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Towering Inferno (1974) - 21 mistakes

starring Faye Dunaway, Fred Astaire, O.J. Simpson, Paul Newman, Richard Chamberlain, Steve McQueen (add more)

Genres: Action, Thriller, Drama

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Updated this week Revealing: After Dan Bigelow is killed, Lorrie goes back into the office to protect herself from the flames. When she is kneeling down in the office, you can see the fireproof pants on her legs.

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Updated this week Continuity: When Steve McQueen is removing his fire suit in the elevator, his tie is loose. But when he runs into the promenade room right afterwards, his tie is secured by a tie clip.

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Revealing: Watch carefully as the statue falls on the bartender. It barely touches his chest and rests on his left thigh. As the bartender slumps dead you can see a wide open gap between his whole upper body and the statue. Even if it crushed his thigh it would not have killed him so quickly. When the bartender slumps down the statue rocks freely as he brushes against it; obviously a styrofoam replica.

Edit Submitted by BocaDavie
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Continuity: During the scenic elevator rescue scenes, the building has moved across the downtown core and is now located next to the Transamerica Pyramid, which is many city blocks to the west.

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Continuity: When O.J. Simpson (Security Guard) attempts to rescue the mother and 2 children from their apartment, he kicks the door in. If you look closely, the door is actually open and he's holding it shut so he "can" kick it in!

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Continuity: In the establishing shot of the San Francisco skyline, the building appears to be located off Market Street and facing the viewer (elevator tracks facing the front of the building). In a night-time shot from the Bay Bridge, the building has "turned around" and faces the other way.

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Revealing: When Dan Bigelow tries to save himself and his girlfriend from certain death by racing through the flames to get help, watch as he falls to his death. The stuntman portraying him is wearing a protective glove on his right hand.

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Revealing: On the roof during the helicopter rescue scene, there is a panic and some women run to the helicopter trying to land in strong winds. As it explodes, a woman in a slinky dress falls down. Paul Newman helps her up and her dress is whisked up to reveal "stuntwoman" kneepads on her legs.

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Continuity: When Will Giddings attempts to open the storage room door where the fire has started he is set ablaze. Look closely and he is wearing large protective gloves over his hands.

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Other: During the scenic elevator rescue scene, a helicopter lowers the Fire Chief down to connect a cable to the top of the elevator. The cable is seen to be hanging no more than three feet from the side of the building. If this were the case, the helicopter's rotors would be hitting the building.

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Revealing: When Dan Bigelow is going out to get help, at one point you can see him dipping down to get ignited.

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Continuity: During the explosions of the water tanks on the top floor, if you look closely as the miniatures explode, part of the floor is already broken and falls apart a second before the explosives go off.

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Character mistake: Just before the fire starts on the 81st floor, a man is shown telling an elderly couple that business offices only go as high as 80, and that 81-120 is exclusively residential. Not long after O'Hallorhan arrives, he asks Jernigan for a list of business tenants from 81-85, which Jernigan replies "most are yet to move in and those that have are not working at night". As said by the man earlier, these floors do not house business tenants, only residential.

Edit Submitted by mightymick Time
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Continuity: Roberts rings Duncan and tells him Will Giddings has suffered burns and there is a fire in the building. We hear the whole conversation and Duncan ends it by saying, "A fire in a storage room on 81 can't hurt us up here," but Roberts never mentioned where the fire is.

Edit Submitted by mightymick Time
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Continuity: In the early part of the TV version. They are holding a meeting in Mr.Bigelows' office regarding Romane Conti. He asked a gentleman from Phoenix on the phone if he could get the wine. Then told his assistant "go get it". A flight plan would have to be filed,and the flying time from SFO to PHX is about 2 hours. Then to find the place where he has to get the Romane Conti. I lived in the Phoenix area for almost 13 years and it is spread out. Then get back to the airport,another 2 hour flight. I would say the fire department would have gotten there first.

Edit Submitted by johnp
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Plot hole: The roof of the building is fully engulfed in flames (from the helicopter explosion) right up to the point where they blow the water tanks. When they explode the water tanks the whole building is put out. It would have been impossible for the water tanks to put out the roof fire; it was above the tanks. Although all of the building shots at the end of the film are looking up at the structure you can see flames shooting off the roof before the tank explosions, then no roof flames whatsoever after.

Edit Submitted by BocaDavie
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Plot hole: By the time O'Halloran phones Roberts, who is in the promenade room, and tells him of their plan to blow the water tanks, over 50 of the floors below the promenade room, along with the roof which is also ablaze, have been destroyed by the fire. So surely the phone lines would have been destroyed as well, making a phone call to the promenade room impossible.

Edit Submitted by mightymick
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Continuity: When the first woman goes across on the breeches buoy, the overhead shot of her going across does not show the outside elevator which at this stage is hanging by a cable and stuck on the outside. However, it is visible in the shots from the peerless building which the breeches buoy is attached to.

Edit Submitted by mightymick
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Plot hole: There are numerous problems with the final solution to putting out multiple burning floors of a skyscraper by blowing the water tanks under the roof. Blowing the floor under the tanks only channels the water into the Promanade Room. From there it cascades out the windows and - as we see in the film - falls to the ground without touching the fires on the lower floors. A tiny percentage makes it into the stairwell door and elevator shaft, despite the fact that the elevator doors were closed. All of the stairwell and elevator doors in the building were shut; none of this water makes it to the fire. Also, as we see the flames going out from all the floors no water is coming out of any of those windows, proving that the fires are going out without any water.

Edit Submitted by BocaDavie
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Factual error: The device used near the end of the movie for ferrying people to another building is repeatedly referred to as a "breeches buoy." It is actually a bosun's chair. A breeches buoy was an earlier, more primitive device that was basically an oversized life preserver with a pair of large canvas trousers (breeches) sewn to it.

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