Character mistake: During the press conference the Secretary of Defense yells at Senator Iselin "Where is the Sergeant-at-Arms? Throw that man of out here!" The problem is that "Sergeant-at-Arms" is a congressional post and that is not a position that would exist at the Defense Department (the Pentagon), nor would the Secretary of Defense hold a press conference in the Capitol (where someone who has that title would be).
The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
1 character mistake
Directed by: John Frankenheimer
Starring: Angela Lansbury, Frank Sinatra, Janet Leigh, Laurence Harvey
Factual error: The movie is set in the mid 1950s, as established by the cars and 48-star American flag cake seen at the party scene. However, the convention hall at Madison Square Garden has 50-star American flags hanging from the ceiling.
Marco: It's not that Raymond Shaw is hard to like. He's impossible to like.
Trivia: Angela Lansbury plays Laurence Harvey's mother in this film, but in reality she is only three years older than him.
Question: A part of this film's critical acclaim was caused by an unfocused shot, which the critics called brilliant - even though the lack of focus was an accident. What is that shot and where exactly in the movie does it appear?
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Answer: The shot in question occurs when Sinatra's character, Marco, holds up a deck full of queens while trying to deprogram Raymond. On the DVD commentary track, the director, Frankenheimer, acknowleges that the scene was out of focus, and that though Sinatra supplied several other takes of the scene, the other takes weren't nearly as good, so he went with the flawed one. Later, Frankenheimer was praised by critics for the unfocused shot showing Raymond's disturbed perceptions.