Revealing mistake: As Rob, Hud, and Lily are rescuing Beth from her apartment, the view outside the window is tilted roughly 45°. This is due to Beth's apartment building being partially collapsed against another building, demonstrated previously by an exterior shot. However, the characters are moving within the apartment with no difficulty or apparent change in gravity, even though they should be struggling to remain upright in a significantly tilted apartment. This makes it clear that the scene outside has been added using chroma key technology, and the camera has simply been tilted to create the illusion that they are on an angle. (01:01:30 - 01:01:52)
Cloverfield (2008)
1 revealing mistake
Directed by: Matt Reeves
Starring: T.J. Miller, Lizzy Caplan, Jessica Lucas, Michael Stahl-David, Odette Yustman
Factual error: During the scene where everyone runs outside, the Statue of Liberty head crashes into the street. The head is scaled too small and its size can be compared to the people taking pictures. In real life the statue head is large enough for people to walk into (17' from chin to cranium).
Trivia: The viral marketing story is incorporated into several parts of the movie. The first is the Slusho! shirt worn by Jason, given to him by Rob. Rob is leaving to work for Slusho! in Japan per his myspace account. Slusho! is owned by Tagruato Corporation, a company whose primary operations is off-shore drilling rigs. The company's logo is visible on the Tanker that is on fire during the Brooklyn Bridge scene. The Easter eggs show the destruction by the monster of Tagruato's Chaui drilling facility located about 2,000 off-shore of NY. The online viral character Jamie is seen passed out on the couch at the party. Her boyfriend, Teddy, who works for Tidowave, is seen on the bridge. Tidowave is an anti-Tagruato operation. At the end, while the camera looks over the Atlantic ocean, you'll see a falling object. The producer, JJ Abrams, has stated that this can be interpreted one of two ways: It's the monster falling out of the sky, or, a satellite which Tagruato reported on their website that they were actively assisting the Japanese government to locate.
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Chosen answer: The actors and crew were kept in the dark as much as possible, unless the information was needed for their performance. They didn't know what the parasites looked like until they began filming the subway scene. Actual-size, realistic puppets had been made for filming but were decided to look too artificial and slow on camera, but it gave the actors a chance to see what they would be running from, how their jaws and legs worked, etc. As for the main monster ("Clover"), actors would only know what was in the script and what the director told them.