Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Corrected entry: When Elizabeth is on her way to the Black Pearl, the first shot we see is from behind the captain, and if you watch this scene closely you don't see anyone entering the main part of the ship from the right, but when it cuts to Elizabeth there is already the bald pirate on the ship, and Elizabeth is climbing over. (00:36:20)

The-Immortal

Correction: In the first shot, Elizabeth is still in the small boat between Pintel and Ragetti. As the next wide shot opens from bridge deck, the small boat is being hoisted by the pirates at starboard side down below and is still below deck rail, as the camera pans back behind Barbossa. In the next shot, the small boat is well above the rail as Ragetti and Elizabeth are at the top of the ladder and walk through the deck rail, while Pintel stands on deck. These three consecutive shots are deliberately cut to indicate time compression for the following: When the small boat pulls alongside the Black Pearl, Pintel, Ragetti and Elizabeth step out onto the ladder mounted on the Pearl's hull that leads to the deck. As they climb up, the boat is being hoisted up beside them, so that by the time they all reach the deck, the small boat hangs above them.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: In the final fight scene after Jack shoots Barbosa he cuts his hand with his sword before tossing the medallion to Will. Jack is cursed so there would be no blood to lift the curse. Only Will's blood can lift the curse.

Correction: As we see when Elizabeth stabs Barbossa, people under the effect of the curse do bleed. As is stated at least twice, everybody who takes a coin from the chest has to give a blood sacrifice - all the pirates already have, leaving just Will, standing in for his father. Jack then takes a coin, so both he and Will have to give a blood sacrifice in order for the curse to be lifted.

Tailkinker

Corrected entry: When Elizabeth tries to get a sword from the decoration in her house, the sword hangs on a nail. When the pirates barge in, there is no nail on the wall. Look closely if you have to.

Correction: When Elizabeth pulls the panoply sword display from the wall the nail is apparent due to the close-up. However, in the next wide shot, as she steps off the stool, the very small nail is not easily noticeable, but it CAN be seen as a small black dot on the wall over the mantle, just as it is when Pintel and Ragetti burst in.

Corrected entry: As Will comes on board the Black Pearl after his own ship blows up, not a drop of water falls off his clothes. Yet he has just been swimming in the ocean, so why isn't he dripping wet?

Correction: Will is dripping wet throughout the whole scene. This is most noticeable by the fact that the sleeves of his white shirt are completely see-through and his hair is without a doubt soaked as well. And water actually does drip of his shirt several times during the scene.

Andreas[DK]

Corrected entry: After the Pirates on the Black Pearl pillage the town and they are bargaining with Elizabeth, they are standing in the open moonlight, however they do not look like skeletons.

Correction: Before the shot of Elizabeth on the small boat with the pirates there is a shot of the moon being covered by thick clouds. So when she is aboard the Pearl with Barbossa and his crew there is cloud cover overhead, hence the pirates are not in skeletal form.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: When the Interceptor starts clubhauling, Captain Barbossa gives the command "hard to port, rack the starboard oars." The film is set in the 1700's but the word "port," meaning left wasn't invented until the late 1800's early 1900's.

Correction: It is true that the word port was not *officially* adopted by the British and US navies (to replace the archaic larboard, which was easily confused with starboard) until the 1840s. However, the term was first recorded in the 1540s, and would have long been in common use by the 1700s. See http://www.etymonline.com/p8etym.htm and http://www.wordorigins.org/wordorp.htm.

J I Cohen

Corrected entry: When Jack and Will are fighting in his shop, Will pulls out the brander, the end of which has changed shape from when Jack used it.

Correction: Of course the tip changed shape, it's an entirely different tool. Jack pulls a glowing red hot 'fire poker' out of the fire, not a brander, which is glowing red-hot with caked-on ash on the tip, in order to get the donkey to move. Later Will pulls long iron tongs from the table beside the fireplace to wield against Jack, after Jack kicks Will's sword out of his hand.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: On Disc 2, go to 'Below Deck', 'Scene Index', then page 2. Highlight 'Types of Pirates' and press right and Enter to view the DVD Credits.

Correction: This is not an Easter egg. You can view the DVD credits anyway by just clicking down the normal way.

Corrected entry: Take a close look at Will's face just before Jack sprays him with soot during their fight. If you pause the movie you can see that Will's face is already dirty, probably from a previous take.

Correction: Seen frame by frame, in the first shot facing Jack, when Will's back is seen, Jack grabs the bag of soot, starts to squeeze it towards Will and plenty of soot begins to pour out into the air already. As the next shot opens, this time facing Will, there is soot in the air making this shot hazy and a large puff of soot right in front of him, so the soot has already started to settle on his face and body, and in the next frame more soot blankets him.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: In the scene where the Black Pearl and the Interceptor are battling head to head, the crew of the Interceptor have just dumped all their cannon balls and weaponry into the ocean to lighten their load, but when it shows Jack Sparrow sitting in the brig of the Pearl, a cannon ball blows through his cell and he shouts, "Stop blowin' holes in my ship." Where did they get cannon balls all of a sudden?

Correction: A cannon ball did not make that hole. It's just as Gibbs says, "Case shot, langrage (which is shot that consisted of bolts and other pieces of iron), nails, and crushed glass!" They also inserted forks, knives, and spoons into the cannons. The force of the cannon fire propelled these things with enough strength to blast a hole in the wood. If you look at the brig cell that Jack exits, you will see a varied assortment of utensils embedded all around him.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: I know Jack was able to fold the handcuffs in half to slide down - but how did he get off? There must have been something the pole was attached to at the end... and he just drops off. Shouldn't he have hit something at the other end of the rope?

Correction: The handcuffs don't go over the rope with his hands on either side. If you watch closely, he throws the chain of the handcuffs over the top of the rope and then holds on to that as he slides down. Then, when he gets to the bottom, he simply lets go of the folded chain. It took a few times watching that scene to figure out how he did that. As for not hitting something at the end, the rope continues for a bit longer, to whatever it is tied to, but Jack simply lets go of the folded chain when he's near enough to the ground, and hits the ground running.

wolfchild

Corrected entry: In the scene where Captain Jack Sparrow rescues Elizabeth Swann from the water, when they are reaching the top of the sea after Jack has taken off her dress, you see his arms and legs moving but he isn't holding onto Elizabeth, but if she's unconscious how would she be able to hold on? (00:16:20)

Correction: She is not holding on, but Sparrow draped her over his shoulder so she wouldn't have to hold on.

Corrected entry: When the Interceptor is trying to escape the Black Pearl, there's a shot of Barbosa from behind. Over his shoulder, there is a pirate dancing quite excitedly on the stern of the ship.

Correction: In the two shots over Barbossa's shoulder, who is himself at the stern of the Black Pearl, the pirate that is seen 'dancing' is actually hopping on one leg on the bow of the Pearl. He is not wearing his wooden leg in these shots. This pirate is portrayed by an individual who really is missing a leg.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: The black, dread-locked pirate with the white cross on his face loses his arm to the Governor in the assault on the Dauntless. The Governor then continues to fight with this dismembered arm, but we later see the same Pirate with two arms when Norrington joins the attack. Am I right, or does a different Pirate lose his arm? And why does no one continue to fight with Swan after after he lops off their arm.

Correction: It is not Koehler's arm that Governor Swann hacks off, it is another unknown pirate's arm. The other pirates are distracted as they fight with the Marines aboard Dauntless and trying to fend off Norrington and his men who are approaching Dauntless from the boats in the water.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: In the blacksmith's shop, you can tell that the donkey is attached to the huge gear above it. However, when Jack and Will are fighting around the large post in the center, the gear is turning, but the donkey is no where to be seen.

Correction: The post Jack and Will fight around is the post of the *second* gear in the shop. The first overhead gear is turned by the donkey, and this gear then turns the one that Jack and Will are fighting around. The donkey can be seen several times during the fight at screen's edge, where the first gear is.

BGTerri

Corrected entry: In the opening scene, the line that keeps the umbrella that is floating in the water pointed straight up is visible in the shot of the umbrella floating past the side of the ship. (00:02:10)

Forrest Wilkinson

Correction: There is no line visible, either in real time or watching frame by frame.

Jason Sieberg

Corrected entry: In the scene where Jack is getting arrested after saving Elizabeth, Norrington looks at Jack's compass and says "...a compass that doesn't point north..." and a clicking sound is made as though the compass has been closed. But if you watch the compass, it doesn't close when the sound is made.

Correction: There are two clicking noises: the first is made when the compass is snapped open, therefore the compass is not supposed to be closed. When the second click is heard, after Norrington says "doesn't point north...", Norrington moves the compass down and out of the frame, as if to flip it closed. It isn't until a moment after the compass disappears from view that the click closed is heard, so there is no way this can even be seen.

Corrected entry: When Jack walks off the plank he has shoes on, when he's swimming down to the bottom of the ocean he doesn't, and when his toe hits a rock he does.

Correction: This is wrong. As 'Jack' (Tony Angelotti) swims down, the silhouette of his boots, especially the top of his boots, are seen. The boots in this shot have a very low heel.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: A lot of the movie is based on the fact that Will's blood is need to break the curse. You see Elizabeth's hand being cut. You see Jack cutting his hand before tossing his coin to Will. However, we never see that Will is bleeding. Did I miss something?

Correction: You can see a gash across Will's hand as he drops both coins into the chest.

Grumpy Scot

Corrected entry: Ragetti has a wooden eye. He is always complaining how much the eye is irritating him by splintering and itching. The pirates are under the curse. It would be impossible for him to feel anything, in this case, it should not itch. (01:08:35)

Correction: It's been established that although the pirates do not feel pleasure, they do react to pain and discomfort, such as itching. This could be part of the curse.

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl mistake picture

Continuity mistake: Either the first shot has a gratuitous view of the fort or the composite people neglected to add the fort in the second shot. Norrington says, "...this is the day that Capt. Jack Sparrow almost escaped. Take him away." The night shot that follows, shows the bridge archway, and beyond it the pier, Interceptor, the fort and its parapet. After Will breaks Jack out of prison, they approach the same archway and beyond it is the pier and Interceptor, but in this shot we don't see the fort and its parapet, nor the line that Jack slid down the day before. The camera angle is exactly the same. (00:27:15 - 00:44:30)

Super Grover

More mistakes in Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
More quotes from Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Trivia: Johnny Depp uses the phrase "Interesting..." as his trademark in many of the movies he stars in, including Sleepy Hollow. He uses it in PotC when Koehler's skeletal hand tries to grab him in prison.

More trivia for Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Question: Why did Jack cut himself before throwing the coin to Will? I thought the curse only needed Will's blood?

Answer: The curse needs the blood of everybody who took a coin from the chest. All the other pirates have already contributed so, as the movie opens, the only blood needed is Will's, substituting for his father. During the finale of the movie, Jack takes a coin from the chest, adding himself to the curse, so his blood is now required as well as Will's.

Tailkinker

But I didn't see any blood on the coins, and none of the pirates cut themselves, even before Will became part of the mix.

Yes, the other pirates did cut themselves before Will came into it, off-screen. The lack of blood on the coins can simply be explained as most of it dripping to the bottom of the chest, it being washed away by storms blown into the cave, or by the fact that they didn't drop that much blood on it in the first place.

When they had Elizabeth they believed she was Bill Turner's daughter, but they all thought the curse had failed, none of them had cut themselves so it makes zero sense.

They had been collecting back the coins for years. During that time they repaid their own blood. All they needed was the last coin and the blood of Bill Turner to break the spell.

lionhead

More questions & answers from Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.