# Little mistakes that take you out of the movie **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 22, 2009, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969 "2009-02-22T19:43:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![BlinkingDuck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eada6e/32.png) [@BlinkingDuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlinkingDuck)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2009, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/41 "2009-02-23T20:58:39Z")
> [@BJMoose](#): > > Since that was a Mel Brooks film, I wonder if the “continuity error” was, in fact, a mistake. Remember the scene in _Young Frankenstein_ where Dr. Frankenstein comments to Igor, “Didn’t your hump use to be on the other side?” While I don’t recall the detail you describe, from your description of it I suspect the “error” was intentional. > > To the OP: for me continuity errors are usually just a brief (and usually amusing) distraction. What will cause my eyes to roll over to the back of my head are errors of fact - dialog or action that I know to be flat wrong. So, sometimes, will errors of logic. What hump? ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2009, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/42 "2009-02-23T20:59:37Z")
> [@xizor](#): > > In _The Chronicles of Riddick_, one of the mercenaries makes a remark something like “Look at you now, all ‘back of the bus’”. > In present day Earth that makes perfect sense. In a futuristic world of lasers and spaceships I doubt they even know what a bus is, let alone know why the back of the bus is an insult. Not neccessarily. Whether it’s a flying super-bus or a robot self-piloted bus or just drives on the ground, a bus is a bus. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2009, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/43 "2009-02-23T21:16:02Z")
> [@xizor](#): > > In _The Chronicles of Riddick_, one of the mercenaries makes a remark something like “Look at you now, all ‘back of the bus’”. > In present day Earth that makes perfect sense. In a futuristic world of lasers and spaceships I doubt they even know what a bus is, let alone know why the back of the bus is an insult. Oh, I don’t know. It’s been hundreds of years since Shakespeare wrote the line “It’s greek to me,” but people still use it. If I were to show up a family dinner after they hadn’t seen me for years, someone would surely sure “Well, the prodigal returns.” Et cetera. ---
**Author:** ![Lightnin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightnin/32/180_2.png) [@Lightnin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightnin)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2009, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/44 "2009-02-23T21:28:16Z")
> [@Zeldar](#): > > I suppose a reasonable analogy, just for the skeptics, you know, would be to go around telling Roman galley slave jokes to folks at work, using as many Roman catch phrases and slang expressions as possible. Eureka! ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2009, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/45 "2009-02-23T22:52:40Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Oh, I don’t know. It’s been hundreds of years since Shakespeare wrote the line “It’s greek to me,” but people still use it. If I were to show up a family dinner after they hadn’t seen me for years, someone would surely sure “Well, the prodigal returns.” Et cetera. Why would they say that? Did you blow through all your money real fast? ---
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2009, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/46 "2009-02-23T23:10:15Z")
> [@muldoonthief](#): > > Iron Man - the scene where Rhodes is on the phone with Tony, asking him if he knows what’s flying around Afghanistan blowing things up - he’s got his Brass Rat on the _wrong hand_. No one ever wears their ring on the left hand - as a friend of mine who had to stop wearing his for a while because of an injury said - “You can’t put it on your left hand - it would mean you’re married to the 'Tute.” Wait- is Rhodes wearing the MIT class ring, or is Tony? _Thanks for making me look up “Brass Rat”… at least it was easy!_ ETA- never mind, in the film they are both supposed to be MIT grads… at least Tony’s wearing the ring on his right hand… ---
**Author:** ![Westrogothia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/3ab097/32.png) [@Westrogothia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Westrogothia)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2009, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/47 "2009-02-23T23:20:53Z")
> [@Zsofia](#): > > Yeah, but it doesn’t drive you nuts when the doctors go around drawing blood and running tests? That’s necessary for the plot? Anybody who’s ever, say, _had blood drawn_ knows damned well your doctor never does it. [handwaving] I kinda thought that was part of Houses process. Having the overqualified docs doing the basic stuff added a level of security/control/accountability on cases that other doctors already had failed diagnosing. Basically when one of his staff did a blood test House KNEW it was done right. At least thats the theory. [/handwaving] ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2009, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/48 "2009-02-23T23:22:44Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > Why would they say that? Did you blow through all your money real fast? [Inability to recognize ironic nitpicking] Because, although the word prodigal means “foolish with money,” in the context of their statement it is clearly an allusion to the parable of the Prodigal Son. Admittedly I might have made that clearer by capitalizing it. [/Inability to recognize ironic nitpicking] ---
**Author:** ![rackensack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@rackensack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rackensack)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2009, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/49 "2009-02-23T23:51:43Z")
> [@Spiny\_Norman](#): > > Germans do have other words than “Los, Los!” or “Mach schnell!” - it is a rich language, and German speakers are known to finish entire sentences from time to time. Yes, but in a two-hour movie there’s not always time for them to get to the verb 😃 . ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/50 "2009-02-24T00:12:28Z")
> [@Terminus\_Est](#): > > > [@Taenia\_spp](#): > > > > In _Jurassic Park_, they little girl “hacker” sees these fancy graphics on the computer screen and exclaims “I know this! This is UNIX!”. > > You mean that scene where they showed a [real Unix application](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fsn) running on a [real Unix machine](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_Graphics,_Inc.) displaying a [real Unix directory tree](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IRIX)? As I remember that movie, SGI provided real computers, but one scene required a notebook computer, which SGI or the production company had to fake, because no such thng existed in reality. (I don’t have a cite, but I think I remember an article about the movie in the SGI in-house magazine at the time.) ---
**Author:** ![BJMoose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/5fc32e/32.png) [@BJMoose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BJMoose)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/51 "2009-02-24T00:20:22Z")
> [@rackensack](#): > > Yes, but in a two-hour movie there’s not always time for them to get to the verb 😃 . Damn, that’s good! Should we explain the joke for the benefit of those unfamiliar with German sentence structure? Someone mentioned mispronunciation of place names. Even worse are botched local references. I had such an experience a few weeks back with an old _NCIS_ episode. For plot purposes, they had Air Force One making an unplanned stop at Wichita. They got the name of the airport, Wichita Mid-Continent Airport, correct, and I was duly impressed that the writer had made enough effort to look up that fact. Then they blew it by dragging the “Wichita County Coroner” into the story. Wichita County, Kansas is way the hell out west, next to Colorado. The city of Wichita is in Sedgwick County (named for the Civil War general whose Famous Last Words were, “They couldn’t hit an elephant at this distance”; make of that what you will). (It ocurred to me later that AF1 would certainly landed at McConnell AFB, not MCI, but that detail is obscure enough to be overlooked.) ---
**Author:** ![amarinth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3be4f8/32.png) [@amarinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amarinth)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/52 "2009-02-24T00:21:14Z")
> [@EJsGirl](#): > > Wait- is Rhodes wearing the MIT class ring, or is Tony? Rhodes is. You can see it in the scene where he’s on the phone with Tony who is flying and being tracked & attacked by the military. (And **muldoonthief** , I now know why it took me so long to be sure it was a rat. I knew something was off, but couldn’t quite place what :smack:) ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/53 "2009-02-24T15:07:32Z")
> [@EJsGirl](#): > > Wait- is Rhodes wearing the MIT class ring, or is Tony? > > _Thanks for making me look up “Brass Rat”… at least it was easy!_ > ETA- never mind, in the film they are both supposed to be MIT grads… at least Tony’s wearing the ring on his right hand… They both are at different times in the movie. Rhodes is wearing it in the scene I’m talking about - he’s holding the phone with his left hand, making the Rat obvious, and obviously wrong. Tony is wearing one at the reception where he dances with Pepper. He’s got it on the correct hand, but a freeze and zoom shows he’s got it on backwards (assuming he actually graduated). I’m willing to forgive that one though - I only zoomed on the DVD because I was curious if I could see his graduation year. ---
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/54 "2009-02-24T15:09:56Z")
Is the rat supposed to be right-side-up to the wearer, or to the viewer? ---
**Author:** ![amarinth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3be4f8/32.png) [@amarinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amarinth)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/55 "2009-02-24T15:20:57Z")
> [@EJsGirl](#): > > Is the rat supposed to be right-side-up to the wearer, or to the viewer? Until he or she graduates, the beaver shits on the wearer. After graduation, it shits on the world. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/56 "2009-02-24T16:59:02Z")
[QUOTE=Skald the Rhymer] Because, although the word prodigal means “foolish with money,” [/QUOTE] I did not know that. Here I was having learned the parable thinking it was about the Son who Went Away for a Long Time. ---
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/57 "2009-02-24T17:34:03Z")
_Insomnia_, Dormer is driving with that young girl and he almost hits a truck head on to scare her, swoosh the car goes into the town dump and the girl gets out screaming that he almost killed them both. It always bothered me the the town dump was in exactly the spot the oncoming truck was at. That and the man went through extraordinary lengths to cover his window to get some sleep when all he had to do was put a shirt over his eyes like I do when my girlfriend watches tv late at night. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/58 "2009-02-24T18:29:21Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > I did not know that. Here I was having learned the parable thinking it was about the Son who Went Away for a Long Time. The adjective means “characterized by profuse or wasteful expenditure.” Although, English being flexible, it will probably have the meaning you imply before long. In noun form, “prodigal” has already acquired the meaning “one who has returned after a long absence,” according to Merriam-Websters. Sorry, I can’t link to a cite, as for some reason the ONLY web page I can get to at the moment is SDMB. But check their online edition for yourself. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/59 "2009-02-26T15:46:01Z")
Not a mistake exactly, but something that made me go HRMMM??? The Princess Diaries 2, where Anne Hathaway’s best friend surprises her by jumping out of her closet in Genovia. She has pretty much the same brown-haired look as before, with a very few dark blonde highlights: Princess: OMG, it’s you! BFF: It’s me! Princess: You’re blonde! BFF: I’m blonde! gigi: She’s blonde??!??? She totally wasn’t blonde. > [@Sitnam](#): > > _Insomnia_, Dormer is driving with that young girl and he almost hits a truck head on to scare her, swoosh the car goes into the town dump and the girl gets out screaming that he almost killed them both. It always bothered me the the town dump was in exactly the spot the oncoming truck was at. I don’t get it–the truck couldn’t have been coming out of the dump? ---
**Author:** ![corkboard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e9bcb4/32.png) [@corkboard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/corkboard)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969/60 "2009-02-26T16:29:00Z")
> [@Waenara](#): > > \ > [sub]I don’t think this really needed a spoiler box, but I just learned about this kind of box and I wanted to try it out.[/sub][/spoiler2] Good thing it didn’t. (avoid the ‘2’ after the word ‘spoiler’). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-mistakes-that-take-you-out-of-the-movie/486969.md?page=4)