X

Great sites

Anything Hollywood

Atomic Popcorn

Banned in Hollywood

Bits & Pieces

Blockbuster Buzz

Book mistakes

CanMag

The Daily Column

Daily Stab

Defamer

Double Viking

EHOWA

The Evil Beet

Film Drunk

Filmofilia

Filmspotting

Foundry Music

Game mistakes

Geek Tyrant

Gone Hollywood

Hollyscoop

Hollywood Outbreak

I Am Bored

I Love Bacon

Joblo movie news

Movie Banter

Movie Buzz

Movie spoilers

Movie timeline

Other crap

Screenjunkies

Sky movie reviews

Something Really Funny

Tengossip

Trailer Addict

Unreality Magazine

Virtually Existing

Mistakes

When Gort picks up Patricia Neal next to the flying saucer, you can see cables leading down to her body to keep her hoisted. See more...

Trivia

In order to make Gort's body appear seamless, two different costumes were created, one that opened in the back for front shots and one that opened in the front for rear shots. Unfortunately, as someone has already pointed out on this site, it was sometimes rather difficult to co-ordinate which suit was needed for which shot and thus there are several times in the film where Gort's seams can be seen. See more...

Picture

Movie Mistakes blog

Popular blog posts:

Top 15 biggest Harry Potter film mistakes

The biggest mistakes in the Harry Potter movies

15 biggest mistakes in Titanic

The 20 biggest Friends mistake pictures

10 Twilight mistakes in pictures

The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) - 13 corrections

Directed by Robert Wise (add more)

Genres: Drama, Sci-fi, Thriller

Comments made in brackets are corrections from other visitors. To submit your own corrections for mistakes, just click "edit" under an entry, then choose "correct entry". You can also submit corrections for corrections, if you think a mistake has been unfairly removed.

Mistakes
Trivia
Pictures
Corrections
Submit
In the very beginning of the movie broadcasters around the world are commenting on the mysterious spaceship. To lend a bit of calm and normalcy one broadcaster notes that despite what is happening many people are enjoying the fine spring weather in the Capital, to this end picnics and the wonderful cherry blossoms are plainly depicted. Shortly afterward when Klatu leaves the hospital, he is seen examining the cleaner's tag on the suit he "borrowed". This is where he adopted the name Carpenter. Clearly printed at the top of this tag is the date-7/18 1951, not spring by at least a few months. [Meaning the suit has been on the rack for months after it was drycleaned. I have about eighty suits, and they can stay where they are for months before I wear them again.]
Edit
The military's security is ridiculously inadequate. After Gort subdues the only two GIs guarding him and the spaceship, the military encases Gort in solid material, but later still only two GIs guard him and the spaceship when Patricia Neal arrives. With a development of this magnitude the US military would probably seal off the city. [One of the major themes of the movie is the hubris of government and military powers, who rely more on inertia than on prudent behavior. Yes, even *after* Gort thumps two guards, the response is to encase him in a new untested plastic and then go back to standard procedure, confident that he has been dealt with. The inadequacy of the response is what frustrates Klaatu throughout the film, so in that respect this is not a plot hole but an intentional theme.]
Edit Corrected by Watchful
The man from mars knows all about our warlike attitudes. He is surrounded by army men with all kinds of weapons aimed at him. He walks out of the saucer with his helmet on which makes him look spookier and then, for a smart advanced being, he pulls the stupidest stunt he can....pulls out a device that looks threatening and snaps open. Of course he got shot....I would've shot him myself. [Why is this a plot hole? The soldiers do exactly what you expect them to, and the plot continues logically from there. Klaatu may have been naive, or he may have been testing, but it's not a plot hole by any means.]
Edit
The man from Mars is in an elevator with a woman when the power goes out. He tells her he cut the electricity and gas powered engines all over the world for a half an hour. They proceed to show clips of the power out in different parts of the world. When they get to Big Ben in London, you can see a motorboat cruising down the river in the background. [In 1950, there were hundreds of oil, coal or even wood fired steam powered boats on the Thames.]
Edit Time
In the elevator, when the electricity comes on again, Klaatu says that the time should be 12:30; Helen checks her watch and confirms this. It's understandable that he left hospitals and planes with electricity, but he also made sure that people would know what time it was? [Why wouldn't he? It would certainly add to the fear and paranoia for people to see that the aliens can pick and choose what to stop.]
Edit Corrected by jhoffman100@yahoo.com
When Gort emerges from the spaceship and walks down the runway, as he walks, wrinkles and bends are quite visibly made in his 'metal' body. This happens in later parts of the movie as well. [When in the film is it ever stated that Gort is made of rigid metal? How would he walk if he was? It is obviously some futuristic super-durable plastic, which flexes and bends as he walks, as Kevlar does.]
Edit Time
Gort kills two soldiers guarding him with his death ray without moving an inch. A few seconds later, Patricia Neal shows-up and the robot decides to chase her first and then almost use his death ray. Was it her skirt or the perfume that got Gort to move? [She wasn't armed. There is a vague hint that Gort and Klaatu were telepathically linked, and it may have required "exposing" the laser for Gort to establish that Patricia's intent was not hostile.]
Edit Time
How was it possible for Klaatu, posing as Mr Carpenter to take a room in a guest house without paying any money as a deposit? Surely it is the norm to pay in advance before being given a room? [It's a guest house, similar to a bed-and-breakfast. They have weekly and daily rates, but I've never heard of one charging a deposit.]
Edit
When Klatuu is running away from the cab, the soldier shoots him in the back. When Gort brings him to the spaceship, we see blood on the left FRONT of his coat. [The bullet probably went all the way through him so he would have blood on the front. Later in the spaceship after he's brought back to life, you can see the two bullet holes in his back.]
Edit Time
When Klaatu is in the hospital his room number changes. Instead of the 3 it becomes an 8. [I watched over and over, and never saw the room number change.]
Edit
Klaatu states that he traveled 250 million miles. Yet, the nearest stars are trillions of miles away. Scientist at the time knew that Mars and Venus were unlikely to harbor life. [While not strictly accurate, this was expected terminology for films at that time.]
Edit Corrected by pierpp Time
Klaatu neutralizes the electricity all over the world for 30 minutes at high noon Washington DC time. The Sun however was shining brightly in England and Russia at that same moment in the film. [This is possible, if the scene relates to the middle of summer then noon Washington DC time is 5pm in the UK and 8pm USSR time so it's quite possible to be bright and sunny - sunset in late June is around 9pm in London and 10pm in Moscow.]
Edit Corrected by pierpp Time
Klaatu supposedly neutralised all the electricity on the Earth for 30 minutes, which would explain why gasoline-powered cars would stop, because the spark plugs wouldn't work. Diesel engines (used in many trucks and buses shown in the film), however, don't use sparkplugs, so they would keep running. [Diesel engines still use an electric stop solenoid on the pump to draw the fuel from the tank up to the injectors.]
Edit