Charles Austin Miller

Continuity mistake: At the beginning of the film, protesters chase Harold through downtown traffic until he dives into his friend Todd's vehicle; whereupon the protesters urinate on Todd's windshield and splatter fecal matter across his driver's side window. For several scenes thereafter, the fecal splatter repeatedly changes shape, orientation and quantity on the side window, actually gaining mass in some shots.

Charles Austin Miller

Trivia: Longtime TV actor Lee Majors was extremely influential in the overall development of the "Six Million Dollar Man" series. Although he had already appeared in the 3 successful made-for-TV pilot movies in 1973, Majors was very skeptical of entering into a weekly series, and he wanted a guarantee that the show would not devolve into a campy superhero series (like "Batman"). Majors further stipulated that there should be no blood and no violent death on the show. Executive producer Harve Bennett, producer Kenneth Johnson, and ABC Television immediately agreed. Majors also thought the original "Six Million Dollar Man" theme song (sung by Dusty Springfield) was embarrassingly bad, so composer Oliver Nelson wrote the iconic instrumental theme for the series. Two years into the hit show, Majors then became concerned that his character, Steve Austin, would be perceived as gay because he never had an onscreen love interest; so Majors essentially demanded that a female character be added to fill that role. The producers complied without question. According to Lee Majors: "People were really getting to the point where it was like, 'When's this guy [Steve Austin] going to come out of the closet here?' That's when we brought in Lindsay Wagner to be the first love interest."

Charles Austin Miller

Visible crew/equipment: When the anxious Benjamin takes Elaine on their first date (against Mrs. Robinson's wishes), he's driving his convertible Alfa Romeo fast and a bit recklessly on the crowded freeway. This brief nighttime scene is one continuous "backseat" shot from behind Ben and Elaine, looking out of the car's front windscreen. As the lighting shifts erratically, the distinct shadow of the camera and audio rigs with vertical cables repeatedly moves left and right across the entire shot for the duration of the scene. (00:58:09)

Charles Austin Miller

Factual error: An especially stupid but common blunder in film and TV over the decades involves a character picking up a random object from nearby and bashing a heavy padlock and steel chain a few times until the lock and chain break and fall away. Of course, steel chain and heavy padlocks are designed to withstand tons of stress that a human being couldn't possibly exert through striking alone.

Charles Austin Miller

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."

Charles Austin Miller

Continuity mistake: When Captain Shakespeare is in drag, doing his fan dance before a full-length mirror in the foreground, Prince Septimus appears in the background in partial profile and slowly turns to his right to fully face the camera. The shot immediately cuts to a closeup of Septimus to get his stunned facial reaction, and he is again turning slowly to his right to fully face the camera.

Charles Austin Miller

Revealing mistake: At the end of "Hot Patootie," an enraged Frank-N-Furter snatches an ice axe from the deep-freezer and menaces the terrified Eddie. There is no blood seen in the freezer at this point. Frank swings his first blow and completely misses Eddie, who is scampering into the deep-freeze several feet ahead of Frank. There is no blood seen in the freezer at this point, either. Frank then pursues Eddie into the fog at the back of the deep-freezer and viciously murders him with the ice axe (a genuinely horrifying scene as Tim Curry plays it, but the murder occurs entirely off-camera). But then, as Frank emerges from the freezer moments later, we see a splattered and gory trail of fresh blood leading into the freezer, as though Frank had already mortally wounded the escaping Eddie even before the offscreen murder. This looks as though footage from an alternate and more graphically violent version of this scene was kept in the revised scene, causing the gory blood trail to appear out of nowhere. (00:45:15)

Charles Austin Miller

Trivia: In this regrettable comedy-filler for NBC Television, writer/director Michael O'Donoghue (of "National Lampoon" and "Saturday Night Live" fame in the mid-1970s) presented a jumbled showcase of tasteless, cruel, stupid and unfunny sketches that managed to stoop lower than low production quality and dubious entertainment value. Even the very liberal NBC considered O'Donoghue's video beneath network standards and it was rejected for broadcast. As an example of the video's dismal offerings, one brief segment featured a deadpan Dan Aykroyd removing his shoes to reveal his real-life genetic deformities: His second and third toes are fused together on both feet. Aykroyd prodded his toes with a screwdriver to prove the deformities were real. NBC was not amused. (00:20:25)

Charles Austin Miller

Jacob and Jesse - S1-E2

Revealing mistake: Air Force Colonel Owen Crawford and his two personal assistants are poring over classified intelligence files in the Colonel's office. When they start to review a slideshow of photographs, one assistant sets up a projector screen and turns off the office lights as the other assistant switches on the slide projector. Photographic images immediately appear on the screen in the background, but the first assistant is still standing directly in front of the slide projector in the foreground. Not only does he not eclipse the projected image on the screen, but no projected image appears on the assistant's body. Obviously, the images on the screen in the background are projected from another source far off-camera. (00:48:50)

Charles Austin Miller

Trivia: In this rather clunking classic murder mystery, the closing gimmick of the film is a sequence of several otherwise unremarkable supporting characters grandly removing their heavy latex makeup to reveal A-List Hollywood movie stars who played mundane roles in the film. The heavily-disguised stars in this film include Kirk Douglas, Tony Curtis, Robert Mitchum, Burt Lancaster and Frank Sinatra. Director John Huston (who also made a cameo appearance in the film) tried to convince Elizabeth Taylor to play a disguised part in this movie, as well; but, when Taylor learned that her lovely face would be completely hidden under heavy latex, she turned down the role.

Charles Austin Miller

This has been annoying the hell out of me for years. I'm thinking of an early 1960s (?) black and white American movie that features numerous cameos by A-List Hollywood actors who are so heavily made-up (with wigs and latex facial prosthetics) that they are all thoroughly unrecognizable. At the end of the film, as a complete surprise, there is a sequence of each of these otherwise unremarkable cameo characters removing their makeup for a big reveal. For example, a plain, middle-aged woman who only appeared for a few seconds onscreen grandly removes her latex face to reveal none other than Burt Lancaster. I believe Robert Mitchum and Tony Curtis were also among the reveals. What is this film?

Charles Austin Miller

Yesterday's Enterprise - S3-E15

Question: The ever-popular gag in this episode is that Worf consumes prune juice for the first time and declares that it is a "warrior's drink," to Guinan's amusement. However, Worf was adopted as a child by human parents, he grew up on Earth, he was highly educated and graduated Star Fleet Academy on Earth. Given the reputation of prune juice as a natural laxative throughout human history, how could Worf not know what prune juice is, having lived most of his life on Earth?

Charles Austin Miller

Continuity mistake: The Stalker, "Shrike," is a persistent hunter, but not terribly quick on his feet. He's sort of a lurching, Frankenstein-like cyborg who is always pursuing Hester Shaw at about walking speed. When Valentine frees Shrike from Sharkmoor prison, miles out to sea, we see Valentine in his airship destroying the prison and we see Shrike's prison cell sink to the sea floor. This cuts to a long distance shot of the prison exploding and sinking in the far background, miles away, as Valentine's airship comes sweeping from the far background into the foreground and out of frame. Almost immediately, Shrike emerges from the surf in the foreground and slowly trudges ashore, implying that he somehow travelled miles across the sea floor just as swiftly as did the airship, in a matter of moments, despite his slow, lumbering gait. (00:47:40)

Charles Austin Miller

Hawkins: I've got it! I've got it! The pellet with the poison's in the vessel with the pestle; the chalice from the palace has the brew that is true! Right?
Griselda: Right, but there's been a change. They broke the chalice from the palace.
Hawkins: They broke the chalice from the palace?!
Griselda: And replaced it with a flagon.
Hawkins: A flagon?
Griselda: With the figure of a dragon.
Hawkins: Flagon with a dragon.
Griselda: Right.
Hawkins: But did you put the pellet with the poison in the vessel with the pestle?
Griselda: No! The pellet with the poison's in the flagon with the dragon! The vessel with the pestle has the brew that is true!
Hawkins: The pellet with the poison's in the flagon with the dragon; the vessel with the pestle has the brew that is true.
Griselda: Just remember that.

Charles Austin Miller

Trivia: Dick Van Dyke starred in this 1968 film about a fellow who purchases and restores a magical motorcar and must protect it from the greedy clutches of a conniving foreign tyrant; and, of course, "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" became a children's classic. Ironically, three years earlier, in 1965, Jerry Van Dyke (Dick's younger brother) starred in an NBC television situation-comedy about a fellow who purchases and restores a magical motorcar and must protect it from the greedy clutches of a conniving car collector. Widely panned by critics as the worst-ever idea for a TV series, "My Mother the Car" was cancelled in 1966 after one season, and the good-natured Jerry Van Dyke always admitted that the series was the very definition of bad television.

Charles Austin Miller

Trivia: Widely panned by critics as the worst-ever idea for a TV series, "My Mother the Car" followed the antics of Jerry Van Dyke as he purchases and restores a magical motorcar and must protect it from the greedy clutches of a conniving car collector. The show was cancelled in 1966 after one season, and the good-natured Jerry Van Dyke always readily admitted that the series was the very definition of bad television. Ironically, two years later, in 1968, Jerry's older brother (Dick Van Dyke) starred in a film about a fellow who purchases and restores a magical motorcar and must protect it from the greedy clutches of a conniving foreign tyrant. "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" became a children's classic.

Charles Austin Miller

Trivia: From its inception, "The Munsters" was supposed to be produced in full color, and its earliest pilot was, in fact, shot in full color. The only reason the series was shot in black and white was because both CBS Television and Universal Studios refused to pay the additional $10,000 per episode for color.

Charles Austin Miller

The Addams Policy - S2-E28

Trivia: Throughout the various television treatments and feature films over many decades, the Addams Family storyline frequently concerned the family's fabulous and mysterious fortune, which was always the target of nefarious (and doomed) flim-flam schemes. However, it was almost never explained how the Addams Family obtained their incredible riches. In this episode from the original TV series, Gomez and Morticia finally revealed the diverse sources of their wealth: Gomez cites his mango plantation, "Mangoes Incorporated"; his Mozambique crocodile farm, "Crocodiles Unlimited"; his Himalayan tapioca mines on Mount Everest, "Tapioca Limited"; and Morticia additionally mentions "Amalgamated Swamp" and his buzzard farm.

Charles Austin Miller

Trivia: Perhaps the most often-repeated "Jaws" trivia is that actor Roy Scheider spontaneously ad-libbed the film's most iconic line, "You're gonna need a bigger boat!" Screenwriter Carl Gottleib apparently started this rumor after "Jaws" became a worldwide sensation in 1975, probably because the only thing that generated as much publicity as the film itself was backstory of the film's production; and Gottleib's rumor has charmed fans and persisted to this day. However, when reporter Paul Iorio interviewed Roy Scheider in 2000 (for a story in the San Francisco Chronicle on the occasion of the "Jaws" 25th anniversary), he specifically asked Scheider about the line "You're gonna need a bigger boat." Scheider answered: "That was in the script. The first time he [Chief Brody] sees the shark. But I liked the line so much, it amused me so much, that I said, 'I bet I could work this in a few other places.' So I worked it in two more times." Indeed, Chief Brody does refer to needing a bigger boat twice more, and those subsequent lines are ad-libbed; but the very first and most memorable time he says the line, it was purely scripted. Paul Iorio's question and Roy Scheider's answer were edited out of the published San Francisco Chronicle story.

Charles Austin Miller

Trivia: While James Cagney was a fine and spirited dancer in his own right, known for spontaneously "ad-libbing" dance steps on stage, Cagney insisted that Warner Brothers hire choreographer Johnny Boyle for "Yankee Doodle Dandy" to teach Cagney the precise dancing style of George M. Cohan. Boyle was an expert imitator of famous dancers and their routines, and he had worked with and choreographed Cohan on stage many years earlier. Under Boyle's instruction, James Cagney delivered a near-perfect impression of George M. Cohan's eccentric, stiff-legged, marionette-like dancing style in this movie. Unfortunately, during rehearsals for the film, Johnny Boyle broke his ankle, and the injury effectively ended his dancing career.

Charles Austin Miller