Driving in TV Shows

[Small White Car]

Ok, Hollywood. We get it. If a TV character in a show* is driving a car and the shots are tight on their faces then they'll soon be in an "unexpected" accident.

Now that we've all noticed this little trick can you please just stop it.

Just...stop.

Thank you.



* Sitcoms are exempt

 

[Spot's Meow]

So you watched Brothers and Sisters last night too?

When my boyfriend and I saw the camera angles in the car scene we looked at each other expectantly. And sure enough, a few moments later...

 

[Sheep]

I thought this was going to be a rant about how fake the scenery outside of the car windows looks in TV shows. They've fixed this somewhat in recent years, but it was distractingly bad pretty much since the dawn of TV.

 

[Smiley]

I was thinking this would be a rant about how the driver sometimes doesn't look at the road for minutes at a time in some TV conversations.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

I thought this was going to be a rant about how the driver always uses the steering wheel as if he's driving through a slalom course when the car is in fact on a perfectly straight road (according to the heavily matted bluescreen).

 

[archeryguy1701]

I thought this was going to be a rant about how fake the scenery outside of the car windows looks in TV shows. They've fixed this somewhat in recent years, but it was distractingly bad pretty much since the dawn of TV.

This is what I thought it was going to be about, especially since I'm watching Invasion, and the really bad CGI everglades, and especially bad through car windows, makes me want to cry.

 

[backstept]

putting a car on a flatbed and 'driving' around works better than sitting in front of a huge screen

 

[auntiehill]

I was thinking this would be a rant about how the driver sometimes doesn't look at the road for minutes at a time in some TV conversations.

This has been a pet peeve of mine for years. Characters supposedly driving through a large city will have eye contact with each other for 30-40 seconds, while one is at the wheel. Hello? Watch where you're going!

I thought this was going to be a rant about how the driver always uses the steering wheel as if he's driving through a slalom course when the car is in fact on a perfectly straight road (according to the heavily matted bluescreen).

This, among MANY other things, used to just crack me up while watching "The A-Team." Watching Mr. T pretend to drive was hilarious. They are supposed to be driving straight down a major LA road, but he's pulling the wheel back and forth like he's taking Lombard Street at 50 mph.

 

[Mistral]

I was thinking this would be a rant about how the driver sometimes doesn't look at the road for minutes at a time in some TV conversations.

Nothing takes me out of a show faster! Y'know, I tried to drive like that once. Once.

 

[Trekker4747]

The "play" in the steering has always cracked me up. Pretty much every TV character driver ever needs to seriously get his steering fixed.

It's also always bugged me that people in TV shows don't have rear-view mirrors, but apparently some DO have the mount for the mirror!

Also, the prespective of the rear-projection is sometiems out of wack.

I'll take the nighttime "poorman's process" anyday. (Which is just blackness with two lights behind the car to represent another car.)

 

[Starbreaker]

The only decent car crashes I've ever seen were in the movie Descent and The Forgotten. Both were completely unexpected to me. TV shows are terrible when it comes to automobiles.

 

[Small White Car]

I am very pleased by all the "I thought this was about..." comments.

Apparently there's a LOT of problems with driving scenes in TV shows!

 

[Trekker4747]

I am very pleased by all the "I thought this was about..." comments.

Apparently there's a LOT of problems with driving scenes in TV shows!

Really. It's like TV people never drive in cars.

 

[Rii]

"But I hate it in old American films when the drivers don't watch the road."

 

[archeryguy1701]

I thought this was going to be a rant about how fake the scenery outside of the car windows looks in TV shows. They've fixed this somewhat in recent years, but it was distractingly bad pretty much since the dawn of TV.

This is what I thought it was going to be about, especially since I'm watching Invasion, and the really bad CGI everglades, and especially bad through car windows, makes me want to cry.

Going back to this, I just watched a really good example in my last Invasion episode... Russell and Dave were driving, and the trees out the side windows were severely blurred as if they were going really really fast, but the trees were moving incredibly slowly across the screen

 

[Trekker4747]

Bad CGI driving scenes are the mainstay and over obvious now.

Drive and Knight Rider are two shows that spring to mind right now where the CGI background scenes were just painfully obvious. It was like they were driving through MS Driving Simulator.

 

[Sheep]

I am very pleased by all the "I thought this was about..." comments.

Apparently there's a LOT of problems with driving scenes in TV shows!

Really. It's like TV people never drive in cars.

They never use computers or Photoshop either, if the actual computers or image enhancing software that can turn a 10x10 pixel image of someone's face into a crystal-clear likeness are any indication.

 

[The Borgified Corpse]

I think it's funny how TV/movie characters never wear their seatbelts, except when they're in an accident, and then, they're trapped in the car (usually on fire or submerged) and seem to have completely forgotten how a seatbelt works. Dude, you just press the button! It doesn't matter how hard you tug at it if you don't press the button! (The 1st X-Men movie has a really good example of this early on.)

 

[Trekker4747]

I think it's funny how TV/movie characters never wear their seatbelts, except when they're in an accident, and then, they're trapped in the car (usually on fire or submerged) and seem to have completely forgotten how a seatbelt works. Dude, you just press the button! It doesn't matter how hard you tug at it if you don't press the button! (The 1st X-Men movie has a really good example of this early on.)

Yeah that gets me too. They fumble with the belt/lock seemingly having forgotten how seatbelts work.

I also like how train-tracks have an anti-working engine field on them whenever a train is due to pass through within the next few minutes.

And people will sit there trying to restart their car, look up at the train, see it coming, then go back to fumbling with the key and/or the door latch.

JUST OPEN THE DOOR AND GET OUT OF THE CAR!!!!!

 

[IndyJones]

"But I hate it in old American films when the drivers don't watch the road."

This only happened in American films?