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Quotes

John Mason: I've been in jail longer than Nelson Mandela, so maybe you want me to run for president.

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Mistakes

Right near the very end where you have the overhead shot of the bombs hitting the back of the island you see Stanley Goodspeed being thrown through the air by the force of the explosion, and into the water. As he is flying through the air you can see the wires he is attached to, to make him fly. See more...

Trivia

The line "I'll take pleasure in guttin' you, boy" is from another Alcatraz-related film, "Escape From Alcatraz" starring Clint Eastwood. See more...

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Directed by Michael Bay, starring Ed Harris, Nicolas Cage, Sean Connery, William Forsythe, David Morse, John Spencer, Michael Biehn, Tony Todd (add more)

Genres: Action, Adventure, Thriller

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.

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Quentin Tarantino is one of the uncredited scriptwriters on this film, which could explain the "plunging the syringe into your heart" thing which was also done in his film Pulp Fiction. [While I understand the suppposed connection between movies, I think the reason this method was used in these movies was because it is a common misconception that this particular medicine must be administered this way. Not true at all. It is delivered through a shot to the rear or thigh, as described in military "self aid buddy care" handbooks. The needle on the device is FAR too short to penetrate below the ribs, let alone into the heart. Its just more dramatic this way.]
Edit Corrected by Kimberly Mason
As Mason is interrogated, he breaks the window. Prior to that he takes a coin and draws a circle on the window. The purpose of that must be that when he uses force the window will break where he has made the circle. That does not happen. The window breaks in the center of the circle, not at the rim as intended. [Mason also draws an "X" in the circle while the camera focuses on Womack and Goodspeed. The glass shatters at the weak point in the center of the "X".]
Edit Corrected by LorgSkyegon
In the beginning when Hummel is talking to his wife's gravestone, the emblem on his hat is broken. [Actually, the United States Marine Corps insignia is not broken, it is perfectly intact. The USMC seal is of an 'eagle' perched atop a 'globe' with a diagonal 'foul anchor' running through it. The same Marine Corps emblem is on his dress uniform's collars (with left and right facing anchors).]
Edit Corrected by lmao
At the start of the movie where Goodspeed is collected by Womack, he states that VX gas was "invented accidentally". Later on, in the war room, one of the army experts around the table describes VX as "specifically designed to withstand napalm". So, designed, or accidental? [Could easily be both. The initial discovery of the basic gas was accidental, then the principle was refined to harden it against napalm and other counter-measures.]
Edit Corrected by Tailkinker
Alcatraz does not have narrated tours by guides. They use a self guided tour where you get a walk-man and listen to a tape. [However, it is possible to arrange a tour through the park system for a specific large group. My high school did that.]
Edit Corrected by shortdanzr
When General Hummel calls the FBI director. The director only asks: "Who is this?" and "I wanna know who this is." He says nothing else, but when he hangs up the phone, his secretary says that she'd cancel his reservations. Most surely she wasn't eavesdropping on another line nor could she have overheard the conversation from where she was standing as the phone call wasn't on loudspeaker, otherwise the director wouldn't have had the receiver to his ear. [Overall this comes down to being a character mistake and not a film one. The secretary might have been told before the director picked up who he was and/or what he was doing. Even if this had not been the case, she might have presumed from what she overheard that she should cancel his plans as it sounded serious. As you mentioned she might have eavesdropped but there is not enough conclusive evidence to say she should not have been able to make the assumption that she did.]
Edit Corrected by Lummie Time
When they are in the chamber defusing the bomb we see the timer at 1:10, there is no slow motion in the movie, however the timer arrives at 0:04 after 1 minute and 14 seconds not after 1:06 as it should. [Very few films are shot in real time. Much like most films, many of the shots during that scene are supposed to be happing simultaniously. e.g. while Cage is defusing, the other guys are trying to turn the water on, and his partner is panicking, and the cockroaches are dying etc.]
Edit Corrected by Soylent Purple Time
In one scene of the shower-room shootout you can see a SEAL land on the floor with close-up of his face. On the floor next to him there is a spent 9mm round. If you take a closer look, you can clearly see that it is a blank for use in movies. The "bullet" is still there, but on a real 9mm round the bullet will be missing when the spent cartridge is ejected from the gun. [There are malfunctions with every weapon, it might have been a round which wasn't fired and just ejected during a reload. God knows how many times I've had malfunctions with my rifle and my side arm during military service.]
Edit Corrected by Ronnie Bischof
When the Thermite Plasma bomb is dropped accidentally and Nicholas Cage is flying through the air because of the detonation, you can see that he (the stuntman) is hung up on the hips. Maybe you can only see this one in the DVD version, frame by frame. [If it's only visible in slow motion it's not a movie mistake.]
Edit
In the scene where Nicholas Cage is supposedly making love to his girlfriend on the rooftop, Cage gets a phone call and has to leave. When his girlfriend gets up you can see her underwear. [It is called simply pushing the panties to the side. I am sure that it has been done many times.]
Edit Corrected by shortdanzr
Alcatraz has been de-commissioned for many, many years when this movie takes place. Why then are there still active flamethrowers with the randomly rotating gears? Why were they there in the first place? It couldn't have been to prevent inmates from escaping. The whole flamethrower part is completely absurd. [The electronic locks on the cells still work, since the guide shuts everybody into the cells as part of the tour. It isn't unreasonable to think that more parts of Alcatraz have been maintained in working order as part of the tour.]
Edit
Having removed the nerve gas from the final rocket, and then discharged said rocket in order to take out the marine who is trying to kill him, why does Goodspeed still need to retrieve the guidance chip from the gas canister? The purpose of the chip is to guide the rocket, and as there is no longer a rocket to guide. [He's fired that particular rocket, yes, but there are still numerous other rockets located around the island, lacking only a guidance chip to be fireable. He needs to get the final chip to prevent anyone from taking it, putting into one of the other rockets, and launching an attack.]
Edit Corrected by Tailkinker
When Stanley is doing the 360 in the Ferrari, the airbag deploys and Stanley puts the gun against the bag so he's not crushed like a grape. About 4 seconds pass and he never pulls the trigger, so the airbag was not popped. [Stanley doesn't take that long. Watching the scene he takes less than a second between cocking the gun and pointing it at the airbag then we hear him shooting it when the camera is focusing on the cable car coming down the road.]
Edit Corrected by Lummie
Ranger Bob said that he spent a couple years in Alcatraz. If the prison is closed since 1963, he must have been a baby when he was arrested. [He doesn't say "I spent a couple of years in there", he says "Spend a couple of years in there..." and is then interrupted. He would presumably have continued to say what sort of effect spending all that time locked up would have on a person.]
Edit Corrected by Tailkinker Time
It is repeated several times throughout the movie that if you come into contact with the chemicals, inject the atropine into your heart. In real life, that would kill you. If you are exposed to a chem agent, you would place an injector about the size of a paint marker against your thigh and press a button on the back of it, which would extend the needle and inject the atropine. If you injected yourself without having been exposed, as Goodspeed was instructed to do in the bomb room in the beginning of the movie, that would kill you too. [Atropine, one antidote of VX gas can be administered directly in heart if the contact with the gas is severe because it will not be circulated quickly enough if injected elsewhere. See: http://neon.chemistry.ox.ac.uk/mom/vx/VX.htm.]
Edit
At the end of the movie, Mason tells Goodspeed, "It's been a long time since I've said thank you to anybody, but, thank you." However, he said thank you to Goodspeed earlier in the movie, after Goodspeed told Mason's daughter that he was helping the FBI. [Technically, Mason has said thank you twice before the end of the movie: the first time is to Goodspeed (as you have pointed out) and the second time is to the Marine Commander (stated sarcastically) just before he goes into the boiler and opens the door to Alcatraz from the inside. The first time was to Goodspeed for allowing him to save face with his daughter, but this really didn't buy him much because he went back into custody of the FBI anyway. The second time was a sarcastic remark to the Marine Commander (i.e., not stated seriously). At the end of the movie, Goodspeed has told the FBI that Mason is dead, thus allowing Mason to get away and live a new life with a new identity, one that the FBI cannot track. So, at the end of the movie, Mason acknowledges that he is truly indebted in gratitude to Goodspeed, something he hasn't experienced in years, just before saying thank you to Goodspeed. So, this is not a mistake.]
Edit
In the scene where all of the men are being taken by helicopter to Alcatraz, a soldier hands Goodspeed a syringe and says something along the lines of 'if you come in contact with the chemical, inject this into your heart.' If Mason was sitting with the men on the helicopter, why was he so surprised when Goodspeed stops him in the tunnel and tells him that the terrorists have chemical weapons. Was he not paying attention on the helicopter? [He is not surprised that they have chemicals, he is surprised that they have missiles aimed at San Francisco (where his daughter lives).]
Edit
When Goodspeed crashes the Ferrari, his airbag deploys and he must shoot it to get out of the car. In reality, airbags inflate and deflate again in less than a second. [Airbags do not always work the way they are designed. Police safty driving courses even mention ways that a non-deflating airbag can be safely deflated. There have also been reported cases of deaths from suffocation caused by faulty airbags.]
Edit
Near the beginning Goodspeed tells his girlfriend to come to San Francisco but changes his mind once he finds out what's really going on. Instead of having the FBI simply pick her up. Why not send her back home on the next flight out? He works for the Feds, how hard could that have been to arrange? [If FBI agents just packed her off home she might have started asking awkward questions in a public setting (the airport). The FBI didn't want to risk alarming the rest of the population.]
Edit
Data on John Mason in FBI database doesn't show his name when Stanley Goodspeed's colleague searches in it [just a string of X's], in order to hide his identity [as remarked by FBI director Womack]. However, there is a full name and address of nearest relative [his daughter Jade]which is would make him easy to identify in any case. [It was not easy to find. It took a trained FBI researcher who knew what he was looking for to find it.]
Edit

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