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Quotes

Sallah: Indy, there is something that troubles me.

Indiana: What is it?

Sallah: The Ark. If it is there, at Tanis, then it is something that man was not meant to disturb. Death has always surrounded it. It is not of this earth.

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Mistakes

In the scene where Sallah and Jones are in the Well of Souls where they are putting the sticks in the Ark to left it up. Notice Sallah stick, when he first puts it in, on the stick are no tassels. But when they both left at the same time Sallah same stick that he put in has tassels on it. See more...

Trivia

The canyon where Indiana confronts Belloq and the Germans and threatens to blow up the Ark is the exact same canyon where the Jawas take R2-D2 in "Star Wars". See more...

Picture

Movie Mistakes blog

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Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) - 73 corrections

Directed by Steven Spielberg, starring Alfred Molina, Denholm Elliott, Harrison Ford, John Rhys-Davies, Karen Allen, Paul Freeman (add more)

Genres: Action, Adventure

Comments made in brackets are corrections from other visitors. To submit your own corrections for mistakes, just click "edit" under an entry, then choose "correct entry". You can also submit corrections for corrections, if you think a mistake has been unfairly removed.

Mistakes
Trivia
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In the 'guns are better than swords' scene when Indy is filmed from behind as he faces the swordsman he is not wearing a holster. But after shooting the swordsman he puts the gun in the visible holster. [The holster is there the whole time. You can see it while he is running just before the swordsman appears. Indy's shirt has come untucked a bit on his right side, so when he's not running around the shirt hangs directly over his holster. This is why you can't see it during this sequence until he lifts the bottom of his shirt aside, draws, and fires.]
Edit Corrected by Phixius
Harrison Ford badly bruised his ribs during the scene when he was dragged behind the truck. [Ho-hum. Not nearly interesting enough to be considered trivia. Actors get cuts and bruises all the time.]
Edit Corrected by Twotall
When Indy - in the opening scene - is running across the open field, dust is rising from him. And in the next cut - more dust. But when he started running there wasn't any. [There is a gap between him running in the forest, then running in the field that is not on film; more than enough time for him to take a tumble in the dirt.]
Edit
What are all these German soldiers doing in British controlled Egypt prior to World War II. Appeasement aside, I think that the British might be a little worried about a large group of armed Germans being in a League of Nations mandated British Protectorate! [Egypt was declared an independent nation in 1922 and largely remained neutral. True, the British had a military base in Cairo to protect the Suez Canal as a result of the Anglo-Egyptian Treaty of 1936. But that wasn't ratified until December of that year. The film probably takes place before that.]
Edit Corrected by JC Fernandez
When Indy meets the government agents who are trying to get him to assist their quest to find Ravenwood, one of the agents is dressed appropriately for the time period; the other one (I think the actor is Bill Hootkins) is dressed in what appears to be a late 1970's style polyester light blue leisure suit. The style of the suit just doesn't fit the 1930's period. [Suits in the 30's most definitely came in light colors, including blue.]
Edit Corrected by JC Fernandez Time
When Indy is in the Well of Souls trying to climb the statue, there is a snake on it. How did it manage to get there? [The same way some snakes wind up in trees: it climbed.]
Edit Corrected by JC Fernandez Time
There is an awfully fast transition between nighttime and a clear, sunny morning during the scene where Indiana and Sallah are retrieving the Ark. [This is not a mistake. It's well into night, perhaps even after midnight, when they finally open the Well of Souls. The indication is that it took some time for Indy and Sallah to clear the snakes, locate the Ark, retrieve it, box it up and prepare the harness to lift it out.]
Edit Corrected by JC Fernandez
Just before the car carrying Marion in the wicker basket explodes in the alley, Indiana shoots a man twice in the chest. The man has blood stains on his shirt before he is shot. [This mistake was already listed.]
Edit
In the scene where Indy and Sallah are walking to the Well of Souls,in the middle of the desert, they pass a man with a running hose in his hand. [Why is this a mistake? There are any number of ways to get a running hose in the desert (connected to a pump at a well, connected to a portable water tank, etc.).]
Edit Corrected by Guy
When Indy whips the red hot poker out of the Nazi's hand, it is glowing brightly. But when it lands next to the curtain, the color is much darker. [A red hot poker will cool quickly when exposed to cold air, and darken in colour.]
Edit
The Mark VII gas bag that Indy carries was not made until well into the second world war. They were used in the movie because the prop department found that they were cheap and plentiful. [Already been submitted.]
Edit
In the scene at the beginning of the movie where Indy is running from the large boulder, if you look at the left side of the boulder, you can see a stick or post attached to the boulder as it is rolling towards him. [This could have been put there by the people who built the place, to guide the boulder in the correct direction, for instance, instead of rolling into the pit Indy and Satipo had just swung over.]
Edit
After Indiana Jones has run the staff car containing Belloq, Toht, et al, off the road to Cairo with the truck, look at the driver of the staff car- he immediately anticipates Paul Freeman (Belloq) striking him two seconds before Freeman actually does by covering his head to protect himself from Freeman's hit. [The driver knows what kind of man Belloq is. He knows Belloq will blame him for what had just happened. It's entirely reasonable he'd brace himself for what he assumes is coming.]
Edit Corrected by Phixius
At the very beginning of the film, Jones arrives at the temple with two companions. He leaves in a biplane, which is waiting for him on a nearby river. The biplane has only two seats. How were his companions going to get out of the area, which is swarming with hostile natives? Swim? [They are never shown arriving together, so who says they did? They just worked together. Apparently, each person arranged for their own transportation in and out of the jungle. Indy's was at the ready, the others' was not. And how were they to know that hostile natives would be so pressing a concern upon leaving?]
Edit Corrected by Phixius
The journey to the temple at the film's start has taken some time, as evidenced by the presence of guides and pack animals, and Satipo's fear that the poisoned dart means they are being followed - yet when escaping the natives, Indiana Jones returns to his transport after only a brief run. [Wrong turns, twisting paths, perhaps even starting off in the wrong direction; all these things could mean days in the jungle when their goal turns out to be only a few hundred yards away from where they started. Just because they've been searching the jungle for a long time does not mean they actually wound up too terribly far from where they first arrived.]
Edit Corrected by Phixius
When Indy and Marion are tied to the stake while the Nazis are opening the Ark, there are a few shots where R2D2's helmet is perched on top of the stake. [Not true. There is a large domed reflector around a lamp, shown lit at 1:44:45.]
Edit Corrected by John W Rosa
When Indy has the bazooka like weapon pointed at the Arc of the Covenant, Beloq and Indy are talking. At one point when Beloq is talking, a fly enters his mouth and he seems to have absolutely no reaction at all. [How is this a movie mistake? I wouldn't even call this a character mistake; that sounds exactly like Beloq. Too dignified to spit, sputter, or even momentarily falter in his speech.]
Edit Corrected by Phixius
When walking towards the temple in the opening scene, Indy finds an arrow in a tree. His helper tastes the poison and says, 'Poison's still fresh. Three days.' The other guy says, 'They are following us'. Well, if they were following them, how could they be ahead of them? And if Indy arrived by plane - and has a pilot sitting and waiting - how could a three day old arrow be a sign that the Indians were following them??? [It's just been three days since that arrow was made, meaning it hasn't been sitting in the tree for fifteen years and finding it was mere coincidence. If the poison was fresh to the day then it would likely come from natives who just happened to be in the area hunting. Since it's three days old, that tells us someone had to do some hunting while traveling a great distance with a ready-made supply of ammunition. Why else, and in that particular area at that particular time, but to keep track of our hero?]
Edit Corrected by Phixius
When Indy leaves the temple with the gold idol, his 'helper' is found killed by spears. But he is on the same side of the room as the spears. How could they have come out of the wall - penetrating him - and still be on that side of the room. He would have had to have been walking very close to the wall - and the spears would have had to come with an immense force to penetrate him while standing. [They did come out with an immense force... just as they did with Forrestal.]
Edit Corrected by JC Fernandez
Indy is surprised by finding Jack's pet snake in the plane. But how could he not have noticed it on the flight into the forest? [The snake presumably wasn't in Indy's part of the plane when they flew in and has simply moved while the plane was stationary and waiting for Indy to return.]
Edit Corrected by Tailkinker

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