Best movie factual errors of 1975

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The Rocky Horror Picture Show picture

Factual error: The criminologist describes the events of the movie as taking place "on a late November evening". In the very next scene, Brad and Janet are driving in Brad's car, and President Richard Nixon's resignation speech is playing on the radio. Nixon resigned in August of 1974. (00:12:00)

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Suggested correction: It is said by the writer of the movie that Brad taped the Nixon speech so he could listen to it later in his car, the movie does take place in late November.

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Jaws picture

Factual error: When Hooper sees the hole in the hull of Ben Gardner's boat, he uses his knife to pry out the shark tooth. The tooth is located at the bottom of the hole, with its flat root side stuck deep in the wood and its pointy side facing up. It is completely impossible for the shark's tooth to become wedged in the wood this way, while he takes a nice bite out of the wood hull. (00:49:15)

Super Grover

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Suggested correction: When Hooper uses the knife to pry to tooth out, it took very little effort, suggesting that the tooth wasn't wedged into that spot, but merely just resting in that spot.

The shark tooth was inserted into the wood by the prop crew with its flat root side down, which would have been impossible to have occurred during the attack on the hull. As to the statement that the tooth was "merely just resting in that spot" then Hooper would not have needed to use the blade to remove it from the wood, plus the fact that since it was underwater it would have floated away during the hours after the attack. But it did not float away, so it must have been at the very least snugly fit into the wood hull. Still impossible.

Super Grover

The original mistake says that the root of the tooth was embedded In the wood. Not possible since it should be the sharp end in the wood and the root showing on top (as described in the mistake).

Ssiscool

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Cooley High picture

Factual error: When Preach hears Cochise is in trouble, he is shown running down a street looking for him. In the driveway of one of the houses is a maroon 1973 Chevrolet Monte Carlo, but the movie takes place in 1965. (01:03:15)

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Hindenburg picture

Factual error: Two passengers play a piano/vaudeville routine in the lounge for the officers and passengers. During its initial season (1936) Hindenburg had a lightweight aluminum baby grand piano on board. However, passenger accommodations were expanded over the winter of 1936/37 and the piano was removed. There was no piano aboard Hindenburg on her fatal flight in May 1937.

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Barry Lyndon picture

Factual error: While Stanley Kubrick boasted about the authenticity of the candlelit interiors, he must have missed the little drawing of a steam train on a period map - 40 years before trains were invented.

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Mitchell picture

Factual error: During the car chase scene with the Mustang, the driver of the Mustang repeatedly shifts his automatic transmission from "drive" to L1. Also, one shot during the chase shows that driver's feet using a clutch to shift his automatic.

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Tommy picture

Factual error: In the air raid scene at the beginning of the film, the burning car is a 1950s Ford Popular.

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A Boy and His Dog picture

Factual error: In the fight immediately after Vic meets Quilla June, someone approaches Vic's nest from the right and fires just past his head. Vic turns and returns fire. The raider, who was moving forward, flies back from the impact and dies. Of course, bullets don't spread out their impact energy enough to knock someone back, no matter the caliber. (00:38:30)

Phoenix

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Picnic at Hanging Rock picture

Factual error: The 14th of February 1900 was a Wednesday, not a Saturday.

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Bite the Bullet picture

Factual error: The motorcycle is not right for the period. It looks like a 1970's Kawasaki stripped down. Look at the rear wheel (too big), motor is 2 stroke (not one), and the exhaust has a muffler.

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Suggested correction: There is no such thing as a one stroke engine.

Leicaman

I don't really follow the technology, but I happen to know there were at least one-stroke prototypes years ago. That aside, a "single-stroke" is possible, but may depend on how it is defined. That is, there will be an accompanying reverse "stroke" ["to" and "fro"], perhaps categorizing it as two-strokes? The "factual error" and your correction may both be correct, using different perspectives or definitions.

KeyZOid

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Monty Python and the Holy Grail picture

Factual error: In the scene inside the Cave of Death, the priest reads the 'Last Words of Joseph of Arimathea'. As he reads them, his eyes go from left to right. If it was Aramaic like he said, he would read it from right to left.

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Suggested correction: The priest that reads the writing on the wall does read from right to left - his right to left, he reads from the AUDIENCE'S left to right. The camera shot is as if the audience is the wall he is reading from and so his eyes move the correct way for reading Aramaic.

His head moves from the viewer's right to left, which means he's reading left to right.

Bishop73

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Zorro picture

Factual error: In the bar in Cartagena amongst the goods advertised there's a sale of slaves of color ("Negroes"). However the movie is set in the early XIX century and the sale the poster refers to (listing very specific figures) took place in South Carolina in 1769.

Sammo

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Hard Times picture

Factual error: The movie is set during the Great Depression, in 1933, but Charles Bronson gets in town aboard of a freight train pulled by an EMD NW5 diesel locomotor, introduced over a decade later. (00:01:15)

Sammo

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The Man Who Would Be King picture

Factual error: Carnehan describes himself as a "gunnery sergeant". This is an American rank and no such rank has ever existed in the British Army.

Necrothesp

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Brannigan picture

Factual error: The route to Tower Bridge is completely wrong - there are no duel carriageways approaching the bridge from the Tower of London side of the Thames, it's all single roads in that area.

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Breakheart Pass picture

Factual error: All the couples on the train are modern and not correct for the period. Trackwork back then wasn't very good, considering the speed that the back end of the train is going it probably would have derailed long before it did. The caboose and the rest of the train seen to be just shunted off the track for the dramatic crash, realistically it would have flipped over and gone over the trestle.

hifijohn

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One of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing picture

Factual error: When the Chinese are loading crates onto the truck with St Paul's in the background, two much more modern buildings are visible either side of the cathedral - out of keeping with the 1910s/20s setting.

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Rooster Cogburn picture

Factual error: On their journey, Rooster is bragging about his navy colts, when actually his sidearm is a Colt .45 Peacemaker, also known as an Army Colt M1873.

goofyfoot

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Side by Side picture

Factual error: Desmond Dekker's backing group are called the aces, but in the opening credits the group is credited as "Desmond Dekker and the Israelites" this is also repeated when the announcer introduces the group when they play at sound city. Israelites is the title of Desmond's biggest hit single, the song he performs in this film.

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