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Kyle Reese: Come with me if you want to live.

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The Terminator (1984) - 67 corrections

Directed by James Cameron, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Lance Henriksen, Linda Hamilton, Michael Biehn (add more)

Genres: Action, Sci-fi, 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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In the scene where Arnold is going to drive the truck, his eyes point in different directions. However, when he gets up as a cyborg while the truck is burning up (and in rest of the film), he can move both eyes in the same direction. ["Can" and "must" are two different things. He's a cyborg, why shouldn't he be capable of moving his eyes independently of one another?]
Edit Corrected by Phixius Time
Early in the film, when Kyle first arrives in 1984, he steals a homeless man's pants and cops chase after him for it. It is very unlikely that police would chase after a man with that kind of intensity simply for taking a homeless man's pants. The cops would have bigger priorities than that. [The cops are chasing Reese before they encounter the homeless (and pantless) man. Maybe to question him about the immense lightning and wanton destruction that had gone on in the alley just moments prior?]
Edit Corrected by Twotall
Sarah Connor's time card at the restaurant gives her last name as Sarah ConnEr, with an E. [And my work has my name spelled wrong too after 18 months. It happens.]
Edit Corrected by shortdanzr
At the end of the film, how does Sarah know which button (she skips the first two, by feel no less) will crush the terminator? She works at a restaurant, not the automated factory. Not to mention knowing that the controls for the machine are located behind her. [We have no idea what Sarah's background is. She could have worked with similar machinery at any point in her life before we see her in the film. She is quite tech-savy in the sequel, thus her having a background in technology isn't a stretch.]
Edit
In the beginning of the movie after Kyle hot wires the car, when he follows Sarah out of the car park, he starts the car up again. There is no easy way to stop the engine after hot wiring. If he did stop the engine, he would have had to re-hot wire the car when he follows her. [Absolutely not correct. All Kyle had to do was split apart the wires he'd just joined and the car would stop, similarly if he hadn't twisted them together properly, they'd quite easily unravel themselves.]
Edit Corrected by GalahadFairlight
Pay close attention to the scene at the TechNoir club. Right as Reese sees what is about to go down when the Terminator approaches Sara with his gun, Reese pulls his shotgun. At this exact moment, Reese turns and cocks his shotgun and a club patron (movie extra with a pink-ish shirt) walks right in front of Reese and looks at him nonchalantly as Reese cocks the gun, as if nothing is out of the ordinary, and continues on walking. This seems odd, most people would have been shocked or jumpy if they suddenly saw somebody pull out, then cock, a shotgun. [Not if that person was drunk and/or on drugs.]
Edit
In the first flashback scene, Reese is walking through the tunnels, it shows a mother and daughter watching TV made of a fire. But the housing is plastic and shows no signs of melting. [Well, since what you see on screen is a real TV casing with a real fire in, this is obviously possible. As for a more precise explanation, we do not know how long the fire has been burning. If they just lit it, the plastic would not yet have reached its melting point.]
Edit Corrected by Twotall
When the Terminator is flipping through Sarah's address book he has two flies on his face. When the janitor asks him the question and he moves his head they're still there. When he moves back after responding, after jerking his head to look back at the book they're still there. In reality they would have flown away. [Not necessarily. I've seen flies stay put when I would have thought they'd have flown away.]
Edit Corrected by Phixius
As the Terminator Breaks into the little room where he fixes his arm and eye, he sits down and cuts a piece of his arm off. After he does so, he moves his finger back and forth. You can see that it is made of rubber and that his arm is in his jacket. You can even hear it bend like rubber the same time it makes the mechanical sound. [Duplicate entry.]
Edit Corrected by Brad
As the Terminator breaks into the little room where he fixes his arm and eye, he sits down and cuts a piece of his arm off. After he does so, he moves his finger back and forth. You can see that it is made of rubber and that his arm is in his jacket. You can even hear it bend like rubber the same time it makes the mechanical sound. [Already listed.]
Edit Corrected by Starchild
When the Terminator comes through at the start of the film, it has longish hair, but when it is removing its eye, its hair is shorter and spiked. When would it have gone for a haircut? [The Terminator's hair was singed off when it jumped through the fire onto the hood of the car.]
Edit Corrected by MovieGuy
When Traxler locks Sarah Connor in the office, there are 2 door. He locks both. Reese comes to look for Sarah, and breaks the glass on one door, he does NOT do the same on the other door, however he is able to simply open it, despite Traxler locking it previously. [Many doors are constructed so that the doorknob, once locked, may be turned from one side but not the other.]
Edit
When the Terminator is shot with pistols in the Police Station, his body reacts to the shots, but when Traxler and his buddy are shooting him in the back with M16's, he doesn't react. [He wouldn't necessarily react to a round from an M16 or 9mm, but a round from a 44 magnum or even .45 would knock him slightly.]
Edit Corrected by MovieGuy
Arnold Schwarzenegger originally was offered the part of Reese, something Cameron thought an extremely bad idea. He went to meet with Arnold "to pick a fight with him" to see if he could somehow get him out of the film, but discovered during the meeting that he thought Arnold would be an excellent Terminator. He was therefore delighted when Arnold's agent called him later and said that Arnold really REALLY wanted to play the part of Terminator instead. [Not entirely the case. Arnold was the one who suggested he play The Terminator after reading the script and relating more with it. It was he who suggested it, just as Cameron was about to tell Arnold he doesn't want him as Reese, which Cameron responded by saying "That's actually a good idea".]
Edit
When the Terminator starts shooting up the Police station, Traxler goes into the room where Sarah Connor is and locks both doors, yet when Kyle Reese comes in later, he is able to open the other door in the room without a key. [He breaks the glass and unlocks the door from inside.]
Edit Corrected by Starchild
It is mentioned in the extra commentary that a production error caused the Endoskeleton to be made of STEEL - extremely heavy - causing Special effects shots to require multiple puppeteers. This is partly the reason why the Endoskeleton moves so slowly while the T800+organic skin moves so quickly. [Movie mistakes are about on-screen errors, not foul-ups in prop fabrication. While this did happen, hence the citation in the commentary, it cannot be said to count as a movie mistake. Even the disparity in movement speed between the flesh-covered cyborg and the exposed endoskeleton is adequately explained within the film as being due to damage sustained, so that cannot really be considered error-worthy either. I suggest that you resubmit as trivia.]
Edit Corrected by Tailkinker
There is a shot from the Terminator's POV, before he rams the blue car with the semi truck, in which you can see that the car is already damaged. No slow-mo is required to see this, but it is a blink-and-you'll-miss-it shot. [You most certainly do need slow motion to see this "mistake" - it is on screen for just six frames.]
Edit
During the motel love scene, it constantly shows clips of Sarah and Kyle holding hands, yet in all the other shots you can see that they aren't. [This is a composite of clips, also known as a montage, where only bits and pieces are shown to mark the passing of time. No continuity mistakes are made because they are shown at different times of their entire love-making session. Each clip represents more time that has passed, as they obviously made love for more than 30 seconds, and showing the whole event is something not done in movies.]
Edit Corrected by Jazetopher
When Kyle and Sarah have changed cars and the Terminator is chasing them, before they exit the car park their headlights are off, then when they exit the car park they are on again, and then in the next shot the are off. [Already posted and corrected.]
Edit
The photograph taken by the boy at the end of the film doesn't match what Sarah Conner was doing. When the boy took the photograph, she was caught unawares and wasn't looking directly at the camera, yet the picture shows her staring toward where the camera would have been. [False. She begins to glance at him as he raises the camera towards her, but he does not actually take the picture until she is looking directly at him.]
Edit Corrected by Jazetopher

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