The Recruit (2003) - 34 mistakes

Continuity: When Layla is hooked up to the lie detector that tracks the movement of her eye, she is looking around the room and blinking repeatedly, but the eye on the screen (which is supposed to be hers) never moves or blinks, even though the camera is still on her.

Continuity: When Colin Farrell's truck is chasing the silver VW Bug, the Bug crashes through a gate, sending debris into the truck's windshield, causing a spider-web impact break. In all subsequent shots, the windshield is undamaged.

Continuity: After Clayton says Burke's name to his 'captors' he is shown holding a pair of pants, in the next shot he is not holding them, then the next shot he is again.

Visible crew/equipment: When James gets into Layla's car after forcing it off the road, the boom mic can be seen in the rear side window of Layla's Volkswagen Beetle.

Factual error: Burke says Clayton graduated "top of your class at MIT, majored in nonlinear cryptography..." but MIT has no such major.

Other: Towards the end of the movie, Clayton has two wounds visible on his face. These wounds keep changing length and shape throughout the scene.

Revealing: In the beginning of the movie when Al Pacino is supposed to be browsing the web you get a quick look at the address bar. It shows the URL to a local .html file instead of a website.

Continuity: When the boys are playing cards, Burke comes in and you can see that there are a bunch of chips and the deck of cards on the table. The camera angle changes and so do the chips. The cards suddenly jump into Clayton's hands as well.

Continuity: The cut on Burke's forehead (which he gets at the end by putting his head through the glass door) changes throughout the final scene from some blood to a lot of blood about 5 times.

Plot hole: If Zack is the NOC as Layla says, why is she reporting to him (passing him notes at Union Station) rather than someone in her chain of command? The NOC is supposed to be "out there alone" according to Burke, not mixed up in the command structure.

Continuity: In the shooting range scene at the Farm, the Recruit to Layla's left fires all of his rounds and his slide locks back when the camera is close up on Layla. In the next shot, the same recruit fires one last shot.

Revealing: In one scene it shows them throwing a Molotov Cocktail at some rocks. The rocks burst into flame before the bottle gets there and busts open.

Continuity: When Clayton is being recruited Burke grabs a newspaper to circle CIA. The previous scene had only the front page, but when he circles CIA there is a part of the torn paper on the bar as well.

Continuity: In the shooting range scene, one of Colin Farrell's shots hits the line of the center ring of his targets. When he pulls his target in, turns to Layla and says "Nintendo", you can see that the rounds are in different places.

Factual error: Early in the movie, Al Pacino advises the recruits that they aren't there for the money, since he, as a GS15 only makes $75,000 a year. A GS15 (step 1) in Washington DC makes approximately $96,000.

Continuity: When James is standing at the wall of the interrogation chamber holding Layla's trousers in his right hand, the trousers are there in one shot, gone the next and back in the next.

Continuity: While searching Zack's bloody jacket for the note Layla passed Clayton's hand gets bloody. However, after reading the note he puts his hand to his mouth and there is no blood on it.

Continuity: In the scene where Layla passes the note to Zack, he has a gray shirt on which is not tucked into his pants. Later, when Clayton is following him the gray shirt cannot be seen.

Audio problem: When the recruits are pulled out of bed at 06h00 in the morning for a run, the running instructor walks past Colin Farrell and Bridget Moynahan asking if everyone is ready. When we see a long shot of the instructor, his mouth opens but no sound comes out. We only hear his words "Let's go!" when the camera is on Colin, who is making gestures towards his mouth.

Continuity: When Layla's VW has hit the tree, James's truck is pulled up alongside her, facing forwards. When James drives off, his truck is facing the other way but there was not enough time for him to turn around, or any indication that he did turn around (i.e. no sound of a vehicle making a three point turn).