Corrected entry: Minnesotans don't actually talk like that. In the movie they use accents on some words that they don't even say very often (e.g. Ya shore, you betcha.) Nobody says that very often. It's a Norwegian term, but it's rarely used. The only accent they have is the Mid-western one that everyone around there has, unless you're Hispanic or have just moved from another country.
Correction: Apparently, while it IS exaggerated in the film, it's more accurate than not.
Correction: Those examples are just Upper Midwest pronunciations of "You bet" and "Yeah sure" - not Norwegian, but common English words and expressions.
Corrected entry: As Marge and Lou leave the scene of the murders, Marge tells a joke about a guy who couldn't afford personalized plates, so he changed his name to "J3L2404". In Minnesota, non-personalized license plates have always had only 6 numbers/digits, so it's highly unlikely that someone who was born and raised here would tell a joke like that to someone else from the area. (00:39:20)
Correction: That may be true, but since Marge is only telling a joke it's a bit of a stretch to include it as any type of error/mistake.
Corrected entry: I live in Fargo. There is so much wrong with this movie. First nobody here talks with that accent. We speak perfectly normally. I don't know one person that says "ya sure ya betcha" or anything remotely close to that. Second, the biggest of all, a huge majority of the movie was not even filmed in Fargo. It was mostly filmed on a rural stretch of interstate between Fargo and Minneapolis, and in a small little city off the interstate that barely looks like anyone lives there. Fargo is a large city, nearly 100,000 people. The movie is not true, but some like to think it is. And please quit thinking Fargo is in Minnesota. It is in North Dakota, a state on it's own, not Minnesota.
Correction: The film is called "Fargo". Apart from the first scene, it takes place elsewhere, which is made quite clear. Why did the Coens call it "Fargo", then? Probably because it sounds better than "Brainerd"...
Corrected entry: When Marge goes to The Cities to investigate the homicides, she stays at The Radisson. She walks into their diner for a meal and reunites with Mike Yanagita. But she never told him she would be there, he never asked, and they never made plans to meet there or anywhere else, for that matter when they spoke on the phone.
Correction: When they meet at the restaurant the film implies that they made arrangements to meet beforehand. The viewer can easily assume one phoned the other a second or third time to make arrangements.
Corrected entry: Minnesotans do not call Mpls/St. Paul the "Twin Cities", they just refer to them as "The Cities".
Correction: I live in the Twin Cities, and that's how I hear them referred to most of the time. "The Cities" might be more common in "Greater Minnesota" (outside Minneapolis and St. Paul), but "Twin Cities" is not unreasonable.
Corrected entry: At the garage, Shep says to Jerry that he does not know Carl, and doesn't vouch for Carl, only for Grimsrud. Obviously the two guys don't know each other. So, how can Carl react by shouting "Shep" when he is attacked in the bedroom by the Indian while humping the escort? (00:13:05 - 01:04:10)
Correction: Shep was lying to Jerry. Shep, tight-lipped as he is, did not want to be involved anymore than he is. He probably reached out directly to Grimsrud, and Grimsrud recruited Carl, but it would seem more likely that all 3 knew each other and Shep had no compelling reason to be open or forthright to Jerry than this being a plot hole. He vouched for Grimsrud. Who Grimsrud used in the caper was not his problem, and he certainly wasn't gonna have that conversation with Jerry.
Corrected entry: Marge flew from Brainerd to the Twin Cities. But then she had a patrol car to drive around, including when she stopped by the Oldsmobile dealership "on her way out of town" she said.
Correction: There is no evidence Marge flew to Minneapolis.
Corrected entry: When Jerry, "Mr. Anderson", is arrested in the end, the two police officers cuff him on the bed, but with a closer look you can see Jerry intentionally puts his hand behind his back, although completely resisting the arrest (kicking, screaming, shaking, escape attempts etc.).
Correction: In fact Jerry pushes his arms back to stop them being squashed underneath him as he is thrown face down onto the bed. This is an instinctive reaction and probably something William H. Macy did while shooting the scene.
Corrected entry: The tan Cutlass Sierra given to the men who were to kidnap Jerry's wife, is an older model Sierra. However, after Carl is shot in the face and after he has assassinated the father, the Cutlass Sierra he speeds off in is a newer model (early 90's probably).
Correction: Carl drives the same year and model (Cutlass Ciera) throughout the movie.
Corrected entry: Towards the beginning of the movie there is a shot of a bunch of new Oldsmobiles. Towards the front there is a blue Cutlass Ciera which has door mounted seatbelts and a driver's side airbag. Door mounted seatbelts weren't introduced until the 1990 model and a driver's airbag wasn't introduced until 1993. The film takes place in the 1980s.
Correction: The seatbelts aren't mounted on the door. They are mounted on the post between the front and rear doors. Same as on my Pontiac Grand Prix.
Corrected entry: After the car that was trying to get away crashes, a man gets out and then gets shot in the back and falls forward onto his stomach. In the scene when the police are looking at the car, if you look in the background the man is now laying face up.
Correction: The man may not have died immediately, and rolled over sometime between the time he was shot, and when the police begin investigating. Many people do not immediately die from gunshot wounds.
Corrected entry: In the scene where Carl and Wade have the shootout, when Carl shoots Wade after he's fallen down, you can see there are no impact wounds from the bullets. (01:10:36)
Correction: You can see the first impact throughout the scene, both before and after Wade falls down.
Corrected entry: Marge's husband is despondent because his entry in the stamp contest is awarded only use on a small denomination stamp. Actually, what are often called "duck stamp contests" or waterfowl stamp contests have nothing to do with postage stamps. This system, in use by the Federal Government's US Fish & Wildlife Service for over 50 years, is a way of funding habitat projects and is not used for postage stamps at all. The winners of wildlife stamp contests have their art recreated on stamps that must be purchased by hunters. Such stamps are used only on hunters' licenses, not on general postage.
Correction: Waterfowl designs can be used on general postage stamps as well (e.g. the 2003 Snowy Egret 37-cent stamps).
Corrected entry: In the scene where the two kidnappers are driving into Minneapolis the one driving comments that the tall glass building is the second tallest building in the mid-west behind the Sears Tower. When actually the next two tallest buildings are also in Chicago - the Amoco Oil building and the John Hancock building.
Correction: Though the statment is true, it is not necessary that we assume that Carl actually knew that. He had trouble remembering the word Tower in "Sears Tower", and barely muttered out "Hancock Building", so it's more of a character mistake than an actual movie error.
Corrected entry: The fence where Carl hides the money is at first a fence consisting of some barbed wire and net, then it is simply three files of barbed wire. (01:17:42)
Correction: Actually the fence consists of two - three strands of barbed wire on top, with the squared wire on the bottom. When the camera pans back, and shows down both sides of the fence, we see the squares in one direction, but not in the other because the snow has blown over and covered the bottom squares. We know the snow is at least as deep as Carl's hips, when he returns to the car.
Correction: It looks like 3 rows of barbed wire when the camera pans back and the guy looks in both directions. In fact it is 2 rows of wire and the trees in the distance makes it look like there are 3.
Corrected entry: In a scene a neighbour and a cop speaks, they are dressed like its -25º c but there is no ice or snow on the street and no cold air coming from their mouth when they speak. Obviously it's above 0º c. (01:00:05)
Corrected entry: In the night scene, there is blood spatter on Carls face BEFORE the cop is shot.
Correction: In the version I have "Special Edition", the blood only appears after the cop is shot. Timecode 00:27:49 to 00:27:55. To me it's more of a problem that that the blood appears on his face when a frame or so before there is none, and the blood is shooting out forwards.
Correction: Carl has blood splatter on his face before the cop is shot in the head because the police officer gets his head slammed into the door by Carl's partner. Therefore Carl gets blood splattered on his face and then his partner shoots the officer in the head.
Corrected entry: It is referred to in the movie that the "bad guys" are staying in a motel in Brainerd "off I-35." Interstate 35 does not come near Brainerd. The closest it comes in Hinckley, MN.
Correction: Buscemi says he knows a place near Brainerd where he and Stormare can get laid. They don't stay there. They stay "out there by the lake" where the bartender serves them, and the bartender says he assumes he meant Moose Lake, which is just off I-35.
Correction: My ENTIRE family is from Minnesota. They absolutely speak like that. Although, it is exaggerated in the film, the accents are accurate.