Unofficial Competition: Truthful but Misleading

[robkelk]

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to come up with a Truthful but Misleading description of a famous work, preferably in a single sentence. You are not allowed to lie about the content of the work, but the description has to give a completely wrong idea about the story. Put the name of the work in a spoiler tag after the description, so that we can try guessing what work you've described misleadingly.

As examples, here are descriptions about two films:

Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first woman she meets, then teams up with three complete strangers to kill again.

Spoiler

The Wizard of Oz (1939), as described by the Marin Independent-Journal

Bedridden girl's invisible friend remodels her room and turns heads.

Spoiler

The Exorcist (1973), as described by Wrong Hands

EDIT: I included sources for the lines in the spoilers because neither of these is original to me. You don't have to include a source when you make up your own entry.

Have fun!

[classicdrogn]

Oh, I've got a bunch for this one!


A private space program is sabotaged by government black ops.

Spoiler

James Bond: Moonraker

Kidnapped by insurgents, a man is given strange drugs and convinced everything he knows is a lie to recruit him to their cause.

Spoiler

The Matrix

Having mutinied and stolen their ship, then lost it and captured another in the previous movie, a pirate crew defies the law and nature itself to hunt whales. The B plot is wacky fun in a foreign port city.

Spoiler

Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home

Occultists set up a scheme to get money out of people who believe they're being haunted or pursued by demons

Spoiler

Ghostbusters

After being captured and escaping from terrorists, a man arms up and goes on a rampage of revenge, first against the perpetrators and then others he can justify as similar to them, until his old partner cobbles up some similar equipment and faces him in a climactic battle that pushes both of them to their limits.

Spoiler

Iron Man

Should I stop and leave some for others? I'll stop for now.

[Inquisitive Raven]

I don't think the description of The Wizard of Oz is quite right in that Dorothy never actually meets the Witch of the East, only finding out what happened on being shown the corpse. Now if one was willing to stretch definitions, one could say that the first thing she did on arriving in this strange land was commit vehicular homicide with the house as the vehicle.

[Norgarth]

Young man falls under sway of fringe religion, blows up military base.

Spoiler

Star Wars: a New Hope

[Dartz]

A global conspiracy to Immenentise the Eschaton, centred in a hot-spring resort.

Spoiler

Neon Genesis Evangelion, of course

[Labster]

Negligent mother killed by daughter running with scissors.

Spoiler

Kill la Kill

This one is from Shadowjack:
"What if Joan Jett and Coco Chanel became New Wave terrorists?"

Spoiler

Bubblegum Crisis

[ECSNorway]

A refugee working his passage tries to fit in with a crew of strangers.

Spoiler

CJ CHerryh's The Pride of Chanur

A youth is badgered into accepting a new job offer, and finds he grows to enjoy it.

Spoiler

David Weber, Oath of Swords

[firvulag]

An exiled criminal accidentally frees an ancient horror from its prison and becomes trapped between family, politics and the end of the world.

Spoiler

CJ Cherryh, Gate of Ivrel

Young woman runs away from home to join the army, but finds God instead.

Spoiler

Elizabeth Moon, The Sheepfarmer's Daughter (The Deed of Paksenarrion)

Convinced by an older man, a young woman abandons her faith and home, destroying an ancient cultural landmark in the process

Spoiler

Ursula K. Le Guin, The Tombs of Atuan

An immortal deceives and manipulates generations of people, and entire kingdoms in her war against god.

Spoiler

David and Leigh Eddings, Polgara the Sorceress

[Norgarth]

Not mine:
An ex-military cab driver teams up with a priest, a DJ, and a girl who falls into his cab. They recover some rocks, and save the world.

Spoiler

Fifth Element

Traditional family struggles with the harmful effects of cocaine and inner city violence be fore peacefully retiring to the suburbs. Starring Ray Liotta, Robert Deniro, and Joe Pesci.

Spoiler

Goodfellas

Boy's dad is space tyrant.
Twin children are reunited but try to kill their father

Spoiler

Star Wars

[ECSNorway]

Space Truckers pick up a problematic hitchhiker.

Spoiler

Alien

[Norgarth]

Space Truckers pick up a problematic hitchhiker.

Spoiler

Alien

I've seen that movie described as: Unplanned pregnancy leads to major complications

[ECSNorway]

Space Truckers pick up a problematic hitchhiker.

Spoiler

Alien

I've seen that movie described as: Unplanned pregnancy leads to major complications

That's also a good one. My other favorite is "Failure to adhere to OSHA regulations leads to industrial disaster".

[classicdrogn]

Wait, there are OSHA regulations for

Spoiler

first contact?

That alone sounds like the basis for a funny movie or novella.

[ECSNorway]

Wait, there are OSHA regulations for

Spoiler

first contact?

That alone sounds like the basis for a funny movie or novella.

Sorta.

Spoiler

Ripley actually quotes the regs in the film, trying to keep them from bringing the infected guy back on board.

[itsune9tl]

An innocent man is killed to save a world from an angry god.

Spoiler

Passion of the Christ.

[robkelk]

A teenager who has foresworn violence is forced to take up arms again by the school's student council.

Spoiler

Girls und Panzer

[classicdrogn]

Time travelers try to stop an invasion of space zombies while building a rocket in a post-WWIII basement to contact friendly aliens for help rebuilding civilization.

Spoiler

Star Trek: First Contact

[Aleh]

Not sure if this counts as "famous," but...

First contact goes horribly awry when a group of humans are so offended by the aliens' sexual practices that they plot homicide.

Spoiler

Worm.

[Dartz]

Communist revolutionary executed by imperialist authorities to placate local rump regime. Goes on to prove that you can kill a man, but the idea will come back.

Spoiler

The new Testament

[Labster]

A powerful group creates a walled city to train their children to gain abilities. They hope produce a human who can reach Level 6. But the protagonist accidentally builds a powerful harem along the way, and even uncovers a nefarious plot to distribute a way to temporarily increase a level.

Spoiler

Is it Wrong to Pick up Girls in a Dungeon?

Am I doing this right, guys?

[robkelk]

A powerful group creates a walled city to train their children to gain abilities. They hope produce a human who can reach Level 6. But the protagonist accidentally builds a powerful harem along the way, and even uncovers a nefarious plot to distribute a way to temporarily increase a level.

Spoiler

Is it Wrong to Pick up Girls in a Dungeon?

Am I doing this right, guys?

You forgot to mention that the anime version has Nobuhiko Okamoto play the annoying, snide, white-haired, Level 5 secondary character, but, yeah, you're doing this right.

[robkelk]

* robkelk blows dust off thread



Source and acknowledgement