Things that strike you odd when watching an older movie or TV show?

[Alice S. Fuzzybutt]

A while ago I watched Are You in The House Alone (1978). It's about a teenage girl (Kathleen Beller, who is married to Thomas Dolby for those into trivia) who is stalked and gets raped while she is babysitting.

The thing that struck me odd is that her dad wanted to press charges against the guy (a young Dennis Quaid) but her mother was against it. When pressed, the mother blurted out "She's not a virgin!"

WOW! I forgot that carried weight back in the day.

I also remember from old movies/TV shows that women can be appeased by fur coats, diamonds, new dresses, and new hats.

[PapaBear]

The TV show thing always hits me when I see or remember old episodes of shows like "All In The Family", "The Jefferson's", etc. Also... remember old McDonalds commercials? There would be commercials with either all black, or all white people in them.

What was even more crazy, was how shows from the 60's wouldn't even show married couples in the same bed. How the fuck did Rob and Laura Petrie ever have a kid, when they slept in twin beds with a night table between them?

[joethebartender]

People smoking in public places or in an office looks weird on tv now. Phone booth scenes too.

[A.J.]

People smoking in public places or in an office looks weird on tv now. Phone booth scenes too.

Further to that was guys who are my age looked 50 back then and had their own offices with their own secretaries. No cubicles!

Oh and booze in their office and martini lunches!

[A.J.]

A while ago I watched Are You in The House Alone (1978). It's about a teenage girl (Kathleen Beller, who is married to Thomas Dolby for those into trivia) who is stalked and gets raped while she is babysitting.

You also might remember her from Godfather II as Genco's girlfriend -- the girl Don Fanucci threatened to cut with a knife in the theater.

She was also Kirby on Dynasty.

[Tall_James]

The effeminate male character who was never really said to be gay.

AKA. Paul Lynde

[jeffdwright2001]

It seemed that on some of the shows where children were characters, but not the main characters, that some phantom being took care of them until it was time for them to appear on scene.

Who the heck is keeping an eye on these kids until their presence in front of the parents is deemed desirable?

[BlackSpider]

Gigantic wireless home phones with rubber antennae.
and in later years, big cell phones.

[Sinestro]

Accordians and Harmonicas. Who plays those anymore?

[SHANEFROMGA]

it seemed every man in the eighties wore colorful wool sweaters when at home relaxing

[SHANEFROMGA]

also big shoulder pads on women.

[TeeBone]

Two sound effects strike me as odd and I hear them both on a variety of late 70s reruns.
The first is a canned laugh track of a guy with the strangest laugh. It seems like every comedy/sitcom in the late 70s used it. I wish I could locate that sound effect.
The other is the sound effect of someone---anyone, getting thrown to the ground. Its so bad, its great.

[Thebazile78]

Accordians and Harmonicas. Who plays those anymore?

You have never been to my family reunions.

Everybody POLKA!!!!!

[Tenbatsuzen]

The effeminate male character who was never really said to be gay.

AKA. Paul Lynde

RESPECT UNCLE ARTHUR!!

[jonyrotn]

The effeminate male character who was never really said to be gay.

AKA. Paul LyndeMonroe in TO Close For Comfort...


I recently saw a movie from the 50's that had a picnic scene in it and when they broke out the fried chicken legs I couldn't believe it..They where so thin, small and meatless I had to thank science for steroids and hormones right on the spot..These people where sucking on these chicken leg bones like they where they where heven sent..Now I can see why fat people where considered freaks back in the day, everyone ate like they were POWs..

[ralphbxny]

How in older movies they slap women and kids around like its no big.

[SHANEFROMGA]

did any man in the late 70's early 80's ever button their really tight shirts up more than the bottom 3 buttons?

[Coach]

Here are a few that will blow your mind:
In the origional Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer, Clarise and Mother wanted to go out and look for Rudolf..but Dad (Donder?) said: "No, this is Man's Work".
In The Quiet Man a woman gives John Wayne a "good stick to beat your wife".
In the Dean Martin Roasts..everyone is SMOKING and DRINKING BOOZE!!!!
You rarely saw Jews on tv.
The Brady Bunch attempted a spin-off in which three best friends become foster brothers one black, one asian, one white.

[WhistlePig]

The way bad guys in old movies hold their guns at waist level when shooting. How the hell did they aim?

[Coach]

obligatory..How the fuck did the A-team..the best special forces team, shoot all those bullets and never kill anyone??

[nukinfuts]

Further to that was guys who are my age looked 50 back then and had their own offices with their own secretaries. No cubicles!

Oh and booze in their office and martini lunches!

I saw a show the other night where they were actually smoking in the hospital...good times...good times.

[Chigworthy]

Bill Burr mentioned it on O&A once. The barrel chest and poorly sucked-in drinker's gut on male sex symbols in the 50's and before.

[Coach]

Bill Burr mentioned it on O&A once. The barrel chest and poorly sucked-in drinker's gut on male sex symbols in the 50's and before.Damn, shoulda been from the 50's!

The cigarrette ads by olympians in the old movies.

[djjd]

for me it's the phone thing

i was watching Bullit the other day, and the detectives are pulling over to use payphones, and when they go out to dinner they tell the maitre de that they left the number with the office in case something comes up

[Reynolds]

I was watching Close Encounters the other day, and he piles all the kids in the pickup truck, none of them put on a seat belt.

[Reynolds]

People smoking in public places or in an office looks weird on tv now. Phone booth scenes too.

Remember lighting up in the mall while shopping? Was around 10 years ago, now if you light up in a bar people look at you like you're a maniac.

[A.J.]

I was watching my Hawaii Five-O DVDs the other night where Danno was waiting for a Telex to come in from the mainland.

[SHANEFROMGA]

on one episode of the dukes of hazzard enos was recieving a "faximoly" of atlanta
on a giant "faximoly machine". it sounded like a machine gun going off in a tin drum

[Gvac]

I wonder why people thought turquoise and aqua were great colors for the kitchen, and orange and brown were perfect for the living room.

Then again, maybe that wasn't an old TV show I was watching. Might've been home movies.

[nukinfuts]

I wonder why people thought turquoise and aqua were great colors for the kitchen, and orange and brown were perfect for the living room.

Then again, maybe that wasn't an old TV show I was watching. Might've been home movies.

Crap, now I have to paint my kitchen and living room :huh:

[Alice S. Fuzzybutt]

turquoise and aqua were great colors for the kitchen

Wow! Were you at my house? The one and ONLY time my parent's "re-did" the house was in the 70s. I can still remember the bicentennial light switch plates.

We also had Dogs Playing Poker proudly displayed.

[bobrobot]

Wow! Were you at my house? The one and ONLY time my parent's "re-did" the house was in the 70s. I can still remember the bicentennial light switch plates.

We also had Dogs Playing Poker proudly displayed.

C. M. Coolidge (1844-1934), one of my FAVORITE artists!!!

http://www.decodog.com/inven/dogs1/dg30064.jpg

[PD]

How about in War games when he has that modem that actually requires you to put your phone down on top of it?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/7c/Acoustic_coupler_20041015_175456_1.jpg/785px-Acoustic_coupler_20041015_175456_1.jpg

and of course how it was perfectly fine to have "a few drinks" and then drive.

[A.J.]

and of course how it was perfectly fine to have "a few drinks" and then drive.

Like Ronnie said the other day: leave the windows down for Dad!

[Fezticle98]

The effeminate male character who was never really said to be gay.

AKA. Paul Lynde

I thought the exact same thing as I was watching an old tv infomercial from the 80's.

Oh, and large bushes and bathing suits.

[GameRelatedSig]

Cinder block-sized cell-phones.

[Coach]

Car phones that looked like old princess phones.
elevators with drivers in them.

[Enabler]

I may be wrong on this, but I feel like sit-coms I used to watch when I was a kid always attempted to tackle some issue WAY too uncomfortable for a 30min sit-com. There was always that one episode of Diff't Strokes or Facts of Life or Family Ties that would be "very special." Seinfeld never addressed child molestation.

[WhistlePig]

I may be wrong on this, but I feel like sit-coms I used to watch when I was a kid always attempted to tackle some issue WAY too uncomfortable for a 30min sit-com. There was always that one episode of Diff't Strokes or Facts of Life or Family Ties that would be "very special." Seinfeld never addressed child molestation.

Like when Janet Jackson was the abused neighbor kid of Florida and J.J. Evans. Cringe. I still remember the hot iron-headed-toward-the-arm scene.

http://www.soul-patrol.com/newsletter/2004/news4/janet.jpg

[barjockey]

Hairstyles were far-outhttp://images.digitalmedianet.com/2005/Week_50/6nnxauxi/story/cast.jpg

[PapaBear]

I'm old, so a lot of the things people mentioned in this thread never strike me as odd. But one thing that always got me when I was a kid was when I watched old reruns of The Dick Van Dyke Show. Even as a kid, I thought it was strange that they managed to have a kid, but slept in separate twin beds. I may not have known the exact mechanics of sex, but I knew it required a much bigger bed.

[Jujubees2]

In the old baseball movies, the photographer would stand 20 feet from home plate while taking a photo of the batter. Man those photographers were brave.

[barjockey]

"Silence of the Lambs" Jodi Foster spends a lot of time on a payphone.

[ChrisOBX]

I could never stand the stereotypical, over-the-top "city kid" in any given show or movie, like Joe in The Facts of Life, or the character played by Scott Baio's brother in the second Bad News Bears movie - or Scott Baio himself in Happy Days...

They always had this generic "street" accent that sounded like a really bad imitation of a Brooklyn person - regardless of what city they were from...and they NEVER came across as "scary-bad" like they were intended to.

[ChrisOBX]

Oh...and Robbie Benson...wtf?
How did that guy keep getting work?
I never understood his appeal as an actor...

[CambriaBurning]

ANY gunshot sound effects. It was always the sound of someone hitting plastic with a baseball bat or that "Peeeuuuwwwww" sound that got high pitched at the end.

[Coach]

Oh...and Robbie Benson...wtf?
How did that guy keep getting work?
I never understood his appeal as an actor...I loved the one with him as a rocker who gets a monkey that has the codex for the nuclear missles launch. The guy from Harold and Maude as a techno punk spy...priceless.
and I loved Robbie as a native american runner.
I believe he is an executive director at Disney now.

Speaking of Disney....Anyone else know that there was a sequal to "Old Yeller" called "Savage Sam"? Verrry much lighthearted, yet weird Disney.

[Sinestro]

People hanging their clothes on the clothes line. Especially in high building.

Anyone ever had to change the clothes line and have to climp up the clothes line pole. that was a mutha fucker.

[SHANEFROMGA]

colors and textures of the fabrics on clothes. most look like burlap sacks made into shirts
all thick and itchie. and i don't mean like on little house where they did have shirts made of burlap sacks.

[Coach]

Ok, here's a few after watching some re-runs of Bewitched and Monty Python:
Milkman deliveries, Diaper services, adjusting the antennae on a tv, and morning and evening papers.

[Mullenax]

The gate of people's speech, especially polite women, is radically different even in retro horror flicks like Carnival of Souls.
Wedding scenes reveal the era.
Transportation via train.
File cabinets, desk lamps, and rolodexes.

[Melissa the Accountant]

for me it's the phone thing

i was watching Bullit the other day, and the detectives are pulling over to use payphones, and when they go out to dinner they tell the maitre de that they left the number with the office in case something comes up

Yeah, I watched North by Northwest last week and he remembers that he left his mother's telephone number with his secretary for her to give her a message, but that she's playing bridge and isn't reachable by phone - and he realizes that the only way to get in touch with her is by telegram. I don't think they even use telegrams for military deaths now. Do they even exist anymore?

[ahhdurr]

Accordians and Harmonicas. Who plays those anymore?
Dropkick Murphys and me (respectively)

Goils were goils and men were men.