What’s the most annoying trope in books or movies?
The McGuffin. A thing chased for the sake of being chased. It only works because humans, like dogs, are programmed to chase certain things without a good sense of whether it’s worth it or what would happen if one ever caught it.
Tropic Thunder. Laughed myself to tears.
I would say it’s much more common for travel to inspire me to read a particular book than the other way about. I can’t think of a case in which reading a book was the prime mover in a decision to travel to a given place. But I do try to read some literature from every country or literarily active city that I visit.
I once slipped and fell on ice, and it was like an outtake from a Jackie Chan movie.
I’ve had it the other way round (i.e. disliked a movie I expected to like,) but I can’t really say I’ve ever watched a movie that I expected to hate. Do people do that? In the very short life one has, are there people who sit around entertaining themselves with movies they expect to not be entertaining? Despite all that I have learned in this life, people perplex me more and more each day.
If Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind taught us anything, it’s that one shouldn’t go around erasing memories. So, I decline to answer. [FYI: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is not my answer because I don’t need the lesson all over again.]
Kung Fu Panda, Kung Fu Hustle, and The Matrix. Together, they contain the sum of all wisdom.
No particular order: Kung Fu Hustle, Caddyshack, Matrix, Inception, John Wick 4, Airplane, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Blazing Saddles, Hero, and Drunken Master II.
Movies: The Matrix (1999), Kung Fu Hustle (2004), and – possibly – The Dark Knight (2008) and Inception (2010). [Really, I could watch any Christopher Nolan film more than once (and probably need to in order to fully get them.)]
TV Series: None. I can’t think of a series that I’ve watched more than once — except maybe in reruns as a kid, watching episodes out of sequence and on a hit or miss basis.
In the order in which they popped into my head: 1.) Caddyshack (1980); 2.) The Matrix (1999); 3.) Hidden Fortress (1958); 4.) Alien (1979); 5.) Casablanca (1942); 6.) Seven (1995); 7.) Kung Fu Hustle (2004); 8.) The Dark Knight (2008); 9.) Inception (2010); 10.) Unforgiven (1992)
Tiger Riding for Beginners 