Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone corrections

Become a moviemistakes.com member and get access to loads of extra features!

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (2001) - 151 corrections

Directed by Chris Columbus, starring Alan Rickman, Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Ian Hart, Maggie Smith, Richard Griffiths, Richard Harris, Robbie Coltrane, Rupert Grint

Comments made in brackets are corrections from other visitors. As such, any aggressive/abusive corrections (and I get quite a few) written as if they're comments I've made myself will be ignored. To submit your own corrections for mistakes, just click "make changes" when viewing mistakes, and click "correct entry". Some entries have "duplicated entry" after them - these are entries which were already listed on the main page, but were submitted again. I occasionally leave these online for a while, just in case they were moved in error, so don't worry about pointing them out to me.

When Hermione first meets Harry and Ron she fixes Harry's glasses. But two or three scene cuts earlier there is no tape around his glasses. Then it magically reappears in time for Hermione to fix. [Ive watched this scene many of times, and there is tape around Harry's glasses, because of the lighting, it's a little hard to see at times but in slow motion or zoom you can see that tape is there the whole time.]

When Harry is in the living room with the Dursleys and the living room is being showered with letters, Harry jumps upon the table to seize a letter. Watch his hand, he's holding one the entire time and only feigning catching them. [If you look frame by frame he doesn't have a letter in his hand but catches one of the falling letters.]

When the three return to Griffyndor house after visiting Fluffy for the first time, Hermione says: "I'm going to bed, before either one of you comes up with another clever idea to get us killed". That doesn't make any sense because it wasn't Ron's or Harry's fault they ended up there. It was Hermione's idea to show Harry his fathers quidditch trophy, then the staircases changed and they had to run from Filch and ended up in Fluffy's room. [It was Harry's idea to hide where Fluffy was. He says: "Let's hide through that door".]

After Seamus blows up the feather in the levitation lesson, his face stays black until after the lesson, when they walk across the courtyard. Yet Harry's face, the side of which was also scorched in the explosion, is mysteriously clean again. [We don't see Harry walking from the classroom to the courtyard, and his face wasn't as badly scorched as Seamus' face. Harry could have cleaned his face before entering the courtyard.]

After Harry escapes from Filch from the Restricted Section of the library, he is there when Filch comes to Snape and talks about how "that means there's a student out of bed." Snape's eyes light up and they all take off to find the empty bed. Unfortunately, nothing more is made of this, even though Harry then proceeds to stumble upon the Mirror of Erised and stay there for what appears to be a good long time. You'd think that both Snape and Filch would have jumped at the chance to punish a student breaking the rules, especially Harry, once they found his bed empty. [They don't take off to find the empty bed, but to find the wandering student - slight difference. I doubt that any of the three knows the secret password into Gryffindor or that Professor McGonagall would allow them (particularly the head of Slytherin) in it anyway.] Corrected by Sereenie

If the Philosopher's Stone really was to be sealed away with all those traps and puzzles, wouldn't it have been a better idea not to leave the broom as an obvious helper in the room with the flying keys? That way anyone who didn't know they had to bring a broom - including Quirrel - would be trapped once they got through Fluffy. [Quirrell was in on this just like Snape was, he would've known to bring a broom anyway. In fact, for all we know, that could be his broom. He could have left it behind as he left the harp behind.]

Ron tells Professor McGonnagal that her tranformation was "bloody brilliant" and she doesn't bat an eye. This is rather obscene language for an eleven-year old to use in school. Americans don't realize how inappropriate this language would be in a formal British school. [This probably has more to do with McGonnagal's charactor than anything else. Remember when Harry caught the Remebrall in flying class she got him on the Quidditch team, we he should have been expelled. She also teased them a little after he said that.]

When Professor Quirrel runs into the dining hall, to tell everyone about the troll, he faints. It is shown that he falls down face first, but when it shows all the students running, Quirrel is suddenly flipped over, lying on his back. [He remains face down.]

In the scene where Harry, Ron, and Hermione have fallen through the trap door and are caught in the devil's snare, Harry yells "Hermione, where are you?". If you watch closely he is not wearing his glasses when he says this. In the next shot, he is. [If you look really closely, you can see the light reflecting off the left corner of the glasses.]

When Harry tries to open the door on the third floor, if you look closely you will notice that the wall which moves in is actually a curtain painted to look like a rock wall. [After viewing the scene many times it looks to me as though what we are seeing waving in the draft is a bunch of cobwebs, not the entire wall.]

When the Durselys and Harry return from the zoo, as the door is just about to shut you can see the crew equipment and boxes outside the door. [I watched the scene in question in slowmotion, there isn't enough time to show boxes or equipment outside because the bodies block the doorway until Uncle Vernon closes the door and all you can see outside is the house across the street. The "boxes" that you may have seen are the windows which can be confirmed when Vernon leaves for work.]

As the first years take the boats to Hogwarts, the camera goes from boat to boat. Neville can be seen on two different boats. [Neville is only seen in one boat, the one with Harry and Ron. Seamus Finnegan is in the other boat with Hermione and Susan Bones. These two actors look a bit alike and have similar hairstyles.]

Hermione says on the train, "I tried a few spells, but they've all worked for me." Underage witches and wizards aren't allowed to use magic. How could she have tried a few spells? [She doesn't specify where she did the spells so she could have done them on train. Harry and Ron didn't meet her until they were on the train for a while.]

As Harry purchases the candy on the train, we see a large body of water outside the train window. The next shot shows the train going through a dense forest. When the boys start eating the candy, the view from the train is again the body of water. If Harry and Ron are typical boys, they wouldn't wait very long to start eating their candy; certainly not long enough to pass through a forest and return to the shoreline. [It's quite possible there's a lake in the forest. Beyond that, this sounds more like artistic license than a mistake.] Corrected by Bob Blumenfeld

Harry, Ron, and Hermione go into the forbidden hall after the staircase moves, believing there is no other way out, when in fact there is a second staircase right in next to the door. [Harry, Ron, and Hermione take several steps into the chamber before they realise they're in the forbidden chamber. As they turn to leave, Filch's cat enters, blocking their way back to the stairs. Fearing that Filch is soon to follow, the kids run and hide.]

In the overhead shot of Olivander's wand shop, you can see three wands on his desk that are in a fanned out position. Then when Olivander is handing wands out to Harry, the wands are straightened out. [Mr. Ollivander puts the box from the first wand on top of the three wands. This would make the wands roll and change positions.]

At one stage in the sea hut scene, Harry is standing beside the BARE wall of the fireplace. The camera then goes to Hagrid, who turns and pulls the broken door down saying "Unless you'd rather stay, of course?". The camera then goes back to Harry, who is stil by the wall that now shows his coat is hanging right there beside him, which Harry then grabs on his way out. [Actually Harry's coat is hanging on the wall the whole time, you just really have to look close. The coat is hanging a little lower than Harry, but there are angles where you can see it there before he picks up the coat.]

When the centaur speaks to Harry in the Forbidden Forest the close up shot shows tape around the bridge of Harry's glasses. In the next shot the glasses are once again repaired. [On a High Definition television, you can see that there is no tape on Harry's glasses-it is just the way the lighting is reflecting off of the bridge of his glasses.]

In the scene where Ron, Harry, and Hermione play chess, Ron, the knight, is directly next to the Queen. In chess, the knight is placed next to the castle and the bishop goes next to the queen. [Ron, the knight, is not directly next to the Queen. Harry is the bishop and he is next to the Queen. Ron is next to Harry.]

In the scene when Harry is sitting in the dark looking at the mirror, just before the old man comes from behind to talk to him, you can easily see the shadow of a camera man and camera on the wall. [After seeing this mistake on the site, I started watching that scene very carefully. The only shadow I can see in that scene is Dumbledore's shadow as he approaches Harry.]