Hollywood Rules

Being a film buff--as I have to be, if I intend to make it as a Hollywood screenwriter--I've noticed a number of rules that one has to live by in making a top notch film. Such as:

1) In the ancient world, everyone had British accents, even if they're not from Britain. This counts for Romans, Greeks, Hebrews, and Egyptians.

2) Old and Chinese? You better believe that guy's wise and to be venerated.

3) In a shootout, if you run out of bullets, you're supposed to stare at the gun as though you weren't aware that a gun could run out of bullets. Then drop the gun, as there's no chance you'll ever find more bullets.

4) In a fistfight, the guy who pulls a knife is always the bad guy. Good guys don't use knives.

5) Even the best trained dog is incredibly stupid in that you can distract him with a bit of meat. In no way can a dog be well-fed and trained to not be distracted by meat.

6) All female scientists and doctors are incredibly hot and strangely single.

7) Young annoying children in movies never get killed, even though we're all desperately hoping they will.

8) If the hero has a dog, the dog will come through and save the day, and not just act like a real dog and go around licking itself and wandering off.

9) Arch-villains never die easily, though their henchmen/soldiers seem to have rotten luck, getting hit by stray bullets, eaten by crocodiles, or falling off of things. To kill and arch-villain, you need to impale him on something, set him on fire, AND dump a vat of acid on him. They don't die easily, but when they do it's a doozy.

10) No matter how well trained the bad guy's soldiers/henchmen are, they've clearly never been trained in trying to hit the broad side of a barn with their bullets.