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Errors you've noticed in films

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IanD

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So "it would make sense" to read a whole 20+ page thread before commenting? Some people may have nowt better to do.

However, in the grand scheme of things, the person who got it wrong in the first place, seems not to agree with you.

Perhaps some people started reading the thread when it was was first created. If you think this thread has 20+ pages then you need to set your pages to show more than 3 per page. That would also make sense.
 
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jbg

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Perhaps some people started reading the thread when it was was first created. If you think this thread has 20+ pages then you need to set your pages to show more than 3 per page. That would also make sense.
I wasn't specifically referring to this one thread, but to threads in general.
 

Kneedown

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Dune (the version with Patrick Stewart and Sting), in the scene where the Guild Navigator arrives to question the Emperor, one of the navigator's aides trips up

Apparently, the outfits the aides wore were actually "second hand" body bags.
Havn't spotted the trip, must watch the DVD tomorrow!
 

Kneedown

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Quadrophenia, the scene where in Jimmy's bedroom, set in the 60's, shows an HST passing in the background.
 

The Crab

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One thing that bugs me is what appears in the dialogue. "Levverage", "Train station" and "Book of second class stamps" in TV series set in the 1940s. People working for "British Rail" in the 1950s. Not important but when a great deal of research is put in to get the appropriate clothes, cars etc why doesn't someone read the script?
 

DynamicSpirit

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For anyone who likes Star Trek and likes finding mistakes in films (or tv serials): There are several Nitpicker's guide books that go through the different series episode by episode, pointing out all sorts of flaws and inconsistencies (including some that basically destroy the whole pretext of some episodes).

Just checking on Amazon, the first one was this.

I have a couple of the books, and if you have the right geeky mindset (like I do) they are great fun to read. A bit like reading this thread, but hundreds of times longer :)
 

deltic1989

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[Spoiler Alert]



Went to see Fast and Furious 8 with Mrs D earlier.
In the final chase scene, on a frozen bay in Russia, a submarine has been taken over by the villan, and fires 2 torpedos at the heros. One of the torpedos skims over the top of the ice, still making good progress, depite not being in the water.

[/Spoiler Alert]
 

Calthrop

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[Spoiler Alert]

...a submarine has been taken over by the villan, and fires 2 torpedos at the heros. One of the torpedos skims over the top of the ice, still making good progress, depite not being in the water.

[/Spoiler Alert]

I wouldn't have known that there was anything wrong about that; but -- as with us railway nuts vis-a-vis the general film-watching public -- I'm one of the ignorant 95%-plus with zero knowledge about torpedoes.
 

Calthrop

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Revisiting this thread after a while: and not about an actual error, just a perceived extreme improbability. Perhaps indicating that I have too much time on my hands...

This post concerns the film “The Train” (wretchedly lame title, I’ve always thought), 1964, director John Frankenheimer. A highly acclaimed piece (including much steam rail material), set in the last days of the WW2 German occupation of France: dastardly high-up German military officer sets up looting of numerous art treasures from museum in Paris, and a special train to take them away into Germany – the Resistance, and Burt Lancaster in particular, do everything they can to thwart his evil plan. The culminating sequence has the Resistance chaps – after the train has gone a certain distance east, and night has fallen – camouflaging things, chiefly by faking of station nameboards and other location-indicators, to fool the train’s escort of German troops into thinking that they continue to travel further east into Germany; when in fact, the train has been diverted south and then north-west, and is heading back toward Paris.

My willing-suspension-of-belief capacity cannot cope with the above feat – not even in order to enjoy an exciting adventure yarn. It is impossible for me to credit that not a single German on the train realised that something dodgy appeared to be happening, and thus caused the plug to be pulled. So many potential indicators, of many kinds (everything couldn’t be camouflaged), even in a blacked-out wartime night, that they were in France not Germany – especially for any German present, who had even slight railway knowledge: the signals would be wrong, the locos and stock encountered en route would be wrong, and presumably on double-track sections the train would perform French left-hand, not German right-hand, running.

All right, it’s a standard trope in WW2 action films, that “Jerry is thick” – but I can’t see him being that thick. I understand that – as with most other armies of the period – German soldiers were encouraged to use their initiative to a fair extent. Somebody would have smelt a rat -- informing his superior as appropriate -- and the brilliant scheme would have been stopped. Consulting Wiki informs me that though some elements of the film are based on fact; it’s mostly fiction, and certainly the “changing direction and heading back home through mock-Germany” part is fiction.

Wiki mentions that the film was intended originally to be a more thoughtful / psychological, less “action – smash ‘em-and-shoot-‘em-up” piece; but there were differences of opinion over this, and a change of director to Frankenheimer – who seemingly was inclined to pull out all the stops and change the script in favour of exciting action, even if unlikely. Presumably, film’s ultimate makers saw the “change direction and back homewards” thing, as artistic licence: and figured that the great majority of folk in audiences wouldn’t have a problem with it – wouldn’t know, or care, or both, enough about railway matters; to be bothered by the inherent great improbability. As touched on earlier in this thread: from the makers’ point of view, the tiny minority of viewers of the film who were railway nuts, and got upset by the perceived great unlikeliness of this episode; would, in the absence of this glaring nonsense element, gripe and nitpick about lesser stuff. At the very least, a few letters of complaint would be received anyway, about stuff such as that loco number 120H-123 was, as at 1944, allocated to Sainte-Merdre-Dans-La-Gidouille depot, so could not have been present -- as shown in the film -- at Connerie-sur-Égout: thus, to hell with all those loons, whether about matters big or little...
 

Drogba11CFC

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The documentary "A Steam Train Passes" is often used for stock footage in Australian films set in the 1930s. However, the locomotive in question wasn't built until the 1940s.
 

Calthrop

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The documentary "A Steam Train Passes" is often used for stock footage in Australian films set in the 1930s. However, the locomotive in question wasn't built until the 1940s.

We have to cut them some slack, I suppose. As above -- "It's close enough for government work; the sane 99.5% viewing, won't know / care; the .5% loony-hobbyist-purist element, are impossible to satisfy anyway".
 
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najaB

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The title of Breakfast At Tiffany's has a grammatically incorrect apostrophe.
True, but it's not the fault of the movie makers. The film is based on the Truman Capote's novella of the same name. So you could say that the fault is his. However, Tiffany & Co. is commonly referred to as Tiffany's so the fault lies with the good people of New York City.

If you want to tell a bunch of Noo Yoikers that they're wrong, let me know when so I can watch. :)
 

eve55

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A lot. Director,scriptwriter and actors should be aware of the relevant history.
 

DaleCooper

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The title of Breakfast At Tiffany's has a grammatically incorrect apostrophe.

It's not a grammatical error as it's essentially a contraction of "Breakfast at the store founded by Tiffany" (cf. Sainsbury's, Sotheby's, Claridge's) it's actually a colloquial misnomer because the correct name is Tiffany & Co. The grammar is correct, the name is wrong.
 

Old Yard Dog

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I've just been to see Kenneth Brannagh's remake of "Murder on the Orient Express" where most of the action takes place between Vinkovci and Brod stations, the latter presumably Slavonski Brod. The line is shown as single track passing through a spectacular mountainous region where the train is derailed by an avalanche while crossing a rickety trestle bridge. This is taking artistic licence a little far. In reality, Vinkovci lies in flatland on the Bosut river, at an elevation of approx. 300 ft, and has a mild continental climate, while Slavonski Brod is a river port on the Sava river.
 

nlogax

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Dunkirk earlier this year, and not just the BR-era Mk 1 carriage running around in 1940. See also large bits of modern-day Weymouth left in frame - including the rotating observation tower with tourists clearly visible inside.
 

TheNewNo2

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When I moved to London, I realised I recognised bits of the Thames from the scene in The World is Not Enough. So I tried to work out what route was taken. I decided they needed teleportation.
 

fowler9

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In the original Robocop film Clarence Bodiker gets out of his newly stolen 6000SUX car, slams the door shut and the interior rearview mirror falls off. I spotted this years before internet sites about movie bloopers sprung up. Go me. it was the first VHS film I bought, and I was under 18! Ha ha.
 

Harbornite

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In one of the flight/map scenes from Indy Jones and the Crystal skull, Belize is shown on the map. At the time the film was set ('48) it was called British Honduras.
 

jon0844

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In one of the flight/map scenes from Indy Jones and the Crystal skull, Belize is shown on the map. At the time the film was set ('48) it was called British Honduras.

That whole film was an error.
 
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