How does Hollywood portray the work you do?

[pink-o]

I work for the airlines, and I howl with laughter every time I see a movie that takes place on a plane or in an airport. Like "Die Hard" 2, where the hijackers wouldn't allow planes to land in Washington Airport. Such crap! Baltimore and Dulles airport would have given those planes clearance to land, they never would have circled and run out of fuel.

On HBO when I was in Los Cabos last month, I watched "The Terminal". Or should I say I tried to watch it. Couldn't get past my original disbelief against the whole premise--believe me, People, it NEVER NEVER NEVER would have happened.

So how 'bout it? What has Hollywood gotten wrong about your jobs?

[ForrestGump]

1. Most recently

:D

Before that:



:o

[Popol Vuh]

114. Like this...

[miss_american_pie]

2. Desperate Housewives

Enough said. :D

[GOPisEvil]

19. Teri Hatcher ain't got nothin' on you.

:shameless:

:D

[miss_american_pie]

21. You are shameless!

:blush:

[GOPisEvil]

23. .

:)

[miss_american_pie]

24. Happy now?

;)

[GOPisEvil]

25. I'm always happy to see you.

:)

[miss_american_pie]

27. And I, you

especially when you have whipped cream. :D

[GOPisEvil]

28. Beware Greeks bearing gifts

especially when it's whipped cream. :D

[miss_american_pie]

30. Oh, I think

I can handle you. :)

[GOPisEvil]

31. I'd like to see you try.

Bring it on. :D

[miss_american_pie]

32. Hmmm

maybe in January. It's hot down there. :D

[GOPisEvil]

35. Actually, the best times to visit

are October through April. It's actually pleasant here. :D I'm driving to see my parents at 4:00 today. Thank goodness for car a/c.

[miss_american_pie]

37. How long of a drive?

[GOPisEvil]

38. Give or take, about 1500 miles.

So, a fairly decent drive. :D

[miss_american_pie]

39. Sheesh

Have fun. :D

[GOPisEvil]

42. I drove to CA this past winter.

That was about 1300 miles. I did it in two days.

Flying is more efficient. :D

[miss_american_pie]

44. I'm driving to MN in two weeks

with my kids. :D

[GOPisEvil]

48. Dear. God.

Ya know, if you head straight down I-35 from MN, you'll get here. ;)

You deserve extra whipped cream for that road trip. :D

[miss_american_pie]

49. You do not

want my kids near your house. Trust me. :D

[GOPisEvil]

51. Heh...

...there are plenty of hazardous chemicals and sharp things fun items out in the garage.

Edit - forgot the :hide:

[miss_american_pie]

52. You want your house blown up?

:hide:

[GOPisEvil]

53. Eh, I'm insured.

I'll just put everything I REALLY like or need in my car and park down the street.

[ZombieNixon]

3. I've never seen a Hollywood flick about video game development,

so I don't know.

College, on the other hand...:o...and "where are those girls here?" :D

[xmas74]

6. Saw a Z grade horror movie w/ one in it.

He was the first one killed off.

[bertha katzenengel]

9. There are a couple of "Law & Order" episodes about that. eom

[Mutley]

46. The dude in "Sliver" is a video game developer.

:D

[GOPisEvil]

4. Insurance claims people are either nebbish, anal-retentive geeks or

out to screw people out of a fair settlement.

I, for one, am not nebbish, and I'm only anal-retentive about a few things. Geek? Guilty. ;)

[ForrestGump]

10. Ned? Ned Ryerson?!?

:P

[xmas74]

5. They don't.

Not too many shows about workers in group homes for the mentally challenged.

I'm training to be a scopist now and I've never even heard that job mentioned in a single show.

[pink-o]

8. Hmmm,,,, maybe it's time to write a script about it.

My mom's a retired mental-health nurse, so she got Louise Fletcher in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest as her Hollywood role model. Nice!

[xmas74]

15. That's the closest I've found.

Not the best rep for the field.

A scopist would be even worse. What would that script be like? Check your email, listen to tapes and check things over when there is work, yell at the kid, get on a message board and bitch about the court reporter that hasn't sent you a check yet. All this while in ratty pajamas. Sounds like a boring movie.

[ForrestGump]

40. Ha! How about "Dream Team"?

Admittedly, the doctor's only in part of the movie, though, but he's sure a step up from Nurse Ratchet.

[xmas74]

41. True but he's a doctor.

The daily workers are usually treated like drones in movies, same as hospital orderlies.

[ForrestGump]

45. Darn

Someone's gotta fix this.

[xmas74]

47. They need to show us for the kind, caring,

highly underpaid individuals we really are. But they won't.

[ForrestGump]

50. If we could squeeze a couple of car chases in, and perhaps

a shot of the female lead's breasts (though maybe that's just me projecting a little here), I think we'll have a shot at a marketable screenplay...

[xmas74]

75. I'm sure they could work it out.

Any actors in mind?

[bertha katzenengel]

7. Secretary. Most are wimpish little "yes, sir" types, with a few

notable exceptions. Like Mrs. Landingham, and Lily Tomlin's role (can't remember the character), in "The West Wing."

[pink-o]

11. Then, of course there's Maggie Gyllenhall....

....in the titular film!!!

C'mon, I KNOW you want James Spader to spank you!

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

12. I love that movie!

[xmas74]

17. I bought that movie.

Most people think it's something silly until the borrow it from me.

After they watch it they ask me questions about why I think that's such a cool movie. It makes them wonder about me.

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

22. Yeah, I own it to.

It's not the sort of movie that would faze my friends or half my family though.

[xmas74]

29. But I'm small town Missouri.

Missionary is about all they care about around here.

Usually the questions they ask about are ways to feel me out, trying to align me w/ Maggie's character. Poor things-they always get it backward.

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

54. And then on the opposite end of the spectrum...

My cousin has built a career out of watching porn. Therefore, porn is often a subject around the holiday dinner table.

[xmas74]

55. Where can I sign up for that job?

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

81. Figure out how to get people to pay you for your advice on what porn

they should watch. Also, be very funny. Although, I don't think there's a thriving porn film industry in the midwest, so it might be tough.

[xmas74]

82. Not thriving but it's here.

One of my classmates was in one filmed at a restaurant the next town over. I'm not kidding-it's a video that I had no qualms w/ renting and giving a review of.

I hated that b*tch in high school and was only too glad to let everyone know that she wasn't as innocent as she let on.

[bertha katzenengel]

16. I haven't seen it. Which movie? eom

[xmas74]

18. Secretary.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0274812/

[RFKHumphreyObama]

111. Lily Tomlin starred as Deborah Fiderer in the West Wing

[XemaSab]

13. People doing what I do are all either in lab coats

or in khakis.

In the jungle.

Or the Outback.

Or the arctic tundra.

:shrug:

I guess "Gorillas in the Mist," "Never Cry Wolf," and any one of a number of shows on Animal Planet would be the closest to what I do.

[XemaSab]

59. Wait a sec, that's sexy as hell...

It's all true! Every bit of it! :D

[Heidi]

14. Too often, as brilliant, drunken or drug-addicted, tortured souls.

:eyes: Fact is, most folks successfully making their livings as artists keep regular studio hours and most of us don't imbibe when we're working.

[Floogeldy]

101. Perhaps it is time for you to get drunk and let CMW torture your soul?

;)

Bwahahaha!

[Heidi]

103. I don't need to get drunk for that. He's a Trekkie.

My soul is tortured.

[Floogeldy]

105. So much for flitting around the Universe with your "Kirk, Out."

Helm, steady as she goes. Engineering, report. Ahead warp factor 2.

I'm a doctor, not a bricklayer!

:puffpiece:

[Heidi]

108. .

:spray: :rofl: *gasp*

[blondeatlast]

20. As uptight, stern women with little to no social life--often

until the "hero" comes along to "save" them.

I'm quite the opposite, thank you very much.

In case you haven't guessed--I'm a librarian.

BTE--great idea for a thread! :toast:

[pink-o]

34. Hey, thanks!

I'm truly curious, since I'm an airline ticket agent, and we're usually portrayed as being bitches and not allowing the hero to get on a plane and save his lady love or some such schlock. Or else everyone thinks we're "stewardesses". I love that one: in real life when someone uses that word, I tend to refer them to my friend Ted who's 6'3" and lifts weights. Not exactly "Barbie"

[ForrestGump]

36. On the bright side, Rachel Weisz' character in "The Mummy" was a

librarian.

Yummy... :D

[Courtesy Flush]

26. I'm a child protection worker

All the field workers I know are willing to listen to people, and slow to remove children. BUT the social workers in the movies accurately portray the social services administrators. My boss is always quick to snatch kids, and slow to give people a chance to prove themselves. The administrators haven't been in the 'hood in twenty years. They drive their Lexus, and pass judgement on people they've never met. But in the movies, it's the guys like me who are portrayed as the baby snatchers.

Disclaimer: Do NOT PM me about your child protection issues. I can hardly tell people what I do for a living without them asking me to intervene in matters I have no business in. Sorry.

[Iniquitous Bunny]

33. Either as perverts or sadists.

While performing nursing tasks, I have no interest in hurting anyone. I can also say that being turned on by someone sick and in the hospital is not happening either. :eyes:

[maveric]

43. I design shipboard and habitability furnishings.

Oh yeah, there was that one movie...I cnt remember the name.... You know...??

[democracyindanger]

80. Titanic.

[Bill McBlueState]

56. Astronomers...

Astronomers put headphones on so we can listen to radio signals from the cosmos. (When Jody Foster did that in Contact I about fell out of my chair.)

And, we all have small telescopes by our office windows so we can look at the sky on a moment's notice.

[XemaSab]

58. My illusions have been shattered!

:cry:

[LeftyMom]

106. To be fair,

I don't recall that it's mentioned in the movie, but in the book her colleagues regard that listening (and a lot of her other behavior) as somewhere between quirky and nucking futs. The character is a bit OCD, she finds herself looking for signal in the noise when she hears the dishwasher as well, if I recall.

[NNadir]

57. Either as noble selfless dedicated people or as dangerous pyschotic freaks

I'm in the sciences.

[XemaSab]

60. Wearing khakis?

:popcorn:

[NNadir]

87. Given that the scientist is a stock hollywood character, I'm sure some

wear khakis.

I've seen so many Hollywood scientists, I can't remember all their characters.

I'll tell you what though, Hollywood science is a hell of a lot sexier than real science. I'd love to talk further but right now I'm in my secret lair building a machine to control the weather and take over the world. I'll work on it a little more right after I reaminate the monster.

[XemaSab]

88. Oh, you're a lab coat wearing scientist

I'm the sort of scientist who goes into the jungle and becomes deeply, deeply unwound. :shrug:

[NNadir]

89. Well, don't bring back any live dinosaurs or Empire State Sized Apes.

My wife and kids are upstairs watching "The Return of the Fly."

I don't have the heart to show them my new head.

[XemaSab]

90. You're not going to be able to keep it a secret forever

:(

[NNadir]

92. Yeah, that bugs me.

I'm hoping my kids will think the compound eyes are cool, and get kind of a buzz from it. Of course they may worry that I'll fly off the handle and start swatting them, but I'm not planning on heading for that kind of shit.

[XemaSab]

93. .

:freak:

[Fox Mulder]

61. Has there ever been a movie about a guy and a printing press?

Somehow I doubt it.

[Bucky]

99. Of course there has

You don't know how wrong your are.

[alarimer]

62. My life is nothing like "The Life Aquatic"

There were no hot tubs on any of the research vessels I have been on! They never show the endless creel surveys at boat ramps or 9-10 hour days in the hot sun. Or patching nets, an boring task that never ends. Or the endless, dull MEETINGS. "Tired of working, have a meeting!"

[XemaSab]

63. What about Jaws?

:popcorn:

[alarimer]

68. not remotely like Jaws either

I am thinking especially of the third installment- "Jaws 3d". Of course that was a terrible movie. I have never worked at a Sea World-type place. From what I have heard from friends, most trainers at those facilities make about minimum wage.

Now occasionally there is shark attack hysteria around here and I will get comments or questions from people but never does anyone (as far as I know) go out and try to hunt down the offending animal, although I think in Hawaii they might. They kill all the tiger sharks but that doesn't stop shark attacks because others just move in.

[av8rdave]

64. I'm a pilot for a major airline....

And like you, I have a hard time sitting through any movie about airlines/airliners/airline employees. I do, however, wish the old stereotype that we are all good looking, wealthy playboys were true! That one is further off than most of the movies.

Dave

[billyskank]

65. Hollywood thinks I am a social misfit who will never get laid

I am a computer programmer. Hollywood often also thinks that people like me are sociopaths who break into systems for fun and/or profit.

[Dangerously Amused]

121. Forget Hollywood - I'll let you break into MY system for fun.

:7

[auntAgonist]

66. Truck Driver ..

I don't drive anymore but those truckin' movies leave me shaking my head. Not a single one of them is near reality.

Breaker! Breaker!, Convoy, Duel, Flatbed Annie & Sweetiepie, High Ballin', Sorcerer, The Great Smokey Roadblock, Truck Stop Women, The Wages of Fear, & White Line Fever.

Citizens' Band, Coast to Coast, the Smokey and the Bandit triology with Jackie Gleason, & Smokey and the Hot Wire Gang.

F.I.S.T , Steel Cowboy with James Brolin, & They Drive at Night


on EDIT: let's not forget the T.V shows either

Movin' On,
B.J. and the Bear with Greg Evigan,
Cannonball with Paul Birch & William Campbell,
18 Wheels of Justice with Lucky Vanous & G. Gordon Liddy.


Just to name a few. :puke:

aA
:hi:

[av8rdave]

69. I'm curious...

Do you sit through those movies silently, or critique them out loud? I used to do that with aviation movies, until I finally learned to keep my mouth shut and just shake my head.

Dave

[auntAgonist]

71. I tend to pick them apart , very vocally....

:rofl: sometimes I just can't watch them at all.


aA
:hi:

[av8rdave]

74. That's what I did until I came to the conclusion

that no moviemaker was ever going to get it right. Well, ok, maybe they came close with "Airplane!" :)

I am serious, and don't call me Shirley.

[pink-o]

85. Airplane! Ha ha ha ha..

It's the only aviation movie I can sit thru. When the plane knocks over the disco radio station tower, we KNOW it's the 70s!

Very few broad parodies succeed like that movie. I tend to enjoy more mordant satire, such as "Network"

Any television news directors out there? Does "Network" accurately portray your job????

[billyskank]

70. Hi aA!

:hug: :loveya:

[auntAgonist]

72. hiya billyskank!

:hug: hope you're not suffering from jet lag :hug:

:loveya:
aA

[billyskank]

73. I feel so fucking wierd

It's kinda like being wasted... :rofl:

There's only a couple of hours before I can reasonably call it bedtime though. :hug:

[liberaltrucker]

76. "Smokey and the Bandit" was pretty good.

:rofl:

[auntAgonist]

77. heh ..

a few chuckles ... yes.

:rofl:

aA

[Tikki]

67. As a grandmother raising my grandchild...

I'm depicted as an old poor single minority woman. Or sometimes depicted, as a wealthy
socialite matron who legally steals the child from her daughter.

Wow, I am non-of-the-above; oh, except I'm a woman.


Tikki

[StellaBlue]

78. I don't get portrayed

mid-to-late twentysomething with two degrees who can't support herself or find decent work, incredibly cynical/witty, not obsessed with finding a man or reality TV... I don't exist in the media. Like cellulite.

I guess the closest thing would be Erin Brokovich, minus the mewling kids. :shrug:

[CanuckAmok]

79. "Curb Your Enthusiasm"

That's pretty much it, sans the success, of course.

I work in film.

[pagerbear]

83. If you've seen a TV show about the typesetting of data-driven documents

...I'd like to know about it.

[GoneOffShore]

84. Hollywood has never really portrayed my job

I'm a casting director and the only movie out there is called - Au Suivant! (Next!) made in France. Very funny and pretty much true to life.

[jobycom]

86. I'm a professional slacker. Seems like Hollywood gets it wrong.

All these movies about slackers working as clerks or trying to pick up teenage girls or smoking pot-- Like I'd exert myself that much! I couldn't afford pot if I wanted to smoke it!

[Doctor Venmkan]

91. Hollywood for the most part does not get my job wrong....

...they just IGNORE it! (pharmacy technician) :(

I've long proclaimed to my co-workers that a show about a pharmacy could rival E.R., but they tend to write it off as more of my geekfest rants...! :D

[XemaSab]

94. You've clearly never seen Desperate Housewives...

[Doctor Venmkan]

118. You're right...

but to be a nit-picker, I think the guy on there is a pharmacist, not a pharmacy technician, right? ;)

Then there's...whatsisname...Mort, I think. From Family Guy. Typical "nerd" stereotype with "UBER-nerd" stereotype son...gah.

[NewJeffCT]

95. how are accounting types portrayed?

none come to mind

[pink-o]

97. As slimy embezzlers

...who cook the books for mob bosses, of course!

[ForrestGump]

107. And usually get whacked in Act II

Sorry... :-(

[NewJeffCT]

115. there was the accountant in "The Untouchables"

he seemed kind of nerdy, if I recall.

[ForrestGump]

116. Was that Charles Nelson Reilly Smith Martin, or

whatever his name is? The dude from Starman and American Grafitti, among others?

[NewJeffCT]

117. Charles Martin Smith

Yes, he was the accountant member of the Untouchables. But, there was also the mob accountant they caught in the infamous train station scene where Andy Garcia stopped the stroller that was falling down the stairs.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

96. Another airline employee checking in --

And yes, anything Hollywood does that involves airplanes is almost always spectacularly wrong. "Die Hard 2" was one of the worst (in more ways than one), but they are all way off base. I did get a kick out of "Terminal," though, despite the fact that it wouldn't have happened that way. It started out with a flight attendant wearing high spike heels, which they don't, and can't, and went downhill from there. (The movie was very loosely based on a guy who has been living at CDG for a number of years, but he's more like a homeless guy, nothing like the movie). So I have to assume that movies about other people's jobs are just as inaccurate.

[Initech]

98. Office Space describes my work perfectly

I feel like Michael Bolton every time I deal with the office paper shredder, and me and at least four other co-workers agree that our boss behaves exactly like Bill Lumberg.

"Yeah, I'm going to have to ask you to go ahead and come in on Saturday. If you could do that, that would be great!"

They say the longer you work in music, the funnier Spinal Tap is. Well, the same holds true that the longer you work a desk job, the funnier Office Space is!

[Bucky]

100. As a teacher I believe Hollywood portrays my job w/ complete accuracy

Of course I am a very bad teacher and sleep thru most of my classes.

[wickerwoman]

109. Another teacher

I think Hollywood always shows either the idealistic young kids who quit after a year or two or they show the dilletants who are only teaching to pay the rent while they finish their screenplay.

The most realistic portrayal I've ever seen of a typical high school teacher was Ben Stein in Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Also, Mrs. Kerbabple(?) from the Simpsons. I worked with dozens of them when I subbed in kindergartens. They all hit the bars by 4:30pm.

[swag]

102. Dupe of EOO

[Initech]

104. "PC load letter? What the fuck does that mean?"

[mike_c]

110. mad scientist, geek, absent minded professor....

All of which are more or less accurate characterizations, now that I think about it....

[ForrestGump]

113. Look familiar?

[DemsRBetterLovers]

112. Im an archaeologist

Contrary to popular belief, a whip and a gun are not part of the tool kit.

[bluethruandthru]

119. WKRP in Cincinnati

Pretty close!

[Blue_In_AK]

120. I haven't seen any movies about legal transcriptionists lately. nt