Best drama movie factual errors of 1998

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The Truman Show picture

Factual error: When the bus breaks down, steam is shown coming out of the front of the bus. GMC buses have the engine and radiator in the rear.

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Pleasantville picture

Factual error: When Reese Witherspoon's character is sitting at the desk reading, there is a cheerleading trophy and the cheerleader on it is wearing a mini skirt, - they didn't have mini skirts on the cheerleading outfits then. (01:08:20)

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Saving Private Ryan picture

Factual error: The Tiger tanks portrayed in the movie are actually Soviet T-34s. You could tell by looking at their wheels. Real Tigers had interleaved wheels. These Tigers had the T-34 suspension. Obviously, Tigers are so rare (only one operational Tiger left) that another tank had to be substituted. But an excellent job was done to make the T-34s look like Tigers.

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Les Miserables picture

Factual error: When Javert arrives in Paris to inform the Prefect that he has found Valjean, the government building displays the French Tricolour. This part of the film is set in 1823, during the Bourbon Restoration, so the flag should be the white, Bourbon flag.

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Velvet Goldmine picture

Factual error: Near the beginning of the film, a scene opens with the subtitle 'New York'. Strange, these New Yorkers drive on the left.

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Enemy of the State picture

Factual error: When requesting images from the satellite, the position (latitude and longitude) is always given in degrees and minutes (but NOT seconds), and a few moments later they get a picture centered on the person they are looking for. Now a minute equals a nautical mile (or 1.85 kilometers), so with a position given in degrees and minutes you'd get a region bigger than 3 square kilometers.... which makes it impossible to find a person that fast (especially in a crowded town).

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The Negotiator picture

Factual error: Adam Beck says "Kill the lights, unit one." They just don't shut off a main breaker but they cut the main wires. Then shortly afterwards the lights are back on again. It would have taken an electrician hours to replace the cut wires to the power. (01:44:25)

thetaz00

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Hard Rain picture

Factual error: When Christian Slater and Minnie Driver are trying to get out of the water before it reaches the transformer, there is a real big problem with this scene. If there really was a flood and it was rising that high, the city should have shut off the electricity to the entire city, to prevent any electric hazards that may happen in that situation.

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The Prince of Egypt picture

Factual error: During the plague when the fire and rocks are falling from the sky, they fall behind a statue of Rameses and are seen through its hollow eye holes. It makes for a great image, but that would mean that the statue's eyes were punched out like a mask, even though before they were just carved into the stone.

Krista

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The Man in the Iron Mask picture

Factual error: 6 years in a mask and he's able to keep that lovely babyface with just a little bit of grime, which easily comes off? Of course it would have wrecked the whole story but still...

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Fallen picture

Factual error: In the scene where Hobbes is talking to Reese in his cell, Reese talks to him in a foreign language. It's stated on at least two occasions that Reese is speaking Dutch. He isn't - he's speaking German.

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

Suggested correction: It's Dutch. "Wie de bal kaatst." Just what Reese said. "What goes around..."

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Sliding Doors picture

Factual error: At the beginning, when Helen is running for her train, the station signs clearly say Embankment. However the type of train that she misses/catches is specific to the Waterloo & City Line, which only runs between Bank and Waterloo - it doesn't go anywhere near Embankment!

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Ever After picture

Factual error: Leonardo da Vinci's painting, the Mona Lisa, was originally painted on wood, impossible for it to have been unrolled after taking it out of the canister. Also, if it hadn't been painted on wood, it would have been painted on canvas, which doesn't stay partially rolled after you take it out of a tube of some kind. It would not have been painted on paper. (00:23:55)

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The Rat Pack picture

Factual error: Dean Martin always drank apple juice when he was on stage because it looked so much like scotch and water and he had to keep up his reputation of being a heavy drinker who forgets where he is.

MCKD

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Shakespeare in Love picture

Factual error: About 20 minutes in when they are at some ball/dance thing, Shakespeare's talking with a musician holding a lute. You can see fret markers on the fretboard of his lute, but these were not used on instruments until the late 1800's, early 1900's, definitely not in Shakespeare's time. (00:27:20)

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Black Dog picture

Factual error: When Swayze starts the truck, he turns a key and it starts. The key only switches on the electronics. Peterbuilts have a push button starter switch.

brantlee

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Great Expectations picture

Factual error: Hawke rides the subway twice during the film. Both times Hawke takes the "G" train. Unfortunately the G doesn't go through Manhattan where he is, it only goes through Brooklyn and Queens.

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Gods and Monsters picture

Factual error: The supposedly Great War vintage gas mask James Whale finds and later gets Clayton to wear is in fact a British style introduced in the 1930's, and the specific variation shown was not made except during WW2. In addition, during the flashbacks to WW1, various pieces of WW2 equipment crop up (e.g. helmets with spring-loaded canvas covered chin straps instead of leather chin straps, and WW2 British pattern gas mask bags).

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Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas picture

Factual error: The movie is set in 1971, but during the start of the motorcycle race several of the bikes are obviously early 90's Honda CR's and Suzuki RM's. You can tell this from the disc brakes on the front wheels of the bikes and the 90's style plastic fenders and bike colors. Bikes in the 70's generally had metal fenders and definitely no front disc brakes.

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