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Friends In Your Head | Forums → Off Topic → Writing, Fridge Logic, and Plot Contrivances [Spoilers: All is Lost]
You know when you get so good at something that you just assume nothing will ever go wrong with it? All Is Lost relies on this pretty heavily.
And yeah, the inciting incident can be as unbelievable as you want as long as the story is decent, because no matter how unlikely the event, it makes no difference. This is the story of what would happen if that thing happened.
+1 
I agree completely that he could have been overconfident due to skill. My guess is he was short on cash. All of the comments regarding the movie are valid and worth discussing. I used a poor example in 'All is Lost', as I am well aware that most people seem to have missed/ignored/disagreed with the problems I saw.
The main point of #3, though, is to discover if there is already film terminology to refer to this sort of thing shorthand. I just don't know any quick way to say: "It would be better if he was borrowing the boat and assumed it was fully stocked and then got to sea and realized it wasn't but decided it was only 2 days to the next port so why turn around and that was an understandable if cocky decision but it lead to a lot of problems." So, instead I have to feel nitpicky and wish the film gave me some room to suspend my disbelief. The problem isn't really a plot hole or contrivance. But, I don't know what to call those things that strain my suspension of disbelief and, if too many occur, leave me feeling like it is contrived. What do you call the little problem or the string of little problems?
All Is Lost loses a lot of its power if you know ANYTHING about the main character, imo. The reason it works as well as it does is that there isn't any extraneous information about him whatsoever. He's just a human being trying to survive.
I think the word you're already using is the right one: "contrivance." Once you get that character up a tree, some of the rocks you throw are going to be contrivances, in the sense of piling-on otherwise improbable misfortunes.
Some people are very sensitive to contrivance in story. I have heard repeatedly from writers that one of the hardest things is getting readers/audiences to accept that the hero could do something dumb or make a mistake.
It's one of those things where what breaks a movie for you is going to be different than what breaks a movie for me is different for what breaks a movie for Viewer X (masked filmgoing crimefighter). I think it is a truly subjective thing. If you are taken out of the movie, you are out. I cannot argue that you are wrong just because bad science/ lack of verisimilitude/ one coincidence too many/ whatever didn't bother me.
JP (John?) I'm in particular thinking about how Gravity didn't work for you while it worked fine for me. In a case like this, all I can do is say "trust me, the movie might not be for you, but it was a damn fine film." And you have no reason to give me that trust because we met on an internet forum a few days ago.
Yes, John
So, I guess the consensus so far (addressing the numbered parts above):
1. Every movie gets a pass for an unlikely introduction. After all, that is why the story is being told.
But
2. Unless we are attempting to tell a 100% authentic true story, all stories are made up, and thus, contrived. The only term we have is to refer to it in differing degrees: "feels contrived", "is a bit contrived", etc.
3. I could say a film has "too many small contrivances". An unlikely start followed by a series of unlikely events can break suspension of disbelief, though YMMV regarding what is a contrivance.
I'd really love to have catchier terms for this stuff, though. We have Spielberging and Baying. Would it make sense to say it was too much "De Palma"? Is there a writer or director I'm not thinking of who is known for contrivances or plot holes in what could be straight-forward or hard science movies?
Also, thank you for everyone's input. There have been plenty of good points about specific movies here. I'm just trying to stay on topic about the one thing that I can't well describe and puts me off plenty of movies.
***
As a side note: I know not everyone feels the same as I do. But, just as motivations are supremely important in a drama, I feel fact is important in a survival movie. The danger in the plot isn't motivated by an antagonist. So, the survival situation becomes a kind of math: water, warmth, food, etc. The sloppier writer creates new obstacles one-by-one as the movie progresses while the better writer builds it all into the initial event. I'd love to give good and bad examples of this but my memory is crap.
In college, I played bass for Masked Filmgoing Crimefighter. 
Friends In Your Head | Forums → Off Topic → Writing, Fridge Logic, and Plot Contrivances [Spoilers: All is Lost]
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