Laugh Out Loud - Unintentionally Funny Movie Moments

[Arpy 4,145]

I'll never forget seeing Revenge of the Sith in theatres fifteen years ago and laughing so hard I was crying at this moment in the film. I went with a group of six or so friends and I turned to see them all laughing their arses off too.

 

Just to make things clear, I love Ian McDiarmid and his performance of Palpatine, but the moment was just so weird that I couldn't help but laugh.

 

Fast-forward fifteen years and I found myself laughing out loud in the theatre again, this time to another Palpatine moment in The Rise of Skywalker where I lost it when he uses Bass Lightning:

 

Are there other instances in other films where it's been so bad or awkward it becomes unintentionally funny?

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

Any time David Duchovny tries to genuinely emote in The X-Files, it just comes off as laughably hysterical. I never noticed this while watching the show while growing up, it was only when I revisited the show last year I realised how much a corny actor he really is.

[Arpy 4,145]

I think that corniness is part of his charm!

[Chen G. 3,948]

This:

 

 

Wide shot (because its not really a movie: its a stageplay). Heston enters frame from the right, delivers ridiculous line ("Your eyes are sharp as they are beautiful"), exits frame on the left. You can just about catch the actress rolling her eyes to the camera.

 

Hysterical.

[Quintus 5,399]

Timestamp?

[Chen G. 3,948]

0:43

[Arpy 4,145]

1:27- end

[Chen G. 3,948]

I hate to do this to David Lean, but every moment of Ryan's Daughter where Christopher Jones is on-screen is sheer rolling on the floor laughing. Roger Ebert said of him "an actor could hardly express less without playing a corpse."

 

Honourable mention goes to young Zhivago (Omar Sharif's son) saying he can't play the Balalaika - with a thick egyptian accent amidst the steppe - and Zhivago's own pantomime of a death scene at the end of the Doctor Zhivago.

 

[Incanus 5,714]

13 minutes ago, Arpy said:

1:27- end

Yeah that hedgehog Sebastian saving scene is an eye-rolling classic.

45 minutes ago, Arpy said:

I'll never forget seeing Revenge of the Sith in theatres fifteen years ago and laughing so hard I was crying at this moment in the film. I went with a group of six or so friends and I turned to see them all laughing their arses off too.

 

Just to make things clear, I love Ian McDiarmid and his performance of Palpatine, but the moment was just so weird that I couldn't help but laugh.

 

Fast-forward fifteen years and I found myself laughing out loud in the theatre again, this time to another Palpatine moment in The Rise of Skywalker where I lost it when he uses Bass Lightning:

 

Are there other instances in other films where it's been so bad or awkward it becomes unintentionally funny?

Yeah those moments are special kind of hamming it up for certain. You could put some scenery into his mouth to chew. 

I also love that Yoda/Palpatine fight where Diarmid goes all out crazy with the cackling madman performance. 

[Chen G. 3,948]

Those Ian McDiarmid moments are funny in a different way to most of the examples here, though. At no point in any one of those trademark McDiarmid-Moments do I laugh at McDiarmid the way I laugh at, say, Heston.

 

When I see his "no, YOU WILL DIE!" I'm thinking: "good on you for going so far with that line, Ian! You went there, and at least its fun!"

 

One of very few actors who can ham it up so much and not be the butt of the joke.

[Incanus 5,714]

11 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

Those Ian McDiarmid moments are funny in a different way to most of the examples here, though. At no point in any one of those trademark McDiarmid-Moments do I laugh at McDiarmid the way I laugh at, say, Heston.

 

When I see his "no, YOU WILL DIE!" I'm thinking: "good on you for going so far with that line, Ian! You went there, and at least its fun!"

 

One of very few actors who can ham it up so much and not be the butt of the joke.

Agreed. 

 

Also I like that McDiarmid shows how much Palpatine loves to be evil. After years of hiding Darth Sidious gets to do what he loves best. 

[Holko 9,514]

51 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

This:

 

 

Why are all shots of the actual actors on tiny crap sets or in front of a not very good projection but there are also proper wides in proper places? Is this the retro version of "Harrison can't be fucked to leave LA county, we'll just CG it"?

[Chen G. 3,948]

Yeah, whenever DeMille is actually shooting in the desert, it looks beautiful. Sadly, there's very little of that in this film, and its very noticable.

 

By far the most egregious is Moses being cast out of Egypt. Its a dialogue between Moses and Pharaoh: the former on-location, the latter - clearly in a studio.

 

But again, I'm more concerned with the choice of camera placement, the style of art direction and the performances. It all just screams "theater". Talk about certain movies not being cinema!

[publicist 4,643]

I wouldn't want these Demille movies any other way.

 

Also, though it was posted a thousand times, in this example you really start feel for the poor guys who had to act out Irwin Allen's dramatic instincts:

 

 

[Chen G. 3,948]

25 minutes ago, publicist said:

I wouldn't want these Demille movies any other way.

 

Reminds me of a remark about Ben Hur that I saw on Letterboxd:

 

Quote

I'd strongly recommend The Ten Commandments. It's just as pious, but it's directed by Cecil B. DeMille so it's way more entertaining merely by dint of being more tasteless.

 

There's some truth to that.

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

34 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

Yeah, whenever DeMille is actually shooting in the desert, it looks beautiful. Sadly, there's very little of that in this film, and its very noticable.

 

By far the most egregious is Moses being cast out of Egypt. Its a dialogue between Moses and Pharaoh: the former on-location, the latter - clearly in a studio.

 

But again, I'm more concerned with the choice of camera placement, the style of art direction and the performances. It all just screams "theater". Talk about certain movies not being cinema!

 

You've theen me uthe my whip!

[A24 4,330]

The epics are clearly being targeted here!

[Jurassic Shark 12,051]

Whenever the main titles says "Music by Hans Zimmer".

[Fabulin 3,510]

.

[Romão 2,274]

I always found this scene specially ridiculous:

 

 

Tom Cruise has done several in this vein

2 hours ago, Chen G. said:

This:

 

 

Wide shot (because its not really a movie: its a stageplay). Heston enters frame from the right, delivers ridiculous line ("Your eyes are sharp as they are beautiful"), exits frame on the left. You can just about catch the actress rolling her eyes to the camera.

 

Hysterical.

 

That's one the best ever

[Edmilson 7,424]

Why no one has mentioned this scene? 

 

 

2006's remake of The Wicker Man, starring Nic Cage, is a treasure of completly LOL moments:

 

 

[Nick Parker 3,040]

I feel guilty for using such an obvious choice, but it's hard for me to think of another movie in recent memory that was so earnest and fell as hard on its face as Rise of Skywalker. It was very hard for me to watch in the theater, because I was sitting next to a ten year old looking kid and his father, and I didn't want to spoil his experience by laughing at the movie right next to him. I mostly succeeded, but there were some moments where I wasn't strong enough.

 

 

The comic timing on this is impeccable. A masterclass. His build up of "decoding the intel", the long pause, then the hardest acted moment in Isaac's career, when he tries to make himself as grave as possible, and he utters the money shot..."Somehow, Palpatine has returned." The sheer matter of factness, while he's trying to do everything he can to hold back his choked tears...beautiful and powerful, like the opening blast of Williams' opening fanfare. Also like Williams' famous text crawl music, the rest continues the excellence. Poe proceeds to recite one of the most blatant exposition dumps I've ever heard, rivalling--nay, besting, this classic:

 

 

It's such a naked attempt to make the stakes as dire as possible in the most childish way possible, and tries to make us care.

 

To add on, it cuts away to this one scrawny-ass dude no has ever mentioned, we have never seen before, suddenly a part of the A List, and apparently replete with uncanny expository knowledge: "Dark science. Cloning. Secrets only the Sith knew." No one acknowledges this dude's point, and barely even his existence...it feels like they filmed his cutaways completely independent from everyone else then just editorially slapped his footage in.

 

The tone of the dialogue struck me so that I believe I unearthed a massive component of Abrams' and Terrio's creative process. Here's the proof:

 

https://tinyurl.com/ixroughdraft

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Koray Savas 2,251]

1 hour ago, Edmilson said:

2006's remake of The Wicker Man, starring Nic Cage, is a treasure of completly LOL moments:

Is it unintentional though?

[Edmilson 7,424]

7 minutes ago, Koray Savas said:

Is it unintentional though?

 

Well, the movie supposedly is a horror thriller that took itself seriously. But how can you stay serious when Nic Cage goes "Not the bees! Not the bees! Argh my eyes, they're in my eyes!"

[Nick Parker 3,040]

3 minutes ago, Koray Savas said:

Is it unintentional though?

 

Yeah, I'm reluctant to use famous examples like that because sometimes you wonder. Or in such classics as this:

 

 

 

That reminds me, I thought Crash was satire for the first 15 minutes. So many classic lines in that ones! 

[Romão 2,274]

1 hour ago, Nick Parker said:

I feel guilty for using such an obvious choice, but it's hard for me to think of another movie in recent memory that was so earnest and fell as hard on its face as Rise of Skywalker. It was very hard for me to watch in the theater, because I was sitting next to a ten year old looking kid and his father, and I didn't want to spoil his experience by laughing at the movie right next to him. I mostly succeeded, but there were some moments where I wasn't strong enough.

 

 

The comic timing on this is impeccable. A masterclass. His build up of "decoding the intel", the long pause, then the hardest acted moment in Isaac's career, when he tries to make himself as grave as possible, and he utters the money shot..."Somehow, Palpatine has returned." The sheer matter of factness, while he's trying to do everything he can to hold back his choked tears...beautiful and powerful, like the opening blast of Williams' opening fanfare. Also like Williams' famous text crawl music, the rest continues the excellence. Poe proceeds to recite one of the most blatant exposition dumps I've ever heard, rivalling--nay, besting, this classic:

 

 

It's such a naked attempt to make the stakes as dire as possible in the most childish way possible, and tries to make us care.

 

To add on, it cuts away to this one scrawny-ass dude no has ever mentioned, we have never seen before, suddenly a part of the A List, and apparently replete with uncanny expository knowledge: "Dark science. Cloning. Secrets only the Sith knew." No one acknowledges this dude's point, and barely even his existence...it feels like they filmed his cutaways completely independent from everyone else then just editorially slapped his footage in.

 

The tone of the dialogue struck me so that I believe I unearthed a massive component of Abrams' and Terrio's creative process. Here's the proof:

 

https://tinyurl.com/ixroughdraft

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

God, this movie sucks. Worst Star Wars movie by a mile

[Matt C 452]

"You'll pay for all the Jedi you killed today."

 

Basically a LOT of Attack of the Clones, it's so inept.

[Romão 2,274]

At least Attack of the Clones, bad as it is, still feels like it was made with genuinely good intentions and vision. It has some integrity. And it is enjoyable in its flaws. ROS has nothing going for it except the score

[Chen G. 3,948]

Yeah. I'm on the fence as to which of the two is worse. I think I tend to lean in favour of The Rise of Skywalker because a clusterfuck is better than sheer tedium.

[Corellian2019 386]

 

Classic. And I don't buy the filmmakers trying to explain that the film was an homage to 50s B-movies; sounds like a lot of backpedaling

[TheUlyssesian 2,475]

7 hours ago, Chen G. said:

Yeah, whenever DeMille is actually shooting in the desert, it looks beautiful. Sadly, there's very little of that in this film, and its very noticable.

 

By far the most egregious is Moses being cast out of Egypt. Its a dialogue between Moses and Pharaoh: the former on-location, the latter - clearly in a studio.

 

But again, I'm more concerned with the choice of camera placement, the style of art direction and the performances. It all just screams "theater". Talk about certain movies not being cinema!

 

This one is a strange beast. It is stagey yet it is also so spectacular. The colors are so lush. The art direction and costume design is so good. It is visually dazzling movie in a way - almost kinda like a green screen comic book movie but an older more analog version of it.

[Koray Savas 2,251]

2 hours ago, Corellian2019 said:

Classic. And I don't buy the filmmakers trying to explain that the film was an homage to 50s B-movies; sounds like a lot of backpedaling

Don’t get me wrong, The Happening is a bad film, but this is intentionally funny. Shyamalan has a fairly distinct sense of humor in his post-Unbreakable films. Plenty of moments in Signs, The Village, Lady In The Water, and this, that are meant to be funny. A classic moment is when they watch that viral video of the man laying down in front of a lawnmower and a woman exclaims, “What kind of terrorists are they?!” 

[Arpy 4,145]

That's gotta be unintentional, he's trying to dissuade a psychotic old woman that he wasn't about to kill her. It really feels like Shyamalan filmed the dialogue in a different tone and then sat down to edit and realized he was fucked! 'Why Mark? Why did you do this to me?'.

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

13 hours ago, Fabulin said:

This scene:

 

2:23-2:39 First smiles, then flips like Charlie Chaplin, and dies. Rey is confused because the kiss must have been poisonous. It was quite funny (if groan-inducing) to witness on the big screen.

 

It's like with what the Youtuber E;R said about Leia's death scene. Rey stabs Kylo, and immediately there is a shot of Leia dying, and then Rey doing a "what have I done" face.

 

My cinema laughed at 2:38-39. I can see why, the pose on Rey is awkwardly hilarious.

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,488]

11 hours ago, Nick Parker said:

I feel guilty for using such an obvious choice, but it's hard for me to think of another movie in recent memory that was so earnest and fell as hard on its face as Rise of Skywalker. It was very hard for me to watch in the theater, because I was sitting next to a ten year old looking kid and his father, and I didn't want to spoil his experience by laughing at the movie right next to him. I mostly succeeded, but there were some moments where I wasn't strong enough

 

Everything is spelled out for the audience. Everyone asks all the right questions and knows something about something that will help them do something, how they should proceed. There's absolutely no surprise to characters like Leia and that ugly little alien, which makes you wonder why no one else suspected this. All the extras look like a bunch of fugly millennials.

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

That's why Leia died midway through. "I'm checking out of this shit".

[Arpy 4,145]

It reminds me of this part of the Plinkett reviews:

 

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,488]

He wash pulling the shtringsh

[mrbellamy 6,275]

Obviously lazy to mention The Room in a thread like this, but of course it's one of the oddest confluences of completely intentional humor that never lands with unintentional hilarity at every turn. 

 

There are a million Tommy Wiseau moments to choose from so I will just post this instead:

 

 

Also:

 

 

[gkgyver 1,645]

"I'm all of the Sith" 

"And I'm all of the Jedi" 

 

exchange is waaaaay up there. 

 

On 7/21/2020 at 5:55 PM, Romão said:

At least Attack of the Clones, bad as it is, still feels like it was made with genuinely good intentions and vision. It has some integrity. And it is enjoyable in its flaws. ROS has nothing going for it except the score

 

Nah. AotC is rancid. 

There is bad, then there's so bad it's funny, and then there's so bad that it's funny for 5 minutes and then it's bad AND boring. 

[Omen II 1,235]

To this day I still recreate this wonderful scene from Fiend Without a Face from time to time when I meet my brother.  He always replies, "Gibbons!" instinctively.

 

 

[Pando 141]

 

 

[Chen G. 3,948]

Just because w'eve recently talked about it, but Excalibur is full of unintentional hilarity. The way the actors in the early part of the film are clearly directed to SCREAM their lines gets hysterical, and Williamson's Merlin is a hoot.

 

The inciting incident is quite funny:

 

 

Starting with Boorman mistaking cutting palms (for the purposes a blood-oath) and slitting one's wrists; followed by Corin Redgrave shouting his lines - You have to imagine they were typed in all caps: "IGRAYNE! DANCE!!" - and culminating in what's supposed to be this alluring, sensual dance which, unfortunately, is anything but. Then we get what, in the script was a series of scenes in which Gorlois becomes aware of Uther's lusting for his wife, replaced by him just intuiting it from a glance and shouting the scene to an end.

 

Honourable mentions go to Sir Patrick Stewart's pantomime of an attempt to draw the sword from the stone.

[Edmilson 7,424]

Batman v Superman is filled with moments that want to be epic, dramatic and bombastic, but end up being memorable... for the wrong reasons.

 

This scene pratically demoralized DC and the whole movie:

 

 

[Glóin the Dark 1,220]

24 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

The way the actors in the early part of the film are clearly directed to SCREAM their lines gets hysterical...

 

Well, you have to scream to be heard at a disco, don't you? Every line should have been screamed several times with yells of "WHA?" in between. 

[Chen G. 3,948]

And just because I'm on a fantasy-film roll, I'm fond of Ralph Bakshi Lord of the Rings, but boy oh boy is his Gandalf over-the-top!

 

Bakshi recorded the voice actors (in this case, William Squire), then had actors act to the recording, and then drew over that footage. So Squire overacted the vocals, which led the guy doing the physical acting to overact in the movements. The end result is sheer hillarity, with Gandalf's recitation of the Ring-verse taking the cake:

 

 

23 minutes ago, Edmilson said:

Batman v Superman is filled with moments that want to be epic, dramatic and bombastic, but end up being memorable... for the wrong reasons.

 

Funny you should mention it. Excalibur is one of Snyder's favourite films: its the film he has the Waynes come out of when they're killed in Batman v Superman.

 

You can definitely see how he drew his style-over-substance and excesses from that film. Boorman obviously pulls it with more grace, but its the same idea.

 

 

[Edmilson 7,424]

I've never seen Excalibur, but I'll try to watch it. At the very least it seems like an interesting experience.

[Naïve Old Fart 9,511]

HAVE YOU FOUND HIM, YET?!

I HAVEN'T?

[Sweeping Strings 2,351]

I can only assume there wasn't time for another take with this scene from Taffin (or Brosnan and the director both thought the level of anger was somehow appropriate) - 
 

 

[Naïve Old Fart 9,511]

Unintentionally funny movie moments?

THE RISE OF SKYWALKER