| 1 | * A common refrain nowadays is that all movies are either remakes/reboots, sequels or adaptations, and that nothing is new in Hollywood. The concept of remaking films is about as old as commercial film, with milking the same franchise as long as possible is about as old art itself. Classic films like ''Film/TheWizardOfOz'' and ''Film/BenHur1959'' are both themselves remakes of [[Film/TheWonderfulWizardOfOz1910 silent]] [[Film/BenHur1925 films]], not to mention each is an adaptation of [[Literature/TheWonderfulWizardOfOz popular]] [[Literature/BenHur books]]. TV Tropes itself has listed various franchises created as far back as TheThirties:[[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FilmsOfThe1930s Here]] |
| 2 | * Graphic sex and violence in movies! Many think this started only when the MPAA ratings system took off in the 1960s (many point to 1966's ''Film/BlowUp'' as the first truly raunchy mainstream movie, which killed off MediaNotes/TheHaysCode). |
| 3 | ** Nudity existed since the start of cinema. Eadweard Muybridge, one of the founders of the motion picture process, [[https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2015/oct/09/indecent-exposures-eadweard-muybridge-early-nudes-in-pictures devoted much of his footage to showing nude males and females moving before his camera]]. |
| 4 | ** Before MediaNotes/TheHaysCode, there was a period in American cinema without organized censorship. This was UsefulNotes/ThePreCodeEra, which, while still mild by modern standards, was a lot more frank and had fewer euphemisms about "matters of the heart" than later. This was the era of Mae West and ''Film/DesignForLiving'', a film about Free Love made by ''Paramount Studios'' starring major stars of the time. Creator/FrankBorzage made films like ''A Farewell to Arms'', ''Film/MansCastle'' and ''Little Man What Now?'' about unmarried couples making love and cohabiting outside marriage and openly stating that SexIsGood. ''Man's Castle'' has a couple, played by Creator/SpencerTracy and Loretta Young, skinny-dipping...made in 1933! |
| 5 | ** There were also independent films exhibited as road shows in this era that didn't answer to the Code. Movies like ''Film/{{Maniac|1934}}'' were free to indulge in nudity and sexual content that Hollywood pictures couldn't have gotten away with even before the Code. And for that matter, straight-up hardcore porn films date back at least as far as the 1910s. |
| 6 | ** On account of SmallReferencePools the films made in other countries usually get lost in this survey. The silent era of German cinema included movies such as ''[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Different_from_the_Others Different from the Others]]'', a pro-LGBT film with a screenplay by Magnus Hirschfield himself. ''Film/{{Ecstasy}}'' (1933) has a topless Creator/HedyLamarr and is believed to be the first film to attempt to portray an orgasm onscreen. Then you had ''Film/Michael1924'' by Creator/CarlTheodorDreyer, about a love story between a male painter and his male model, presented without stereotypes. Likewise nudity, while rated, was not uncommon in French cinema of TheThirties, you had topless dancers in Julien Duvivier's ''Un carnet de Bal'', and of course, the Swedes were never as prudish, and Creator/IngmarBergman owed part of his popularity in the Anglophone world to that [[NorseByNorsewest free attitude]]. In the UK, Creator/MichaelPowell's ''Film/PeepingTom'' was an early title that featured an actress posing nude in a brief scene. |
| 7 | ** As far as violence goes, movies in the late '60s like ''Film/BonnieAndClyde'' and ''Film/TheWildBunch'' popularized the use of squibs and fake blood to graphically simulate gunshot wounds, but didn't invent the practice. Polish filmmaker Andrzej Wajda employed them first in his 1955 film ''Film/AGeneration'', while Creator/SamuelFuller became the first Hollywood director to use squibs in his Western ''Run of the Arrow'' two years later. That said, prior to ''Bonnie and Clyde'', the Hays Code ensured that they were used sparingly over the following decade (perhaps most notably in the finale of ''Film/TheMagnificentSeven1960'', used to emphasize the shock of a major character's death), until the Code's collapse allowed later filmmakers a lot more leeway. |
| 8 | * It's a common joke among movie buff circles to jot down all the stuff in ''Film/CitizenKane'' that was done in earlier films: |
| 9 | ** The movie is credited for pioneering work in deep-focus cinematography, by which action in foreground, middle and background is clearly visible and scenes are arranged accordingly. You have deep focus in films like ''The Long Voyage Home'' by Creator/JohnFord (shot by the same DP Gregg Toland, and indeed Ford even introduced the gimmick of sharing his director's credit with the DP that Welles repeated). Toland also used it in his films with Creator/WilliamWyler (such as ''Wuthering Heights'' and the film he made after Kane, ''The Little Foxes''). And of course in France, Creator/JeanRenoir in 1939's ''Film/TheRulesOfTheGame'' also had pioneering deep-focus cinematography. Even in Soviet Russia in 1937 was made "The Great Citizen" about biography of a fictional political leader (although it is very subtly hinted that this is Sergei Kirov, who was killed in 1934, like the hero of the film). Others go further and note that deep-focus cinematography can be found in Creator/ErichVonStroheim's ''Film/{{Greed}}'', cited by Welles as one of his all-time favorite films. |
| 10 | ** Likewise the film is famous for its use of sound to bridge scenes, i.e. where dialogue is cut mid-sentence and continues in the next scene but in another context. Such techniques can be seen in Creator/FritzLang's ''Film/{{M}}'' as can the film's complex fusion of powerful visual style with detailed editing geared to telling an entirely cinematic story. |
| 11 | ** The film's narrative of a corrupt businessman dying and having his rise-and-fall life narrated via flashback was preceded by a film called ''Film/ThePowerAndTheGlory'' whose screenplay was written by Creator/PrestonSturges. Of course there it was only one narrator whereas Welles had multiple narrators, and the earlier film stresses the story's politics (with a long subplot detailing a strike by the protagonist's employees) much more than ''Kane'' does. |
| 12 | * Ah yes, the first tracking shot, the first moving camera take, [[TheOner the first long-take]], and many other credited "firsts": |
| 13 | ** For a long time, many credited Creator/FWMurnau's ''Film/TheLastLaugh'' for having the first tracking shots, and making extensive use of camera movements. As a point of fact, the first people to use moving cameras were none other than [[Film/LumiereFilms the Lumière brothers]] themselves. In many of their shorts, especially ones showing movement, they simply put the camera on a horse-cart, or a wheelbarrow, or a train or a tram and recorded movement, and staged action accordingly. So the idea of a moving camera existed right from the start. |
| 14 | ** The first documentary, docu-drama, first newsreel or reconstructions: nope, not Robert Flaherty...it was Creator/GeorgesMelies. The father of special effects illusionist cinema was also [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dreyfus_Affair_(film_series) the father of]] realistic HistoricalFiction and documentary recreation, whose series of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reconstructed_newsreels_by_Georges_M%C3%A9li%C3%A8s reconstructions]] by which he would recreate in meticulous detail events like the Coronation of the English King and the Dreyfus Affair to inform the public about the events. |
| 15 | ** The first gangster film: not ''Film/ThePublicEnemy1931'', and certainly not ''Film/TheGodfather''; the answer is Creator/DWGriffith's ''Film/TheMusketeersOfPigAlley'' that has the NeighbourhoodFriendlyGangsters, real-life location shooting, and shootouts, as well as tough charismatic bad guys, made in the year of 1912, and all in less than 12 minutes. |
| 16 | ** Shooting on location using non-professional actors is obviously something that Italian Neorealist films like ''Bicycle Thieves'' invented. Well, except for Creator/FWMurnau who made ''Film/{{Tabu}}'' in 1931, shooting on location in Tahiti with non-professionals as actors. That was of course a silent film. Creator/KingVidor shot ''Film/{{Hallelujah}}'' on location in the DeepSouth ''with sound'' in 1929, with a cast of African-Americans, several of whom had never acted before. On a related note, many credit ''Film/{{Psycho}}'' with the first film to show a toilet, but Vidor got there first with ''Film/TheCrowd'' (although ''Psycho'' was the first to show one being flushed). |
| 17 | ** A few fans have credited Creator/StanleyKubrick's ''Film/TheKilling'' for using handheld shots in 1956, but there were quite a few movies before that already had done that, namely Creator/NicholasRay's ''The Lusty Men'' and ''Film/OnDangerousGround''. The first shot recorded from a helicopter also belongs to Ray, who did that in the first scene of ''They Live by Night''. |
| 18 | ** Direct Sound (sound recorded on location) was a market cornered by Creator/JeanRenoir in his very first film made in 1931 ''Film/LaChienne''. The Altmanesque HyperlinkStory of a movie "without main characters" was also pioneered in films like ''La marseillaise'' and ''Film/TheRulesOfTheGame'' (Creator/RobertAltman himself cited the latter as one of his major influences). |
| 19 | ** Independent films made outside the studio and showing real people was invented in the [=80s=] with Sundance, or certainly no earlier than Creator/JohnCassavetes. But independent cinema or "indies" can be seen in Creator/JosefVonSternberg's first film ''The Salvation Hunters'' made outside the system, shot largely on location, using limited resources to tell a RealIsBrown story of working people on the skids and it only found traction thanks to the fact that Sternberg knew a guy who knew the projectionist of Chaplin's private theater and impressed the Little Tramp. Likewise, as many historians noted, what we consider Hollywood was essentially an attempt by independent film-directors and film producers to escape the studio system of UsefulNotes/ThomasEdison's company to more or less StartMyOwn and getting as far away from Edison as possible. In course of time, these indies of course became SellOut and formed the Studio System. |
| 20 | * Experimentation with sound, color and even 3D date back to the early days of the medium; what was important was the evolution of these technologies, and the moment when they became mainstream, which is a very blurry line. Also, many young people today don't realize that there were several waves of interest for 3D movies before the current one, dating back to several decades ago. |
| 21 | ** Additionally, the clear glasses used for 3D screenings today are far, far older than the average moviegoer realizes. It's a common belief that, prior to ''Film/{{Avatar}},'' most 3D films were viewed using low-quality "anaglyph" (red and blue) glasses, but in reality clear glasses have been the main type since the first big 3D craze started in 1952. It's likely that the confusion is caused by 3D ''comic books'' in the 1950s using anaglyph glasses and many 50s films being re-released in anaglyph during the 70s, 80s and 90s. |
| 22 | * The idea of the {{Fanvid}}, which most people would probably suppose dates to the creation of the Internet, actually dates back all the way to 1936 and ''Film/RoseHobart'', in which an artist and Rose Hobart fanboy cut down her 1931 film ''East of Borneo'' into a 19-minute short consisting solely of her scenes, slowed down to silent speed, tinted blue, and with a new and incongruous soundtrack. |
| 23 | * A few iconic horror franchises, such as ''Franchise/ChildsPlay'' and ''Film/{{Poltergeist|1982}}'', were remakes of ''[[Series/TheTwilightZone1959 Twilight Zone]]'' episodes. |
| 24 | * Creator/JohnCarpenter's ''Film/TheThing1982'' is a classic. It's also an adaptation of a novella called ''Literature/WhoGoesThere''. It's actually the second adaptation, with the first being the classic 50s sci-fi film ''Film/TheThingFromAnotherWorld''. Carpenter's version is more faithful to the original. |
| 25 | * The saying "What is best in life?" "To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their women!" is often attributed to ''Film/ConanTheBarbarian1982'', as he spoke the line in the eponymous 1982 movie. Genghis Khan supposedly originated the quote nearly 800 years earlier. However, the source it is from is unreliable, as it did not come from the only actual Mongolian source we have (the ''Secret History of the Mongols''), and was probably made up by his enemies, seeing as how vastly different it is from his characterization in the ''Secret History''. Nonetheless, the line was still known in the West long before Conan put on his first loincloth. |
| 26 | * ''Film/GoodWillHunting'' was not the source of the phrase "How do you like them apples?" The phrase is recorded in use as early as 1910 and appears in numerous classic films. In fact, Will asking the man if he likes apples before springing the line assumes that the man is already familiar with the expression. |
| 27 | * When ''Film/TheRocketeer'' was released, a newspaper review smugly informed the reader that the idea of a rocket pack was nothing new, having been used in the 1965 ''Film/JamesBond'' film, ''Film/{{Thunderball}}''. The fact that ''The Rocketeer'' is a specific homage to ''far older'' comics and serials (most particularly the "Commando Cody" series, whose rocket suit was nearly identical) was completely lost on the reviewer. |
| 28 | * Many, many movie critics seemed absolutely convinced that ''Film/CrouchingTigerHiddenDragon'' was the originator of the {{Wuxia}} genre, and that ''Film/IronMonkey'' was derivative of it. ''Film/IronMonkey'' was made eight years prior. Wuxia films have been around [[OlderThanTelevision long before that]], and mystic monks are nothing new to ''[[OlderThanSteam much]]'' older Asian culture and mythology. |
| 29 | * Several times and in several unconnected sources, the old timey map legend "Here There Be Monsters" has been attributed as a quote of Captain Barbossa from ''Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanTheCurseOfTheBlackPearl''. Barbossa says it specifically to quote the well-known custom of putting "Here There Be Dragons" or more commonly "Here There Be Lions" in places where the mapmaker didn't know much about. It wouldn't make much sense unless you got the reference. |
| 30 | * The film ''Film/TheMist'' (2007), based on author Creator/StephenKing's 1980 short story of the same name, has been accused of stealing elements from the video games ''VideoGame/HalfLife1'' (1998) and ''VideoGame/SilentHill1'' (1999) -- both of which were released almost 20 years after the short story. The original title for ''Half-Life'', "Quiver", was in part a reference to the "Arrowhead Project" of ''Literature/TheMist''. The tentacle monster from ''Half-Life'' is in fact a direct homage to the short story, and the game itself was partially inspired by it. |
| 31 | * A lot of people think that having zombies that move as fast as living humans (as opposed to classic, lumbering zombies) is something that started with ''Film/TwentyEightDaysLater''. But ''Film/TheReturnOfTheLivingDead'' had fast zombies in 1985, ''[[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080931/ Nightmare City]]'' was made in ''1980'', the very first zombie to appear in ''Film/NightOfTheLivingDead1968'', while still somewhat lumbering, is very agile and quick on his feet, and the very first instance is the 1966 comic book ''[[ComicBook/TheSmurfs The Black Smurfs]]''. |
| 32 | ** Remaining in the theme of ZombieApocalypse, the trope actually originates in Myth/MesopotamianMythology, where the sisters Inanna and Ereshkigal threatens to free the dead from the underworld and unleash them to devour the living in ''three separate occasions''. |
| 33 | * ''Film/CharlieAndTheChocolateFactory'': An awful lot of quotes are attributed to Willy Wonka, most frequently "[[http://www.bartleby.com/103/6.html We are the music-makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams]]." Almost any catchy line usually attributed to Willy Wonka probably came from somewhere else. He's a quoter, he is. [[https://home.comcast.net/~tom.brodhead/wonka.htm Here's]] a website that lists the quotes and their sources. |
| 34 | * Speaking of Willy Wonka, [[Film/WillyWonkaAndTheChocolateFactory the 1971 film]] is often subjected to criticism that it's too surreal for its own good. Read the original book -- quite a lot of the things people point to are actually original, such as the "there's no Earthly way of knowing/which direction we are going" song (though being played by Creator/GeneWilder may or may not help). |
| 35 | * ''Film/TheUsualSuspects'': |
| 36 | ** Many believe the phrase "round up the usual suspects" comes from the movie. In fact, the title of the film is a reference to ''Film/{{Casablanca}}'', which originated the phrase. The line does not even appear in ''The Usual Suspects.'' |
| 37 | ** "The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he doesn't exist" does appear in the movie, but it's not original -- it's a paraphrase of a [[https://quoteinvestigator.com/2018/03/20/devil/ much older saying]]. |
| 38 | * People use the phrase "GoodNightSweetPrince" in reference to the 1998 comedy ''Film/TheBigLebowski''. Some know the source material and just think that Walter's use of the line was hilarious, while others are completely oblivious to the fact that it is one of the most memorable lines from Creator/WilliamShakespeare's ''Theatre/{{Hamlet}}''. |
| 39 | * ''Film/SinginInTheRain'' was made as a vehicle for the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GdN_NncZkM Freed and]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=94QR4v3zsnc Brown songs]] that it contains. They predate the film by many years, with the exception of "Moses Supposes" and "Make 'em Laugh" (the latter was a rewrite of a Music/ColePorter song, "Be A Clown"). |
| 40 | * Shortly before the movie ''Film/Underworld2003'' was released, White Wolf Publishing, makers of the ''TabletopGame/OldWorldOfDarkness'' TabletopRPG setting, sued for copyright infringement, stating the movie's setting and plot had been lifted wholesale from Creator/NancyACollins' ''For Love Of Monsters'', that quite a number of world elements in the film's setting bear resemblance to White Wolf's ''TabletopGame/OldWorldOfDarkness''. However, White Wolf can't exactly claim to stand on completely original footing either, having co-opted some pretty ubiquitous mythical characters. In fact, ''TabletopGame/{{Nightlife}}'' by Stellar Games beat them to the punch of putting Vampires and Werewolves in a GothicPunk setting. |
| 41 | * The ''Film/{{Scream}}'' series is often credited with being the first Post-Modern slasher, introducing {{Lampshade Hanging}}s and GenreSavvy characters. The little-known CultClassic ''There's Nothing Out There'' did it first. The director of ''Scream'', Creator/WesCraven, had himself done it before-to [[Franchise/ANightmareOnElmStreet Freddy Krueger]]!-in ''Film/WesCravensNewNightmare''. |
| 42 | ** ''Popcorn'', made five years before, shares many of ''Scream'''s themes and elements. |
| 43 | *** The ''Franchise/FridayThe13th'' series had self-parody before before ''Scream'' (''[[Film/FridayThe13thPartIII Part III]]'' has a character reading an issue of Fangoria magazine before her death, and ''[[Film/FridayThe13thPartViJasonLives Part VI]]'' had the line "I've seen enough horror movies to know any weirdo wearing a mask is never friendly.") |
| 44 | ** Also, the iconic "Ghostface mask" that The Ghostface Killer wears was first sold in costume shops in 1991, about five years before the film came out. The movie contributed so much to the mask's iconic status that it is often erroneously referred to as a "Scream mask" by trick-or-treaters who commonly buy it as a costume accessory around Halloween, mistakenly believing that the ''Scream'' films invented it. |
| 45 | ** The films didn't invent it, but the mask was based on Creator/EdvardMunch's series of {{paintings}} titled "Art/TheScream", with the most recent of them being completed in 1910. It's a Scream mask alright, just a different Scream. |
| 46 | ** It also wasn't the first parody of the genre. ''Film/StudentBodies'' (1981) uses the same combination of parody and LampshadeHanging. |
| 47 | ** The 1987 film ''Film/ReturnToHorrorHigh'' (no, it's not a sequel) is another Post-Modern slasher film, particularly notable for how it takes place in the production of a fictional slasher film, similar to ''New Nightmare'' and ''Scream 3''. |
| 48 | * ''Film/IKnowWhatYouDidLastSummer'' is seen by some as an attempt to capitalize on the revival of the slasher genre introduced by ''Film/{{Scream 1996}}'', despite the fact that it was not only based on [[Literature/IKnowWhatYouDidLastSummer a book]], but the screenplay was actually written before that of ''Film/{{Scream 1996}}'' (and by the same screenwriter). However, the film has [[InNameOnly very little to do with the book]]. |
| 49 | * When ''Film/{{Cloverfield}}'' came out, a lot of people started comparing the camera style-and the entire film's nature as an ApocalypticLog-to that of ''Film/TheBlairWitchProject''. In reality, ''Film/CannibalHolocaust'' was most likely the first film to use this concept, and was followed by such films as ''Film/ManBitesDog'' and ''Film/TheLastBroadcast'', the latter of which has a very similar concept to ''Film/TheBlairWitchProject''. |
| 50 | * Creator/JamesCameron: |
| 51 | ** The phrase "Hasta la vista, baby" was popularized by Jody Watley in her song, "Looking for a New Love" in 1987, four years before the release of ''Film/Terminator2JudgmentDay''. Presumably, this is why John encourages the Terminator to use the phrase. |
| 52 | ** ''Film/TheTerminator'' was reportedly based on two Creator/HarlanEllison episodes of ''Series/TheOuterLimits1963'' called "Soldier" and "Demon with a Glass Hand" (Ellison took him to court over it). It also bears a strong resemblance to ''Film/LaJetee'', a French film from 1962 in which a time traveler from a post-nuclear future meets a blonde woman in our time, and then dies, just after learning that his entire existence is dependent on a predestination paradox. |
| 53 | ** ''Film/{{Avatar}}'' as well -- ''WesternAnimation/{{Pocahontas}}''? Nope. ''WesternAnimation/FernGullyTheLastRainforest''? Nope. Look a little further back, and the plot best resembles an obscure 1976 science fiction novel called ''[[Literature/{{Hainish}} The Word for World is Forest]]'' by Creator/UrsulaKLeGuin. Creator/BenBova's [[http://www.benbova.com/avatar.htm official site]] also points out the similarity between ''Avatar'' and Bova's ''The Winds of Altair'', published in 1973. And the idea of a paralyzed man "going native" while operating a cloned remote-control body to explore an alien world had been used in such stories as Creator/PoulAnderson's "Literature/CallMeJoe", from ''1957''. |
| 54 | ** People who think Cameron is the first filmmaker to set a [[Film/{{Titanic 1997}} fictional love story]] aboard the ill-fated ''UsefulNotes/RMSTitanic'' are in for a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_about_the_RMS_Titanic huge reality check]]. |
| 55 | * ''Avatar'' has also been compared dismissively to ''Film/DancesWithWolves'', which itself owes a huge debt to older GoingNative Westerns like ''[[Film/BrokenArrow1950 Broken Arrow]]'', ''Run of the Arrow'' and ''A Man Called Horse''. Not to mention ''The Squaw Man'', which [[TropeCodifier saw its first film adaptation in 1914]]. |
| 56 | * 2007's ''WesternAnimation/{{Beowulf|2007}}'' is often accused of plagiarizing ''Film/ThreeHundred'', with the line "I! AM! BEOWULF!" being a bit too similiar to "THIS! IS! SPARTA!" and the line "TONIGHT! WILL BE DIFFERENT!" being rather akin to "TONIGHT! WE DINE! IN HELL!" What these people don't realize is that there's a thing called ProductionLeadTime. Filming of ''Beowulf'' was done long before filming of ''300'' began. Although it is true that these lines were in the ''300'' comic (and Herodotus records Leonidas saying "Tomorrow we break fast among ghosts,"), it seems doubtful that ''Beowulf'' was plagiarizing what was then an obscure Creator/FrankMiller comic, in which the lines were not delivered with any particular [[PunctuatedForEmphasis emphasis]]. ''Beowulf''[='=]s source material is a epic poem written between the 8th and 11th century AD, while ''300''[='=]s is a historical battle (i.e the Battle of Thermopylae) in 480 BC. |
| 57 | * It's often thought the term "X Movie" as the name of a parody film was made by the creators of the ''Film/ScaryMovie'' series. Creator/MelBrooks actually released a film in 1976 called ''Film/SilentMovie''. There was also the double-feature spoof ''Film/MovieMovie''. |
| 58 | ** Making a parody of a movie is even older then that, and can be traced back to the early days of film. Many of the Film/TheThreeStooges shorts are actually parodies of the popular movies of the time. |
| 59 | * With all the talk of [[HeterosexualLifePartners bromance]] movies, there was a [[http://roflrazzi.com/2009/03/16/celebrity-pictures-winter-reeves-original-bromance/ post on ROFLRAZZI]] naming Franchise/BillAndTed as "the original bromance." Commenters there quickly pointed out they were still about [[Literature/TheEpicOfGilgamesh four thousand years too late]]. And there are plenty of others working up to Bill and Ted, too. [[Literature/TheBible David and Jonathan]] are either (somewhat extreme) bromance or out-and-out HoYay, depending on who you ask. |
| 60 | * Many people think the concept of TheMenInBlack originated in [[Film/MenInBlack the movie of the same name]] (or the comic it's based on). It is actually a preexisting conspiracy theory, with artistic examples going back at least as far as ''They Knew Too Much about Flying Saucers,'' a 1956 book by Albert K. Bender purporting to be nonfiction. They also made an appearance in the 1984 film ''Film/RepoMan'', and previous films (such as ''Film/CloseEncountersOfTheThirdKind'') included similarly silent, terse, or otherwise awkward and intimidating people in black suits. |
| 61 | * Many people seem to think ''Film/{{Halloween 1978}}'' was the {{Trope Maker|s}} for the slasher genre. However, ''Halloween'' was originally conceived as a sequel to Canadian horror film ''Film/BlackChristmas1974''. The genre as a whole can trace its origins back even further, although ''Halloween'' is often accepted at the TropeCodifier, at least. |
| 62 | ** ''Black Christmas'' itself (alternately titled ''Silent Night, Evil Night'') was not even the UrExample of a SlasherFilm with a Christmas setting featuring a mysterious killer harassing people via phone calls, as the existence of ''Silent Night, Bloody Night'' theatrically released two years earlier in 1972, and filmed ''in 1970'', can attest (nor would it be the last Yuletide slasher movie, as the very similarly-titled 1984 film ''Film/SilentNightDeadlyNight'' and its sequels showcase, which in turn share a very similar premise of a BadSanta who turns to murder out of unresolved childhood trauma with 1980's ''Film/ChristmasEvil'', even though ''Silent Night, Deadly Night'' ended up engendering far more prominent public controversy with MoralGuardians, while [[Film/SilentNightDeadlyNightPartII its first sequel]] achieved a more memetic status for [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7gIpuIVE3k "Garbage day!"]] if nothing else). |
| 63 | * The 1994 film of ''Film/TheShadow'' is an adaptation of a very old character that had become obscure by the time the film came out, so this was bound to happen. [[http://starwars.wikia.com/index.php?title=List_of_references_to_Star_Wars_in_movies&oldid=2507023 Some people]] accused it of ripping off the JediMindTrick from ''Franchise/StarWars'', while others believed it to be a ripoff of Batman due to several concepts being similar between the two (rich playboy with a secret identity, cape-wearing dark hero stalking a city at night). The Shadow first appeared in 1930, and his characterization in the movie was codified in the 1937 Creator/OrsonWelles radio program, while Batman first appeared in 1939. And the very first Batman story was in fact closely modeled on a 1936 Shadow story. The concept of a rich, masked vigilante can be traced back at least to ''Literature/TheScarletPimpernel'', first published in 1905. |
| 64 | * ''Franchise/IndianaJones'': |
| 65 | ** Some consider him to be the original AdventurerArchaeologist, even though this trope existed in multiple pulp novels and movie serials from the 1930s, including H. Rider Haggard's Allan Quartermain. Others included Professor Challenger, Harry Steele, and Sir William Rutherford. |
| 66 | ** Another trope from Indiana Jones that is OlderThanTheyThink (though probably coincidentally) is its NeverBringAKnifeToAGunFight scene, which is at least as old as Tchaikovsky's 1884 opera ''Mazeppa'', in which Andrei charges Mazeppa with sabre, only to be shot by Mazeppa. |
| 67 | ** Imagine an ''Indiana Jones'' story that takes place '''after''' World War II, features Soviets as the bad guys instead of Nazis, incorporates science-fiction elements into its plot, and ends with the revelation that some supposedly divine beings are actually {{Sufficiently Advanced Alien}}s from AnotherDimension. Are we talking about ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheKingdomOfTheCrystalSkull'' (released in 2008), or ''VideoGame/IndianaJonesAndTheInfernalMachine'' (released in 1999)? Yes, it turns out that the ''Indy'' franchise was dabbling with aliens and the Cold War long before ''Kingdom of the Crystal Skull'' was accused of [[TheyChangedItNowItSucks ruining the series forever]] by bringing those things in. |
| 68 | * ''WesternAnimation/TheLionKing1994'': |
| 69 | ** The opening shot of a sunset above Africa appeared seven years earlier in the opening of the Malian film ''Film/{{Yeelen}}''. Except ''Yeelen'''s version then cuts to [[MoodWhiplash a chicken being roasted alive]]. |
| 70 | ** Using the word Simba (lion in Swahili) for a lion was not first done by ''WesternAnimation/{{The Lion King|1994}}''; in fact it's a stock term in fictional media. For example, ''WesternAnimation/ScoobyDooWhereAreYou'' had Shaggy use the term while pretending to be a lion tamer in the episode "Bedlam In The Big Top" from November 1969. |
| 71 | * In ''Film/PulpFiction'', most of Jules' "Ezekiel 25:17" speech is from the OpeningScroll of ''The Bodyguard'', the English version of ''[[Creator/IkkiKajiwara Karate Kiba / Bodyguard Kiba]]''. |
| 72 | * Franchise/{{Batman}}'s archenemy, [[Characters/BatmanTheJoker The Joker]], was [[OurLawyersAdvisedThisTrope most definitely not]] based on the poster for the film version of ''Film/TheManWhoLaughs'', starring Creator/ConradVeidt. In the days leading up to the release of ''Film/TheDarkKnight'', a recoloured version came into mass Internet circulation, and was actually mistaken by many for a publicity shot of Creator/HeathLedger's Joker makeup. |
| 73 | ** ''The Dark Knight'' was not the first time the Joker has used the ''Film/JerryMaguire'' quote "You complete me" to Batman in a [[FoeRomanceSubtext romantic manner]]: he had previously used the line in ''WesternAnimation/TheBatmanVsDracula'', and possibly even before that. |
| 74 | *** ''The Batman’s'' infamous “hobo Joker” prefigured ''The Dark Knight’s'' (much more positively received) grungy interpretation of the character. ''The Batman'' also had Joker break ReasonableAuthorityFigure Ethan Bennet and turn him into a supervillain before he did it to Harvey Dent. |
| 75 | ** At one point in ''The Dark Knight'', the Joker kills somebody using a writing utensil. [[Film/Batman1989 Sound familiar?]] |
| 76 | ** The Joker's parody of Creator/FriedrichNietzsche, "What does not kill you makes you '''stranger'''" was previously used, with "us" rather than "you", by Trevor Goodchild in the first talkie episode of ''WesternAnimation/AeonFlux''. |
| 77 | ** Christopher Nolan has acknowledged that he drew on ''Film/TheTestamentOfDrMabuse'' for his characterization of the Joker. If you compare Mabuse's famous speech about using chaos to create "an Empire of Crime" and, say, the Joker's confrontation with Harvey Dent, the parallel becomes pretty obvious. |
| 78 | ** ''The Dark Knight'' isn't even the first film to use its opening scene as a teaser trailer. That honor goes to ''WesternAnimation/{{The Lion King|1994}}'', which showed Simba's christening as a four-minute teaser trailer before ''Film/TheThreeMusketeers1993'' and ''Film/SisterAct2BackInTheHabit''. |
| 79 | * Creator/TimBurton is a rich source for this trope. |
| 80 | ** To begin with, Burton's very existence as a filmmaker isn't all that original. A former animator in charge of big-budget live-action films? Sounds mind-bending...but Creator/FrankTashlin (a former Warner Brothers animator who went on to direct some of Creator/JerryLewis's and Creator/JayneMansfield's star vehicles) was doing that a full generation before Burton came along. |
| 81 | ** Burton also, like Creator/QuentinTarantino, copied many tropes and gags he had seen in the B-movies and other entertainments of his youth. ''Film/PeeWeesBigAdventure'', for example, owes a great deal to classic cartoons. That "breakfast machine" that [[AwesomeButImpractical looks intricate but succeeds only in getting pancakes stuck to the ceiling]]? Similar machines had already appeared in the cartoons of Rube Goldberg, and to make the very same satirical point. Pee-Wee using a "three-dimensional" backdrop to trick people chasing him into running into a wall? That's from the Roadrunner cartoons. Even Pee-Wee's "I know you are, but what am I?" repartee with Francis could be considered the SpiritualSuccessor to the "Rabbit season!/Duck season!" exchange from Bugs Bunny cartoons. |
| 82 | ** In ''Film/{{Beetlejuice}}'', [[MundaneAfterlife Purgatory is depicted as a massive bureaucracy, with dead souls forced to sit in waiting rooms for interminably long periods of time before being shuttled off to different departments.]] Sounds funny, right? [[CelestialBureaucracy Not to the ancient Chinese]], [[AluminumChristmasTrees whose religion literally taught this]]. |
| 83 | ** ''Film/BatmanReturns'' redesigned the Penguin to the point where many people, shown a picture of Werner Krauss's [[Film/TheCabinetOfDrCaligari Dr. Caligari]], will believe it to be the Penguin. |
| 84 | ** In ''WesternAnimation/TheNightmareBeforeChristmas'', Halloweentown looks suspiciously similar to Holstenwall in ''Film/TheCabinetOfDrCaligari'', and Film/EdwardScissorhands LooksLikeCesare. |
| 85 | * Online videos of Neill Blomkamp's short film ''Alive in Joburg'' occasionally bear comments accusing it of ripping off ''Film/{{District 9}}'', which is extra amusing considering the latter is ''his own'' remake of the former. |
| 86 | * In an interview, Creator/DavidCronenberg tells about showing ''Film/Shivers1975'' at a German film festival during the '80s, and a man stood up and asked [[WhoDares how dare he]] show so obvious an ''Film/{{Alien}}'' ripoff, as both films are set in an isolated location (''Alien'' on a spaceship, ''Shivers'' in an apartment complex called the Starliner Towers), and both films involve BodyHorror creatures that burst out of stomachs and attach themselves to faces. Cronenberg politely explained that his film was made several years prior, and that ''Alien'' screenwriter Dan O'Bannon admitted to taking some inspiration from ''Shivers''. "Ah," said the German man, "Now we know who the real thief is." |
| 87 | * ''Alien'', apart from taking inspiration from ''Shivers'', also reportedly took some thematic inspiration from Van Vogt's ''Black Destroyer'' and the alien race called the Coeurl. It is directly based on a sequence from ''Film/DarkStar'', written by the same author, in which an alien runs amok on a spaceship. |
| 88 | ** Some film scholars have pointed out that the both the plot and visual design of ''Alien'' bear more than a passing resemblance to those of Creator/MarioBava's 1965 sci-fi/horror film ''Film/PlanetOfTheVampires''. |
| 89 | *** In his negative review for ''Film/TheThing1982'', ''Creator/RogerEbert'' believed that ''Alien'' was the superior remake of ''Film/TheThingFromAnotherWorld'' (see above). Watch the films back to back and you'll see a lot of similarities: a team gets a report of a crashed ship. They bring a body into their quarters against their better judgement. They track the monster with a geiger counter. They attack the monster with fire. A scientist who risks the lives of his crewmates to protect the monster and a smart and resourceful female deuteragonist. |
| 90 | * "There's no place like home" is now most commonly recognized as a phrase from ''Film/TheWizardOfOz''. The phrase didn't originate in the film though, or even in [[Literature/TheWonderfulWizardOfOz L. Frank Baum's book]] (though it appears in both); it came from the 19th-century song "Home, Sweet Home", which was recognizable enough to be a StandardSnippet. In fact, said snippet is worked into the underscore in the final scene. |
| 91 | ** Several aspects of the Oz story are thought to be original to the 1939 MGM musical ''The Wizard of Oz'', but are actually older. The characters being saved from the poppy field by a snowfall is actually in the [[Theatre/TheWizardOfOz1902 1902 stage production]]. Changing to Technicolor when the characters arrive in Oz was also done in a 1933 animated cartoon, although legal problems prevented the short film from being distributed with the Oz segments in Technicolor. |
| 92 | ** Technicolor, for that matter, was first used in 1916, though many of the earlier films to use it survive only in black-and-white if at all. "Modern" three-strip Technicolor was first used in ''Film/BeckySharp'' (1935); ''The Wizard of Oz'' was only the second MGM musical to use it (the first was ''Sweethearts''). |
| 93 | *** An earlier experimental three-strip colour process was used in May 1913 to film the festivities at the wedding of Princess Viktoria Luise, daughter of Wilhelm II, with Prince Ernst August of Hanover. They can be seen within the 1999 German documentary film ''Majestät brauchen Sonne''. |
| 94 | ** Even earlier than that, documentary footage of [[UsefulNotes/TheHouseOfWindsor King George V & Queen Mary]]'s coronation visit to India in 1912 was filmed in an early color process called Kinemacolor, in which film shot through red/orange & blue/green lenses was projected using red & green lenses; the film itself does not contain any dye, so it appears monochrome when examined. |
| 95 | * When the first trailers for the ''Film/GetSmart'' movie appeared on Platform/YouTube, many of the comments accused it of being a ripoff of the 2003 film ''Film/JohnnyEnglish''. Never mind that ''Get Smart'' is a TV show from TheSixties. |
| 96 | ** And never mind that the two films aren't nearly similar enough for either to be a ripoff of the other. Yes, they are both spy comedies. But all that means is they share the same subgenre. It'd be like picking two random foreign action films and saying one must be a ripoff of the other. |
| 97 | * ''Film/TheLordOfTheRings'' has a particularly daft section of its fanbase who, upon seeing Creator/PeterJackson's film version of ''[[Film/TheLordOfTheRingsTheReturnOfTheKing The Return of the King]]'', believed that Jackson's Oliphaunt march had been ripped off by George Lucas for his walker attack in the film ''Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack''. This incredibly stupid group somehow convinced themselves that Lucas' film, made in 1980, copied one of its key scenes from Jackson's film, made in 2003. |
| 98 | ** The scenes aren't even that similar. AT-[=ATs=] and Mûmakil both have four legs. And are really big. And used by the bad guys. That's about it. |
| 99 | ** WordOfGod admits that the AT-[=ATs=] from ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi'' (1983) were inspired by the three-legged walking machines from ''Literature/TheWarOfTheWorlds'', the Novel (1889) (The [[Film/TheWarOfTheWorlds1953 first film adaptation]] (1953) didn't have those, they just floated on [[BlatantLies "Invisible legs"]]. The Peter Jackson movie (2002) was an adaptation of Tolkien's book (1954) and THAT was inspired by... um... elephants? |
| 100 | *** Tolkien says they're the ancestors of today's elephants, who aren't nearly as huge or impressive. |
| 101 | *** Elephants dominating the battlefields and slowly moving towards the lines of enemy are usually the first thing associated with Hannibal Barca (III-II century B.C.). Definitely OlderThanFeudalism. |
| 102 | *** It should be noted in passing that the [=AT-ATs'=] walking motion was directly based on the way elephants walk. (They are popularly reputed to be "the only animals with four knees", although the front "knees" are actually just knobby wrists.) |
| 103 | *** Both Lucas and Ben Burt have confirmed that the [=AT-ATs'=] look was inspired by [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59iMsrRlfxw&t=602s Paraceratherium]] a giant hornless rhinoceros that went extinct 23 million years ago. So that's WAY before Tolkien, Lucas... and the modern-day elephant. |
| 104 | ** ''Film/TheHobbit' confused some audience members by implying Aragorn was alive during the events of the film, a good 60-77 years before the events of LOTR. The extended edition has a scene explaining how he is a race of Men who have long lifespans, and that he is 87. So he would be around 27 (or 10 in the books) depending on how much time passes between Bilbo leaving the Shire and Gandalf returning to warn Frodo about the ring (in the books it was 17 years, in the films it isn't implied to be very long). |
| 105 | ** Parodied by the Website/{{Cracked}} article [[http://www.cracked.com/article_15739_50-reasons-lord-rings-sucks.html "50 Reasons Lord of the Rings Sucks"]], which includes complaints that the idea of orcs was obviously stolen from ''VideoGame/{{Warcraft}}'', Gollum was a ripoff off [[Film/ThePhantomMenace Jar Jar Binks]], Gandalf was a copy of [[Literature/HarryPotter Dumbledore]], and the concept of a village of little people was stolen from ''Film/{{Willow}}''. The author concludes by shaking his head at how the greedy producers had [[Literature/TheLordOfTheRings the movie novelization]] released years in advance before the films. |
| 106 | ** In June 2012, an Website/{{IMDb}} user by the name of brian__007 took to their forums to complain about how ''The Lord of the Rings'' ripped off ''Film/HarryPotter''. Hilarity Ensued among the Internet, which was quick to point out that ''The Lord of the Rings'' novels were originally published in the 1950s while ''Harry Potter'' began as [[Literature/HarryPotter novels]] in 1997. The original post was eventually deleted, and a sizable group eventually concluded that brian__007 was a {{troll}}. |
| 107 | * The 'pram bouncing down the stairs surrounded by gunfire' scene in ''Film/TheUntouchables'' was a deliberate reference to a similar scene in ''Film/TheBattleshipPotemkin'' from 1925. ''The Untouchables'' wasn't even the first film to reference this; there is a brief shot of a baby carriage bouncing down some stairs during a gun battle in Creator/WoodyAllen's film ''Film/{{Bananas}}''. |
| 108 | ** Also referenced in ''The Godfather'' and ''Brazil'', among others. |
| 109 | * Name a movie about a burn victim, thought to be dead, who exacts his vengeance via the children of those responsible. Now name a movie about a slowly-dying man who comes up with overly elaborate deathtraps for his victims, but sometimes leaves a possible way out. Now name a movie about an extremely creative PoeticSerialKiller who takes his inspiration from a religious sequence. If you answered ''Film/ANightmareOnElmStreet1984'', ''Film/SawI'', and ''Film/{{Se7en}}''... you're wrong (if you thought they were first). The answer to all three is ''Film/TheAbominableDrPhibes'', a Creator/VincentPrice movie from 1971. |
| 110 | ** While it isn't a horror movie, ''Creator/FritzLang'''s ''Film/Fury1936'' employed a similar premise way back in 1936. |
| 111 | * A man is drugged, and awakens in a room with a tape player. The tape informs him that there's a trap in the room, and if he tries to leave, he'll die. If he can disarm the trap within three hours, he'll be permitted to live, but if he fails, he'll die, and if he triggers it, he'll die. I think I [[{{Pun}} saw]] that before, right? Wrong. This is the plot of the 1964 ''[[Series/TheTwilightZone1959 Twilight Zone]]'' episode "The Jeopardy Room", predating ''Franchise/{{Saw}}'' by a full 40 years (39 if you count the short film). |
| 112 | * A kid's doll that comes to life and kills people. Sounds like ''Franchise/ChildsPlay'', right? Wrong. The ''[[Series/TheTwilightZone1959 Twilight Zone]]'' episode "Living Doll" developed this concept a full quarter-century earlier. |
| 113 | * Similarly, TheEighties TV special ''The Electric Grandmother'' (a fixture of the Creator/DisneyChannel back in the day) was actually the second adaptation of Ray Bradbury's short story "I Sing the Body Electric". The first was as an episode of ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959''. |
| 114 | * Overhead shots of ChorusGirls linked in geometrical formations are usually identified with the work of [[BusbyBerkeleyNumber Busby Berkeley]], though they first seem to have been used by French director Robert Florey in the Creator/MarxBrothers film ''Film/TheCocoanuts'', which was filmed in 1929, before Berkeley started working in Hollywood. Audiences applauded the shot when the film was first shown. |
| 115 | * "Your ''[[Film/TheWolfMan2010 Wolfman]]'' [[https://www.themovieblog.com/2010/02/twilight-fan-rips-universal-the-wolfman-is-a-cheap-twilight-ripoff/ ripped off]] ''[[Literature/TheTwilightSaga Twilight]]''." ...um, ahem. The angry letter claims that the new Wolfman movie (2010) is ripping off of Twilight (2008) even though it's a remake of [[Film/TheWolfMan1941 the original movie]] (1941) which drew from the common mythology of werewolves (circa 60 AD). The context of the letter strongly indicates that the writer believes Stephenie Meyer invented werewolves. |
| 116 | ** Speaking of ''Twilight'', a lot of people complain about vampires being sexualized. Vampires are almost always meant to be a metaphor for sexuality, even Dracula in the 1931 movie. |
| 117 | * A film critic claimed (until being called on it) that ''Film/RepoTheGeneticOpera'' was inspired by a 2009 book called ''Repossession Mambo''. This despite the film version of ''Film/RepoTheGeneticOpera'' being released in 2008. There was also the short-film version made in 2006. And these film versions were based on the stage musical version of ''Repo!'', which was created in 2001. That was a union of short operettas that had been performed live in Los Angeles since the late 1990s. You can read the full story (with the pictures to prove it) [[https://web.archive.org/web/20100322194042/http://www.terrancezdunich.com/blog/?p=2804 HERE]]. |
| 118 | ** There was more of the same when ''Film/RepoMen'' (which WAS based on ''Reposession Mambo'' -- the author decided to make a film out of it when it was still being written) was released. |
| 119 | ** The producers of ''Film/RepoMen'' did talk about doing a ''Film/RepoTheGeneticOpera'' movie, under the condition that it wasn't a musical. The creator of ''Genetic Opera'' refused, then ''Repossession Mambo'' was written... So it probably happened the other way around what people actually think. |
| 120 | * ''Film/TransformersRevengeOfTheFallen'' is accused of ripping of ''Film/TheMatrix'' simply because of an artifact called the Matrix Of Leadership. The Matrix was an artifact in the original [[Franchise/TransformersGeneration1 G1]] continuity, 15 years before the Matrix films were ever developed. |
| 121 | ** For that matter, Sam's ability to commune with the All-Spark (itself a reference to ''WesternAnimation/BeastMachines'') calls to mind a storyline from the comic book from the 1980s. |
| 122 | *** The much-criticized "robot heaven" also takes cues from the various interpretations of Transformer afterlife that have been around since the original show. |
| 123 | ** Optimus Prime's alternate mode, much hated by some fans, and character dynamic (somewhat brusque military commander of a small team of Autobots) are far more reminiscent of ''Anime/TransformersArmada'' than the G1 Optimus. |
| 124 | *** The shot of him scanning his alt mode and transforming into it is even a direct homage to the second episode of ''Armada''. |
| 125 | *** His alternate mode also closely resembles Generation 2 Laser Optimus, a longnose Peterbilt that transforms into the commander of the Autobots. |
| 126 | ** Optimus having a mouth under a facemask has been already seen in ''WesternAnimation/BeastWars'' from '96 and ''Anime/TransformersCybertron'' from '04... and in the storybook ''The Great Car Rally'' from ''1984'', the year in which ''Transformers'' has started, as well as in numerous comics from the '80s. Many other characters that "shouldn't" have an actual face, for instance Soundwave, have also had genuine human faces in some early media, and Bumblebee's original toy lacked a mouth, much like movie Bumblebee. |
| 127 | ** Optimus' updated design from ''Film/TransformersAgeOfExtinction'' lacks his signature chest cab windows, causing further complaining. Also been done before, most famously in (again) ''Armada''. |
| 128 | ** The amount of people who complain that the movie designs don't look like Transformers is staggering considering that similarly over-detailed, bizarre looking and often very ugly and monstrous robot designs have been a constant part of the franchise (most famously) since ''Beast Wars'' and (perhaps more obscurely) since the tail-end of G1. Some of the characters from the ''original'' toy lineup even had to be drastically redesigned for the cartoon and comics because they looked too weird. |
| 129 | ** Transformers with beards, beer guts, and cigars in their mouth? All been done before, and overly "humanized" robots have in fact been one of the most discerning aspects of the entire franchise since its conception. On the other end of the spectrum, some viewers are giving the filmmakers a hard time for the inclusion of animal-inspired robots, Dinobots in particular, which have also been a staple of the brand since the beginning. In truth, the live-action movies have barely scratched the surface of the weirdness that lies within the franchise. |
| 130 | ** Some call out the notion of samurai Transformers, in reference to Drift's portrayal from ''Film/TransformersAgeOfExtinction'', as a clear example of how the moviemakers keep "screwing up" the property by introducing ridiculous ideas, unaware that there have been several samurai-based robots in the earlier franchises, and that the various Transformers universes have in fact always closely paralleled all sorts of real-life Earth cultures. |
| 131 | ** One of the all-time biggest complaints fans have against the live-action films is [[TheyChangedItNowItSucks how they keep drifting away from the source material]], renaming characters, changing their looks, personalities, powers or backstories. In truth, the movies are not meant to be adaptations of any previous cartoon or comic series, but their own, separate universe, of which there are incredibly many already -- the ''Transformers'' brand is well known for reinventing itself every couple of years, and some of the iterations have had very little to do with the original series, beyond featuring shape-shifting robots who fight. Also, even the Gen 1 cartoon and comic series have been drastically different, so a lot of characters and concepts had already started out "not being true" to themselves. In some aspects, the live-action films are actually among the most G1-faithful "reinventions" the brand has ever had. |
| 132 | * Many Website/IMDb posters are annoyed that ''Film/StTrinians2TheLegendOfFrittonsGold'' is called "St. Trinian's 2" (meaning the second ''of the current incarnation'') when it's actually the seventh ''Film/StTrinians'' film overall. Although the first came out over fifty years earlier, and the fifth (''The Wildcats of St. Trinian's'') is so legendarily awful that it's no longer available, so ignorance is perhaps excusable. |
| 133 | * Despite what you may think, ''Film/SpeedRacer'' is '''not''' the first American live-action film adapted from an anime or manga series. Neither is ''G-Saviour'', a SoBadItsGood direct to television movie adapted from the Franchise/{{Gundam}} series back in 2000. That goes to ''Manga/{{Guyver}}'', starring Creator/MarkHamill, adapted from the manga/anime series of the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bio_Booster_Armor_Guyver sort-of-same-name]] back in 1991 and still kickin'. |
| 134 | ** While LiveActionAdaptation of manga/anime series (either made by Japanese productions or Hollywood) can be [[AmericansHateTingle polarizing among (North American) anime fans, especially for the younger generations]] ([[MemeticMutation hence, the]] {{Creator/Netflix}} [[MemeticLoser Adaptation]]), but keep in mind that this wasn't a recent phenomenon. [[https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/the-mike-toole-show/2010-12-05 As Mike Toole pointed out, adapting mangas into live-action films or television series goes way to back the genesis of anime itself]]. In fact, some of the early manga-to-live-action-films, such as ''Film/LoneWolfAndCub'' and ''Film/LadySnowblood'' are actually good and [[VindicatedByHistory now considered to be classic Japanese cinema]] (enough to get to be part of Creator/TheCriterionCollection). Not only that, it often overlaps with the Japan's {{toku}}satsu genre as some of toku materials are based of manga series as well. |
| 135 | * Many (though by no means all) of the elements ''Film/GIJoeTheRiseofCobra'' is taken to task for "changing" are actually taken directly from the source material. Examples include the mechanized body armor, Destro being Scottish, the mouth on Snake-Eyes's mask, and the black machine-gunner being named Heavy Duty instead of Roadblock. The thing is, there's a ''lot'' of source material: the armor was from the ''WesternAnimation/GIJoeSigma6'' line; Destro has been Scottish in the comics for decades; Snake-Eyes has had more than a dozen different action figures, several of which had mouths molded into their masks; Heavy Duty's been around since 1991 (and Roadblock himself has been renamed Heavy Duty in the comics due to trademark issues). But most people are only aware of a small portion of the franchise's history (in most cases that's the 80s cartoon) and assume anything they haven't seen before is new to the movie, which (perhaps unwisely) tried to combine elements from as many different eras as possible. |
| 136 | * Who was the first person to say "[[MemeticMutation It's a Trap!]]" in the ''Franchise/StarWars'' movies? First? Wasn't Admiral Ackbar in ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi'' the only one who said it? Actually, it was first said by Princess Leia in ''Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack'', as the Imperials were leading Luke Skywalker into Darth Vader's trap on Cloud City. |
| 137 | ** Likewise, many a fan criticized the “[[SuicideAttack Holdo Maneuver]]” that was first shown on screen in ''Film/TheLastJedi'', questioning why the Rebels never thought to launch smaller ships and the Empire at light speed for such devastating results. There are a number of reasons why this wouldn’t work or at least wouldn’t be practical in universe, but there is actually an example of the Rebels trying this in the Legends continuity. In the fan favorite ''VideoGame/StarWarsBattlefrontII'' no less! |
| 138 | * At least one reviewer took ''Film/ReturnToOz'' to task, for taking Tik-Tok straight out of the ''Franchise/StarWars'' films. Tik-Tok was taken straight out of Creator/LFrankBaum's 1907 novel ''Ozma of Oz'', and is generally considered by literary historians to be the first depiction of a robot in modern literature ''ever''. |
| 139 | ** While Tik-Tok is original to the Oz novels, Creator/ETAHoffmann had a clockwork automaton that was able to pass for human in his short story "Literature/TheSandman1816", which is a clear precursor to the concept of Tik-Tok, though in Hoffmann's case the character does not seem to have any intellect and only utters the phrase "Ah-ah". Oh, and the character is capable of singing and dancing quite well. |
| 140 | *** There have been clockwork (wind-up) toys that looked like animals, soldiers, and so forth since the Middle Ages. To imagine one that was so convincing it passed for human, or a sentient one that lived in a magical world where scarecrows and pumpkin-headed creatures could come to life is not such a big leap. |
| 141 | *** The Jaquet-Droz automata of the 1770s are surprisingly complex real-world examples, including a self-contained, programmable boy who can write up to 40 characters with a quill pen and ink on paper. It's amazing, even by today's standards. |
| 142 | ** The OverlyNarrowSuperlative "first depiction of a robot in modern literature" is there for a reason: fictional artificial beings, often made of metal, had been around for over 2000 years before Tik-Tok. Two prominent examples from Greek mythology are Pandora and Talos. |
| 143 | *** Vulcan/Hephaestus, Blacksmith of the Greek and Roman gods, was famous for making things we would consider "robotic" today, including tables and chairs that could be ordered to walk around and position themselves. |
| 144 | * A film uses a documentary style to cover real-life events without defined characters, dialogue, or even a 'story'. Regardless of this, it conveys a clear ideological message and manages to exhibit some impressive techniques that only film could really display in such a way. It's got to be ''Film/{{Koyaanisqatsi}}'' and its sequels, right? Well, actually it's Dziga Vertov's 1929 Soviet Montage film ''Film/ManWithAMovieCamera''. |
| 145 | ** Or is it? Maybe it's Walter Ruttmann's 1927 film ''Berlin: Symphony of a Great City''. Or maybe it's Charles Sheeler and Paul Strand's 1921 short ''Film/{{Manhatta}}''.) |
| 146 | * The concept of "Vamping Out" (a vampire having two forms: regular human, and vampire human) was credited by Creator/JossWhedon as coming from ''Film/TheLostBoys''. However the vampire in ''Film/FrightNight1985'' had the same ability (notice just how inhuman he looks after he gets stabbed in the hand by a pencil!). This may go all the way back to the Dracula novel, when Mina saw a massive figure feeding on Lucy when she finds her out on the moors, but ended up thinking it was only a trick of the shadows. |
| 147 | * "You talking to me? You talking to me?" Yes, [[Film/TaxiDriver Travis Bickle]] did the talking to the mirror bit but [[Recap/TheTwilightZone1959S2E3NervousManInAFourDollarRoom Jackie Rhoades]] did it first with those lines. |
| 148 | * Imagine a film in which an asteroid is on a collision course with Earth, so a team is sent to drill holes and place explosives in this unwanted visitor, thus saving our planet. That description sounds like ''Film/Armageddon1998'' or ''Film/DeepImpact'' (1998), although in the latter there were differences such as a comet instead of an asteroid. These plot elements are actually much older and can be found in the 1968 film ''Film/TheGreenSlime'', while the concept of preventing a huge celestial body from colliding with Earth goes back at least as far as the 1962 Japanese film ''Film/{{Gorath}}'', although in this film the solution is to ''move the entire Earth out of the way''. |
| 149 | * Many elements of the ''Franchise/StarWars'' Universe that are often assumed to have been invented for the prequels were actually established in books, promotional material, and other sources before the development of Episode I. These include Bail Organa, the planets Kashyyyk and Coruscant, stormtroopers being clones, Palpatine being elected after the previous chancellor was removed from office by the Galactic Senate, Palpatine later abusing emergency powers given to him during a crisis, and Anakin being grievously injured fighting Obi-Wan on a lava planet. |
| 150 | * Let's roll back in time with the idea of dream-hijacking popularized by ''Film/{{Inception}}'': prior to 2010, there was 2006's ''Anime/{{Paprika}}'', 2005's ''VideoGame/{{Psychonauts}}'', 2004's ''Film/EternalSunshineOfTheSpotlessMind'' and 2001's ''[[VisualNovel/{{Tsukihime}} Kagetsu Tohya]]'' and ''VisualNovel/DaCapo'' (minor plot device in the last one, though). It doesn't stop at that: in 2000 there was the original draft of ''Inception'''s script, the original ''Paprika'' novel in 1993 and 2 movies closely released in 1984: ''Film/ANightmareOnElmStreet1984'' and ''Film/{{Dreamscape}}''. Now that's a long retro ride, isn't it? |
| 151 | ** The ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "Frame Of Mind" (1993). |
| 152 | ** And the ''Series/{{Charmed|1998}}'' episode "Dream Sorcerer" (1998). |
| 153 | ** And and that one ''[[Creator/DonRosa Scrooge McDuck]]'' comic... |
| 154 | ** ''Film/DarkCity'' (1998). |
| 155 | ** ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' also did it in "Extreme Measures" (1999). |
| 156 | ** The ''WesternAnimation/MenInBlackTheSeries'' episode "The Elle of my Dreams Syndrome" (1998) |
| 157 | ** And the ''Series/ThePrisoner1967'' episode "A. B. and C." beats all of those by a large margin. |
| 158 | * The premise of ''Film/TradingPlaces'', where two wealthy businessmen bet over whether heredity or environment makes a gentleman, and proving it by taking a bum off the street and making him sophisticated, was previously tackled in Film/TheThreeStooges short "Hoi Polloi". |
| 159 | ** which was taken from Creator/GeorgeBernardShaw's play ''Theatre/{{Pygmalion}}''. |
| 160 | ** ''Trading Places'' also shares elements with Mark Twain's ''Literature/ThePrinceAndThePauper''. |
| 161 | * [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7E9i4KZkzAE Heeeere's Johnny!]] It wasn't intended as anything more than a ShoutOut in ''Film/TheShining'', but became a stolen OlderThanTheyThink quote instead. |
| 162 | * The famous line ''"If it bleeds, we can kill it"'' from ''Film/{{Predator}}'' was earlier phrased (slightly more verbosely) in ''Literature/TheHoundOfTheBaskervilles''. |
| 163 | --> "''If [the hound] was vulnerable he was mortal, and if we could wound him we could kill him.''" |
| 164 | ** On the subject of ''Predator'', it was far from the first film to focus on sentient aliens [[HuntingTheMostDangerousGame hunting humans for sport]], with one notable antecedent for this being ''Film/WithoutWarning1980'' released around seven years earlier (featuring Creator/KevinPeterHall starring as the offending extraterrestrial in both respective cases, no less). |
| 165 | * A Platform/YouTube comment on the ''Film/FrightNight2011'' trailer: ''"This is just a Film/{{Disturbia}} clone with a vampire."'' [[Film/RearWindow So many things]] [[Film/FrightNight1985 wrong with that.]] |
| 166 | * The 1989 film ''Film/DeadCalm'' seems like it's based on an original concept, right? It's actually based on an unfinished Creator/OrsonWelles film called ''The Deep'' which in turn is based on a book, ''Dead Calm'' by Charles Williams. |
| 167 | * Ever wondered why the building-collapsing scene in the 4th-layer dream of ''Film/{{Inception}}'' (2010) is so similar to the self-restoration of the city scene of ''Film/DarkCity'' (1998)? Why? Because they are both homages to the ending of the Manga/{{Akira}} manga (1982-1990). |
| 168 | * Some friends head to Las Vegas for a fun time, and after a night of drunken partying, wake up in their disheveled hotel room to discover they've apparently gotten married to some Vegas cocktail waitresses. As they attempt to make sense of what happened and get out of their new marriages, they face such obstacles as show tigers and a celebrity boxer. The 2009 film ''Film/TheHangover''? I was talking about the 1999 ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' episode "Viva Ned Flanders"! And before then, you had the 1998 film ''Film/VeryBadThings'', which similar to ''The Hangover'' featured a bachelor party in Las Vegas gone wrong and the hilarity ensuing from covering up the evidence (Though ''Film/VeryBadThings'' is [[BlackComedy much, much darker]]). |
| 169 | ** In the same vein, this society has a day where nothing is illegal once a year, with no consequences. ''Film/ThePurge''? No, it's the ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'' episode "A Taste of Freedom"! |
| 170 | * ''Film/ThePurge'' centers around the concept of a 12-hour period of time during which crime is legal and citizens are allowed to do almost anything they want, including pillage, rape, and murder, during this time. The concept, however, dates back to an episode of ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'', "[[Recap/StarTrekS1E21TheReturnOfTheArchons The Return of the Archons]]", when the crew of the ''Enterprise'' arrive on a planet of otherwise docile people who, during a "Festival" that commences on the "Red Hour", act on their baser impulses and commit otherwise inconciable acts of violence and debauchery. This episode even serves as a partial inspiration for ''The Purge'', according to director James [=DeMonaco=]. |
| 171 | * NewMediaAreEvil types would have you think that sex and violence are new to movies. In reality, intense sex and violence have been in movies since the birth of cinema in the late 19th century. In fact, complaints about there being too much sex/violence/etc. in movies were actually what led to MediaNotes/TheHaysCode in the mid-1930s. |
| 172 | * Probably the most common one is people believing that "Revenge is a dish {{best served cold}}" comes from ''Film/StarTrekIITheWrathOfKhan'', misunderstanding a reference to the phrase as claiming it a Klingon proverb. (Actually, a character is only asking what the equivalent Klingon proverb ''is''.) In fact, it's French. (This did not stop the ''Film/KillBill'' movies from identifying it as Klingon, which was most likely an intentional "mistake" on Creator/QuentinTarantino's part.) |
| 173 | ** Probably the first recorded usage occurs in the 1782 novel ''Dangerous Liaisons'' by French author Pierre Choderlos de Laclos. |
| 174 | ** Mario Puzo's 1969 novel "The Godfather" uses "Revenge is a dish best served cold" and identifies it as Italian. This predates the use in "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan" at the very least. |
| 175 | *** Even earlier in film history, in the 1949 Ealing comedy ''Film/KindHeartsAndCoronets'', the narrator and protagonist Louis Mazzini says this: "As in an old Italian proverb: revenge is the dish which people of taste prefer to eat cold." |
| 176 | ** The Klingons seem to be guilty of a lot of this. "Today is a good day to die," comes from the Lakota Nation and their leader Crazy Horse, but is associated with Klingons. {{Proud Warrior Race|Guy}} much? |
| 177 | *** In-joke, [[InTheOriginalKlingon Klingons claim Shakespeare was one of them]], they also claim some of our sayings. |
| 178 | *** Which is another "older than they think" joke. It was done earlier in the movie ''Pimpernel Smith'' (1941), where a German general insists that Shakespeare was German. Smith's comeback? "Yes, how very upsetting. Still, you must admit that the English translations are most remarkable." |
| 179 | *** It's also an ''in''-joke for the franchise, as it's directly analogous to Chekov's TOS habit of [[InTheOriginalKlingon wrongly attributing all sorts of historical inventions and ideas to Russians]]. |
| 180 | ** "From hell's heart I stab at thee..." is originally by Herman Melville (from ''Literature/MobyDick''), but more likely to be quoted now secondhand as a reference to ''Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan''. |
| 181 | *** Khan uses several ''Moby-Dick'' lines in the film. However, this is intended as him consciously quoting the book. He sees himself as analogous to Ahab, a great man injured by a monster (Kirk) who has dedicated his life to the death of said monster. A copy of the book is seen earlier in the film when Chekov and Terrill are searching the shelter on Ceti Alpha 5. Literary allusions are nothing new to the character; in his original appearance he quotes Milton. |
| 182 | *** Cetus is the constellation of the whale. |
| 183 | *** ''Wrath of Khan'' is essentially a feature-length MobySchtick. |
| 184 | ** Referenced, or possibly lampshaded, in the later ''Star Trek'' movies. |
| 185 | --->'''Spock:''' There is an old Vulcan proverb: "Only Nixon could go to China."\ |
| 186 | ''(and)''\ |
| 187 | '''Spock:''' An ancestor of mine once maintained, "Once you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains -- however improbable -- must be the truth." Of course, it's possible that this idea independently originated from someone on Vulcan as well. |
| 188 | *** That last one is partly a joke about how Spock is half-human, so technically one of his ancestors (by implication, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle) did say (or write) that. |
| 189 | *** It may also have been a nod to the fandom, among which it had been widely speculated since 1967 that Spock was related to Sherlock Holmes. Several scholarly essays associated him with the Wold-Newton Family of Creator/PhilipJoseFarmer, which also included Sherlock. |
| 190 | * One complaint about ''Film/StarTrek2009'' was that the romantic relationship between Spock and Uhura was random and came out of nowhere. They forget that in early episodes, Uhura flirted with Spock a couple of times, and the kiss she shared later with Kirk was originally supposed to be between her and Spock. There's also rumours that, had the executives allowed it, a relationship would have developed between them. Fans (at least those not busy creating Kirk/Spock SlashFic) often focused on Uhura as a possible romantic interest for Spock. |
| 191 | ** Also, the very premise for the reboot, [[EveryoneWentToSchoolTogether Kirk and Spock first meeting in Starfleet Academy]]? Per a Starlog magazine from ''1988'', the idea was being kicked around by both ''Franchise/StarTrek'' creator Creator/GeneRoddenberry and ''[[Film/StarTrekIITheWrathOfKhan Star Trek II]]'' director Creator/NicholasMeyer as an alternate universe television series. ''Star Trek II'' producer Harve Bennett wanted to use it for ''[[Film/StarTrekVITheUndiscoveredCountry Star Trek VI]]'', but it was rejected in favor of a story featuring the entire TOS cast (his story would've featured only Creator/WilliamShatner and Creator/LeonardNimoy as Kirk and Spock in the present-day). |
| 192 | * One related to Trek, but not directly part of it; much of the premise and plot of ''Film/GalaxyQuest'' can be traced to a 1967 ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' fanfic called "Visit to a Weird Planet" where a transporter malfunction swaps Shatner, Nimoy, and Kelly with their fictional counterparts in the middle of a crisis, forcing the actors into the bluff of their lives. Swapping actor and character was a small genre of fanfiction more common to the 70's and 80's than today, playing more on the then-unknown status of organized fandom. |
| 193 | * Creator/MarvelComics' ''Film/{{Daredevil|2003}}'' utilized many aspects of the "gritty and realistic" approach to superhero movies about two years before Creator/ChristopherNolan got credit for trying the same approach with ''Film/BatmanBegins'' (though it was much less successful). Aside from the two costumed vigilantes, the movie could easily be mistaken for a gritty crime drama, and it even {{deconstruct|ion}}ed many aspects of superhero stories: Daredevil is shown to be nearly dependent on painkillers because of his injuries from fighting criminals, his HonorBeforeReason tendencies have left his legal practice struggling because he refuses to represent wealthy men who he knows to be guilty, and [[spoiler:though he triumphs over his archenemy, he ultimately fails to save his love interest, Elektra]]. |
| 194 | * A young boy, heartbroken by the death of his beloved dog, resorts to crackpot science to re-animate his beloved pet. If you think it's the animated film ''WesternAnimation/{{Frankenweenie}}'', or even the original live-action short, that first used this, you're several decades off: Dr. Robert Cornish wrote and starred in ''Life Returns'', based on his RealLife experiments in adrenaline-triggered resuscitation, in 1935. |
| 195 | * The 2002 film ''Film/JasonX'' took Jason to space. However, the JustForFun/RecycledInSpace idea was done as a parody first in a 1995 episode of ''Series/{{MADtv|1995}}'' (which combined ''Franchise/FridayThe13th'' with the plot of ''Film/{{Apollo 13}}''). |
| 196 | * After the success of ''Film/TheHungerGames'' in 2012, the Japanese film ''Literature/BattleRoyale'' was given a belated North American DVD/Blu-ray release. Some uninformed fans claimed Battle Royale was a rip-off of ''Hunger Games'', even though the film and the novel it was based on predates ''Hunger Games'' by a number of years. |
| 197 | * 2012's Best Picture Oscar winner ''Film/TheArtist'' was a beautiful love letter to old Hollywood, but its plot was virtually identical to that of ''Film/SinginInTheRain''. The idea of [[spoiler:inserting unexpected sound elements into an otherwise-silent film]] was also not completely original as Creator/CharlieChaplin had done something similar in ''Film/ModernTimes'' and in fact ''Film/TheJazzSinger'' did it too. |
| 198 | * ''Film/TheStraightStory'' is often labelled as Creator/DavidLynch's one non-maddening movie. While it is playing against type (being a simple G-rated Disney movie as opposed to the more surreal and unnerving MindScrew films he is famous for making), it is not the first time he made a film that was meant to have a comprehensible story, having directed ''Film/TheElephantMan'' back in 1980, ''Film/{{Dune|1984}}'' in 1984, and ''Film/BlueVelvet'' in 1986. However it ''is'' still incredibly mellow even compared to the aforementioned movies. |
| 199 | * A lot of reviewers and people who watched ''Film/ANightmareOnElmStreet2010'' praised the introduction of micro-naps to the series as a clever invention. They were actually introduced in ''Film/FreddyVsJason'', in which Lori's father briefly morphs into Freddy in broad daylight when she's sleep-deprived. |
| 200 | * There is a scene in ''Film/TheFly1986'' where Jeff Goldblum describes himself as an insect who dreamed he was a man. This was intended as a Chuang Tzu reference, but many people just thought he was referring to the "unsettling dreams" in Kafka's "Metamorphosis". |
| 201 | * ''Franchise/DCExtendedUniverse'': |
| 202 | ** ''Film/ManOfSteel'': |
| 203 | *** [[spoiler:Superman kills Zod, which some might think is a dark, new direction for the character, but it's actually been done before in Superman Vol. 2 #22 (the end of ''ComicBook/TheSupergirlSaga'') and to all appearances in ''Film/SupermanII''.]] |
| 204 | *** A lot of stuff that several reviewers have credited (or accused) ''Man of Steel'' of adding to the Superman mythos are actually from the comics, such as Superman's "S" symbol being the Kryptonian symbol meaning "hope",[[note]]Marlon Brando is credited with the original idea of the "S" symbol actually being the El family crest.[[/note]] Kryptonians being DesignerBabies, one of the Kryptonians being a MadScientist (the character is named [[AllThereInTheManual in the credits]] as Jax-Ur, a character dating back to 1961), Superman being treated with fear and distrust from some people, and even Kryptonian dragons. |
| 205 | ** ''Film/BirdsOfPrey2020'': |
| 206 | *** People have criticized the casting of Creator/JurneeSmollett as Characters/BlackCanary due to the character being white and well as "being" blonde. Except one: ''ComicBook/FirstWaveDCComics'' ''did'' do a RaceLift on Black Canary prior to this and two: canonically, Black Canary ''isn't'' a natural blonde; she's a noirette who, depending on the era, uses a wig or bleach to achieve the blonde look. |
| 207 | *** The lack of a mask on Black Mask and his fashion sense (wearing a white jacket and pants with Hawaiian shirts) was likewise criticized -- with likewise a prior basis. The depiction of ''WesternAnimation/BatmanUnderTheRedHood'' dressed in similar clothes. Additionally, the SkullForAHead look Sionis has been depicted with since ''ComicBook/BatmanNoMansLand'' in the comics actually ''isn't'' a mask (despite ''WesternAnimation/TheBatman'' and the ''VideoGame/BatmanArkhamSeries'' presenting it as such), but Sionis's actual face, the result of him cutting off the mask fused to his face in ''ComicBook/BatmanNoMansLand''. |
| 208 | * Many fans think ''Film/PacificRim'' is based off of ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'', while Del Toro has explicitly stated that he had never seen the series and was basing the film off older {{super robot|genre}} shows he had seen in his youth. His co-writer Travis Beacham might have been familiar with EVA and included some references, but the point that it's a more general genre homage still stands. What some fans also forget is that "Humans piloting robots to fight giant monsters" was already a thriving anime genre as far back as TheSeventies, with ''Manga/GetterRobo'' and ''Anime/MazingerZ'' being two of the most prominent examples. EVA and ''Pacific Rim'' are both intentional homages to those kinds of older shows. |
| 209 | * With the release of the 2014 ''Film/{{Godzilla|2014}}'' reboot, some people (mostly from countries where [[NoExportForYou the Japanese films haven't been released]]) are expressing their surprise (and in some cases bitter disappointment) upon finding out that Franchise/{{Godzilla}} was not, in fact, [[Film/{{Godzilla1998}} created by]] Creator/RolandEmmerich. Even if they are aware of the franchise's Japanese roots, a few still see the fact that the monster does battle with other giant creatures as a unique direction, at times comparing it to more recent "monster VS monster" flicks (like ''Film/MegaSharkVsGiantOctopus''), even though he's been doing that in nearly every movie since 1955's ''Film/GodzillaRaidsAgain''. Likewise, his ability to shoot radioactive breath comes as a surprise to many who grew up on the 1998 film. |
| 210 | ** Gigan's eye beam debuted in ''Godzilla Island'', a whole 6 or so years ''before'' ''[[Film/GodzillaFinalWars Final Wars]]'' did it. And the general concept of Godzilla, a prehistoric monster attacking a city, dates all the way back to 1925, with the first film version of ''Film/TheLostWorld''. |
| 211 | ** The original 1954 film wasn't even the first time a giant lizard-like monster emerged from the ocean to attack Tokyo. In 1947, some staff of the WVTR radio station in Tokyo reportedly played a prank where they claimed to be receiving reports of a 20-foot tall lizard monster that had emerged from Tokyo Bay and was besieging the city, the military's efforts to stop it proving futile. About an hour into the broadcast, one of their on scene reporters approaches the monster...which promptly congratulated them on the fifth anniversary of their station, revealing it to be a big joke. Newspapers at the time reported that the radio play caused mass hysteria in the city, and while this is almost certainly exaggerated like the 1938 War of the Worlds radio play before it, it did lead to the men involved being fired for the stunt. |
| 212 | ** [[spoiler:There are people who draw parallels with ''WesternAnimation/GodzillaTheSeries'' due to the titular monster's somewhat heroic portrayal in the 2014 film, unaware that a lot of the original movies (and [[WesternAnimation/TheGodzillaPowerHour a previous animated adaption]]) have already covered that ground.]] |
| 213 | ** The script for ''Film/GodzillaVsBiollante'' was pitched as part of a create-a-script contest by Toho, but what many people don't know is that the contest winner first wrote his script when he was 16 and originally pitched it as part of a similar contest for 1971's ''Series/ReturnOfUltraman''. That early version of the script ended up becoming the 34th episode of the show, in which Ultraman Jack battles a giant {{planimal}} created by a scientist. |
| 214 | * There are comedy {{Mockumentary}} films older than ''Film/ThisIsSpinalTap''. For example from 1972 is Creator/TheBBC TV movie [[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0421744/ The Black Safari]] where a crew of native African adventurers are followed by a camera crew as they explore the darkest corners of [[OopNorth Northern England]]. |
| 215 | * ''Film/{{Inception}}'' isn't the first film to use the distinctive horn sound, but it's the one that stands out to the mainstream, to the point that many other instances are accused of ripping it off. |
| 216 | * A big reason why ''Film/Dune1984'' took so long to come out and was changed so vastly from the book was because the various producers and writers involved were worried about being called a Franchise/StarWars ripoff. Frank Herbert still considered the end product pretty faithful to [[Literature/{{Dune}} the book]]. |
| 217 | * "KlaatuBaradaNikto" is obviously a reference to 1992's ''Film/ArmyOfDarkness'', even when used in ''Film/TheDayTheEarthStoodStill1951''. |
| 218 | * ''Film/XMenDaysOfFuturePast'' introduced mainstream audiences to the character of Blink, whose power is essentially to create portals. Of course, this resulted in many people saying the character must've clearly been inspired by the video game ''VideoGame/{{Portal}}'', even though the character Blink predates that game by over a ''decade''. |
| 219 | * Many people think ''Film/TheSixthSense'' was the first movie to employ the [[spoiler:DeadAllAlong]] twist ending; in fact, as that trope page indicates, this plot device goes back a long way. WordOfGod has stated that he got the idea from a 1994 episode of ''Series/AreYouAfraidOfTheDark''. |
| 220 | ** Which in turn got the idea from the 1976 James Herbert story, "The Survivor". |
| 221 | * ''Film/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles2014'': |
| 222 | ** Shredder's armor has received some nasty scrutiny from certain portions of the fanbase, with such comments that they turned him into "[[Film/TransformersFilmSeries a Transformer]]", no doubt inspired by Creator/MichaelBay's involvement as producer -- even though it's plainly obvious the character is simply wearing full-body PoweredArmor, the design of which recalls the Shredder of the [[WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles2003 2003 animated series]]. Some shots of the [[RooftopConfrontation rooftop battle]] even show that his arms are exposed, just like nearly every older version. |
| 223 | ** There were also complaints over Shredder not being Japanese. Considering that the Shredder has been [[WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles2003 an alien, a demonic abomination and a woman]], this is hardly the most drastic change to his character. And it turns out, [[spoiler:he ''is'' Japanese.]] |
| 224 | ** Having the Turtles and Splinter [[spoiler:be lab animals who April already knew back then]] is similar to the [[ComicBook/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtlesIDW IDW Comics continuity]], though with its own twists. |
| 225 | ** Foot Soldiers relying heavily on firearms as opposed to martial arts training and stealth like what is typically expected of ninja also recalls [[WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles1987 the incarnations depicted in the original animated series]], who on the basis of being robots were used repeatedly as CannonFodder. |
| 226 | ** Some people complained about the use of ToiletHumour being added for the 2014 movie, even though it's been common in the franchise since the 2000s, with that type of humor being used in the [[WesternAnimation/{{TMNT}} 2007 film]], the [[WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles2012 2012 cartoon]], and even the DarkerAndEdgier [[WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles2003 2003 cartoon]]. |
| 227 | * ''Film/{{Annie 2014}}'': |
| 228 | ** A lot of people complain about Sandy the dog being changed to a Shiba Inu. Sandy in the original ''ComicStrip/LittleOrphanAnnie'' comics is almost always a large, orange or reddish-brown dog with pointed ears and a white muzzle. The new dog is more true to the source than the Otterhound Sandy from [[Film/{{Annie1982}} the 80s film]]. |
| 229 | ** This isn't the first modern version of Annie -- the comic had spent much of its last two decades abandoning its UnintentionalPeriodPiece trappings before it ended. |
| 230 | * Despite comparisons to ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaLordsOfShadow'', ''Film/DraculaUntold'' might have more in common with the ''Dracula: Vlad the Impaler'' comic book series published by Topps in 1993 ([[http://www.crazyedscomics.com/content/dracula-vlad-impaler-set-1-3-plus-bonus-cards see here]]), detailing the life of the historical Vlad before he became a vampire. |
| 231 | * ''WesternAnimation/TheBookOfLife'' has more than a few similarities with ''Theatre/OnceOnThisIsland''; albeit with a Mexican gender-flip. |
| 232 | * In ''Film/APerfectMurder'', Creator/DavidSuchet plays Mohamed "Mo" Karaman, a Muslim immigrant who fled the war to refuge in the United States and becomes an NYPD homicide detective. This is not the first time that he has played a foreign detective, as his backstory bears some striking resemblance to that of Literature/HerculePoirot, a role that Suchet first played in the 1989 British TV series ''Creator/AgathaChristie's Series/{{Poirot}}''. |
| 233 | * Most people associate the MirrorRoutine with the Creator/MarxBrothers, who did it in ''Film/DuckSoup'' (1933). But even they were just using a standard vaudeville routine that Creator/MaxLinder did on screen first in "Seven Years Bad Luck" (1921). |
| 234 | * Homer Simpson's "D'oh!" actually originated from actor James Finlayson in the Creator/LaurelAndHardy who used it in the same context, but said it much slower and longer. |
| 235 | * Many fans of the 1994 movie ''The Little Rascals'' are unaware of [[Film/TheLittleRascals the film series that it was based on]]. |
| 236 | * ''Film/{{Cinderella 2015}}'': |
| 237 | ** "Lavender's Blue" is an actual folk-song, and made an appearance in an earlier Disney film ''So Dear To My Heart'' (1948). |
| 238 | ** Several previous adaptations have had Cinderella meet the Prince before the ball, such as the 1965 and 1997 [[Theatre/CinderellaRodgersAndHammerstein Rodgers and Hammerstein telefilms]], the modern-day adaptation ''Film/ACinderellaStory'', and the Muppet version, ''Film/HeyCinderella''. And of course, the scene with the stag was actually based on a cut scene from [[WesternAnimation/{{Cinderella}} the original animated film]]. One should not forget ''Film/EverAfter'' either, where almost the entire relationship between Danielle (this version's Cinderella) and the Prince occurs before the ball. |
| 239 | ** This is also not the first ''Cinderella'' film to have black characters; [[ColorblindCasting the 1997 version went above and beyond just one]]. |
| 240 | ** Cinderella [[spoiler:singing alerting the Captain and the Prince that there is another girl in the house locked in the attic]] could be a reference to Jetlag's animated version of the story, the Nollywood film version, or possibly Walter de La Mare's version (the line "Has your cat learned to sing?" is similar to his "Has the pump learned English?"). |
| 241 | ** Cinderella's actual name being Ella and the "Cinder" being an insulting prefix appears in many adaptations, as well as the original tale. |
| 242 | * Some may think that the anime ''Anime/AttackOnTitan'' and its [[Film/AttackOnTitan2015 film adaptation]] invented the notion of giant monsters who resemble disfigured or mutated humans, but the idea shows up in some ''far'' older films. Namely, ''Film/TheAmazingColossalMan'' and its sequel, ''Film/WarOfTheColossalBeast,'' ''Film/TheCyclops,'' ''Film/FrankensteinConquersTheWorld'' and its sequel, ''Film/WarOfTheGargantuas''. Bonus points to ''Frankenstein Conquers the World'' for giving its monster regenerative abilities similar to the Titans, and to ''Gargantuas'' for having one of the titular beasts feed primarily on human flesh. |
| 243 | * Picture a scene where the hero is kicking back and relaxing when an unsavory character shows up, points a gun at him, then starts giving a big speech about killing him, only to be interrupted by the hero casually blowing a hole in his chest with an out-of-sight handgun. You're likely thinking of the Han vs. Greedo scene in ''[[Film/ANewHope Star Wars]]'', but that exact setup showed in ''Film/TheGoodTheBadAndTheUgly'' about a decade earlier. The only key differences are that Tuco is taking a bath and has his gun hidden in the bubbles, whereas as Han is holding his under a table, and that there's no [[GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion special edition]] where Tuco lets the bad guy shoot first. |
| 244 | ** Slightly more obscure, but even older, Creator/JohnFord's ''Film/CheyenneAutumn'' features a similar scene where Creator/JamesStewart (as Wyatt Earp) shoots an outlaw's foot with a concealed derringer while playing poker. There's even a shot of Stewart fumbling for his gun under the table like Han reaching for his blaster. Lucas is a major John Ford fan so its likely he kept this in mind, since Han Solo was intended to be a Space Cowboy. |
| 245 | ** The idea of a villain being so cool that he ends up stealing the film from the male and female leads, spawns a spinoff franchise that deals with his origins, and who also causes an ethical dilemma for the hero out of a personal bond often strikes many as being Darth Vader's thing in ''Franchise/StarWars'', but before Vader, the most iconic example of that kind of villain from cinema was Harry Lime from ''Film/TheThirdMan'' played by Creator/OrsonWelles. A villain who [[EvilIsCool is so cool]], that the audience ends up [[RootingForTheEmpire rooting]] for him and [[DracoInLeatherPants sympathizing]] with his eloquent justifications, who is also a FallenHero who comes to blows with his best friend. That's true for both Lime and later Vader, complete with a spin-off radio show and a number of novels, which are prequels dealing with his adventures before ''The Third Man'' showing how he went from the relatively decent man Holly Martins remembered to the scoundrel we see in the movie. Lime also tries to get Holly to join him by preaching his own amoral philosophy much like Vader does to Luke. The fact that Welles was one of Lucas' first choices for Vader's voice is likely not an accident, since Lucas admired Welles as both actor and director, and ''The Third Man'' was a huge commercial hit in the late '40s and '50s and easily the most commercially successful movie Welles ever appeared in, and the radio spin-off (where Welles voices Lime again) was similarly successful. |
| 246 | * Despite the generally positive reception to ''Film/{{Thor}}'', some fans criticized the movie for DoingInTheWizard by implying that Asgardians were actually {{Sufficiently Advanced Alien}}s that [[AncientAstronauts early Europeans mistook for gods]]. Creator/WarrenEllis actually introduced the very same idea in the comics over 15 years prior, and it later wound up being reused in the {{Elseworld}} story ''Comicbook/{{Earth X}}''. |
| 247 | * Creator/SergioLeone synthesized the plots and attitudes of many American Westerns rather than creating something completely new. Although Leone happily acknowledged his inspirations, viewers and critics often credited him with innovations he never claimed for himself. |
| 248 | ** To start, Leone did not invent the Spaghetti Western. His own father Vincenzo (alias Roberto Roberti) directed one in the silent era, ''The Indian Vampire'', which also starred Leone's mother Bice Valerian. The genre was already gaining steam before Leone due to the collapse of the SwordAndSandal genre in Italy, a succession of German "Sauerkraut Westerns" based on the Winnetou novels and the popularity of American Westerns in postwar Italy.[[note]]How popular? Howard Hawks' ''Film/RioBravo'' was the highest-grossing movie ever released in Italy prior to Leone's ''Film/ForAFewDollarsMore''.[[/note]] Leone did, however, provide the Spaghetti Western with a unique style and GreyAndGrayMorality as opposed to merely aping the mood and tone of American Westerns. Leone disliked critics claiming that he "invented" the genre, once asking an interviewer "how many sons of bitches do you think I've spawned?" |
| 249 | ** Film critics often point out that Leone's films which are often seen as emblematic of the "revisionist Western" was merely repackaging several films made in TheFifties (the true Golden Age of TheWestern). Compare for instance, Robert Aldrich's ''Film/VeraCruz'', with treasure-hunting American gunfighters double-crossing each other in French-occupied Mexico, to ''Film/TheGoodTheBadAndTheUgly'' which has a similar plot set in the American Civil War. ''Film/ForAFewDollarsMore'' borrows its concept of a revenge killer showing victims his pocket watch from ''The Bravados'' with Creator/GregoryPeck. Leone's signature duster jackets showed up in several Creator/JohnFord movies, especially ''Film/MyDarlingClementine''. Leone's iconic close-up of actors in widescreen frames (known as "Beeg Eyes") was there in Creator/SamuelFuller's ''Forty Guns'' shot in glorious black-and-white Cinemascope. |
| 250 | ** ''Film/OnceUponATimeInTheWest'' was arguably nothing ''but'' a huge collection of homages to classic Westerns, from ''Film/HighNoon'' to ''Seven Men From Now''. Leone admitted as much and he told his screenwriters to think accordingly. The famous gimmick of casting Creator/HenryFonda against type as a bad guy was prefigured by Creator/JohnFord who made him a Custer {{Expy}} in ''Film/FortApache'' (and likewise calls dibs on demolishing Custer's legend before ''Film/LittleBigMan''). Leone was also not the first Ford fanboy to reconfigure Westerns. Creator/AkiraKurosawa's classic samurai picture ''{{Film/Yojimbo}}'' was redressed in cowboy hats to become ''Film/AFistfulOfDollars'' and Leone got sued accordingly by Kurosawa. |
| 251 | ** Likewise, some have credited Leone's films for introducing greater violence in Westerns, but already in TheFifties you had Creator/AnthonyMann whose films had characters hurling scissors into the face of enemies, had Creator/JimmyStewart's hands shot badly by the bad guy, and much brutal violence and shootings, so much so that film critic Manny Farber nicknamed him "Tin Can [[Creator/MarquisDeSade De Sade]]". |
| 252 | ** In many cases Westerns made in TheFifties were more sophisticated than Leone, whose films never dealt with politics (such as Native American displacement and other issues of gun violence and race/gender politics).[[note]]The exception was ''Film/AFistfulOfDynamite'', which is largely a commentary on European radical politics disguised as a Western.[[/note]] ''Film/JohnnyGuitar'' is today identified as the first avant-garde Western in that it had female cowboys, bright candy coloured outfits, subverted the black-hat and white-hat dynamic, had a real anti-authoritarian bent. |
| 253 | ** ''Film/McCabeAndMrsMiller'' by Creator/RobertAltman turned many heads in TheSeventies for being a Western set in snowbound landscapes, with many noting that Westerns are usually set in hot arid landscapes. But snowbound westerns do exist in the classic era: Anthony Mann's ''The Far Country'', Andre [=DeToth=]'s ''Day of the Outlaw'' and even Creator/JohnFord's ''Film/TheSearchers'' has a scene in a snowy region during the time passes montage (it's also where Creator/JohnWayne mouths the iconic "turning of the earth" speech). Likewise a few years before Altman, there's the famous spaghetti western ''Film/TheGreatSilence'' by Sergio Corbucci which was also a downer of a film set in a bleak snowclad landscape. |
| 254 | * ''Film/BigTroubleInLittleChina'' actually predates many of the titles audiences might think it's referencing, as Robin Laws points out in ''Literature/BlowingUpTheMovies'': |
| 255 | --> Creator/TsuiHark's {{Wuxia}} [[GenreTurningPoint game-changer]] ''Film/ZuWarriorsFromTheMagicMountain'' (1982) exists as a reference at this point, along with such early kung fu ghost comedies as ''Close Encounters of the Spooky Kind'' (1980, Creator/SammoHung) and ''The Dead and the Deadly'' (1982, Wu Ma). But as the film is being written (...) most of the HK supernatural fu classics have yet to be made. No ''Film/MrVampire'' (q.v.), no ''Film/AChineseGhostStory'' (q.v.), no ''Film/{{Swordsman}}'' (1990, credited to King Hu). The western fandom for HK films extant in 1986 revolves around Creator/BruceLee, Creator/ShawBrothers chop socky, and real-world martial arts practice. It sure isn't ready for lightning-throwing warriors or ghostly sorcerors. Accordingly, ''Big Trouble'' flops on its theatrical release, joining the roster of [[CultClassic fan favourites that slowly grows its popularity on home video.]] |
| 256 | * It's largely assumed that color films began in TheSixties or that ''Film/TheWizardOfOz'' was the first technicolor film. The first full-length film in color was the silent film ''Film/TheTollOfTheSea'' from 1922. |
| 257 | * The death of [[spoiler:Han Solo]] in ''Film/TheForceAwakens'' was actually suggested by [[spoiler:Harrison Ford]] when filming ended on ''Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack''. |
| 258 | * [[SplashOfColor Selective color]] (that trick where certain objects are in color while the rest of the film is in black and white) is generally thought of as a modern effect that is achieved digitally for movies like ''Film/SchindlersList'' and ''Film/SinCity'', but the effect was actually achieved as early as the 1910s using the complex Handschiegl dye process. The most famous example of this is the Phantom's billowing red cloak in ''Film/ThePhantomOfTheOpera1925''; others, better known to film historians than the general public, are Creator/ErichVonStroheim's 1924 ''{{Film/Greed}}'', in which gold, money and other objects of the titular obsession were tinted, well, gold, and Creator/SergeiEisenstein's ''Film/TheBattleshipPotemkin'' with its red flag. Creator/WilliamCastle created his own low-tech method in 1959 for ''Film/TheTingler'', which consisted of painting the sets and actors in various shades of grey, then splashing bright red blood everywhere. |
| 259 | * Many of the "new ideas" Creator/PeterJackson's ''Film/KingKong2005'' is credited with when compared to the [[Film/KingKong1933 original film]] actually date back to the [[Film/KingKong1976 1976 remake]]. Carl Denham is sleazy and borders on being villainous, more like Fred Wilson from the 1976 than the Denham of the original. Ann develops a soft spot for Kong and is able to communicate with and control him like Dwan could in the 1976 film, while the original Ann hates Kong and never manages to calm him down. The 2005 and 1976 Jacks are both somewhat effeminate intellectuals who aren't supposed to be on the ship while the 1933 Jack was a rugged, masculine sailor. Kong himself is sort of a gentle giant who can be pushed too far in both remakes, while in the original he's almost always on the rampage. |
| 260 | * ''Film/Deadpool2016'': |
| 261 | ** Several interviews with the cast and crew had them referencing Deadpool being pansexual with Creator/RyanReynolds even saying he hoped Deadpool could have a boyfriend in the sequel. A lot of fans erupted in anger over this, claiming that they changed his sexuality for the movie, but in truth Deadpool was confirmed as being attracted to men in the comics years ago. Thor, Cable, Wiccan and Hulkling are just a few of the men he's openly had a crush on. |
| 262 | ** Wade's joke that, with three ''Film/{{Taken}}'' movies released, at some point you have to wonder if it's just bad parenting. Three years before ''Film/Deadpool2016'', [[http://www.mtv.com/news/2814981/liam-neeson-taken-3-2/ Liam Neeson said almost the same thing]]. |
| 263 | ** A surprisingly large number of fans thought this was the first superhero movie that was rated R. The concept of an R-rated superhero movie has been around at least since the '90s with movies such as ''Film/TheCrow1994'' and ''Film/{{Spawn|1997}}''. Even a few years ago, comic fans got an R-rated ''ComicBook/{{Watchmen}}'' movie as well as ''Film/KickAss''. Then, you have non-comicbook based superhero movies such as ''Film/{{Super}}'' or ''Film/{{Defendor}}'' which are R-rated. No-one can even say this is the first Marvel movie to get an R-Rating (hello, ''Film/{{Blade|1998}}''). |
| 264 | * ''Film/TheNewMutants'' isn't the first Marvel horror movie; that honor goes to ''Film/Blade1998''. However, this is the closest we will ever get to a traditional HauntedHouse horror movie made by Creator/MarvelComics. |
| 265 | * Complaints about Max being "sidelined" in ''Film/MadMaxFuryRoad'' tend to neglect that both ''Film/MadMax2TheRoadWarrior'' and ''Film/MadMaxBeyondThunderdome'' also featured Max as a SupportingProtagonist who has to choose a side in someone else's conflict. |
| 266 | ** When ''Fury Road'' was released in Japan, younger viewers thought it was copying ''Manga/{{Fist of the North Star}}''. Actually, it's the other way around. |
| 267 | * The notion of the TorturePorn film -- that is, a movie that exists primarily to show people being painfully tortured and killed in graphic detail -- is often credited to modern movies like ''Film/SawI'' and ''Film/{{Hostel}}'', but it dates back to 1963's ''Film/BloodFeast'', which popularized such movies amongst drive-in audiences in the days before the [=MPAA=] came about. |
| 268 | * The movie ''Film/WhatWomenWant'' is about a guy with socializing problems gaining the ability to read minds, using it to improve his social standing, then losing the ability, but gaining true love in return. So is Creator/ETAHoffmann's novel ''[[http://manybooks.net/titles/hoffmannet3222332223-8.html Master Flea]]'', 1822. |
| 269 | * Some people criticized the casting of Creator/TomHolland as [[Characters/MarvelComicsPeterParker Spider-Man]] in ''Film/CaptainAmericaCivilWar'', saying that Marvel was trying too hard to make the character YoungerAndHipper. Spider-Man was a teenager when he first started off in the comics and for the entirety of ''Comicbook/UltimateSpiderMan'', as well as the original Creator/SamRaimi ''Film/SpiderMan1'' movie (though he graduated high school midway through the film) and the first ''[[Film/TheAmazingSpiderMan Amazing Spider-Man]]''. It's just that thanks to the DawsonCasting, people tend to remember the previous cinematic Spider-Men as being much older. |
| 270 | * The ''very first'' Franchise/UniversalHorror film? It's not ''Film/TheHunchbackOfNotreDame1923'' or ''Film/ThePhantomOfTheOpera1925''; it's the silent movie ''The Werewolf'', released in 1913. (It's also the first werewolf movie with a female werewolf. Unfortunately, it no longer exists due to a fire at Universal Studios in 1924.) |
| 271 | * Young hotshot Oscar-winning Italian-American director gets a major studio to greenlight his ambitious dream project. The perfectionist filmmaker runs way behind schedule and puts the film over budget. The studio, concerned that the project might threaten its very existence, starts to [[ExecutiveMeddling meddle]] in the film. The director delivers an initial cut in excess of 5 hours. The studio urges him to trim the film and he finally gets it down to 3.5 hours. A preview screening of that cut bombs horribly, and the studio takes the film away from the director and re-edits it on its own. ''Film/HeavensGate''? Or minus a few of the specifics, ''Film/ApocalypseNow''? No, Creator/FrankCapra's ''Film/LostHorizon'' in 1937. |
| 272 | ** Creator/FrankCapra wasn't even the first Italian-American film-maker, that honour goes to Creator/FrankBorzage who was one of the biggest film-makers of TheRoaringTwenties and the early-30s (on account of his frankness in dealing with sexuality, he didn't make many notable films beyond the Pre-Code Era with a few exceptions, chiefly his FilmNoir ''Moonrise''). |
| 273 | ** The first Italian-American star was Richard Conte who appeared in many crime films, FilmNoir and other films of TheForties and TheFifties. One of those films was a movie by Creator/JosephLMankiewicz called ''House of Strangers'' where he's the younger son of a corrupt Italian-American patriarch who wants [[EvilParentsWantGoodKids him to be good]], gets called out for assimilating into [[WhiteAngloSaxonProtestant WASP]] America by his fellow brothers, and the entire story is a metaphor for Italian-American immigration. Conte's casting as Barzini in ''Film/TheGodfather'' was very much a {{Homage}}. |
| 274 | * Some people ([[PoesLaw with varying degrees of seriousness]]) treated ''Film/{{Black Panther|2018}}'' as "the first black superhero movie." This ignores ''Film/{{Spawn|1997}}'' and the ''[[Film/BladeTrilogy Blade]]'' trilogy, as well as less auspicious ones like ''Film/{{Steel}}'' and ''Film/Catwoman2004''. As a nod to this, the ''WebAnimation/HowItShouldHaveEnded'' episode for ''Black Panther'' ended with Blade emerging to challenge T'Challa for the throne. |
| 275 | -->'''Blade:''' Time for the Daywalker to take back his day! |
| 276 | * During TheNewTens, popular review aggregate site ''Website/RottenTomatoes'' has come under fire for its use of "Fresh" and "Rotten" labels to describe a film's quality, which some filmmakers and studio executives have derided as being reductionist and unfair. Despite this, the use of shorthand for grading movies is by no means a new development. As ''The New York Times'' [[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/07/business/media/rotten-tomatoes-box-office.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur pointed out]], similar accusations were made against ''Series/SiskelAndEbert'' back in the 1980's over their use of "Thumbs up" and "Thumbs down" ratings, while backlash over the use of a star system to grade movies dates ''at least'' back to the late 1920's. |
| 277 | * 2015's ''Film/{{Carol}}'' is mistaken for a modern '50s PeriodPiece. In actuality, the original novel was contemporary. ''Literature/ThePriceOfSalt'' was written in 1952. It predates the rise of queer romance novels by several decades. |
| 278 | * A movie starring a RagtagBunchOfMisfits who team up to stop someone named Loki from destroying the world. That's ''Film/TheAvengers2012'', right? Nope -- ''Film/{{Dogma}}'' did it all the way back in 1999. |
| 279 | * ''Film/RamboLastBlood'': Contrary to what many critics believe, the idea of Rambo fighting against sex traffickers near the U.S.-Mexico border and saving a girl from them wasn't inspired by the politics of the late '10s. It actually dates back to 2009, shortly after filming for ''Film/RamboIV'' wrapped up. |
| 280 | * ''Film/ETTheExtraTerrestrial'', from 1982, is usually considered the TropeCodifier for ProductPlacement as it exists in movies today, with obvious plugs for products done as a mutually-beneficial tie-in between the movie and the product. The sales of Reese's Pieces shot through the roof after being featured in the film. [[note]] Ironically, the filmmakers ''never'' intended to specially highlight Reese's Pieces; they were originally going to use [=M&Ms=] (which were, according to the novel, meant to be what inspired E.T. to discover the Speak-And-Spell, seeing the "M" from the candy on the keyboard), but replaced them with Reese's Pieces because Mars Inc. didn't want their flagship candy to be associated with aliens[[/note]] But the practice goes all the way back to the beginning of Hollywood. ''Film/{{Wings|1927}}'', the first [[MediaNotes/AcademyAwardwinners Best Picture]] winner, had a conspicuous close-up of the wrapper of a Hershey chocolate bar a character was eating. ''Film/ItsAWonderfulLife'' features cameos by ''Magazine/NationalGeographic'' and a Coca-Cola sign. The {{Trope Maker|s}} for companies paying to be featured in a movie is 1949's ''Film/LoveHappy''. The cash-strapped production solicited products like Wheaties and Baby Ruth to be featured on billboards in the background of a rooftop chase scene. |
| 281 | * While the Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse is the most popular SharedUniverse, it wasn't the first. That title goes to Universal Studios's Franchise/UniversalHorror in the 1940s with crossovers like ''Film/FrankensteinMeetsTheWolfMan'' and ''Film/HouseOfFrankenstein'', the latter of which starred Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster, and the Wolf Man. Likewise, Toho Studios have been making interconnected Kaiju movies since the 1960s when they started bringing in Rodan and Mothra into the Showa-era Franchise/{{Godzilla}} movies. |
| 282 | * ''Film/WonderWoman2017'': |
| 283 | ** German soldiers wear the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stahlhelm Stahlhelm]] instead of the pointy [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pickelhaube Pickelhaube]] more often associated with World War I, thus leading some lazy observers to think this was set in World War II from the trailers and that she was beating up ThoseWackyNazis. The Pickelhaube was phased out in 1916 in favor of the Stahlhelm[[note]](as the name indicates, the Stahlhelm was made of steel, while most Pickelhaube were actually made of leather and provided zero protection to the soldiers' head in case of shellings, introduction of the Stahlelm decreased head injuries by 70%)[[/note]] and the movie takes place in 1918. Not only that, these soldiers wear the era-accurate [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stahlhelm#/media/File:Brow-armor.jpg M-1916 model]], whereas [[UsefulNotes/NazisWithGnarlyWeapons World War II German soldiers]] wore [[https://s3.amazonaws.com/mgm-content/sites/armslist/uploads/posts/2014/11/17/3717570_02_world_war_ii_german_helmet_sta_640.jpg M-1935 and M-1940 models]], which were logical upgrades a few decades after the helmet's invention. |
| 284 | ** Similarly, the portrayal of Erich Ludendorff as the film's BigBad (well, at least until [[spoiler:Ares is revealed]]) was occasionally criticized as an [[HistoricalVillainUpgrade exaggerated caricature]] more appropriate to the Nazis than a Great War officer. Well, the real Ludendorff didn't ''actually'' murder a group of other generals for considering peace talks, and wasn't [[spoiler:killed by Wonder Woman shortly before the war's end]], but beyond that [[FreakierThanFiction it's not much of an exaggeration]]. He was very much a proto-Nazi possessing the racial and mystical obsessions attributed to him in the film,[[note]]Though Ludendorff was, unsurprisingly, more attracted to Norse and Germanic gods than the Greek gods of the movie[[/note]] once called war "the foundation of human civilization" and started the "stab-in-the-back" myth later used by the Nazis to justify their antisemitism. Indeed Ludendorff was an ally to the Nazis in their early years (famously joining them in the Beer Hall Putsch of 1923), falling out with them largely because he resented Adolf Hitler's growing popularity. |
| 285 | ** [[spoiler:Ares]] as a QuintessentialBritishGentleman had been done in the ''Franchise/DCAnimatedUniverse'' episode "[[Recap/JusticeLeagueUnlimitedS1E4HawkAndDove Hawk and Dove]]" where he's voiced by Michael York. Like in the film, he enjoys RunningBothSides to drive conflict and increase his power. |
| 286 | ** This isn't the first UsefulNotes/WorldWarI film set in the trenches to feature [[spoiler:David Thewlis as a bad guy. Creator/StevenSpielberg's ''Film/WarHorse'' got there first]]. |
| 287 | * When the Creator/SamRaimi ''Film/SpiderManTrilogy'' first came out and depicted [[Characters/MarvelComicsPeterParker Spider-Man]] with organic webbing, many fans were displeased. The idea of a Spider-Man with organic webbing is actually much older these films, having been used in the ''ComicBook/SpiderMan2099'' mini-series. |
| 288 | * Up until the year 2000 every generation seems to have thought they invented the Revisionist Western. The truth is that the concept is as almost as old as the genre itself. The Other Wiki states that they date back to the 1940s, with a handful of classics coming out every decade (especially in the 60s and 70s), but it may be even older than that. |
| 289 | ** Many classic Westerns [[UnbuiltTrope border on deconstructions]] of the tropes they were supposed to have established. Creator/JohnFord, for instance, was well aware of the moral contradictions of the "taming" of the West, generally depicting the genre's usual heroes (lawmen, gunfighters and outlaws) as antiheroes at best if not outright villains, and the "civilization" they represented as often corrupt, hypocritical and racist. Ford was also highly (if imperfectly) sympathetic towards Native Americans and rarely depicted them as outright villains, aside from ''Film/{{Stagecoach}}'' and a handful of others. Ford overall treats "the winning of the West" as a mixed blessing, despite the general optimism of his films. |
| 290 | ** Even in the silent era, Westerns like Creator/CecilBDeMille's ''Film/TheSquawMan'' offered sympathetic, if often patronizing depictions of Native Americans. The subgenre became especially popular in the '40s and '50s, with movies like ''Film/FortApache'', ''Film/BrokenArrow1950'' and ''Film/RunOfTheArrow'' being extremely sympathetic towards indigenous peoples, and equally critical of American aggression towards them. Creator/AnthonyMann's ''Film/DevilsDoorway'', released in 1950, even features a Native American protagonist (albeit one played by white actor Creator/RobertTaylor) who initiates a war against greedy, racist white ranchers trying to steal his land -- and is portrayed as unabashedly in the right. That said, such depictions often suffered from [[MightyWhitey having white protagonists]], with the natives themselves demoted to a secondary role. By the 1970s, after the popularity of films like ''Film/LittleBigMan'' and ''Film/AManCalledHorse'', it became difficult to find Westerns that weren't at least nominally pro-Native in their outlook. |
| 291 | ** Similarly, Westerns loved parodying, deconstructing and otherwise commenting upon the gunfighter ethos common to the genre pretty much from the beginning, long before Creator/SergioLeone and Creator/SamPeckinpah got hold of the genre. By the early '50s, films like ''Film/TheGunfighter'' and ''Film/Winchester73'' regularly depicted gunslingers either as neurotic antiheroes or men tormented by their own notoriety. Even as archetypical a Western as ''Film/{{Shane}}'' stresses the loneliness of the gunfighter and his lack of a place in a civilized society. And while Wyatt Earp's modern, mixed reputation is largely shaped by the GreyAndGrayMorality of ''Film/{{Tombstone}}'' and ''Film/WyattEarp'', earlier films like ''Film/CheyenneAutumn'', ''Hour of the Gun'' and especially ''Doc'' (where Earp is an outright ''villain'') beat them to the punch by decades. |
| 292 | ** What's especially strange is by the times the 1990s rolled around the only westerns being made were revisionist, to such a degree that Creator/RogerEbert criticized ''Film/BackToTheFuturePartIII'' for being too much of a classic western (which it arguably wasn't). |
| 293 | * ''Film/DoctorStrange2016'' [[ReimaginingTheArtifact turns Wong into a capable sorcerer in his own right and Strange's teacher in the mystic arts as opposed to his manservant]]. But almost a full decade prior to the movie, the kid friendly ''ComicBook/MarvelAdventures'' line of comics took a similar approach, turning Wong into Stephen's friend from med school, a fellow student of the mystic arts, and the person who first introduced him to the Ancient One. |
| 294 | * ''Film/{{Nope}}'': Many reviewers suggested that the idea that [[spoiler:flying saucers could be a living organism in itself that sucks up and devours people and animals (and that this causes rainfalls of blood, as in some anecdotal reports)]] was an original and creative idea. This very concept was actually once a popular idea amongst UFO theorists in the 1950s, having first been suggested as far back as the 1920's in the writings of Charles Fort. It eventually faded into obscurity when the concept of TheGreys and AlienAbduction took hold in the 1960's. |
| 295 | * What was the first cinematic adaptation of Creator/JamesMCain's ''Literature/ThePostmanAlwaysRingsTwice''? Tay Garnett's [[Film/ThePostmanAlwaysRingsTwice1946 1946 film noir]] starring Creator/LanaTurner as Cora and Creator/JohnGarfield as Frank? No. ''Film/{{Ossessione}}'', the 1943 debut of Italian director Creator/LuchinoVisconti? Again, no. The correct answer is Pierre Chenal's 1939 film ''Le dernier tournant'' (''The Last Turning''), starring Fernand Gravey as Frank, Michel Simon as Nick, and Corinne Luchaire as Cora. |
| 296 | * ''Film/Oscar1991'': ''Film/ASlightCaseOfMurder'' covered many of this movie's plot points (a ReformedCriminal spending a chaotic day dealing with his daughter's marriage, his loyal but dimwitted old goons' inability to adapt to becoming servants instead of thugs, an old enemy gangster who poses a threat to his life, and an important meeting with some bankers) before ''Oscar'' star Creator/SylvesterStallone was even ''born''. |
| 297 | * ''Film/RaidersOfTheLostArk'': Indy isn't actually the first fictional Nazi fighter to use a whip and revolver and be nicknamed after a state (or in his case, a dog named after a state). Franchise/TheDCU CListFodder superhero Harold "Tex" Thompson/Mr. America/Americommando also has all of those traits. |
| 298 | * On July 21st 2023, [[Film/{{Barbie}} Barb]][[Film/{{Oppenheimer}} enheimer]] came out, and it took off because movie-goers were amused by the idea of a lighthearted, women-centric comedy romp being released on the same day as a dark and heavy Creator/ChristopherNolan film. However, ignoring the fact that this setup is a simple case of counter-programming, the exact same thing had already happened twice before: |
| 299 | ** On July 21st 2008, Nolan's ''Film/TheDarkKnight'' - sequel to the DarkerAndEdgier Batman reboot ''Film/BatmanBegins'' - was released on the same day as ''Film/MammaMia'', an adaptation of the the jukebox musical of the same name. Interestingly, the distributors were swapped (Warner Bros. released ''The Dark Knight'' and ''Barbie'', while Universal released ''Mamma Mia'' and ''Oppenheimer''). Both movies were massive hits in their own rights, but in both pairings, the WB film came out on top. |
| 300 | ** On 21st July 2017, Nolan's UsefulNotes/WorldWarII movie ''Film/{{Dunkirk}}'' was released on the same day as road trip comedy ''Film/GirlsTrip'' (once again released by WB and Universal respectively). While the latter was a hit in its own right and well received, it didn't take off like ''Barbie'' or ''Mamma Mia'', and ''Dunkirk'' itself was Nolan's lowest grossing post-Batman film up to that point. |
| 301 | * Despite the "tried it once and didn't like it" scene being considered one of ''Film/CarryOnAbroad'''s most memorable by fans, Creator/JuneWhitfield wasn't the first actress to utter this phrase to Creator/SidJames. A MadeForTV ChristmasSpecial airing the previous year (''All This, and Christmas Too!'', which also starred ''Film/CarryOn'' regular Creator/KennethConnor) had Rose Power playing a similarly stoney character to Evelyn Blunt and saying these same words to James. |
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