X

Quotes

Bill: Everything you see belongs to me, to one degree or another. The beggars and newsboys and quick thieves here in Paradise, the sailor dives and gin mills and blind tigers on the waterfront, the anglers and amusers, the she-hes and the Chinks. Everybody owes, everybody pays. Because that's how you stand up against the rising of the tide.

See more...

Trivia

At the end of the film you see two gravestones, "Priest" Vallon and William Cutting. Behind them is a river, with a view of lower Manhattan after that. You see a bridge being built,and the city growing and changing. The two men had to have been buried in Brooklyn, rather than Manhattan for this view. See more...

Picture

Movie Mistakes blog

Popular blog posts:

Top 15 biggest Harry Potter film mistakes

The 10 biggest mistakes in Iron Man 1 & 2

15 biggest mistakes in Titanic

30 Biggest mistakes in the Star Wars movies

The 20 biggest mistakes in Jurassic Park

Other great sites

Anything Hollywood

Bits & Pieces

Book mistakes

Bullz-Eye Movies

CanMag

Daily Stab

Defamer

Double Viking

EHOWA

Film Drunk

Foundry Music

Game mistakes

Geek Tyrant

Gone Hollywood

Hollyscoop

Hollywood Outbreak

I Am Bored

I Love Bacon

Joblo movie news

Movie Buzz

Movie spoilers

Movie timeline

Other crap

Rock Paper Everything

Screenjunkies

Sky movie reviews

Something Really Funny

Tengossip

Trailer Addict

Unreality Magazine

Update alerts | Exclude type?

Gangs of New York (2002) - 88 mistakes

Directed by Martin Scorsese, starring Brendan Gleeson, Cameron Diaz, Daniel Day-Lewis, Henry Thomas, Jim Broadbent, John C. Reilly, Leonardo DiCaprio, Liam Neeson (add more)

Genres: Crime, Drama

Mistakes
Trivia
Pictures
Quotes
Corrections
Questions
Submit
⇑
⇓

Factual error: In a scene set in 1862 or 1863 Bill the Butcher says: 'An Irishman will do for a nickel what a ****** will do for a dime or a white man for a quarter'. The first nickel 5 cent piece was coined in 1866. At the time of the scene the 5 cent coin was a small silver coin called a half-dime.

Edit Time
⇑
⇓

Factual error: When Amsterdam kills the man that shot Bill the Butcher in the shoulder at the theater, you can see bananas on the floor. Bananas were traded in the U.S. only after the Civil War.

Edit Picture Time
⇑
⇓

Continuity: At several times during the movie, Butcher Bill's glass eye changes to what looks like a normal eye. Also, if it is a glass eye, it shouldn't move along with his real eye. It should stay in one spot because no muscles are attached to it.

Edit
⇑
⇓

Factual error: When the Lords and posh folk are playing snooker they are using plastic tipped cues with blue chalk on the tip. These would not have been used in this time period.

Edit Time
⇑
⇓

Continuity: After Bill the Butcher stabs and beats Amsterdam's face badly (and brands him with a hot knife) notice how as time passes the wounds heal then reappear in varying degrees of severity. This is particularly true with the branding, which is almost absent by the end.

Edit
⇑
⇓

Factual error: In one scene where Bill is in the Mayor's office, the mayor is sitting behind his desk and holding a bunch of papers, and on the upper right hand corner of the papers is a paper clip. Paperclips were not invented until 1899.

Edit Time
⇑
⇓

Continuity: After Jenny gets mugged at the dock, the shot shows her pulling herself to a standing position on a crate. In the next shot, from farther back and up high, she is crawling over to the crate she just pulled herself up on.

Edit Picture Time
⇑
⇓

Continuity: When Amsterdam arrives in New York City and is talking to his new friend, the bag he is holding switches from being held under his arm (camera shot from front) to being carried on his back (camera shot from the back). This happens at least four times in a row during the same scene.

Edit Picture Time
⇑
⇓

Other: Towards the end of the movie, when the mobs are breaking into stores/houses, the police come to try and stop them. The mob starts to throw rocks at the police. You can see one of these rocks, which look like they should be heavy, bounce right off of one of the officers' heads, and just bounce around as it hits the ground, like it weighs nothing at all.

Edit Time
⇑
⇓

Continuity: As someone pointed out earlier, the poster for the commemoration of the Five Points battle claims to be the 16th anniversary, but the date shows 1863 -- 17 years after the 1846 battle. To further add to the confusion, when William Cutting is talking to Amsterdam in the bedroom after the night at the brothel, he says, "I killed the last honorable man [Priest Vallon] 15 years ago [in the Five Points battle]." So which is it? 15, 16, or 17 years?

Edit Submitted by Gabbo Time
⇑
⇓

Other: When Bill, Amsterdam and Tweed are standing on the docks, Bill mentions his father died in battle in 1814, 49 years before the movie takes place. Later, Bill tells Amsterdam that he's 47 years old. That means Bill's father died before he could have been conceived.

Edit
⇑
⇓

Factual error: When Monk's funeral procession is going down the street, the dog on Bill's porch appears to be a Doberman. The Doberman did not exist until the 1890s. Any importation from Germany to the US was not until the early 1900s.

Edit Time
⇑
⇓

Revealing: In the scene where Bill has Amsterdam on the table, he begins headbutting him. You don't even have to look closely to see that Amsterdam's head is obviously just a dummy head with hair sewn on it. You can even see Bill headbutting it, and the head bends a significant amount, just like rubber. If it were Amsterdam's actual head his skull would be shattered in several places and he'd be killed instantly.

Edit Submitted by RJR99SS
⇑
⇓

Revealing: When Jenny gets mugged at the docks, a thug hits her in the stomach with a large wooden club. The club is obviously rubber, as it bends almost ninety degrees after hitting Jenny.

Edit Time
⇑
⇓

Continuity: When Amsterdam and Jenny continue talking after Bill has just left them in the bedroom, Jenny's hands keep shifting from both hands on her chest to just one hand between shots.

Edit Time
⇑
⇓

Factual error: The prayer uttered at the beginning of the movie ("Saint Michael, the Archangel, defend us in battle; be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil") was composed by Pope Leo XIII in the year 1884. The movie is set during the American Civil War in the 1860's.

Edit Submitted by movies
⇑
⇓

Continuity: At their first encounter after Amsterdam's return to New York, Bill asks him to come closer. Amsterdam comes around the post he was leaning on, then the camera cuts to Priest Vallon's picture, and when Bill says it's close enough you see Amsterdam coming around the same post again.

Edit Submitted by Nancy<>Felix Time
⇑
⇓

Continuity: At the end of the fight in the bar between Amsterdam and Bill's Irish henchman, Amsterdam is in four consecutive shots from two angles bent over in pain, leaning back, doubled over again, and leaning back again as Bill approaches him.

Edit
⇑
⇓

Continuity: When Monk gives an election speech we see Amsterdam and his buddies standing at a distance in front of a house. When the camera angle changes in mid-sentence Amsterdam is standing in the first row of the audience.

Edit Submitted by Nancy<>Felix Time
⇑
⇓

Revealing: In the last scene where Amsterdam is crossing the black man's arms, wait until the camera pans onto Jenny. In the background there is another dead man and you can see him breathing pretty heavily.

Edit Time