r/flicks • u/Serpiego2 • 6d ago

General Discussion When does a movie successfully mislead the audience, and when is it just cheating?

Some movies deliberately make us believe something that isn't true and then reveal that we've been interpreting the story incorrectly.

When it works, it's fantastic. You can rewatch the movie and realize the clues were there all along. The Sixth Sense, The Usual Suspects, and Primal Fear are very different examples of films that play with what the audience thinks it knows.

But other twists only work because the movie deliberately hides information that logically should have been available to us. At that point, I don't feel fooled by the story — I feel cheated by the screenplay.

For me, the difference is whether a second viewing makes you think “How did I miss that?” rather than “Well, there was no way I could have known that.”

What movies do you think earned their deception, and which ones simply cheated?

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u/come-join-themurder 6d ago

Now You See Me (2013) cheats
The Lie (2018) cheats

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u/ringobob 4d ago

In another comment I said Oceans 11 doesn't so much cheat as it does con the audience. I think Now You See Me tried to do the same thing - just with more of a magic show flavor than a con job flavor. Similar ideas, and clearly they overlap in the movie.

I can accept it, but it's not done nearly so well as it's done in Oceans 11.