Continuity mistake: When Del comes out of the passenger side of the dairy truck, he is with a black eye, for no reason. The next scene, it is not there. It is there again when he admits to being homeless. (Steve Martin punched Del in a deleted scene.)
Planes, Trains & Automobiles (1987)
Ending / spoiler
Directed by: John Hughes
Starring: Kevin Bacon, Steve Martin, John Candy, Michael McKean, Laila Robins
Del and Neal make it to Chicago and Neal boards a commuter train for home. While on the train, he thinks about his journey with Del and certain things he said along the way. Sensing something doesn't add up, he goes back to the train station to find Del still sitting there. Del confesses that he is in fact homeless, and Marie (his wife) passed away eight years ago. Neal brings Del home with him to spend Thanksgiving with his family. In the post-credits scene, the executive who was debating which picture to choose is actually still trying to determine that, with a Thanksgiving meal present on the table in the conference room.
More mistakes in Planes, Trains & Automobiles
Del: You could kill a man like that, hitting him in the stomach. That's how Houdini died you know.
Trivia: When Neal's wife is watching TV in bed, she is impossibly viewing the John Hughes film "She's Having a Baby," which didn't even premier in theaters until February of 1988, three months after "Planes, Trains and Automobiles" premiered in November 1987. John Hughes (who directed both films) used his own unreleased "She's Having A Baby" footage/soundtrack and a cameo by Kevin Bacon as teasers for the upcoming 1988 film. There's still some speculation that the plots of the two films actually intersect, and that Kevin Bacon (who is credited as the Taxi-Racer in "Planes, Trains and Automobiles") was playing his character, Jake, from "She's Having a Baby."
Question: This question is about the scene where John Candy is the driver, and Steve Martin is the passenger in the rented car. Steve is unaware at one point, that they are going the wrong way on the highway. He becomes aware, after looking out the window and down onto the shoulder of the road with the wet snow splashing up. As soon as he looks at that, he knows they are going the wrong way. What was it about the road that made him realize it?
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Answer: The reason was that the snowbank was on his side (the passenger side) when it should have been on the driver's side if they were driving in the right direction. Also and I'm not sure if you could see this in the film but the deflecters on the road which separate the lanes if you are going in the right direction shine yellow and if you are going the wrong way shine red.
Tobin OReilly