The War of the Worlds

Character mistake: On several occasions, scientist (Clayton Forrester) refers to the impacting objects as "meteors". Any scientist knows (or should), that when a meteor impacts the the ground, it becomes a "meteorite".

Character mistake: During the first big battle between the Martians & the U.S. Army, the Martians use their heat ray to vaporise people and equipment. Dr. Forrester, a physicist, then quickly speculates, "It neutralises mesons somehow. They're the atomic glue holding matter together. Cut across their magnetic lines of force and any object will simply cease to exist." During the '50s mesons were theorised to hold atomic nuclei together strongly. But if the Martian rays worked as the Dr. guessed, then objects wouldn't just vaporise. They'd explode with the ferocity of nuclear weapons.

Revealing mistake: In the first scene of the crashed meteor, on the extreme left of the scene where the smoke is, it seems to be billowing up from behind a stage wall, as there is a definite vertical line and a gap between the smoke and the left edge of the frame.

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More mistakes in The War of the Worlds

Major General Mann: Pattern-wise, one lands, then two, making groups of threes joined magnetically. Is that possible?
Dr Clayton Forrester: If they do it, it is.

More quotes from The War of the Worlds

Trivia: Steven Spielberg saw this film when he was a child and was fascinated by the Martians. He later based E.T. from E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) on them.

More trivia for The War of the Worlds

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