The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) - 25 mistakes

Revealing: When the spaceship arrives in Washington, many people look in the wrong direction.

Continuity: As Drew Pearson is doing his news broadcast, the desk next to the microphone is clear. In the next frontal shot, two pencils have appeared next to the left of the microphone.

Continuity: As the spaceships runway platform emerges from the ship, there are hardly any trees behind the spacecraft; only a few behind the left side. In the next wideshot, there are plenty of trees behind the ship.

Continuity: When Gort emerges from the spaceship, we see all of the crowds run away in fear and panic. Yet in the very next shot the crowds are visible standing behind the ropes again.

Revealing: When Gort begins to walk down the saucer ramp, after Klaatu is shot, the crowd gets scared and runs away. I guess the director found the extras running too slow so he sped up the film.

Continuity: When Klaatu posing as Mr. Carpenter is sitting with the others at the table, Helen says "Well after all, he was shot.." and Klaatu holds his newspaper up in his hands. In the next shot he holds it down on the table.

Continuity: When Klaatu writes some notes on the blackboard, in order to help Professor Barnhardt, the handwriting of the words on the board changes between shots, most noticeably the 'T' on 'Try.'

Continuity: When Klatu goes to see the professor, there are several white notes tacked around the chalk board. In later shots some of the notes are gone.

Continuity: Klaatu introduces himself to the Professor for the first time by relaying some details of his stay at the hospital to verify who he is. Klaatu tells the Professor he was staying in room 309, but the early scenes at the hospital show him in room 306.

Factual error: When Bobby is doing his math homework, Klaatu looks over his shoulder and says: "All you have to remember is, first find the common denominator, then divide." Division of fractions doesn't require a common denominator. In fact, the original script says "subtract".

Revealing: After all of the elecrticity is neutralised, in a street shot you can see neon signs are still working; a huge Coca Cola one, for example.

Revealing: During the black-out, there's a shot when you see two cars moving in the background. One of them is slowing, which is normal if the engine stops, but the other is parked and then starts moving.

Continuity: The taxi Helen gets into changes in one shot as it drives down the highway, evident by the writing on the side, then back again when it parks outside her house.

Continuity: In the newspaper headlined 'Step up Hunt for Spaceman' the photo on the right shows Klatu and Gort on the hull of the ship. This shot is a still from the end of the film.

Revealing: When Gort goes behind the wall to pick up Patricia Neal, the camera moves about an inch in the same shot, because they had to stop filming, go rig the wires up to Patricia, then start filming once again.

Revealing: When Gort picks up Patricia Neal, then heads back to the spacecraft, you can see a zipper on the front of Gort's costume, which is never there in any other shots.

Continuity: In some shots, Gort the robot has air vents under the chin. In others there are no vents.

Visible crew/equipment: When Gort picks up Patricia Neal next to the flying saucer, you can see cables leading down to her body to keep her hoisted.

Plot hole: Klaatu is shot and his body is lying in a prison cell. Gort leaves the flying saucer and walks all the way to the heavily guarded police station in downtown Washington DC. Gort is 8 feet tall and is a robot plus he uses his noisy death ray to create a hole in the police station to retrieve Klaatu's body and nobody noticed him? On top of that, he walks all the way back to the saucer unseen with a dead body.

Revealing: When the spaceship is going to take-off, every scientists are trying to escape, but there's a man wearing a light colored suit and hat who seems more interested in pushing the chairs everywhere than escaping. He even pushes a chair in another row. The director obviously told the actors to push some chairs to create more excitement in the scene, but he seems to take that too seriously.