Best movie stupidity of 1988

Please vote as you browse around to help the best rise to the top.

Big (1988)

Big picture

Stupidity: After Josh runs away from home after being turned into an adult, nothing seems to be done about his "disappearance." The only indication that he is missing is his picture on the back of a milk carton. There's no flyers about him missing. No mention of his disappearance in any newspapers or TV news about his mom saying that he's been "abducted" by a stranger. Even when Josh writes a letter home, he uses the actual address of where he's staying, but no cops turn up at his door after his mom receives the letter.

More Big stupidity
Child's Play picture

Stupidity: John, the guy who taught Chucky the voodoo spell is confronted by Chucky later on in doll form. When things don't go how Chucky wants, he finds a Voodoo doll of the same guy just lying around and uses it to torture him. So this idiot who knows Voodoo and what it does, happens to have a Voodoo doll of himself just lying around? Yeah sure, that can't go wrong at all.

Quantom X

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: Not all magic is evil, and the doll could've been made for something else.

More Child's Play stupidity
Beetlejuice picture

Stupidity: Barbara and Adam can obviously interact with physical objects (the statue horse, holding the door shut, etc.) but when trying to scare the Deetz's they tried visual stunts rather than throwing or moving objects.

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: Barbara and Adam are not aggressive, intimidating people. Maybe they could have thrown and moved objects, but that would be almost violent. They would rather try a few visual stunts, instead of possibly hurting someone and/or damaging something in the house.

I respectively disagree with this. One of the visual tricks Barbara and Adam tried was her holding a bloody knife over his decapitated body, that in itself would have been violent and aggressive if they had been seen.

But they weren't violent and aggressive. They weren't threatening violence or aggression to anyone. They didn't commit an aggressive or violent act in front of anyone. They were just trying to scare them, just like wearing the sheets earlier.

Suggested correction: They first off didn't really understand how to interact with the physical world and secondly they didn't realise yet they were invisible.

lionhead

I'm not sure the point of this correction because we see none of this is true. Barbara picks up a physical object and moves it without thinking about it. Then she looks at herself in the mirror with the horse and sees she doesn't have a reflection.

Bishop73

I have to agree. Even if Adam and Barbara couldn't be seen, the noose that Barbara "hanged" herself with or even the knife she was holding still should have been seen as they are physical objects and a knife, to the Deetz's, would be floating in midair and would probably scare them off.

More Beetlejuice stupidity
Die Hard picture

Stupidity: Hans keeps a major part of his plan secret from his own team: that the electromagnetic lock will be disabled if the FBI shuts down power to the building. The mercenaries hired as muscle don't need to know the minutiae of the plan, but it seems ludicrous that Theo wasn't told. Theo states on more than one occasion that he can't proceed past a certain point and that he hopes Hans has a plan for the final lock. Evidently, Hans was keeping this information secret simply to amuse himself, which makes little sense considering how much planning went into the heist.

BaconIsMyBFF

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: Or because he simply doesn't trust anyone with that kind of knowledge. He neither trusts them or cares about them, it's all him.

lionhead

So he trusts that Theo would be on board with all the murder and mayhem, open all the other locks, be in a tactical lookout position when the police try to breach, and drive the getaway vehicle. But he doesn't trust Theo enough to tell him the last lock will open when the power goes out?

BaconIsMyBFF

It's not about trust; Hans needs Theo to do what he is there for and that is all you mention up to the final lock. He has a plan for the final lock and so there's no need to discuss it with the team, since it won't be any of them responsible.

kayelbe

The more people that know the plan the more chances of someone talking. Especially when they are hired mercenaries.

Ssiscool

Theo was already on board with taking hostages and committing murder. Him knowing that the power needed to be shut off to open the last lock doesn't appear to be particularly important information you would need to keep from someone to keep them from talking.

BaconIsMyBFF

If he's the only one that knows the final step to get the money, then at least up until that moment he is absolutely indispensable to the plan and ensures no-one would double-cross him. In any case I'm not sure being more cautious than necessary really qualifies as "stupidity."

TonyPH

More Die Hard stupidity
Nightmare Sisters picture

Stupidity: The girls are saved at the end from being possessed by the succubus. All three have become very attractive looking, one's no longer got an overbite, another's not overweight, the last one no longer wears glasses yet they don't notice these changes themselves.

Rob245

More Nightmare Sisters stupidity
Halloween 4 picture

Stupidity: For being supposedly clever as well as purely evil Michael's pretty stupid here. He gets to the gas station well ahead of Loomis yet waits for him there, doesn't kill him either despite knowing he'd try to stop him like the last time.

Rob245

More Halloween 4 stupidity
Midnight Run picture

Stupidity: Jack has been using Mosley's badge and identification to pass himself off as FBI. He never once uses this trick to commandeer a civilian car for him and John when it would have been the safest way to get to L.A. much sooner.

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: Probably because If he did that, the car's owner like Red the bar owner would eventually call the FBI office to get their car back and then the feds would know the make, model, license plate, and the last location of Walsh and the Duke. The police would have caught them in minutes. Walsh had to keep a low profile.

Zorz

More Midnight Run stupidity
Killer Klowns From Outer Space picture

Stupidity: Knowing that the Klowns' noses are their weak point from previously shooting them, Dave doesn't bother to shoot the giant Klown at the end with his pistol, instead waiting to be almost crushed and finally popping it with his badge pin.

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: He was trying to shoot it, but he ran out of bullets just before it grabbed him.

Phaneron

More Killer Klowns From Outer Space stupidity
Shoot to Kill picture

Stupidity: When Jonathan is chasing the truck to try and save Sarah, he could have removed his heavy backpack and run faster...but instead just leaves it on. No wonder he wasn't fast enough.

Gavin Jackson

More Shoot to Kill stupidity
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels picture

Stupidity: When Steve Martin reaches the beach with the wheelchair, he tips it over, giving the illusion that he fell out of it. However, with where he starts crawling on the beach, it's tipped the wrong way. If it was that way, he would've been on the other side of it. A clever con-artist should know better.

More Dirty Rotten Scoundrels stupidity
Appointment With Death picture

Stupidity: Poirot addresses the person in the shadow outside the hotel as "dear sir or madam", which would make sense given the clothes, but makes no sense with the fact that voice is definitely a male voice, there's no mystery at all there. (01:11:50)

Sammo

More Appointment With Death stupidity
Cheerleader Camp picture

Stupidity: It seems dumb on the cops' part not to notice Cory acting like a cheerleader after the events of the weekend.

Rob245

More Cheerleader Camp stupidity
Running on Empty picture

Stupidity: Paul Manfield (Arthur Pope) and his family have been hiding from and eluding the FBI for fifteen years, but Paul gets so intoxicated one night that he loudly sings "Pretty Woman" walking toward his house - where neighbors could hear - and yells that he is not Paul, he is Arthur Pope. (00:52:18)

KeyZOid

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: People do seriously stupid things when they are drunk, and Manfield/Pope is very, very drunk.

More Running on Empty stupidity
Bloodsport picture

Stupidity: Amongst the dubious statistics attributed to the real Frank Dux at the end of the film is the claim that he holds the record for "Most Consecutive Knockouts in a Single Tournament - 56." A single tournament with at least 56 rounds would include over 72,000,000,000,000,000 entrants.

BaconIsMyBFF

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: While the entire film could be considered fiction based on Dux's dubious claims, your statement is only valid for a single-elimination style tournament. There are other types of tournaments, such as a round robin which would only require 57 contestant (Dux plus at least 56 guys to knock out).

Bishop73

The kumite is a single elimination tournament. It wouldn't make any sense to have a full-contact tournament, where the action is so (legally) violent that fights routinely end in severe injury or even death, use any other form of bracket.

BaconIsMyBFF

Nothing is stated that every tournament Dux was in was the Kumite as depicted in the film. Just that he retired undefeated in the Kumite.

Bishop73

The records listed at the end of the film are kumite records. The information comes from Frank Dux himself who made the claims on more than one occasion. When it says 56 consecutive knockouts, it is referring to the kumite and not some other, possibly round robin (which honestly would still be a ridiculous claim) tournament. It is likely the makers of the film believed "consecutive knockouts" meant "single tournament."

BaconIsMyBFF

I guess everything I've read on him over the decades never made it clear it was talking about one type of tournament with all the accomplishments he's claimed to have. And I've read the same repeated factoid about how many contestants 56 rounds would have that you read.

Bishop73

More Bloodsport stupidity
The Great Outdoors picture

Stupidity: John Candy was being dragged by the speedboat because he was holding the bar when the boat took off. It simply never occurred to him that letting go off the bar would have solved the problem (Of course then you wouldn't have had the speedboat scene at all but it's still pretty dumb).

Gavin Jackson

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: Characters doing stupid things doesn't constitute a stupidity entry. That was part of the joke, that Chet spent all the time telling his son to remember to let go of the rope if something goes wrong, but then forgets his own advice in the heat of the moment. People do stupid things in real life all the time.

Bishop73

Well how does this not count as a Stupidity then? You just said it was and there was no need for him to stay holding onto the rope.

Gavin Jackson

Stupidity is basically a minor plot hole, something small that doesn't rise to the level of an plot hole entry. Characters are still allowed to do stupid things though if it's not a plot hole (otherwise everything Lloyd and Harry do in all the Dumb and Dumber movies would be stupidity entries).

Bishop73

More The Great Outdoors stupidity

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.