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  • The Abyss has a scene where Hippy is the only one to agree with Lindsey...but he starts veering off into conspiracy theory territory, discrediting her case by association. A frustrated Lindsey orders Hippy to "Stay off my side!"
  • In Lawn Dogs, Trent is widely distrusted by the town in which he works and treated with suspicion for being a lower-class outsider. He is accused several times of crimes he didn't commit. As such, he feels he has no love to lose from the town, and rebels with various acting-out behaviors that don't help people's perception of him at all. To make matters worse, in the end he runs over the pet dog of one of the people who bully him.
  • The protagonist of Alfred Hitchcock's Frenzy is framed by a serial killer, who turns out to be his best friend. As he's hauled off to his cell he repeatedly screams "I've got nothing to lose now! I might as well do what I'm being put away for!" This almost comes back to bite him when he escapes, as his attempt to catch the killer results in the cop who's been trying to prove his innocence for the whole film finding him standing over a dead prostitute. The real killer then shows up in a way that implicates himself.
  • In Street Kings, Keanu Reeves's character is suspected of having his former partner killed. The things he does afterwards (stealing the security footage, removing a bullet from his gun from the autopsy room, pressuring the detective investigating the death) make him look far guiltier than if he just told the truth about what happened.
  • The protagonist of Minority Report works for an organisation that predicts crimes and preemptively catches would-be criminals. Then he learns that he is predicted to murder a specific person at a specific location. He immediately flees, and ultimately follows the clues to get to that exact location at that exact time. He had his reasons (he knew he was being set up, and hoped to find information on who was after him), but it made him look insanely guilty. (It turns out, he was being set up, but the setup was a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy intended to lure him there and goad him into killing the victim, and it kind of works).
  • In Salt, when a man claiming to be a defector accuses the title character, not very credibly, of being a Russian Deep Cover Agent, she immediately flees the government building where the interrogation is taking place, forcing American law enforcement to chase and attempt to capture her. Unlike most examples, the accusation is true (albeit Salt has long since gone native), but the trope still applies.
  • Ghostbusters II: When the Ghostbusters are being carted off to the insane asylum, three of them, Ray, Egon, and Winston, visibly fight against the guards while screaming and ranting like lunatics. Peter, however, calmly accepts it and goes along without a fight, at least until someone wises up and lets them out. This leads to one of the best moments in the sequel, as the other three Ghostbusters are frantically trying to explain the situation to a disbelieving psychiatrist. The doctor then turns to Venkman, who had been sitting quietly to that point:
  • In Men in Black 3, J is stopped by some very racist 1960s cops for driving while black. They seem to think that because J is black, the nice car he's driving must've been stolen. J tricks them into neuralizing themselves.
    J: That, gentlemen, is a standard issue Neuralizer, but you're not gonna remember that. AND JUST BECAUSE YOU SEE A BLACK MAN DRIVING A NICE CAR, DOES NOT MEAN THAT IT IS STOLEN! [beat] ...Well, I stole this one. BUT NOT BECAUSE I'M BLACK.
  • In Ant-Man, Scott gets apprehended by the police after bringing the suit back to the vault. His response to the police?
    Scott: I didn't steal anything. I was returning something I stole. [realizes what he just said before getting handcuffed]
  • Captain America: Civil War: Both sides do a poor job of convincing the other of why their side is in the right, mostly because each side just keeps validating the other's worries:
    • Pro-Accord:
      • A team is sent after Bucky, only a suspect at this point, with shoot to kill orders. This is a massive misstep for a manhunt and barely justifiable by Bucky legitimately being that dangerous. When Steve asks if Bucky will at least get a lawyer, Everett Ross laughs in his face.
      • Steve's worries about government obstruction are proven when T'Challa interferes with the above manhunt and gets away with it because of his status as Wakanda's ruler. He also essentially says to Steve's face that he is going to kill Bucky regardless of what gets in his way after the latter's capture, implying that he's willing to break laws that his country is openly pushing for just to get revenge on the person who might be responsible for his father's death.
      • Ross outright ignores evidence that Bucky was framed, implying that the UN is more concerned with appearing efficient than with doing what it's supposed to be doing.
      • Most of the collateral damage during the airport battle is caused by the Pro-Accord side going to increasingly drastic lengths to stop the others.
      • Tony basically puts Wanda under house arrest and doesn't even tell her about it until after the decision was made, which leads to her breaking out with Hawkeye.
    • Anti-Accord:
      • While Steve and Sam were protecting Bucky from being executed, Tony points out the ensuing property damage is something of a "PR fire".
      • This trope is Played for Laughs when Steve gives Bucky a brief disapproving look after he almost knocks a SWAT officer over a railing.
      • Concerns about collateral damage aren't disproved as necessary losses when Ant-Man mistakes a fuel truck for a water one and uses it as a weapon during the battle.
      • Steve protests against Wanda's house arrest, but Tony points out that due to both the scale of her powers, and her direct involvement with two major superhuman disasters, she's considered a huge risk. This position isn't entirely unfounded, given that she once freely worked with both HYDRA and Ultron, freely admits that she doesn't understand her own powers, and was indirectly responsible for the events that led to Ultron nearly destroying the world.
  • Star Trek Beyond: Spock mentions that he gave his now-ex-girlfriend Uhura a pendant that had belonged to his mother (a Chekhov's Gun from earlier in the movie), which gives off energy they can use to locate where the imprisoned Enterprise crew are being held.
    McCoy: You gave your girlfriend radioactive jewelry?
    Spock: The emission is harmless, Doctor. But its unique signature makes it very easy to identify.
    McCoy: You gave your girlfriend a tracking device?
    Spock: (Beat) That was not my intention.
  • In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin is told that he will not be made a Jedi Master. Instead of calmly pointing out his accomplishments or deciding to speak privately with Yoda later on (who's already shown earlier in the film to be sympathetic to his problems and willing to take time out of his busy schedule to help), Anakin then throws a tantrum, proving that he can't even control his own temper. One wonders how he expects to be called Master of anything if he can't even master himself, as Obi-Wan even points out in the novelization.
  • Office Space has Tom, very worried that he'll be seen as a redundant asset in the company, being interviewed by "efficiency experts" (read: people who will fire him if they think he doesn't sufficiently prove his value). He attempts to explain to them that his job is, more or less, to negotiate with customers and relay their instructions to the engineers, communicating their respective needs, and that they need to keep him on because he's friendly and personable enough to handle customers, when the engineers don't like dealing with customers. However, when pressed, he loses his temper and starts insulting, to their faces, people who could fire him at a moment's notice.
    "I deal with the goddamn customers so the engineers don't have to. I have people skills; I am good at dealing with people. Can't you understand that? What the hell is wrong with you people?"
  • In The Good Son Mark tries to convince Henry’s parents that he’s crazy, they don’t believe him and think that he’s making it up, two things he does later in the film cause Henry’s parents to believe that Mark is the crazy one. First after Henry implies that he might’ve poisoned the food and he dumps as much as he can down the garbage disposal, and later after Henry implies that because he loves his mother so much that he might try to kill her, and Mark holds a pair of scissors at his throat, this incident leads to Henry’s father deciding to lock him up in a room and call an institution.

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