood memory that Tom recounts is him and his mother and sister getting raped by three men who escaped from a nearby prison and broke into their home, which is such a horrible ordeal that some viewers are willing to forgive any of the cheesiness of the overall scene.
  • After Tom finishes his retelling to Susan, he breaks into a line of song, which is so abrupt and comes out of nowhere that it can cause some unintended laughs, but it still fits into Tom's characterization as a Sad Clown who has spent his whole life repressing a very traumatic childhood instead of facing his problems directly.

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