Whenever we watch movies, it goes without saying that viewers need to suspend their disbelief, because movies are usually not going to be completely realistic, and some movies are completely far-fetched. With that in mind, most viewers will simply go along for the ride and the let the film entertain them.
However, what is not so entertaining is when aspects of the film’s plot make absolutely no sense or do not add up, making viewers wonder, “what the hell?” or “wait a minute!” These are moments that contradict other events in the film or the logic the setting of the film has already set up. Many of these plot holes would have been overlooked or dismissed by the screenwriters or the director because logic got in the way of telling an entertaining story.
While it is fair to dismiss these plot holes by saying “it’s just a movie,” these plot holes are one of those pet peeves that movie buffs cannot look past, no matter how good the movie is. While the films on this list vary from winning Oscars to “winning” Razzies, regardless of their quality they all have one thing in common: plot holes that ruin the logic of the story that have left audiences scratching their heads.
10. Gremlins (Joe Dante, 1984)
“Gremlins” is one of those still beloved family films from the 1980s from the same ilk as “The Goonies” and “The NeverEnding Story. However, the story falls apart by the three not-so-simple rules of having a Mogwai as a pet.
One of the rules of taking care of a Mogwai is to not feed them after midnight. But the film does not take international time zones into consideration, meaning it is always after midnight somewhere in the world. What if the Mogwai travels to another part of the world, meaning its normal body clock would not be in sync with the local time? What about daylight saving time?
Another rule is that Mogwais cannot get wet, otherwise they will multiply and cause chaos. While this is a justified caution, it would be nearly impossible to uphold. If the Mogwai is outside, it would at some point encounter rain or get wet in some form. Surely its owners would want to wash their pet Mogwai when it starts to smell, right?
Mogwais also cannot be exposed to sunlight, otherwise it will die. Although you could theoretically always keep a Mogwai in a dark room, like how you could keep a goldfish in a fishbowl, it would be hard to do.
9. The Hangover (Todd Phillips, 2009)
“The Hangover”, one of the most popular comedy films of the past decade, is about a group of men who have a reckless bachelor party in Las Vegas, only to lose the groom-to-be, and it spawned two sequels. Many viewers laughed away at the silly shenanigans on screen, perhaps so much so that they have overlooked how improbable the catalyst for the film is.
The aforementioned missing buddy, Doug (Justin Bartha), has been stuck on the roof of the Caesars Palace casino for two days. How did Doug not get noticed by anyone? Surely the security cameras of the casino would have noticed a guest on the roof when he should not be there, and therefore alert the security guards to Doug’s plight.
He does throw a mattress down to get attention, but seemingly just gave up after that, just sitting on the roof for two whole days under the hot Nevada sun. Since the windows to the hotel rooms do not open, a maintenance worker would have had to remove the mattress stuck on the statue, and would have realized something was amiss and have inspected the roof, hence finding Doug. Perhaps, as the title suggests, he was simply too hungover to think of any of this.
8. Toy Story (John Lasseter, 1995)
Naturally, a movie about living and talking toys was never going to be the most realistic or logical movie ever made. It is a fantasy movie that children and adults have equally adored since 1995. Viewers of all ages would let themselves be enamored by the fantasy of toys living their very own secret lives when no one was around.
The premise of “Toy Story”, though, is that the new toy Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) thinks he is a real space ranger and does not believe the other toys when they tell him he is in fact a toy. If Buzz Lightyear thought he was real and not a toy, then why did he also freeze and act lifeless whenever Andy appeared? That seems very convenient.
The toys can definitely interact with humans, as seen when the toys scare the bully next door for torturing and disfiguring toys. So there is absolutely no reason for Buzz to not be himself in front of Andy if he thinks he is real.
7. The Dark Knight Rises (Christopher Nolan, 2012)
The Dark Knight trilogy is almost universally loved by both Batman fans and movie buffs in general. The acting is superb, the action is thrilling, the look and feel of Gotham is as dark as it is beautiful, and they are just so entertaining. Perhaps it had the advantage of following up from Joel Schumacher’s maligned Batman films, so almost any Batman movie made after them would look great. However, the Dark Knight films were spectacular.
However, the last entry in the trilogy, “The Dark Knight Rises”, ends on a huge plot hole that kind of ruins the integrity of the overall story arc. Batman (Christian Bale) flies the Batplane and the nuclear bomb Bane (Tom Hardy) sets into the ocean; it explodes, presumed to have killed Batman in the process. If the nuclear bomb could wipe out an entire city and its population, then a man sitting just above it would seemingly have no chance of survival.
Yet somehow, Alfred (Michael Caine) bumps into Bruce Wayne and Selina Kyle (Anne Hathaway) at a restaurant in Florence. How did Bruce escape? It is to be assumed that Batman ejected himself out of the Batplane before the bomb went off. His escape not being shown on screen would have been to keep the sombre mood of the film, since everyone thinks Batman has died. But it is still very confusing, as he would have been right in the vicinity of the nuclear blast.
Also, Bruce Wayne is a billionaire, therefore the whole world would know who he was simply because of him being known in the media. Could you imagine real life billionaires like Richard Branson or Rupert Murdoch faking a very public death, and then simply walking down the street without raising any eyebrows? Not likely.
6. Battlefield Earth (Roger Christian, 2000)
Many consider “Battlefield Earth” to be one of the worst films ever made, and there are gaping plot holes that help justify the film’s bad reputation. The film is set in the year 3000, one thousand years after the Psychlos took over Earth. How it has taken a whole millennium for the humans to finally fight back is silly in itself, but how they try to do it presents even bigger plot holes.
The human rebels learn, in just one week, how to fly Harrier jet fighter planes. Not only does it take years to learn how to fly these complex military machines, but how have these planes not rusted over the thousand year period that they were just sitting in the hangar, and how are they still in working order despite the lack of maintenance in a millennium?
Also, keep in mind that one thousand years have passed since the Psychlos took over Earth, when the military was using these Harriers that were so easily defeated. In fact, it is said that it took only nine minutes for the Psychlos to take over Earth! So if Harriers were not enough to fight against the Psychlos for a measly nine minutes a thousand years earlier, then how could these jet fighters possibly compete against Psychlo technology that has advanced by another thousand years?
The humans use the gold they find at Fort Knox to pass off as the gold they have mined in order to use their time to prepare their uprising. If the Psychlos primarily use Earth to mine for gold, then how is it that they have never come across Fort Knox, where the US government keeps its gold bullion? Either the Psychlos are even more arrogant and lazy than they appear to be in the film, or the writing is just plain terrible (it’s the latter reason).