Factual error: While the Szpilman family is listening to the radio learning of France and Britain's declaration of war, the radio is interrupted with a German radio broadcast. This broadcast however is Goebbel's 1943 Total War speech, while the scene takes place in 1939. (00:04:00)
Factual error: The tram appearing in December 1939 is a K type no. 403, built in 1940. The same two trams are always on the scene - no. 257 and no. 403. (00:12:05)
Factual error: Władysław Szpilman is searching for food in a basement of a ruined house and finds a can. The body of that tin-can is welded with the Soudronic welding method, only invented in 1965. (01:58:01)
Factual error: An old man appears with children following him. This is supposed to be pedagogue Janusz Korczak. It appeared as if he was just wearing a suit and a Jewish arm band. In the Warsaw Ghetto, Mr. Korczak never wore an arm band and wore his WWI Polish Army Uniform, both as acts of defiance. He was beaten and almost put to death (he had connections) for not wearing an arm band so having one on in the movie is inaccurate.
Factual error: In a few scenes, you can see street signs with inscriptions in Polish, for example "Ulica Lubanski" (Lubanski's Street). In fact, because Polish language retained the Old Slavic case-system with seven cases for nouns, the inscription should be "Ulica Lubanskiego" ('Lubanski' is a nominative noun, and 'Lubanskiego' is a genitive/possessive case).
Factual error: In the scene where the Germans are bombing the wall, the rebels are hiding behind. You can see that the bricks which came out of the wall because of the bombing are lying on the "non-Jewish" part of the wall and not on the ghetto side as it should be.
Factual error: The German tank's gun would not have had powered elevation, and possibly not powered turret traverse (if it was a 75mm Mk. III, or a Mk. IV J), although its appearance was unusually accurate.
Suggested correction: The German tank is simulating a PZ III N. The Pz III Ns were converted late models Pz IIIs, its original L60 50mm gun was replaced with a 75mm L/24 gun from the early Pz IVs that were all up-gunned leaving, large numbers of the older 75mm L/24 guns which they were originally equipped now available. The Pz III N is the last variant of this Pz III during the war. It has power traverse and manual elevation.
Factual error: The credit of the film describes the German officer who slapped Szpilman's father as "SS officer who slapped the father." The credit also describes the German soldier who gave a speech to Szpilman and other labor camp prisoners as "SS who gave speech." However, in the film both of these German soldiers were wearing Wehrmacht (i.e. regular Army), not SS, uniforms. SS uniforms can be easily distinguished from Wehrmacht uniforms due to different collar insignia.
Factual error: In the DVD extras, the bio of Thomas Kretschman states that he was an East German swimmer who didn't go to the 1980 Olympics because of the communist boycott. The 1980 Olympics were held in Moscow, therefore no communist boycott. The 1984 games were in Los Angeles, they were boycotted.
Continuity mistake: There is a scene where the Nazis are executing some fighters after destroying their stronghold, and they line them up facing a brick wall. If you look one of them is kneeling down when they get shot, and the bullet line across the wall would not have hit her, especially as she seems to go down before she's even hit.
Factual error: On a real Waffen SS helmet, the SS insignia is always painted on the right side of the helmet while the swastika is always painted on the left side of the helmet. However, in some of the scenes of the film, the SS insignia appeared on the left side of the Waffen SS soldiers' helmet.
Continuity mistake: When Wladek Szpilman is watching the Polish uprising out his window, several rebels attack the German hospital and police station. The pavement starts out icy, but when the Germans run out of the police station, the ice has completely melted.
Continuity mistake: There are various disparities between Szpilman's hair from shot to shot. This is most noticeable when he is told to leave the first apartment; he has a centre parting which changes to being combed back when he starts to smoke the cigarette. There are also continuity problems with his beard and stubble length in some scenes.
Continuity mistake: In the scene where Wladyslaw Szpilman is in the parlor speaking with the German officer (just before he's about to play the piano for him), you can see his breath in the cold air every time he speaks, yet when the camera pans to the German officer, his breath isn't visible.
