In the movie Friends With Benefits, there's this logo animation...

September 13, 2015 9:48 AM

I'm not sure exactly what to call this. I'm collecting examples of obvious miscommunications in movie production that no one cared enough about to get fixed. I noticed one of them in the movie Friends with Benefits. Can you help me find this clip online?

If I'm remembering correctly, Timberlake's character shows a new GQ logo animation. There's a theme in the movie of flash mobs, and a flash mob morphs into the GQ logo.

BUT, it's totally ridiculous: The mob kind of squishes together and fades out to be replaced by the GQ logo. And, it seems to be the case that the animators had no idea what the actual vision for this was supposed to be, and no one cared enough or noticed it to make it better.

I've madly searched online for this clip, especially on youtube, but no search string I can come up with gets me this scene. I'm resigning myself to pay $4 to rent the movie unless someone can dig it up.

(Bonus: Other examples like this.)

posted by zeek321 to Media & Arts (9 answers total)

Best answer: Is this it?
posted by modesty.blaise at 10:01 AM on September 13, 2015 [1 favorite]

modesty.blaise seems to have found your clip. I'm not sure how obvious it is that this is a miscommunication, however. It seems more likely to me that the effect was inexpensive.
posted by pheide at 11:27 AM on September 13, 2015

You need to clarify what you mean by "obvious miscommunication" here. This was a decision made by the director, in conjunction with the art department, which is headed by the production designer. You may not like it, but there's nothing from that clip that supports your asssertion that "the animators had no idea what the actual vision for this was supposed to be, and no one cared enough or noticed it to make it better."

(I come at this from a long background in film production, with a husband who does an art department job in films and TV, and other family members and friends involved in all facets of production, both above- and below-the-line.)
posted by BlahLaLa at 11:46 AM on September 13, 2015 [6 favorites]

I'd agree that it was a cheesy effect, but when I first saw the movie a month or so ago I was under the impression that it was meant to be cheesy, and that the director wanted it cheesy because if it had been good we might have been tempted to accept the character's cynical appropriation.
posted by johnofjack at 12:40 PM on September 13, 2015 [1 favorite]

Best answer: In the movie Twister, Philip Seymour Hoffman's character out of the blue says "A manly handshake ensues." when meeting Bill Paxton. This is obviously supposed to be a parenthetical in the script describing how the handshake should look, but for whatever reason he actually says the line and nobody thought to cut it out.

Is that what you meant?
posted by dilaudid at 1:14 PM on September 13, 2015 [8 favorites]

Do really low budget movies count? Plan 9 from Outer Space has scenes (or maybe just one scene? I can't recall) shot day-for-night, but then the proper processing for day-for-night wasn't done at the later stage, so they just look like "day".
posted by phoenixy at 2:11 PM on September 13, 2015

Response by poster: modesty.blaise, at 2:00, yes!! I found that clip but didn't watch that far. pheide and BlahLaLa, I will contemplate your assertions! My memory of this scene was not quite veridical.
posted by zeek321 at 9:17 AM on September 14, 2015

On the subject of mistakenly performed stage directions being left to stand, per the example from dilaudid above, this is a classic case of it.
posted by dadaclonefly at 3:59 PM on September 14, 2015

Riker makes scrambled eggs and calls it an omelette which I kind of figured came from someone neglecting to bring any other ingredients to the set.
posted by RobotHero at 1:41 PM on September 25, 2015