Enigma

Enigma (2001)

5 corrected entries

(0 votes)

Corrected entry: In both scenes showing an oncoming steam train rounding a curve, the railway track has modern concrete sleepers rather than the wooden ones that were the only type used at the time. The scene at the railway station has the correct wooden sleepers.

Correction: Concrete sleepers were in use in Britain before WWII (they had been in use although not popular across Europe since shortly after the turn of the century). Popularity increased during the war as timber became scarce.

Corrected entry: When the car chase starts, the black police car is a Wolseley. It crashes and is seen again as a Wolseley but when it arrives at the barn it is a Rover.

Correction: The car that arrives at the barn is not the Police car, it is the Security Agent's car - it doesn't have the Police sign on the roof. The Police arrive afterward when the search begins.

umathegreatstationarybear

Corrected entry: The Morse code used in the movie is mostly numerical, even in places where it is supposed to be alphabetical according to the plot. When an interception operator gives Jericho her headset to listen to an ADU transmission similar to what he was looking for, it is all digits, not suitable for an Enigma machine. (01:03:10)

Correction: The morse used in just about every scene in Enigma is the date. While that wouldn't be appropriate to encipher using an enigma machine (you have to spell the numbers out), it is in fact entirely appropriate for a message 'preamble'. Preambles typically list the message serial number, the number of groups in the message, some sort of precendence indicator, and the date and time. When Kay lets Jericho know that ADU is back on, he obviously just started transmitting. It would be appropriate for ADU to be sending the preamble at that time. Oh, and by the way, ADU does not have a great 'fist', just an adequate one, judging from the morse I heard.

Corrected entry: Dougray Scott manages to drive several hundred miles to Scotland, unofficialy, and during a time of severe petrol rationing to intercept the U-boat.

Correction: The supply of rationed goods to individuals close to the military and especially those in intelligence was designed to keep them happy to prevent defection. Therefore, it's quite possible he was given petrol because he asked for it.

David Mercier

Corrected entry: According to Alan Turing, Enigma has "150 million million million" starting positions (1.5 x 10^20), while Shark has "4 thousand million billion", or 4 x 10^18). So Shark, the "ultimate refinement" of Enigma, has FEWER starting positions? (00:10:25)

Correction: Not an error. Shark had 4x10^21 positions. At the time the movie was set, in the UK (and the rest of Europe) a billion was a million million. The American usage of a billion being a thousand million was adopted more globally in the 70s.

Continuity mistake: In the scenes in Bletchley (south of England) it is obviously early Spring (daffodils, few leaves on trees), but towards the end of the film, and apparently only a few days later, when a German U boat surfaces off the coast of Scotland, it is clearly high summer, with all the trees covered in leaves. Trees don't come into leaf that quickly, and the seasons are always later in Scotland.

More mistakes in Enigma

Tom Jericho: Puck and Claire were having an af.
Wigram: Were seeing each other, as you like to put it. Seeing each other's brains out.

More quotes from Enigma

Trivia: The twice-used shot of the train rounding a curve is actually near Rabbit Bridge on the Great Central steam railway near Loughborough. The train is in fact heading South; according to the film, it is first heading West (Cambridge to Bletchley), then North (Bletchley to Manchester). The same locomotive is hauling both trains - unlikely - and is suspiciously clean for wartime. However, it was a masterful touch to dub in a passing steam train as background noise when the security man interviewed Jericho in his digs. Such background noise is often conspicuously absent in films.

More trivia for Enigma

Chosen answer: This is not a mystery. Claire "stole them to read them" as Tom Jericho told Hester. As he later explained to Wigram, she had taken the messages to give to Puck who had the means to decipher them, and who was looking for his missing brother. The Kestrel traffic from ADU contained the names of victims of the Katyn Massacre. However, Puck and Claire were surprised by the imminent reappearance of Tom, and suddenly fled, explaining why some messages were left behind.

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