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Mistakes

When Michael and Shorty are having lunch, Michael watches the lottery numbers on the TV. He confirms the numbers on his fortune tag that has the phrase on the back, "If you only look where you cannot go, you will miss the riches below". The shot goes back to the TV, and then back to the fortune paper. If you look through the paper to the phrase on the back, it says something about a "wise man". Obviously a different piece of paper. See more...

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Movie Mistakes blog

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Paycheck (2003) - 31 corrections

Directed by John Woo, starring Aaron Eckhart, Ben Affleck, Uma Thurman (add more)

Genres: Sci-fi, Thriller, Action, Mystery

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.

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The bullet cartridge cannot be used the way Michael Jennings used it in the movie. It is not possible to fire a bullet without a gun. The casing of the bullet cartridge alone is not capable of sustaining the pressure of the gases produced by ignited powder. In order for the bullet to actually fire in forward direction the side walls of the casing must be supported by the gun barrel. Without the barrel the bullet cartridge will simply burst on the side. The bullet won't go anywhere, it will stay in the cartridge. Plastic cable tie used in the movie to hold the cartridge is not enough to make any difference. [That's not entirely accurate. Please see the link below for more information. http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_far_will_a_bullet_travel_when_fired_without_a_gun.]
Edit
When Affleck discovers that the thing he built is a time viewing machine, there is a long monologue where he explains that seeing into the future is wrong, could be catastrophic, etc. and concludes that he must destroy the machine. Practically a few seconds later when he arrives at the machine to destroy it, he says, "Let's see what our futures hold" and uses the device. If he just came to the explicit decision that future-vision is wrong, to the point of setting out to destroy the machine at the risk of his life, why in the world would he himself choose to view the future? There's no suggestion of "temptation" or anything, he just walks up to it and stupidly contradicts everything he just said. [In order to properly destroy the machine, he has to figure out what is going to happen in the immediate future.]
Edit Corrected by shortdanzr
When Ben Afflec gets out of the square-ish taxi right before he agrees to the three year contract, he is in the back of the taxi. Then he opens the back door to get out. This would not be a mistake except that this model is a Honda Element and it has "suicide doors". In order to open the back door you must first open the front, which would make it a horrible taxi. [Where to start? It is a science fiction movie which means there is no reason that the cab has to BE a "Honda Element", it just may look like one. Also, since he obviously did get out of the taxi by the back door - it cannot have the "suicide doors." Also, since it is a fiction movie and is not necessarily trying to depict modern times, I fail to see how this would be a mistake.]
Edit Corrected by Zwn Annwn
The pass cards for the complex where Jennings works have what appear to be a bar code along one edge. During most (if not all) closeups of the pass cards in use, that code is swiped through the reader (ie, the edge with the barcode is closest to the wall). However, when Jennings uses the card for the first time (after creating the metal detector diversion), that edge is on the bottom (closest the floor) and is not swiped through the reader, yet the door still unlocks. [I work at a large company and we use access cards with bar codes on them. Although we do swipe them for access the swipe is for the internal chip, NOT the bar code. The bar code is used by security guards with a scanner.]
Edit Corrected by jhoffman100@yahoo.com
After Michael Jennings finishes at Allcom and goes home to check his shares, the date of purchase is 2003. When he signs the release form at Reddy Grant, the year is 2007. That is 4 years and not 3. [If he starts the job in December '03 and finishes the other job in January '07, that's close enough to three years for people to still say 3 years. In fact, a larger distance between the dates would still count for some people.]
Edit
When Ben Affleck tries to open the BMW with the remote control on the key, he repeatedly presses the "close"-button. The "open"-button is the one closer to the key itself, while the BMW-sign in the key is used to close. [This is not necessarily a movie mistake. It could be considered a mistake by Michael, pushing the wrong button.]
Edit Corrected by Zwn Annwn
When Michael is held in FBI custody, one of the agents takes a cigarette from Michael's package and lights it. The resulting smoke sets off the fire suppression system. In the later scene when the attorney is showing Michael the inventory of the items, you can see "cigarettes - smokeless" listed. If the "smokes" are in fact "smokeless", they wouldn't have set off the alarm. [That is not a mistake. That is the point of that scene. The FBI agent smokes the cigarette thinking it is safe as it is smokeless. In fact they're intentionally not smokeless, to help Michael escape.]
Edit Corrected by Soylent Purple Time
Before Rachel goes out and meets up with the guy that Jimmy sends to look after her before she goes to work, she puts her purse on. Initially, the purse is around her left shoulder. After she walks through the door, it is across her chest and on her right shoulder. [The strap starts across her body and the bag is on her left shoulder. They remain exactly that way as she exits the door.]
Edit Corrected by Tax Dude Time
Towards the end of the movie, Colin Feore was at the controls of the machine that could look forward into the future. While he was on the machine, he was wearing a grey jacket. However, when the machine showed himself getting killed, he was wearing a brown jacket. [This is a trick of lighting. He's wearing a blue pinstripe suit and a blue striped tie during the last half of the movie. Both are clearly visible as he's standing at the machine as well as on the screen.]
Edit Corrected by Tax Dude Time
In the scene where the people from Allcom are chasing Michael on the motorcycle, and the first car flips over, you can see that there is no one in the car. [If you're talking about the car that's struck by the semi, you can clearly see that the driver is thrown down onto the passenger's seat (out of view). If you're talking about the car that runs into the bulldozer, the driver is readily apparent (you can see his hands on the wheel right before the explosion).]
Edit Corrected by Tax Dude
When Jennings is being dragged up to the catwalk by the cable around his neck, you can see someone's feet on the catwalk, in the upper right hand corner of the screen. [They're not "someone's" shoes on the catwalk. They're clearly Jimmy's shoes and he's standing on the mobile tower contraption.]
Edit Corrected by Tax Dude Time
When the machine blows up, Umma and Ben jump from the catwalk onto transparent drapes. Umma's drapes get torn and she starts falling when Ben catches her. You then see Ben's drapes being torn but now they only fall a few feet before hitting the ground. They were much higher up to begin with. [They don't fall to the floor (which is what makes this somewhat deceiving) - they fall onto a part of the catwalk.]
Edit Corrected by Tax Dude Time
Jennings rents a room after he escapes from the FBI and empties the paper bag onto the bed to see what is inside. When he looks at the slip of paper with the quote on one side and the lottery numbers on the other, the numbers are in red. In the shot of his hand placing the paper back on the bed, the numbers are black. [In the shot of his hand placing the paper back on the bed, the numbers are still red.]
Edit Corrected by Tax Dude Time
In the scene where Jennings is being chased on the motorcycle, he jumps over a big pile of rocks followed by a police car. The first shot of the car has a perfect body and seconds later it's all torn up before it hits the ground. [This scene takes place in the junkyard. First off, it's not a police car that comes over the hill, it's one of the Allcom vehicles. Secondly, it is not "all torn up" before it hits the ground. There is some heavy damage to the passenger's side front (from scraping along the trailers earlier). The front of the vehicle does not "disintegrate" until it actually hits the ground.]
Edit Corrected by Tax Dude Time
Michael Jennings has bought the new 3-d TV-screen. He is setting it up, and he is wearing a tie. The angle then changes, and suddenly he isn't wearing the tie. The angle changes multiple times afterwards, and so does his wearing of a tie. [The point of the scene is that his work on the 3D screen is taking place over 2 months. It's a montage of all the work he does, so it makes sense for him to be in different states of dress and appearance.]
Edit Time
After Rachel and Michael are reunited after Michael's escape, she asks him in the hotel room if he remembers her. Michael says no, because of the memory wipe. The memory isotope wasn't injected into him until AFTER he had met Rachel, and flirted with her at the dinner party. The memory wipe should have only erased his memory back to the point of the injection, and shouldn't have affected his memory of his early meetings with Rachel. [First of all, it's entirely possible to forget meeting someone at a crowded party, especially when nothing out of the ordinary happens. Secondly, the method memory wipe had never been used on Jennings before, so it could have made memories around the injection point fuzzy.]
Edit Corrected by Nick N.
In the scene where Jennings and Rachel are trying to deactivate the device, Jennings zip-ties a bullet to one of the tanks. All Jennings said he had left were the crossword puzzle and the bullet. If this was the case, where did the zip-tie come from? [Zip ties are quite common in computer rooms with a lot of wiring like he was in at the time. Since he saw this future he realized he wouldn't need to mail himself a zip tie.]
Edit
When the machine is being described, it is stated that Einstein's theories proved that time travel is impossible. In fact, his work on relativity show that time travel is theoretically possible and Einstein, not believing or liking this, spent some time trying to find a way to prove otherwise, without success. [Einstein's theories stated that time travel would be possible if we could travel faster than the speed of light, however, his theories also stated that it is impossible for us to travel faster than light, as we have a mass. However, since light has no mass, it can be (theoretically) accelerated beyond the threshold, which is what the science of this movie is based upon. What Einstein spent much of his life trying to refute is quantum theory, not time travel.]
Edit
While Rachel and Jennings are escaping on the BMW, he asks her as they race through traffic "Was I any good on one of these?", and she says he was "OK". However, Jennings has been locked away for three years, unable to leave the facility, and bought the bike on eBay. Locked up like he was, he obviously hasn't been able to ride it on the streets before this, and didn't have a relationship with Rachel before this time (only meeting her at the party before the big paycheck offer). [It's obvious that Jennings was not "locked up", as he was able to purchase and acquire the items which he sent to himself in the envelope, as well as purchase a lottery ticket.]
Edit
If Michael Jennings saw the future after he built the time machine, he would have only seen his fate with the FBI and whatever came after that. It would have been impossible for him to see himself get shot because a different future was created after he escaped from the room. [Exactly. By ensuring that a different future would occur, Jennings was able to see that new future in the time viewer. For example, immediately after he put the glasses and cigarettes into the envelope (or even after he thought of doing so), the time viewer would show him escaping the FBI room and what happened after. He had access to the viewer many times over the course of his research.]
Edit Corrected by Phoenix

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