Continuity mistake: At Port Royal, Jack attempts to escape by holding Elizabeth hostage. After she puts his hat on in the first shot, while their bodies are extremely close, her right arm reaches under his left arm to go around his back in order to put the strap with the buckle on. Yet, in the next close-up, they haven't moved but now her right arm is over his left shoulder. Quite impossible between shots. (00:19:10)
Continuity mistake: Aboard the Black Pearl, Pintel and Ragetti load the cannon with the chain-link cannonballs. As the cannon fires, in this shot from outside the port hole, the rungs of the steps on the side of the ship are to the right of the port hole. This shot has been flipped. The rungs are really to the left of the port hole, as seen when they load the cannonballs into the cannon and other shots throughout the movie. (01:26:55)
Continuity mistake: In Port Royal, during the pirates looting, the sign comes crashing down onto Grapple, and Will says, "Good bye." In the next wide shot, behind Will to his left are a large and small barrel up against the wall, the large one being right in the corner. As a passing pirate hits Will on the head with a candlestick, in this shot both barrels are now further from the corner and closer to the door. (00:35:15)
Continuity mistake: Near the end of the first scene of the Isla de Muerta duel, we cut from Will's fight to Jack and Barbossa (just before "You're off the edge of the map"), and we have a good view of the cave. Where did Will and the other pirates go? (01:52:40)
Continuity mistake: When Captain Jack Sparrow steps from the sinking ship to Port Royal's dock, he lifts his right leg for the step-off. Yet, when the shot cuts to his feet hitting the dock, Captain Jack steps off on his left foot. (00:10:05)
Continuity mistake: Elizabeth, alone in her room, puts on her robe while standing near her bed, when her father knocks. He walks in with one maid who goes to open the curtains and doors and a second who's carrying the dress box. Yet, as her father inquires, "Still abed at this hour?" a third maid steps out from behind Elizabeth and goes to open the curtains and disappears again. This maid didn't come in with Governor Swann, nor any other doorway including the one behind Elizabeth. Obviously this was part of a longer shot, but she still appears out of nowhere. (00:05:45)
Continuity mistake: Jack and Will jump down from the beams and Jack reaches for the bag of soot (really cocoa powder). In the back shot of Will as he approaches Jack, Will has his sword in his right hand. In the front close-up of Will as Jack starts to spray him, his right hand is NOT holding the sword - we SEE his hand when he turns. In the next wide shot, Jack is still spraying the soot, Will is again holding the sword in his right hand, then Jack kicks the sword out of Will's hand. (00:26:15)
Continuity mistake: Just before Elizabeth whacks Jacoby, she asks, "You like pain?" and in the first shot as she starts to swing her hair has some waves and curl to it. Mid swing it cuts to the second shot, and when she says, "Try wearing a corset!" her hair is totally flat with no waves or curls whatsoever. Then, in the very next shot it's actually full, wavy and curly. (01:59:45)
Continuity mistake: In the close-up of young Elizabeth, as she sings on the bow of the ship, she's standing between two posts of the railing. Each post has rope wound around it. In the next few shots of her, the existence, the amount and the thickness of the rope on each post changes drastically. (00:00:45)
Continuity mistake: In the cave, Ragetti is holding a parasol over his shoulder, rubbing his eye. In the close-up, as Pintel says, "Stop rubbing it," there's no sign of Ragetti's parasol, nor any shadow on his hair or shoulders, and the folded parasol that Pintel is holding, is much lower in the close-up, than it is in the wide shot that follows and so forth. (01:08:40)
Continuity mistake: Cannon fire breaks a hole in the jail wall and inside the cell, the last pirate says, "You've no manner of luck at all," In the next shot from outside, escaping through the hole the pirate takes a huge leap forward and out to the right. After a close-up pan of Jack, in the next outside wide shot, that same pirate is still right beside the hole in the wall and is just starting to climb down the rocks below the hole. (00:35:40)
Continuity mistake: On Dauntless, when Elizabeth tells Gillete that the pirates can't die, she is wearing a loose braid in her hair. Later, when she is tying the cloth together in order to escape, she is wearing an almost perfect braid. And even later after leaving Dauntless, when rowing the boat towards the Black Pearl, her hair is messed up again. (01:43:35 - 01:50:35)
Continuity mistake: When Barbossa pulls apart his jacket, after he is shot by Jack, the fatal wound bleeds out staining a large portion of the front of his white shirt with blood. However, when Barbossa falls to the ground, in the close-up after he drops his beloved apple, his jacket is open and amazingly ALL the blood on his white shirt is gone. (This is ONLY visible on VHS.)
Continuity mistake: Below deck aboard the Interceptor, Elizabeth gives Will the medallion. When Will clenches the medallion in his fist, the way the chain hangs down his fingers differs in this close-up and in the next shot, also showing his face. (01:19:15)
Continuity mistake: Jack asks, "Where's dear William?" and Elizabeth runs over to the hatch that Will is trapped under. Tied to the hatch is a rope attached between two holes and lying on top is a piece of the broken mast and sail with more rope. In the wide shot of Elizabeth running towards the hatch and the following close-up, the ropes and twisted sail are either lying or tied differently on the hatch in both shots. This has nothing to do with the angle of the shot. (01:29:15)
Continuity mistake: In Tortuga, as Will and Jack are seen for the first time, in the foreground is a drunk man teetering on two barrels and another drunk man on the ground drinking what is being poured into his mouth. In this wide shot the man on the ground has his right elbow on a sack on top of a small barrel. In his next close-up, the sack on top of the small barrel is gone and now there is a tied sack between him and the shovel. (00:50:50)
Continuity mistake: Elizabeth takes the medallion out of the drawer, and in the first wide shot as she looks at it (*before* she wipes away the dust with her thumb), seen to her left in the corner, are a tapestry chair and small table with a candelabra, between the the french door draperies and the louver trim door. The table and candelabra are partially in front of the door's louver trim. However after Elizabeth takes the dress out of the box, behind Governor Swann (who stands in front of the french door draperies now), to his right we see the same tapestry chair, table and candelabra, but the table and candelabra are further away from the door's louver trim and much closer to the corner now. (00:05:15)
Continuity mistake: Aboard the Pearl, Barbossa says, "Did you not notice? That be the same little island we made you governor of on our last little trip." While he says those words, hair, etc, keeps changing. 1st shot - the wind blows their hair the same way. 2nd shot - Jack's ponytail at the top of his head is blowing in a different direction. 3rd shot - the wind doesn't blow their hair at all. 4th shot - their hair is blowing just like in the second shot. 5th shot - the wind doesn't blow their hair at all again. (01:33:55)
Continuity mistake: In the foyer of the Swann home, there is a large floral arrangement on the table. In various shots, the flowers are shown either from the front, left or right side. Regardless of the angle it's seen in, the height and position of some flowers and greenery, more so at the top, differ between these shots. (00:07:05)
Continuity mistake: Aboard the Black Pearl, after Elizabeth walks out onto the deck and sees the skeletal pirates for the first time, in the shots as she stumbles backward and is tossed in mid-air her strapped shoes with heels are visible. After she knocks off Grapple's skeletal head with the wheel, as Elizabeth runs down the stairs her right shoe is perfectly visible and it most certainly isn't one of those pretty shoes with heels. (This is ONLY visible on VHS.)
Chosen answer: Because they'd have to find it. The gold may "call to them", but it obviously doesn't function as a millimetre perfect homing beacon or they'd never have missed the medallion years earlier when they attacked the ship carrying the young Will. Elizabeth drops it into the sea and they're going to have to spend what could be months trying to locate it - currents could take it well away from the dropping point. They've found the final missing piece; they're potentially just hours away from finally being cured. The last thing they want is to see it thrown into the sea.
Tailkinker ★
Well, if the crew was anxious to get the medallion then why did they act like they weren't interested in it before Elizabeth pretended to drop it?
Reverse psychology.
Ssiscool ★
What do you mean by reverse psychology?
By showing they are not interested in the medallion they are hoping Elizabeth will just drop it on the floor or chuck it to them as it's of no real value. However when she releases a bit of chain and the medallion drops, and the pirates lurch forward revealing that they really want the medallion and as such Elizabeth now has the upper hand in negotiations.
Ssiscool ★
I'm guessing Elizabeth wasn't fooled when the pirates showed disinterest in the medallion.
That's not called reverse psychology, which is used to encourage someone to change his or her mind. Doesn't work with a threat. They are feigning indifference to hide the importance of the object.
lionhead
They didn't want to give her an advantage over them. Pretending to not care about the coin would make Elizabeth think that the coin is worthless and cannot use it to barter a deal.