10th Oct 2019
The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim - S2-E5
Plot hole: The safe is behind a painting that acts like a real door. When Mrs Davenheim spots it, it's wide open. But Japp questioned her in the same room and the painting was in place back then. It really makes no sense that with a story depicted as being so big (it makes the first page of the national newspapers) and with an investigation in place, nobody in a week has checked the safe at all. (00:27:50)
10th Oct 2019
The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim - S2-E5
Continuity mistake: During the conversation between Lowen, Hastings and Japp through the car window, in his close-ups Tony Mathews moves his torso closer to the window and then back towards the wheel, several times. That is not always reflected accurately in the reverse shot with just the shoulder visible. For instance, right at the end of the scene, he leans in saying "Good God, you don't think you can keep a thing like that secret, surely", but his body is exactly in the same spot in the shots before and after. (00:24:20 - 00:25:10)
10th Oct 2019
The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim - S2-E5
Other mistake: Lowen allows Hastings inside his Bugatti, but then leaves to join a member of his staff who beckoned him. We actually see him in front of the staffer and the person with him. Cue Japp, who has then a little comical interlude with Hastings for about 20 seconds. Cut then to Lowen who.is just now being introduced to the guy he came over to greet. Surely he has not been standing in awkward silence all that time. And even if we assume that this conversation is supposed to happen simultaneously to the Hastings and Japp show, it is half as short, meaning it would have cut into their antics when he ends it by yelling at them. (00:23:15)
10th Oct 2019
The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim - S2-E5
Factual error: Poirot reads a fake copy of the Daily Express with a big article about the mystery disappearance. What makes it a not so believable fake, besides the odd artwork instead of a picture (a clash of style with the real Express first pages), is that you can make out of the words of the article closest to the camera, and like it happens to other props used this season, it mentions the Abyssinian crisis...but saying that "Mr. Churchill himself made the only speech." Churchill was not in office in the 30s. (00:17:05)
10th Oct 2019
The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim - S2-E5
Factual error: It is shown explicitly that The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim includes the fact that before going to his study at 4:30 PM, he starts the record player, with Tchaikovsky's "1812 Overture", and that the record stops at 4:45 PM. The problem with it is that Mrs. Davenheim during the whole 15 minutes stayed in the same spot, absent-minded, and in 1935 a recording of that song would have been on a three sided 72 rpm record, since 33 rpm LPs were introduced in 1948. (00:03:15)
10th Oct 2019
Continuity mistake: Mrs Pengelley is outraged by Hastings' question about the niece. Poirot opens his umbrella and begins to move forward to ask a different question. The left side of his coat is mostly spotless, but in the next close-up that side is instead covered in water stains, including a quite visible streak on the chest. (00:05:40)
10th Oct 2019
Audio problem: There's a bit of a mix-up in the codenames of the cars who chase Reggie Dyer. Unit 7 is the first to give chase and it is identified by its crew with the photographer. Then Unit 8 intercepts at the rendez-vous point. Check the license plate; FVW 49. Japp mentions a "unit 10" that is not shown. Later in Chinatown, Japp calls for the other cars, and "Car 8" responds, but its license plate is now YD 8501 and it's another car model. Unit 10 is again not shown. They dubbed in the wrong voiceover, they should have kept offscreen the second response by Unit 8 and made it Unit 10's.
10th Oct 2019
Factual error: One of the two police cars identified as Unit 10, is appropriately enough, a Sunbeam-Talbot Ten. The episode is set in 1935 though (with amazing accuracy for some details, including the poster for the movie "George White's Scandals 1935" shown before the car tailing starts), and that car was manufactured only after 1937. (00:19:55 - 00:22:00)
10th Oct 2019
Other mistake: Japp manages to coordinate the pincer action of the 3 police cars using a very broad map and no real information about the whereabouts of the suspect. The whole scene is rather silly, it would work in a modern thriller with a GPS, perhaps, not with toy cars and a street map of London.
10th Oct 2019
Stupidity: The policemen in car 7 are able to take pictures and talk to Japp with total ease, with a direct eyeline at such a low distance from the 3 people that is quite amazing they haven't been discovered - everyone was blind and possibly deaf, since they were so close and with the window open, you'd think they could even easily be heard.
10th Oct 2019
Factual error: In Poirot's study, Lord Pearson shows the big piece of mineral, saying "You're left holding a a nugget of top-grade 24-carat silver." That's a laughable blunder, from a top level banker and investor about to do a massive mining deal even. Silver purity is expressed in millesimal fineness. (00:11:30)
10th Oct 2019
Continuity mistake: His Bankship visits Poirot during the evening, and begins telling him the story of the silver mine. "For half a century, men have died", he says. Poirot has the magnifying lens in the right hand, but also the rock in the left; cut to a different angle, the hand with the rock is held low, out of frame, and then back to the first shot, with the rock exactly where it was. (00:11:55)
10th Oct 2019
Factual error: The episode is set at a precise date (it's even a plot point); 8/2/1935. But at the beginning Poirot and Hastings are playing Monopoly, and right there on the board you can distinctly read; "Trade Mark - Pat.app. For Nº 3796-36." As signaled by the last 2 digits, it's a 1936 edition (the UK localization of the game). (00:01:40)
10th Oct 2019
Stupidity: The gang is brutal enough to have Lavington killed; considering they know where he lives and that there's just a single housekeeper, it would have been miles easier for them to just kill or tie her up and ransack the house themselves with all the time they wanted, rather than involving the most famous detective with an obvious ruse and hope he'd find the object.
10th Oct 2019
Continuity mistake: The cream colored shoes of the Lady are prominently featured in the finale. When the actress has to run, not only are the heels replaced by modern tennis shoes, but they're black, in contrast with her white stockings. (00:46:40)
10th Oct 2019
Factual error: To meet The Veiled Lady the second time, Hastings and Poirot go to the Natural History Museum. The establishing shot is the iconic "Dippy the Diplodocus", right in the main hall. But in 1935, Dippy would have been in the reptile hall instead, and with his head and neck mounted differently. (00:37:35)
10th Oct 2019
Continuity mistake: Poirot tells Miss Lemon to calm down because "It is only the simple blackmailer." Pauline Moran has her right hand on the bag, but in the close-up that follows her hand is at a distance from it. The difference in position (and thus in the takes being edited together) is reflected by a mistake happening a few seconds later, when you can notice as she turns around to answer the door, that her gloves have also switched hand. (00:12:10)
10th Oct 2019
Continuity mistake: When Poirot and Hastings enter the Athena, there's an establishing shot as they walk to the right of the concierge. In the following shot, some elements like the lady with the flower dress by them are consistent, but the desk employee is suddenly on the phone and a bellboy appears by the stairs. Also the lady in the corner changes from a blonde to an elderly woman in a red coat. (00:05:50)
10th Oct 2019
Other mistake: Poirot, Hastings and The Veiled Lady go upstairs because the lobby is 'too public'. The man spying on them is hiding behind the same newspaper prop used in the previous episode of the season, where Hastings was reading it in Cornwall at the beginning. So must be a pretty old issue now (Peril at End House takes a few days, and they were on holiday). (00:07:40)
10th Oct 2019
Continuity mistake: Sitting on the park bench, Japp narrates the jewelry heist to Poirot. The passersby during the scene change in the various angles, and the most evident demonstration is offered by the fella that starts his walk exactly when Japp sits down. Grey pants, a sleeveless vest and hat, he walks all the way to the path in the background and exits stage right. But he's walking behind Japp when he says "The stones in his pocket were not the real stones." (00:03:00 - 00:03:45)
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