Corrected entry: The whole premise of the movie is to rob a very large vault of securities in the form of bearer bonds. The vault rightly takes hours to breach and the last safety feature requires a cut in power. This is patently impossible to accomplish in the short time they had. Firstly, that super-sophisticated vault would have a state-of-art power back-up system that would take hours itself to be disabled. It is likely that the disabling of THAT system would lock down the vault and seal it for days or weeks. Secondly, shutting down the main power would almost certainly lock down the vault. I actually install the back-up systems and know that any odd power surges or especially power losses alert the security systems to prepare a lock down.
Tailkinker
11th Jun 2004
Die Hard (1988)
9th Jun 2004
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
Corrected entry: When Faramir and his men are overwhelmed by Orcs, they retreat to Minas Tirith. Gandalf, with Pippin astride, gallops out from Minas Tirith on Shadowfax and drives off the Nazgul and the fell beasts. There is no reason for Gandalf to have ridden out with Pippin.
7th Jun 2004
Ocean's Eleven (2001)
Corrected entry: When Andy Garcia says "walsh" after he notices that there is no money in the vault, we can see how destroyed the inside of the vault is. If there had been an explosion that big the Amazing Yang would have died, or at the very least bleeding due to ruptured eardrums.
Correction: Remember that they throw a second explosive into the vault during their SWAT team masquerade - it's this detonation that wrecks the vault, not the initial one that blows the door. Yen was well out of the way for the second, larger blast.
7th Jun 2004
Ocean's Eleven (2001)
Corrected entry: After the lights turn back on the motion detectors turn on as well. If that is so then the motion detectors inside the vault would be active as well. Those would go off when the vault door explodes due to all the debris being scattered about.
Correction: According to dialogue in the film, the blast that destroys the door locking mechanism also takes out the floor sensors.
9th Jun 2004
Enemy of the State (1998)
Corrected entry: Reynolds wants to discredit Dean so if he ever comes forward with the tape nobody would believe him. But I don't see how that would do anything since the tape speaks for itself and I can't see how any intelligent person would dismiss it simply because the person who had it is questionable.
Correction: Tapes could be faked, so any doubt that they can shed on Dean's character will serve to increase public skepticism about what they see - buying them enough time to take alternate action. And remember that they are trying to recover the tape as well - if they do that, then discrediting Dean will ensure that nobody believes anything he says without evidence.
9th Jun 2004
Deep Impact (1998)
Corrected entry: In the scenes that lead up to the impact of the meteor, we're shown horrible traffic jams with cars all over the freeway blocking everything, yet Tea Leoni can pass all that and ride out of the city all the way to the sea to be with her father and she gets there long before the impact takes place.
Correction: Of course she gets there - everyone else is trying to get AWAY from the coast. The blocked roads are those leading out of the city away from the sea, not towards it.
9th Jun 2004
The Day After Tomorrow (2004)
Corrected entry: At the end of the movie, the President of the United States says, "It is telling that my first address comes to you from foreign soil." The only problem is that the US Embassy in Mexico (and any other foreign country) is considered US soil. That is why they are havens for travellers abroad.
Correction: He says "first broadcast from a consulate on foreign soil" so no mistake.
8th Jun 2004
Minority Report (2002)
Corrected entry: Precrime couldn't figure out Howard Marks' new address. But the Post Office (also a federal organization) must have known it; otherwise how would the Markses get their mail? Recall that a magazine or newspaper was shown in the previsions, and Anderton unsuccessfully tried to zoom in on the address label, proving it was delivered. The United States Postal Service knew their new address, yet Precrime didn't?
Correction: Magazines, letters and so forth are delivered to whatever's on the address label - it doesn't automatically follow that this information is in a Post Office database somewhere. Besides, we never see how the magazine gets to the house - it could have been forwarded on from their old address by the new occupants, or Marks could have gone back and collected it.
9th Jun 2004
Fight Club (1999)
Corrected entry: When Ed Norton is walking down the street he runs into Bob, and Bob tells him he joined fight club. He also tells him about Tyler. If Ed Norton is Tyler and Ed Norton is one of his friends wouldn't he notice they look exactly alike, or at least say he looks like him?
Correction: By this point, there are several fight clubs - the Narrator and Bob discover during their conversation that they attend on different nights. Bob merely knows about Tyler from what he's heard from other club members - he's never actually met him, so he doesn't realise that Tyler and the Narrator are one and the same.
3rd Jun 2004
Swordfish (2001)
Corrected entry: Where does John Travolta acquire a corpse that looks just like him AND has matching dental records without resorting to altering an existing corpse (by plastic surgery) so flawlessly that it wouldn't be detected by an autopsy to fool the authorities into thinking he died in the helicopter crash?
Correction: You're assuming that the dental records were actually his - it seems more likely that Shear simply substituted medical information for the dead man in place of his own. As far as finding a similar corpse, it seems reasonable that a concentrated search would turn up a lookalike - any subtle differences in appearance would be erased by the damage done in the helicopter crash.
7th Jun 2004
The Matrix (1999)
Corrected entry: When Neo surprises Cypher, he can't read the code, and Cypher says "I don't even see the code any more" indicating that he took time to learn it. Since they can download vast amounts of information (combat techniques, chopper piloting, ...) directly into the brain, why don't they make a disk to learn the Matrix code?
Correction: There may be a disk, but, as we saw with Neo's 'training', Tank elected to bypass the operational stuff in favour of the combat training.
2nd Jun 2004
Hulk (2003)
Corrected entry: In the scene where Bruce is fighting tanks in the desert, in one shot he picks up a tank, twirls it around, and tosses it. Now let's think about that. He would have to get that 60 ton tank moving about 180 MPH to throw it that far away. That would take about 200,000 horse power, roughly the strength of an aircraft carrier. But in the very next shot, he takes the turret of that same tank and hits another with it, making only a moderately sized dent.
Correction: People are capable of using differing levels of strength when performing tasks - the Hulk is no different.
3rd Jun 2004
Minority Report (2002)
Corrected entry: Wouldn't they cancel Anderton's access rights the moment he became wanted for murder? He gets into the Precrime building and the Temple - where the security is expected to be extremely high - without any problem at all.
Correction: Burgess needs Anderton to get to the right place to kill Crow - he may well have anticipated that, in order to get the necessary information to find Crow, Anderton might have to get back into the PreCrime building at some point. As such, he might have used his authority as Director of PreCrime to delay the cancellation of Anderton's access rights.
2nd Jun 2004
Enemy at the Gates (2001)
Corrected entry: How come these supposedly "Russian" characters have British accents? Obviously it's because the actors are British, and for the sake of simplicity and American audiences, the majority of dialogue was written and performed in English. Even Bob Hoskins, a British actor, performs perfectly with a Russian accent; so why couldn't the others do this?
Correction: There have been umpteen incidents of 'wrong' accents in films (often involving Sean Connery), to the point where it cannot really be considered a film error - in many ways, it's better if an actor simply uses their natural accent rather than doing a really appalling version of the 'real' accent. Hoskins was obviously capable of pulling off a Russian accent - maybe the others weren't.
31st May 2004
Big Fish (2003)
Corrected entry: Edward Bloom, a white baby, is shown being delivered by a black doctor in what's described as a small Alabama town in the 1940's. This would have been highly unlikely.
Correction: All the scenes from Edward's past are taken from his stories - therefore, they should not be taken as completely accurate.
29th May 2004
Ed Wood (1994)
Corrected entry: If Glen or Glenda and Bride of the Monster were so horrible, why would the premier of Plan 9 From Outer Space be so crowded? Don't you think people would know by then how bad Ed Wood's movies were?
Correction: The whole point about Ed Wood's movies is that they were considered to be almost legendarily bad - as such, people actually wanted to see them, just to find out how bad they were.
27th May 2004
Equilibrium (2002)
Corrected entry: When Preston and his partner are coming back from the Nether, he sees that his partner has a book with him. He asks "Why didn't you leave that for the evidence team?" The partner replies "I wanted to log it in myself, they miss these things sometimes." Later, he has a book and Tae Diggs asks him about it. He says the excact same thing. The problem is that it is not a strech to assume that the best cleric on the force would know that saying that will likely lead to his being outed as a sense offender.
Correction: Preston has to say something in response - he's been caught on the hop, doesn't have time to think, so resorts to repeating what Partridge said earlier. Anyway, it wasn't that phrase that caught Preston's attention earlier anyway - his suspicions were aroused by other statements by Partridge - he then investigated and found that Partridge had not turned the book in as he said he would. At the time, he accepted it as a reasonable answer - there's no reason to think that Brandt wouldn't accept it as well.
20th May 2004
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
Corrected entry: Watch Gollum's fingers, they change in number from six to five, on the same hand, several times.
Correction: The Gollum construct has a specific bone structure, musculature and skin setup. The number of fingers is set by this construct, which would not be changed at any point - any apparent deviation can only be an illusion.
19th May 2004
Shaun of the Dead (2004)
Corrected entry: Just before Shaun and his gang meet a similar group of survivors in an alleyway on their way to the Winchester Arms, look at the background as they enter the alleyway. First a car goes past, then a person on a bike. This is a very risky method of transport in a supposedly zombie infested area.
Correction: Actually, it's an excellent form of transport. Assuming a reasonably fit rider, it provides for reasonable speed, much faster than the zombies themselves, and has a great deal of agility, much more so than a car. It would also allow the rider to move quickly through narrow alleyways, something that a car wouldn't allow. While a car is better as an offensive weapon against the zombies, and would be safer if the zombies got too close, if the aim is purely to escape, then a bike is a pretty good choice, probably bettered only by a motorcycle.
Corrected entry: What suddenly makes Elizabeth the great expert on nautical affairs when they are being chased by the Black Pearl? I know it's to involve the actress in the scene, but really this is just silly.
Correction: Rubbish. Elizabeth has lived around a port and ships for at least half her life - there's every reason to expect that she'd be familiar with nautical affairs, particularly as it seems likely that Norrington has been a frequent visitor to the Swann household and would no doubt relate tales of his misadventures. And note that the real sailors on the crew do point out that her ideas are pretty out-there - sailing into dangerous areas and dropping the anchor while at full sail are not the suggestions of an experienced sailor.
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Correction: Just because some vaults are set up in this way, it doesn't follow that they all are. Gruber researched his target in enormous detail prior to committing the robbery - it's clear from what happens in the film that none of these features are in place. Maybe, for improved security, they should have been, but the fact that they weren't in no way qualifies as a movie mistake.
Tailkinker ★