Best drama movie mistakes of all time

Please vote as you browse around to help the best rise to the top.

American Beauty picture

Visible crew/equipment: After he gets beaten up by his father, Ricky looks in the mirror. On the left edge you can see a bit of the camera, then it moves away. (01:10:10)

More American Beauty mistakes
Double Jeopardy picture

Factual error: Ashley Judd is convicted of murdering her husband for the insurance money and that would make it a first degree murder charge (first degree meaning she planned the murder). Because of that there is no way she would have been eligible for parole after just 6 or 7 years.

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: It's never stated that she was charged with 1st degree murder, nor that she killed her husband for the insurance money. It was only brought up in trial as motive. Nick's accident was ruled "wrongful death" and the fact she did get paroled further show she was never convicted of 1st degree murder.

And what about the phone call from prison the Libby makes to Angie, and Angie says she "was just about to call her" or she tried calling her like how the heck can you call someone in prison!?

More Double Jeopardy mistakes
Eraser picture Eraser mistake picture

Continuity mistake: Arnold goes to the gay bar to solicit the help of the guy he saved at the beginning of the movie. The guy is wearing a white shirt and a vest black/gold lamay. During their conversation he takes off the vest, then it cuts to another bartender. When it cuts back the guy has the vest on, another shot and the vest is off again. (00:08:05 - 01:10:50)

More Eraser mistakes
The Mighty Ducks picture

Continuity mistake: When Adam Banks is playing in one of the games, he scores a goal and his teammates on the bench stand up and cheer when he scores. Problem is, Adam Banks is on the bench too.

More The Mighty Ducks mistakes
More Romeo + Juliet mistakes
Passengers picture

Factual error: During the 31st year of the Avalon's voyage, the ship passes close to the star Arcturus, which is about 37 light years from Earth. Later in the movie, it was stated that the Avalon was moving at around 50% of the speed of light. The ship would not have reached Arcturus in the time allotted.

Blathrop

More Passengers mistakes
Cube picture

Deliberate mistake: Leaven spends too much time thinking about if 645 and 372 are prime numbers to be believable. But she knows the factors of 649 and the result of 26 to the power of 3 almost immediately. Plus anyone with any maths knowledge whatsoever would know that any even number (or one divisible by 5) can't be prime, so 645 and 372 could be dismissed without even thinking about it.

More Cube mistakes
Pump up the Volume picture

Revealing mistake: Near the middle of the movie Samantha Mathis is walking across the high school campus. The name of the high school in the movie is "Hubert Humphrey High School, " but behind her, above the library door, a sign says "Saugus High School Library". Shows better in 4.3 aspect. (00:31:45)

More Pump up the Volume mistakes
Along Came a Spider picture

Revealing mistake: After the woman is strangled and the people come in trying to find the little kid, the dead woman is clearly seen blinking. (00:11:25)

More Along Came a Spider mistakes
Shutter Island picture

Revealing mistake: When Leo is laying his dead kids on the grass, the little girl keeps moving her eyes and breathing.

More Shutter Island mistakes
Midway picture

Factual error: In the final scene, where Fonda and Holbrook are looking over the carrier at the crowds on the dock, you can see that only the first rows of people are dressed in period clothes. The rest of the crowd are dressed as they would have been in 1976 when the film was made. Also, between them in the background is a yellow Ford Pinto.

More Midway mistakes
High Noon picture

Factual error: During the gun battle, Gary Cooper runs behind a building that has an air-conditioner or swamp cooler installed in a second-floor window. (01:17:30)

More High Noon mistakes
Pearl Harbor picture

Factual error: In the scene where Admiral Kimmel is inspecting the crew of the battleship an aide comes up with a message to send some ships to the Atlantic. Admiral Kimmel starts complaining about the orders. No Admiral would ever do this especially in front of enlisted men. In fact he was placed in charge of the Pacific fleet when his predecessor complained about moving the fleet from San Diego to Pearl Harbor.

Clarence Daugette

More Pearl Harbor mistakes
Jeepers Creepers picture

Continuity mistake: About 10 minutes into the movie, when the truck is chasing the 2 college students in the car and starts ramming them, the bumper and the trunk is smashed in. The shot changes and shows the car's rear end and it is in perfect condition. This repeats at least 3 times.

More Jeepers Creepers mistakes
Tristan & Isolde picture

Factual error: The poem Isolde recites, John Donne's "The Good-Morrow", is a 17th-century work, which is centuries later than the movie's time period.

More Tristan & Isolde mistakes
The Hurt Locker picture

Factual error: In one scene they are playing on an Xbox 360, but the Xbox 360 did not come out until 2005, and the game being played, Gears of War, wasn't released until 2006. The movie takes place in 2004.

More The Hurt Locker mistakes
In the Bedroom picture

Continuity mistake: In the kitchen scene, when Frank's parents are arguing, the clock reads about 6:45 and then in the next shot, it is 6:15.

More In the Bedroom mistakes
Planet of the Apes picture

Plot hole: The "video history" of the crashed USAF ship makes it very clear that the planet is uninhabited when they "landed". I can understand how a race of apes develops - they had a bunch of them on board. I can understand how a race of humans develops - they are descendants of the original crew. What I don't understand is...where the heck did all the horses come from?

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: Humans refer to parts of their own planet as uninhabited even though they are crawling with animals - vast areas of the Arctic are "uninhabited" even though polar bears and seals are found there. Were we to find a planet with nothing but primitive horses on it, we would label it as uninhabited. Apes and humans came from the crashed spaceship, horses were always there.

Which still makes no sense whatsoever.

Charles Austin Miller

I agree with you Charles. Horses are native to Earth but, the Oberon lands on a planet light years from Earth so it's a big plot hole how horses from one planet could end up on another when the planet was not only uninhabited but, the Oberon was believed to be lost.

Again, the Oberon was a massive space station, genetically experimenting with many earthly lifeforms, including horses, apparently. The time/space-rift was very near Earth (Mark Wahlberg made the journey in about 25 seconds at the end of the film. Not years but seconds). The implication is that the Oberon passed through the rift, and much of the crew survived to continue their genetic research on what later became the Ape Planet. So, the Oberon initially arrived on a barren planet and introduced all of the biological and botanical species, including apes, horses, and everything else.

Charles Austin Miller

Suggested correction: According to the backstory, the space station Oberon was dedicated to genetic modification sciences. They were actually experimenting with animal genes in the safety of space (which kind of makes sense). Given that the Oberon was a truly gigantic space station, it's not too much of a speculation that they were experimenting on many different types of animals (not just apes). When the Oberon crashed on Ashlar, half its crew was killed, but half survived with a number of ship's systems still functional, and they continued their genetic research, possibly producing a number of Earthly species on the otherwise uninhabited planet.

Charles Austin Miller

I think this should've been posted as a question, rather than a plot hole.

Charles Austin Miller

That's just a wild guess. There hasn't been a single mention of horses on board the Oberon. Even if there were, why only horses?

lionhead

Wild guess? The Oberon was experimenting in genetic modification, which implies a broad range of research...and not just on great apes. The Oberon was gigantic enough to be an Ark.

Charles Austin Miller

So where are all the other animals?

lionhead

Exactly. Where are the birds, lions, lizards, etc?

More Planet of the Apes mistakes
Road To Perdition picture

Factual error: Tom Hanks is driving his car over a bridge in downtown Chicago in 1931. In the background is the elevated train structure. An aluminum bodied train passes on the trestel in the background. This aluminum bodied train is of 1980's contruction. In the 1930's the train cars were of wood construction and painted brown. They were still in service in the 1950's.

More Road To Perdition mistakes
Gravity picture

Factual error: When Sandra Bullock and George Clooney manage to get to the ISS, she gets entangled with some ropes and manages to grab Clooney's safety rope. Clooney's speed should be very close to Bullocks' and the ISS', hence. The parachute ropes should be able to withhold the forces of deceleration (the mass of two people is very small, compared to Soyus or ISS), so no more pulling or having to sacrifice himself... This is due to the fact that there's no drag in space to constantly change Clooney's velocity (revert to Newton's First Law).

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: The parachute ropes are of course strong enough to hold the relatively low kinetic energy of the drifting astronauts, but that is not the reason why Clooney detaches. The rope is not attached firmly to Bullocks' leg. There are some loops loosely wrapped around her leg, and while both astronauts are still drifting away from the ISS (seen in a shot a few seconds earlier), those loops slip away from the foot one by one. Before the last loop slips away from the foot, untethering and condemning both astronauts, Clooney detaches himself to lessen the kinetec energy that pulls on the rope by reducing the total mass of the "system of two astronauts", so that there is a better chance that the last loop will remain attached to Bullock.

Once Clooney had stop moving all that would have been need was a slight pull from Bullock to pull him towards her. The momentum was lost when he stopped moving. So no need to cut himself loose.

It all happens in free fall. As soon as the cord withstood inertia resulting from George's body mass pulling on it, George would bounce back towards Sandra. The entire scene was completely unrealistic.

Clooney stopped moving in relation to Bullock. But both were still moving in relation to the ISS (look at the scene again; there is a wide shot that establishes this), with both their masses pulling on the parachute cords, straining the tenuous connection of the cords looped around Bullock's foot. To lessen the strain, Clooney detaches itself from the two-astronaut-system, reducing the mass and kinetic energy pulling on the cords.

t-6

Clooney and Bullock - when they were connected to each other - never actually stopped moving in relation to the ISS.

Actually parachute cords can withstand hundreds of pounds of force, making them very difficult to snap.

The danger wasn't the ropes snapping, the danger was that they would slip off her foot, and they would both be lost to space.

Friso94

More Gravity mistakes

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.