Factual error: Jack (Leonardo DiCaprio) was handcuffed with old English Hiatt's Darby Handcuffs (type 104). This is historically correct. But the key for these handcuffs identifies them as modern reproductions, because it had a flat top and was "checkered". The old keys had an oval and smooth (only marked with "Hiatt" and a number) top. The handcuffs used in the film were not from 1912. (01:47:50)
Audio problem: When the leader of the orchestra suggest to play "Orpheus", the music starts later than the musicians actually begin playing their instruments. (02:07:00)
Continuity mistake: In the scene where Jack and Rose are on the third class level partying with the other people in third class. When Jack hands Rose a glass of beer, how she holds the glass differs between shots. (01:06:20)
Continuity mistake: When Jack holds the diamond his nails are clean and perfect. When he starts to draw they are ugly cut and dirty, revealing they're somebody else's hands (later known to be director James Cameron's). (01:21:00 - 01:23:30)
Continuity mistake: As Rose shows the men she can rise up on her toes, from the front she has a cigarette in the first three fingers of her right hand. In the next shot her right hand is seen under her left arm and she has no cigarette. When she falls back into Jack's arms the cigarette is back in her right hand. (01:06:50)
Continuity mistake: During the first meal on the Titanic (the one where Cal plucks Rose's cigarette from the holder) the stone on Rose's necklace changes between almost disappearing in her dress and about two inches above. (00:33:10)
Deliberate mistake: Even though the movie uses the correct number of rockets, the timing is awful. The last rocket was fired at 1:40 AM at the latest. In the movie, the last rocket is fired when the last boat to be lowered on the davits leaves (the one Rose gets, and jumps off of). This would make it 2:05 in James Cameron's Titanic time. It was probably changed to add more drama to that heart-throbbing scene... (02:18:30)
Factual error: All deep sea submersibles that travel to depths of two or three miles fall to the ocean floor with no power on. At the start of the film, you see MIR1 and MIR2 pan past the camera with all their lights on. The lights should be off to conserve electrical power. The journey to the sea bed takes two and a half hours. (00:02:00)
Deliberate mistake: When Jack and Rose are adrift in the ocean, the stars behind them are not the right ones for that time and date. In fact, it's not any sky ever seen on Earth. The right half of the sky is a mirror image of the left half. The fimmakers deliberately positioned the stars to form the shape of the pendant 'Heart of the Ocean.' (02:46:00)
Continuity mistake: When Jack cries he's king of the world he raises his arms pointing in an 11-12 o'clock direction. A frame later, from a different angle, they're in a 9-10 o'clock direction. (00:31:00)
Revealing mistake: If you look at the deck planks to the right of Rose and Jack you can see that there is something that runs perpendicular to the rest of the planks. This wasn't on the real Titanic. This is where the set was "cut" so that the front half could be sunk into the tank later on in the film. (00:51:00)
Continuity mistake: Close to the end of the film when lots of people are trying to free the lifeboats from the ropes, you can see Cal, climb up a black wire and stand on the side of a half turned lifeboat, but if you watch closely in the following shot, you can see that Cal is still climbing up the black wire. (02:27:55)
Continuity mistake: On the day after Rose got the diamond she and Jack talk a walk on the deck. From the light on the deck you can tell that the sun is still fairly high up. When the camera angle changes and we see them from behind the deck is in the dark, and the sun is falling in almost horizontal. When they sit down to look at Jack's drawings the sun is higher again. (00:46:15 - 00:49:10)
Factual error: On the real Titanic the first set of davits were cranked back in to lower the lifeboat Cal is in, not the second set. One of the davits that should have been cranked back in is still on the real Titanic in the position ready for picking up the lifeboat to lower it. (02:25:40 - 02:34:45)
Continuity mistake: When Cal gives Rose the diamond her front hair changes from shot to shot, most drastically when she says "good gracious." (00:44:30)
Factual error: Early in the film Jack smokes hand-rolled cigarettes. When he is smoking on the stern deck before Rose is thinking about jumping, he is smoking a mass-produced filter cigarette. Filters in cigarettes didn't exist in 1912. (00:36:05)
Continuity mistake: In the scene where Jack is handcuffed water starts running into the room the desk. At that moment the desk, which had been out of reach before, is moved closer to Jack and standing diagonally, so that Jack can climb on it. This happens before things get moved around by water or gravity. (01:54:45)
Continuity mistake: When Jack is sneaking over the rail to the first class deck, a boy is preparing to spin his toy top. As Jack leaps the rail and begins walking, the boy throws the top and you see it start to spin. The camera angle then changes to show Jack walking, toward the coat he is about to 'borrow', and in the background you can see the boy again drawing back to toss his toy top. Since you have to meticulously wind the string around the top of the toy, it would be impossible for him to be making a separate toss. It's obviously the same toss filmed from two separate angles. (01:13:40)
Continuity mistake: In the scene close to the end, we see crewmen of the ship pulling down a lifeboat, if you watch closely the plank that passengers sit on breaks off when falling onto the deck, but in the following scene it has repaired itself and is back on the lifeboat. (02:20:10)
Continuity mistake: When Tommy begs the steward to open the gate he is reaching with his right arm through the gate, holding on to a bar. When the camera angle changes the arm is hanging down. (02:04:05)
Chosen answer: During the several years it took to construct the ship probably, or in any of the supplies/food brought on board, or in the furniture brought on board. A single pregnant female rat can be responsible for thousands of rats in a very short space of time (the offspring are not too choosy about who they breed with).
Soylent Purple
A pregnant female rat could have made a home in a underneath a third class couch and had the other rats then all the females would have baby rats quickly.