PLOT HOLES, MISTAKES IN FILM AND TV

childeroland · Feb 23, 2008

I thought it'd be fun if people listed plot holes and other mistakes (continuity errors, etc) in films and television shows, or corrections if someone finds a mistake isn't a mistake. For example:

Commando

After chasing down Sully, the yellow Porsche is totally wrecked on the left side, until Schwarzenegger drives it away, when no dent appears.

Attack of the Clones

When Padme and some clone troopers get blown out of the ship chasing Count Dooku, a trooper approaches Amidala and asks about making their way back to the front lines. Amidala says they should go to the hangar to help Obi-Wan and Anakin. How did she know about the hangar, having left the ship quite some time before it arrived at the final destination?

The Phantom Menace

Anakin has just helped saved Naboo from the Trade Federation (the bad guys, for those who don't speak nerd) and his mother remains a slave on his home planet: not once does anyone think to show him gratitude by, you know, BUYING HER FREEDOM.

Spiderman 2

Harry tells Doctor Oct that to find Spider-Man he must find Peter. Doctor Octopus finds Peter with Mary Jane in the cafe and throws a car straight at them. Octopus doesn't know that Peter is Spider-Man, so why would he take an action that would have killed a normal person?

DeleyanLee · Feb 23, 2008

One (of many) from League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Dorian Gray somehow misses having the Invisible Man in a tiny sub for nearly two weeks just because he can't see him. What? The man didn't have to relieve himself? Breathe? Eat? Sweat? Ish.

That movie is a train wreck of plot holes. Both fun and infuriating.

HeronW · Feb 23, 2008

Rocky Horror Picture Show, Rocky is hurt, Janet-Susan Sarandon bandages his hand but there's no wounds a couple hours later.

At the end, Brad and Janet are told to take the Prof with them. They roll him out in his wheel chair but it doesn't show up when the house/ship takes off.

DWSTXS · Feb 23, 2008

since this is a writer's web site, how about a book mistake:

The DaVinci Code - Silas has severe albinism. He should be legally blind. People with even mild albinism have impaired vision due to lack of retinal pigmentation. There is no way Silas would be able to fire a gun over a distance with any accuracy, or drive a car, yet he does both these things. There is never a hint or comment anywhere about his poor vision.

DWSTXS · Feb 23, 2008

Titanic: When Rose is arriving in New York half asleep, she looks at the Statue of Liberty, which is the same colour as now (green). But if you visit the statue of liberty, you'll find a plate telling you that the original color was brown, and it took over 35 years for it to change colour. The statue of liberty was placed there in 1886, so in 1912 it should have still been partly brown. Also, the flame was replaced in 1986 (for its 100th anniversary) with a gold flame. The film shows the Statue holding a torch with a gold flame, not the original

Chumplet · Feb 23, 2008

Okay, in Raiders of the Lost Ark, it drives me nuts that when they lifted the stone cover to the chamber that contained the ark, a big WHOOSH! of air spurts upward as if the chamber was in a vacuum. How, then, did all those snakes manage to live down there? When Indie notes the snakes coming through a hole, the inner chamber has a direct air supply from the outside.

robeiae · Feb 23, 2008

The snakes had been holding their breath for two thousand years. They exhaled.

Zelenka · Feb 23, 2008

There was a series called 'Civvies' back in the 90s, written by Linda La Plante, about ex paratroopers trying to adjust to civilian life. Jason Isaacs played the MC, and had a scar that moved around his face and then disappeared completely for one scene. Later there was a scene where he was supposed to make a phonecall. The character had 'Love' and 'Hate' tattooed on his knuckles, but only in the close-ups where he was holding the phone.

Supposedly there's a shot in The Two Towers where Gandalf's wearing trainers but I've never caught that.

maxmordon · Feb 23, 2008

Vampire Assassin; the Plan 9 from our generation. A scene happening in a bar (through the external shot shows a deli) there is a band playing and a girl singing, but the only music you hear seems to be muzak played with a keyboard

By the way, this is the poster

and this is the guy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRmKrlRvh5c&feature=related

PattiTheWicked · Feb 23, 2008

Oooh, I love stuff like this. I live for movie goofs.

In Gladiator, there's a scene in Germania where Maximus is moving his horse. Just under the horse's neck and forelegs, you can see the blue jeans and workboots of a grip who didn't get out of the way in time.

Later, when they're in one of the arena scenes, there's a woman wearing sunglasses in the front row.

katiemac · Feb 23, 2008

Supposedly there's a shot in The Two Towers where Gandalf's wearing trainers but I've never caught that.

During Aragorn's motivational speech at the end of Return of the King, behind him on horseback is the kid stand-in for one of the hobbits. It's a pretty blatant mistake. I was hoping they'd find a way to fix it for the DVD release but alas, no.

childeroland · Feb 23, 2008

Another one from Two Towers. When Merry and Pippin are tied up by the orcs, they don't get loose till after Karl Urban's troop attacks the orcs and they escape during the fight. But in one scene during the fight Pippin's arms aren't bound, and in the next shot they are.

DWSTXS · Feb 23, 2008

Gladiators - - -
Visible crew/equipment: When Maximus is told the Emperor is dead we see him barge past Commodus to see the body. Look behind Commodus at the roof and you should see an electrical stage light.

Factual error: When a group of soldiers goes to Maximus' villa to burn it and kill his family, his son points them, saying in perfect Italian "Mama! I soldati!" I just don't understand why he speaks Italian in a movie in English, where people are supposed to speak Latin, in a province where this language was never ever spoken.

Continuity: During the enactment of the Battle of Zama, Maximus rides his horse around a bend with his sword in his left hand. When we cut to close up, it's back in his right. Looking at the left-handed shot in freeze-frame, you can see the frame has been flipped, left-to-right (check the armor). This was probably for continuity reasons. Similarly, Maximus jumps on the horse and his shoulder protector is clearly on his injured left shoulder. However, a few frames later, the protector is on his right shoulder, then it moves yet again back the correct spot, the left shoulder.

Visible crew/equipment: During the scene where Maximus throws the sword into the crowd and yells "are you not entertained," the camera pans around, and in the crowd, for a split second, you can see a cameraman in jeans and a shirt standing next to a camera. This is visible on the big screen, but hard to see on video, unless you see it on DVD and can zoom in.

Continuity: During the first Gladiator match in Morocco, Maximus and Juba are chained together. Once they have killed the last man, the camera takes us around the arena. You can clearly see the shadow of the camera on Maximus' chest. It happens twice.

Factual error: In one of the scenes in Rome leading up to a fight, leaflets are being handed out. These didn't exist, event notices were written up on boards.

Factual error: Before Maximus enters the colliseum, he selects a helmet and places it on his head. On the rack is a copy of a saxon helmet found at Sutton Hoo, England and part of the treasure found at that location. Unfortunately this is a 7th century design.

Chasing the Horizon · Feb 23, 2008

In Twister, the main characters drive their truck into a house (which a tornado has thrown into the middle of the road). As they enter the house the windshield is very obviously broken by a piece of debris, but when they pop out the other side the windshield is in tact. Then the camera angle switches and it's broken again. The error is so glaring me and everyone with me noticed it the very first time we saw the movie. Of course, having the two main characters tie themselves to a pipe and survive a direct hit by an F5 twister without so much as a scratch is completely unrealistic too. Come to think of it, Twister has more errors than most 'B' horror movies (but for some strange reason I still like it, lol).

Zelenka · Feb 24, 2008

'Doctor Who' has a fair number but the two I can think of right now, one from the classic series, one from the new;

In the episode 'The Chase', right back in the 60s with William Hartnell, the MCs are being chased through time and space by a group of Daleks. They land in what seems to be Dracula's Castle but which turns out to be a House of Horrors with androids in. In the basement they go down and find Frankenstein's laboratory and in the background is an archway, where the Dalek 'prop' can clearly be seen, sitting in the shadows, waiting to be trundled on later. Only the Daleks don't arrive in the building for another couple of scenes.

In the new, the episode 'The Shakespeare Code' - minor thing but they showed a view of Shakespearean London and the Globe Theatre was on the wrong side of London Bridge, but was in the right place in another shot. Think they'd just reversed the graphic.

There was an incident when Star Trek was showing on BBC1 too where transmission left the station ident up too long and the Enterprise flew around the BBC's graphic of the globe.

The Two Towers again, but in the scene where Sam and Frodo are being questioned by Faramir, in one shot you see the two hobbits sitting together with their backs against some barrels, a moment later the barrels have disappeared. Eomer also drops his sword as he dismounts his horse when he first meets Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - Hagrid's half brother Grawp hands Hermione the handlebars off a bicycle and gets her to ping the bell. You never see her hand it back but in the next shot he has it, she doesn't, and he's pinging the bell on it.

DWSTXS · Feb 24, 2008

in my opinion Twister was one of the worst movies ever. Of all time. It seemed to me like they chased one tornado all over the place, while it was making right angle moves, etc etc. Also, the visibility they had up close to the twisters was too damn much to be believed. Stupid stupid movie.

Toothpaste · Feb 24, 2008

beezle said:
Well, I see everyone's picking on the Star Wars prequels just because they suck. How about some classic Star Wars bloopers?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBQaLuqwtl8

Here an ‘elite’ storm trooper bumps his head on a door frame in the Death Star.

When they reissued the films with the new effects and stuff back into the theatres in the late 90's, they added a little sound effect to the bumping of the head. It's pretty awesome.

maxmordon · Feb 24, 2008

DWSTXS said:
in my opinion Twister was one of the worst movies ever. Of all time. It seemed to me like they chased one tornado all over the place, while it was making right angle moves, etc etc. Also, the visibility they had up close to the twisters was too damn much to be believed. Stupid stupid movie.

A parody from this blog

Starring: Hillbilly Tornado Chasers, Hillbilly Scientists, Pepsi can shards, special FX, some British guy trying to sound like a hillbilly, and other disturbing things
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(Bill Paxton and Jami Gertz are in civilization.)

JAMI GERTZ
We're so in love. We should get married right away.

BILL PAXTON
Okay... D'oh! I just remembered I'm still married to my ex-wife, the hillbilly tornado chaser.

JAMI GERTZ
Oh well. I guess we could just move to Utah.

BILL PAXTON
No, it's not a problem. She just has to sign the final divorce papers. Say, let's take a week off work to drive down and watch her sign them in person. I'm sure that won't be awkward.

(Bill Paxton and Jami Gertz arrive in Hillbilly Country.)

HILLBILLY TORNADO CHASER 1
Yeee-haw! We chase tarnados!

HELEN HUNT
Hi, Bill. Here're the papers you want. I just have to sign my name to them to make the divorce official. Anyone have a pen? Okay, here's an "H"... And now an "E"...

HILLBILLY TORNADO CHASER 2
Pack up yar saddles, ladies! My Chevy's satellite imaging's telling me we got a big'un comin'!

AUDIENCE
You'd think if he has a satellite imager, he could afford to buy some teeth.

(The Hillbillys, Helen Hunt, Bill Paxton, and Jami Gertz all drive into the tornado.)

JAMI GERTZ (to Bill Paxton)
What are we still doing here? This tornado hasn't rekindled the love between you and your ex-wife, has it?

BILL PAXTON
Er...hey look, a flying cow!

HILLBILLY COW
MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE YER ASS I'M COMIN' THRU! YEEEEEE-HAW!
(flies by)

HELEN HUNT
Look over there! It's Evil Tornado Scientist Guy!

EVIL TORNADO SCIENTIST GUY
Muhahahahahahahaha!!!! I've stolen the idea for your Tornado Predictor Thingofmajig and will use it to profit from science!

EVERYONE ELSE
Noooooooooooo!!!

JAMI GERTZ
You do realize that your "Tornado Predictor" machine is nothing more than an oversized trashcan filled with miniature snow-globes, right?

(Pause)

HELEN HUNT AND BILL PAXTON
Yeeeeeeeeeeee-haw!!!

(Repeat three times with different tornados.)

JAMI GERTZ
That's it, I'm outta here.
(leaves)

(Repeat two more times.)

BILL PAXTON
Oh no, look! It's the biggest, baddest tornado of them all!

BAD TORNADO
Whooooooooooooooooooshhh!!!!!!!!!!!

EVIL TORNADO SCIENTIST GUY
I saw it first! I'm gonna capture it, cage it up in my basement, and charge ten bucks a head to see it! Hahahahahaha, later, suckers!
(dies)

BILL PAXTON
Quick, we need to make peace with the tornado. Put the trashca—I mean, Tornado Predictor in it's path and let's see what happens.

(They do, but they almost die.)

HELEN HUNT
Did it work?

HILLBILLY TORNADO CHASER 3
All I kin see are them Pepsi cans we put in thar flyin' 'bout.

HELEN HUNT
That means it's working!

BILL PAXTON, HELEN HUNT, AND THE HILLBILLIES
Hoooooray!!!!

PEPSI CEO STEVEN S. REINEMUND
Hoooooray!!!!

BILL PAXTON
Phew...well, that was fun, huh? All right, time to go back to civilization with my fiancee—hey, where is she?

HELEN HUNT
She cursed your name and took off like two days ago.

BILL PAXTON
Hmm...that might put a damper on our wedding. Oh well, guess I'll just stay here.

HELEN HUNT
Glad to have ya back, cowboy.

EVERYONE
YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE HAW!!!!

(They all go home and vote Republican.)

Moon Wolf · Feb 24, 2008

JessRamage said:
'Doctor Who' has a fair number but the two I can think of right now, one from the classic series, one from the new;

In the episode 'The Chase', right back in the 60s with William Hartnell, the MCs are being chased through time and space by a group of Daleks. They land in what seems to be Dracula's Castle but which turns out to be a House of Horrors with androids in. In the basement they go down and find Frankenstein's laboratory and in the background is an archway, where the Dalek 'prop' can clearly be seen, sitting in the shadows, waiting to be trundled on later. Only the Daleks don't arrive in the building for another couple of scenes.

In the new, the episode 'The Shakespeare Code' - minor thing but they showed a view of Shakespearean London and the Globe Theatre was on the wrong side of London Bridge, but was in the right place in another shot. Think they'd just reversed the graphic.

<snip>

AH! I love Doctor Who... lol, off topic.

There was one I was trying to think of but I lost it. ><

EDIT: Wait, I remember! It's not really an error, but whatever...

In the first Harry Poter movie, when Ron's getting bucked off his Knight that gets stabbed by a Queen, if you look closely, you can tell it's a stunt double.

The funny thing is, in the next scene when he's on the ground and the rocks are getting blown at him, his face gets scratched by one of the boulders, for real. His face flinches, and you can still see it at the end of the movie scene.

Must have hurt. ^^

inkkognito · Feb 24, 2008

I'll toss in a HUGE book continuity gap. In the V.C. Andrews "Heaven" series, a character named Troy dies at the end of a book. He rides a horse into the ocean, and they recover and bury his body. But all of a sudden in the next book it is discovered that he is alive. Suddenly they're saying that his body was never recovered, even though it was very plainly stated in the previous book that it was. I wonder if it had anything to do with V.C. Andrews dying around that time and a ghost writer taking over. But you'd think the ghost writer would at least stick with the "facts" that were already established in the earlier books.

DWSTXS · Feb 24, 2008

another crap movie that absolutely sucked. Seriously sucked. I mean, by the end of this thing, I was practically slumped over in the corner, head down on chest, vomit running down, glazed look in my eyes, wanting to swallow the barrel of a .45 ACP.

Forrest Gump.

Plus, for a year or two afterwards, we're all subjected to the total ass-whip of having to listen to morons running around repeating stupid phrases like 'Life is like a box of chocolates'
arghhhhh. It makes me want to stab their eyeballs with toothpicks.

nevada · Feb 24, 2008

http://www.moviemistakes.com/

childeroland · Feb 24, 2008

I've never made it through more than the first 20 minutes or so of Gump.

Speaking of classic bloopers: anyone remember the famous one in Meet Me in St Louis during the party scene when Tootie's shoes keep changing colors?

moviemistakes is a great website.

DWSTXS said:
another crap movie that absolutely sucked. Seriously sucked. I mean, by the end of this thing, I was practically slumped over in the corner, head down on chest, vomit running down, glazed look in my eyes, wanting to swallow the barrel of a .45 ACP.

Forrest Gump.

Plus, for a year or two afterwards, we're all subjected to the total ass-whip of having to listen to morons running around repeating stupid phrases like 'Life is like a box of chocolates'
arghhhhh. It makes me want to stab their eyeballs with toothpicks.

ChaosTitan · Feb 24, 2008

There's a scene in Troy, when Hector stops Helen from sneaking out of the city and giving herself back to the Greeks. During the conversation, the POV changes from one to the other. On Helen, her hair is pulled back from her face at the sides. On Hector (looking at the back of Helen's head), her hair is obviously down.

ChunkyC · Feb 25, 2008

DWSTXS said:
another crap movie that absolutely sucked. Seriously sucked. I mean, by the end of this thing, I was practically slumped over in the corner, head down on chest, vomit running down, glazed look in my eyes, wanting to swallow the barrel of a .45 ACP.

Forrest Gump.

Plus, for a year or two afterwards, we're all subjected to the total ass-whip of having to listen to morons running around repeating stupid phrases like 'Life is like a box of chocolates'
arghhhhh. It makes me want to stab their eyeballs with toothpicks.

I lived through all the times depicted in that movie, and I think it's a fantastic film. I'd just like to make the point that just because one doesn't like a particular movie, it doesn't mean it's bad. Gump won the best picture Oscar, after all, so it can't very well suck. You just didn't like it, which is entirely your perogative. Also, I bet you've repeated phrases from movies you do like, but that doesn't make you a moron just because you might have done so within earshot of someone who didn't like it.

On to some bloopers I've spotted:

Jurassic Park

Nedry is trying to get to the dock and crashes the jeep. When he climbs out and slides down to the road, there's a direction sign with an arrow. It's shown a couple of times more while he runs the cable around the tree and meets the dilophosaur (dunno if I spelled that right), and each time you see the sign, the arrow is pointing a different way and then back again to where it was when no one or no thing in the scene went anywhere near it.

Star Trek II: the Wrath of Khan

In the climax battle scene, after the Enterprise is banged up by Khan's first volley of phaser fire, Kirk goes to see the wounded. A young kid grabs Kirk's jacket and leaves a bloody hand-print behind. In subsequent scenes, the shape of the stain shifts back and forth between what we saw the kid do and a smaller, less defined shape.

PLOT HOLES, MISTAKES IN FILM AND TV

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