Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

If you thought you’d already seen people saying the stupidest things possible on the internet, prepare yourselves.

Republicans do not trust women.

Polls are now a reliable indicator of what corporate Republicans want us to think.

Consistently wrong since 2002

Hot air and ill-informed banter

Stop using mental illness to avoid talking about armed white supremacy.

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

The revolution will be supervised.

’Where will you hide, Roberts, the laws all being flat?’

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

Our messy unity will be our strength.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

People are weird.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

Trump should be leading, not lying.

The willow is too close to the house.

DeSantis transforming Florida into 1930s Germany with gators and theme parks.

Every decision we make has lots of baggage with it, known or unknown.

If you voted for Trump, you don’t get to speak about ethics, morals, or rule of law.

Welcome to day five of every-bit-as-bad-as-you-thought-it-would-be.

To the privileged, equality seems like oppression.

Let’s bury these fuckers at the polls 2 years from now.

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Open Thread

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So after our movie thread last night, I broke down and got Bridesmaids on PPV. It was mildly amusing, and I guess I never noticed that Kristen Wiig has a killer set of legs. At any rate, there was one scene where she was caught driving like an idiot and forced to do a dui test. If you’ve seen the movie, you know what I am talking about. At any rate, the moment I saw it, I recognized it as a direct rip-off of this:

And I’m sure that was stolen from someone else. Tonight’s movie fun- name two movie scenes that you think the second is a direct rip-off of the former. Just to keep things honest, we’ll just ignore Quentin Tarantino’s entire body of work.

Reader Interactions

141Comments

  1. 1.

    The Dangerman

    My nomination: Avatar

    Ripped off: The list is lonnnnnnnnnnnnnng.

    The Man With two Brains is one of my favorite SM films; Roxanne might be my favorite. Both are too often overlooked.

  2. 2.

    HyperIon

    Lots of pics of Elizabeth Warren being shown today.

    I don’t think she wears any makeup except for a little bit of lipstick. How can this be?

  3. 3.

    Ken

    You also need to ignore Eragon, and perhaps the entire output of the Italian film industry except for Mario Bava. Also, how do you want to handle remakes, and sequels that don’t add anything (Evil Dead 2)?

  16. 16.

    adolphus

    There was a scene in Voyage of the Dawn Treader when everyone was told to empty their minds of all thought so as not to give form to their deepest fears and I would have bet anything the Stay Puff Marshmallow Man was just around the corner. (But then Dawn Treader was based on a book, of course, so does that count?)

    And I know you want movies but I could never watch an episode of Scrubs without thinking “Hey, they stole that from M*A*S*H but just added a Monkees sensibility.”

  22. 22.

    John O

    I’m not sure Inglorious Bastards has ever been done before, I certainly can’t remember a film where a Jew was pumping bullets into Hitler’s head at close range, and in at least one viewer’s opinion Tarantino is, thankfully, awfully good at ripping people off.

  23. 23.

    karl

    Depends on how far back you set the links of the chain — every moviemaker rips off W.S. Porter in every film.

    What I want to know is: who was the first director to film a slow-motion “Noooooo!” I want to kill him.

    Liked All Of Me, hated Roxanne.

  24. 24.

    JPL

    Many decades ago my son would sing that song and then I saw the movie. Great memories and once again thanks John.

  28. 28.

    Villago Delenda Est

    Shakespeare borrowed from those who came before him, and of course his versions suffer because they’re not in the original Klingon.

  31. 31.

    Hob

    This is neither a movie, nor fun, but I felt I had to share it– in much the same way that the curse in the Ring movies had to be shared.

    I just got the following email from the Frumalicious non-party entity No Labels. I never signed up for any such nonsense, nor have I ever “been in touch” with them as they claim. I’m almost morbidly curious enough to attend their little chat thing, just to see if anyone is actually taking this shit seriously. Are there really disaffected common-sensical masses out there who think Obama is taking an “extreme position” by not supporting “social security reform”? I guess this guy should know– he used to be the Kentucky State Treasurer!

    ****

    Hi _______,
    America’s elected officials are finally talking sense: Everything must be on the table in order to reach a fair, bipartisan debt reduction package. Everything that is, but social security reform says President Obama. Everything but tax increases says House Speaker Boehner. Back and forth they go. But solutions don’t come from one side alone.

    We know it’s been a while since we’ve been in touch but we want you to join us on a call this Thursday night at 7 p.m. ET for new members of No Labels to talk about common sense solutions that involve both sides. Sign up for the call here.

    Obama and Boehner’s statements may only be the opening gambits by each side in what figures to be a drawn-out negotiation. But how can the Super Committee come to a fair, bipartisan deal when party leaders are taking such extreme positions at the outset?

    As a recovering politician (I was twice elected to serve as the Kentucky State Treasurer), I’ve seen first-hand how hyper-partisanship in government prevents us from coming together to solve problems.

    Thursday night, No Labels Co-Founder Kiki McLean, who has served as a senior advisor to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and as national press secretary and spokesperson for Vice President Al Gore’s presidential campaign, will join No Labels members across the country to discuss how we can bring our country together and what each of us can do to help. Sign up here to talk solutions with Kiki Thursday night.

    Also, stay tuned for details about our first ever National Convention this coming summer. Join thousands of Americans from across the country as we bring our voices together to ensure our leaders hear that we want fair, common sense solutions to move America forward.

    Sincerely,

    Jonathan Miller
    No Labels Co-Founder

    P.S. Don’t forget to RSVP to join the conversation tomorrow night: hq.nolabels.org/page/s/sign-up-to-talk-with-kiki-mclean

  32. 32.

    adolphus

    This isn’t exactly what you asked for, but there is a really good documentary by Penelope Spheeris in 1988 called the Decline of Western Civilization: The Metal Years in which a number of 80’s heavy metal musicians are interviewed saying things and telling stories seriously that were said for laughs in Spinal Tap 4 years earlier. It’s a sad, sad spectacle.

    As an added bonus there is a scene with Ozzie Osborne wondering aloud how people could laugh at Spinal Tap when that movie was showing things that had happened to him in real life and it never occurred to him that people were laughing AT HIM!

  33. 33.

    The Naked Vine

    To go kinda film geekish:

    Dark City and Requiem for a Dream.

    Both have an almost identical shot of Jennifer Connolly standing at the end of a long pier, staring out to sea.

    (While those two shots look uncannily alike, the tone of the two scenes couldn’t be more different.)

  34. 34.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @srv:

    No one ever talks about Cross of Iron when discussing Peckinpah.

    They should. It’s a very interesting film in a number of ways.

    Also, I’d like to give a shoutout for Starship Troopers, an under appreciated satire of Hollywood’s take on war, in general.

  36. 36.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @adolphus:

    The wikipedia entry on This is Spinal Tap has an entire section devoted to the reaction of rock stars to it…how so many of them didn’t see what was funny, or said “this is the story of our band” or whatever.

    Reiner, Guest, and McKean really nailed it, hard, with that one.

  40. 40.

    MikeJ

    @adolphus: I was in HS when the punk years of Decline came out. One of my friends had a tape of it, we played that fucker to death.

    Weird that she went on to do The Beverly Hillbillies movie and the Little Rascals movie. Both of which, for what they are, could have been much worse.

  46. 46.

    Nevgu

    Who are you trying to kid Dan Choi Fluffer Cole. I know someone as light in the loafers as you would propably be sobbing like an emotional teen girl over that chick flick.

  49. 49.

    JPL

    @Hob: Do listen. Could it be another organization that thinks the gov shouldn’t pay back earned benefits. Contracts only count for corporations because they are people also, too.

    BTW..PBS newshour did a segment on income equality and they had someone on who said with medicare and social security it wasn’t a big deal. Medicare and Social Security are worth a few hundred thousand so all is good. They showed folks in a nice assisted living facility and spoke about medicare taking care of the elderly. Duh..does Medicare or Medicaid pay for assisted living and long term care? It has always been my understanding that once you use up all your income, medicaid kicks in. What’s up with that???????????????????????
    Did anyone see that segment? At no time did they mention earned benefits.

  53. 53.

    Short Bus Bully

    Holy balls dear blog host! This thread will be endless. Why not post a real challenge and try to think of movies that are actually ORIGNAL? Or is that an impossibility?

  55. 55.

    MazeDamcer

    Twitter is a-buzz with tweets that SCOTUS is going to review Troy Davis case and he gets a stay until they do. But can’t find any confirmation.

    Anyone know?

  58. 58.

    keith

    All this talk of Steve Martin but no mention of LA Story? Great, great flick. It steals some scenes but I can’t recall another movie quite like it.

  59. 59.

    DFH no.6

    “Bridesmaids” mildly amusing? Gah! That movie blew chunks.

    And, somewhat ironically, the only actual funny scene in that whole, long, tedious “comedy” was the bridal shop scene where the characters had food poisoning and were literally blowing chunks (and so forth).

  61. 61.

    lacp

    Man, I’m glad everybody’s been able to get over that unpleasantness about whoever-he-was getting executed and shit tonight.

  62. 62.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @keith:

    The restaurant…Patrick Stewart as the maitre’d…

    Oh…and the scene were Martin gets in his car and drives down two doors to return a cup of borrowed sugar…

  70. 70.

    srv

    @Villago Delenda Est: A real war movie.

    Watched Bring me the head of Alfredo Garcia with some young ones a year back. About every other scene, one of them would say “hey, that reminds me of …” and then they’d start arguing about it. Thought I was in a film critic class.

  72. 72.

    General Stuck

    @lacp:

    I haven’t stopped thinking about it, and wish I could stop it. Even many of the wingnuts I’ve read think it is a travesty executing this man, Troy Davis. The SCOTUS is his last chance now,

  73. 73.

    Thoughtcrime

    “One of us, one of us, one of us….”

    Romney calls for a tax policy that will help “us” in the middle class
    …
    MIAMI – Mitt Romney suggested Wednesday that he feels the pain of the middle class.
    …
    At a town hall meeting here, the millionaire GOP presidential contender told his audience that he favors a tax policy that will help “those who have been hurt by the Obama economy.”
    …
    “And that’s the middle class,” Romney continued. “It’s not those in the low end; it’s certainly not those in the very high end. It’s for the great middle class – the 80 to 90 percent of us in this country.”
    …
    A look at Romney’s personal financial disclosure form, however, reveals he’s in the bracket that President Obama is targeting with his proposed “Buffett rule” to tax millionaires. An analysis of Romney’s 28-page accounting of his wealth by the Boston Globe earlier this year put the former Massachusetts governor’s net worth at between $190 million and $250 million.
    …
    cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20109658-503544.html

  74. 74.

    MazeDancer

    Having been so excited I typed my own name wrong. So if you read a comment about Troy Davis that’s now in moderation ignore.

    And answering own question:

    State of GA decides to delay execution. Their choice. They’re waiting for SCOTUS. But the court has no time limit on review. And GA can start up execution anytime.

    Mr. Davis had already refused his last meal. And making a last statement. It is unknown if he had been taken from his cell or not.

  76. 76.

    Raven (formerly stuckinred)

    @lacp: So logoff and turn on msnbc or get in your car an go there. What’s your problem, don’t you care?

  77. 77.

    piratedan

    @John O: oh I’ve heard folks try and reduce it to something like ‘The Dirty Dozen with Jews”

    @Omnes Omnibus: you could say the same of Star Wars and the Buck Rogers serials, but I think that SW and Roxanne are a modification/modernization of the original story with significant changes in setting and technology. If you want another example, look at Easy A and The Scarlett Letter, same source material but completely different in tone and setting.

  78. 78.

    DFH no.6

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred):

    Some nasty shit in Requiem

    Ain’t that the truth.

    Requiem For A Dream is just about the most difficult-to-watch movie I’ve ever seen.

    After all these years (I saw it only once, when it was in theaters, what, ten years ago?) I’m still not sure whether I should have watched it or not, or if the powerful but gut-wrenching stories (and great acting) were worth the incredible nastiness.

    I’ll put Short Bus in a somewhat similar category, too, but Requiem’s got it beat by far.

  79. 79.

    Thoughtcrime

    Meanwhile, here’s a nice chart to pass along:

    CHART: Only Advanced Degree-Holders Saw Wage Gains In Last Decade | The only group of Americans whose average wages increased over the last decade were the 3 percent with advanced college degrees (other than a master’s degree), according to data released by the Census Bureau. The 1.5 percent of Americans with an M.D., J.D., or M.B.A. saw wage gains of about 5 percent, while the 1.5 percent with a Ph.D saw gains of slightly more than 5 percent. Among those with a four-year college or master’s degree — more than a quarter of the American workforce — average wages dropped by about 7 percent, and wages dropped even more for those who haven’t completed college:

    thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/09/20/323385/chart-wage-gains-education/

  85. 85.

    DFH no.6

    @lacp:

    Man, I’m glad everybody’s been able to get over that unpleasantness about whoever-he-was getting executed and shit tonight.

    You know, I think I’ll go with what Raven said in reply to that, and add that I disavow Stalin and Farrakhan, too, and I’m also pretty fucking unhappy with what’s happening in Somalia right now.

    But most of all, what General Stuck said.

  86. 86.

    Raven (formerly stuckinred)

    @lacp: No but when someone comes out of nowhere and lays a bullshit trip on people I’m going to say something. Like that better?

  87. 87.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @piratedan: 10 Things I Hate About You and The Taming of the Shrew, also too. WRT Rostand, Martin was doing homage not rip-off; I know that.

  92. 92.

    Gravenstone

    I recall gleefully crushing some goober at GenCon years back. He was dressed up as one of the goons from Reservoir Dogs and was yammering on how Tarantino was sooo smart and cool with his use of colors for names. He didn’t take kindly to my informing him it was a blatant rip-off from The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3

    Yeah, yea, I know, we were supposed to ignore Tarantino, but I couldn’t resist the fact I got to crush a fan boi’s spirit.

  94. 94.

    MikeJ

    @Gravenstone: One of the things that makes Tarantino so great is the depth of knowledge of everything he’s ripping off. He knows those movies and at some point he said, “*That’s* what I want to do”, so he goes out and does exactly that.

    But yeah, being a QT fan without learning the source material is pretty lame.

  95. 95.

    DFH no.6

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred):

    With you on Burstyn’s acting in Requiem.

    Never saw (or even heard of) Nil By Mouth.

    Saw Once Were Warriors when it was out in theaters a long time ago (90s sometime?). Good movie – a tough and tragic story about an underclass Maori family in contemporary New Zealand, but I don’t recall many specifics other than a suicide by hanging.

    On that note – and with lacp continuing to hang around and scold us for being so callous and all – I think I’ll head out now and do something cheerful and meaningful, like play fetch with my dogs (it’s late afternoon here in Joe Arpaio County).

  99. 99.

    lacp

    @DFH no.6: ???? I take a little tweak, Raven responds, I take a little tweak at Raven, Raven responds, I basically answer,”OK, I see your point,” and I’m a BJ scold? The intertubes are not subtle, that’s for sure.

  101. 101.

    TooManyJens

    @lamh34: That’s because the case originated in the Eleventh Circuit, which is assigned to Thomas. He didn’t, as far as I know, take a special interest in it other than it being his job to handle requests for stays coming out of the Eleventh.

    Although at least he didn’t reject it outright, so there’s that.

  102. 102.

    cay

    Johnny Depp making grilled cheese sandwiches with an iron in Benny and Joon and Michael Keaton doing the same in Mr. Mom a decade earlier.

  103. 103.

    lacp

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred): True ’nuff. I like to stick the pin in occasionally, but I’m really not a fan of flame wars. If there’s anything more pointless and useless than launching Pixels of Destruction, I’m not sure what it is.

  106. 106.

    piratedan

    well the Death at a Funeral movie was a nice lil Brit independent film with some former Spooks actors and our favorite dwarf actor Peter Dinklage and three of years later the movie was remade with an urban twist, with Martin Lawrence and Chris Rock (and Dinklage reprising his role). Direct rip off because hardly anyone saw the Brit version although it was well done.

  108. 108.

    Raven (formerly stuckinred)

    Even msnbc has stopped tweety’s insane babbling about Troy Davis and is replaying earlier programming.

  112. 112.

    PurpleGirl

    @JPL: Medicare does NOT pay for nursing homes and/or assisted living facilities except in very specific circumstances after a person has been in the hospital and needs skilled nursing care following the illness.

    Yes, the person must spend down whatever assets they have so that Medicaid will pay for nursing home care.

    See the official Medicare website:

    medicare.gov/nursing/payment.asp

  113. 113.

    PurpleGirl

    @MazeDamcer: I just read that SCOTUS has taken the case in the NY Times. No analysis though as to what it means.

    Remember Scalia does not think that innocence is a bar to carrying out a jury verdict and he believes that there must be an end to all appeals at some point.

    IANAL so my paraphrasing may not be as accurate as it could be.

  117. 117.

    gogol's wife

    The scene in “Bringing Up Baby” where Cary Grant steps on Katharine Hepburn’s dress and rips open her skirt was supposedly suggested by Grant himself. It is a ripoff of numerous scenes in his first film, “This Is the Night,” where men keep stepping on Thelma Todd’s dress and ripping it off, to the musical chorus of “Madame has lost her skirt!” I’m sure if Cary Grant suggested the scene, he was at least subliminally recalling that earlier film.

  122. 122.

    PurpleGirl

    @piratedan: That is brilliant.

    @gogol’s wife: Cthulhu is a fictional character that first appeared in the short story “The Call of Cthulhu”, published in the pulp magazine Weird Tales in 1928. The character was created by writer H. P. Lovecraft. (Copied from Wikipedia.) Cthulhu is the demon overlord of horror stories.

    Yes, indeed — why vote for a lesser evil when you can vote for the most evil being ever?

  123. 123.

    Shlemizel - was Alwhite

    Many of the bits everyone found so hilarious on “Laugh-In” were direct scene for scene copies of Ernie Kovacs blackouts from his show 10 years earlier. The man is an under appreciated genius.

  124. 124.

    YellowJournalism

    Most of John Cusack’s “Sure Thing” is an homage to “It Happened One Night”. Actually, most road trip romantic comedies are ripoffs of that one.

    The main reason for the events in both “Road Trip” and “Overnight Delivery” with Reese Witherspoon are the same: guy sends girlfriend kissoff by mail and needs to get there before the package does.

    Later Hitchcock ripped his earlier self off sometimes. Welles did it,too. And everyone rips those guys off, especially if your last name is dePalma.

  126. 126.

    Jamey

    @opal: Everything DePalma is ripped off. He’s such an arrogant douche that he thinks nobody is kewl enough to know where he bit his stuff from.

  128. 128.

    Will

    28 Days Later “shopping” scene

    is a rip-off of

    Dawn Of The Dead (the Romero original, of course).

    But then again, so is the entire movie.

    And yes, I know I am not the first person on the planet to point this out.

  129. 129.

    YellowJournalism

    AMC’s The Walking Dead pilot ripped off 28 Days Later.

    And every single college/prep school/university based comedy has ripped off (most unsuccessfully) Animal House.

  132. 132.

    vanya

    “AMC’s The Walking Dead pilot ripped off 28 Days Later.”

    Not if The Walking Dead comic(the basis of the AMC series) came first, which I think is the case.

  133. 133.

    Gus

    @pattonbt: Yes! Of course I didn’t realize it the first time I saw it. The next time, though, Elsinore brewery? I guess the McKenzies are Rosencrantz and Guildenstern? Love that movie. Also, of course Clueless is Emma.

  134. 134.

    adolphus

    I know this thread is dead, but I just read a review of the new movie Restless at Ebert’s site

    Gus Van Sant’s “Restless” is an uncommonly touching romance about a young man and woman who essentially worship at the shrines of their own deaths. The girl with infinite tact and sweetness is able to coax the boy back into the world of the living, even though we learn cancer will allow her only three more months of life.

    They begin to notice each other among the mourners at funerals. They stand back a bit and don’t speak to anyone, and by the time she turns and smiles at him, it’s probable she realizes they’re both up to the same game: requiem-watching. Well, lots of people crash weddings. Why should funerals be exempt?

    He later asks: “Where Van Sant and the screenwriter Jason Lew found the idea for this story, I have no idea.”

    Ummmmmmmm, it’s pretty much the same plot as Harold and Maude except they have replaced a young hottie for Ruth Gordon?

    Edit: Block quote fail, that second paragraph should be in the box.

  135. 135.

    Jose Padilla

    In the late ’70s and early ’80s it seemed that every action/adventure movie released had a scene ripped off from John Ford’s The Searchers. From Hard Core to the Deer Hunter to Star Wars.

  136. 136.

    Stefan

    @keith:

    “LA Story” steals a lot from Woody Allen’s “Manhattan.” Man has simultaneous affairs with much younger woman and with age-appropriate woman, both are love letters to their respective cities, etc.

  137. 137.

    Ethan Hoddes

    The ending of “Training Day” ripped from Sonny’s death in Godfather Part 1. Though that one was high profile enough that it was probably supposed to be an ‘homage’ it was one of those ‘homages’ which have no apparent point beyond ‘remember in that one movie?’ Otherwise a great film.

  138. 138.

    Stefan

    @DFH no.6:

    I still regret having watched it. Absolutely one of the most unpleasant moviegoing experiences I’ve ever had. All I wanted to do afterwards was wrap myself in warm flannel pajamas, drink hot chocolate, and read Tintin and Asterix comics in order to get some of my lost innocence and hope back.

  139. 139.

    jake the snake

    @Joel:

    For all practical purposes 12 Monkeys is an extended remake of “La Jetee”. Just like Lindsay Anderson’s “If” is an extended remake of Jean Vigo’s “Zero for Conduct”

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