Factual error: Contrary to what the movie states, priests can be elected Pope - they are simply elevated to the rank of Bishop before taking the office.
Suggested correction: Him being only a priest was simply an excuse not to elect him. Those who did not want him to be pope were trying to find any reason to keep it from happening.
Any baptized Catholic male can be elected pope, although it has only happened once. Pope John XIX in the 11th century was a layman, ordained after his election.
Factual error: The "hard suits" the divers wear have soft, relatively normal gloves and soft joints. More akin to a football uniform with armor over spandex. They are at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, at 36,0000 feet below sea level. The pressure is over 7,000 psi. Without a hard suit, they would instantly be crushed.
Factual error: In the flashback, when Teddy was among the soldiers liberating Dachau, there is a semi-circular sign above the gate that says "Arbeit Macht Frei". Dachau had a sign with those words on it, but its sign was oblong. The sign at Auschwitz was that shape.
Factual error: The Portuguese slave ship Tecora was one of the most notorious of the illegal slave ships, but no slaves were thrown overboard in mid-ocean as shown in the film - at least on the trip in question. The Portuguese were pros at the slave trade and had plenty of food on board to feed their "cargo" between Sierra Leone and Cuba. The only time a slave would be thrown overboard in mid-ocean was if his/her health posed a serious risk to the crew and "cargo". (Slaves were too valuable to just throw away for the price of their food.) Historically, though, there were instances where whole cargoes of slaves were tossed overboard. The British Royal Navy zealously patrolled the waters off West Africa to try to shut down the slave trade. If a British ship was sighted, the slavers sometimes tossed slaves overboard to destroy the evidence and prevent the seizure of the ship.
Factual error: Early in the movie when the interior of the downed aircraft is shown (underwater in Chesapeake Bay), with the eerie picture of Dutch's wife and the congresswoman's husband sitting underwater in first class with their hair waving slowly in the current, they are shown on the right side of the aircraft (the left side as we are looking at them, but the right side of the plane proper). Yet, when the airline representative is discussing this "problem" (non-married-to-each-other people apparently flying as a couple), they are announced as sitting in row X (don't remember), seats A and B. Aircraft seating is always done from left to right - i.e., the A and B seats would be on the other, or left, side of the aircraft.
Factual error: When J.D. gets killed, Vince's leg shakes. Vince is suppose to be paralyzed. Even if he was extremely scared, his leg shouldn't have been able to move no matter how much he tried. It happens again later in the movie. (00:30:55)
Suggested correction: During the film, its never discussed whether or not Vince is paralyzed. He may just have a damaged spine. The scene where his foot is shaking, the entire camera frame is pointing directly at his feet. Seems unlikely that would have been included, if he was playing a paraplegic.
Factual error: When Clouseau heard the footsteps of what he thought to be a lady and what we afterwards knew was the Russian trainer, he described how tall she was using the English system of feet and inches, not the metric system, which is used in France.
Factual error: In the scene where Lt. Exley arrives at the Night Owl after the murder, the patrol officer is wearing a Safariland velcro-fastened handcuff case on his left hip. That style of rounded cuff case was not introduced until the early to mid 70s.
Factual error: When Eleanor Shaw tries to convince other members of the senate to choose her son as a candidate for vice president, a map of the fifty states and their corresponding electoral votes can be seen. The map shows Colorado as having 3 electoral votes and Wyoming having 8. Wyoming should have 3 and Colorado 9.
Factual error: While Sgt Howie (dressed as Punch) is being chased by the women, you can see autumn leaves on the grass, though the story is set on the 1st of May.
Factual error: Michael Douglas is lying on the couch watching the Jeffersons. Jeanne Tripplehorn arrives and they talk. In the background the theme song to the Jeffersons is playing, but it is the song from the beginning of the show rather than the closing theme.
Factual error: While Fletch is riding with the bikers, they stop at a stop sign where a family in a station wagon roll up their windows in fear. A sign at a service center in the background is the Castaic Junction, which is in the greater Los Angeles area. The movie is supposed to be taking place in Louisiana. (01:12:35)
Factual error: When Cary Grant is attacked by the crop duster, he is supposed to be between Chicago and Indianapolis. Unfortunately, northwest Indiana looks nothing like this. The scene in the movie has miles and miles of treeless landscape. Even in the flattest farmlands of Indiana, there are many visible groves of trees.
Factual error: At the end of the film, SGT Angel gets into his Police car Subaru Impreza, and on the bonnet it has the writing 'Sandford Constabulary'. This is incorrect, it would in fact be 'Gloucestershire Constabulary' as established at the start of the film that Sandford is in Gloucestershire. A Constabulary is always named after the County, never after a tiny village within that County. (01:49:35)
Suggested correction: While this may absolutely be true, this falls right in line with the entire plot of the movie. The people of Sandford are extremely proud of their village, with one of the higher up people in the village being the police chief himself, who we find out later is just as corrupt as everyone else. Not only would this be allowed by him, it was likely his call.
Factual error: After Joe spends sometime underwater in the bus, he goes into the village and pulls a picture of his wife out of his pocket to show the village people. After getting that wet, a picture will not be intact, and it would pretty much be stuck together.
Factual error: When Derek is calculating how much explosive Mentos to put in Cody's mouth to get the microchip out, he says to himself, "a thousand nanograms equals 1 microgram". While this measurement is correct, it is highly unlikely that any explosive would be of use in even milligram quantities. So 1/1000 of a milligram (a microgram) would be virtually useless, and measurements of 1/1,000,000 of a milligram (a nanogram) would be even less than useless. He couldn't have been calculating explosives in such small quantities. As well, Mentos mints are about 37.5 g (http://home.socal.rr.com/mentosfaq/candies.html), and he then cuts it into approximately 1/8 - micrograms would measure 1/250 of a mint, and nanograms would be 1/2500 of a mint. (01:12:30)
Factual error: During the car chase at the beginning, they are chasing a car on Bigelow Blvd., less than a mile from downtown Pittsburgh and we see a big, brick hill they chase down. This hill is actually in Duquesne, PA more than ten miles south east of Pittsburgh. Then as you're watching they are still in the same area as Bigelow Blvd., in the Polish Hill section of Pittsburgh.
Factual error: Benjamin leaves his family at some point after his daughter's first birthday (1970), and definitely before her second birthday. But a 1973-1977 El Camino is parked in front of their house as he rides away on his motorcycle. (02:24:15)
Factual error: During the final fight, Liam Neeson jumps down an aisle to pick up the pistol that is hurled from the floor upwards in the air and shoots the villain in the head. The problem here is with physics. The plane was in radical descent moments before. The pilot eventually brings up the nose. At that moment, the gun and Liam Neeson himself would have been pinned to the floor.
Factual error: When Sam speaks with his daughter on the long range phone there is virtually no delay between some questions and answers. It takes over two seconds for radio waves just to travel from the Moon to the Earth and back in a straight line. The interval between question and answer physically can't be shorter than that and realistically should be around 3 seconds or even more, accounting for additional signal relays and time needed for a person to form a statement. Same for the communication between Gerty and the Lunar employees when Sam 2 got out of his infirmary bed.