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Quotes

Riley Poole: Who wants to go down the creepy tunnel inside the tomb first?

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Mistakes

When Ben and Ian get the two different fingerprints from two different people, Mr. Ferguson [random security guard] and Abigail Chase, they are the exact same fingerprints. This can be confirmed on the DVD with pause and zoom. Moreover, the two scans show exactly the same emphasis/pressure on different regions within the print, with more light and detail on the left side and little in the center. See more...

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When Ben is talking to Riley in front of the Lincoln Memorial, you see a long pool behind them. This pool is filled with computer generated water, because the pool was drained at the time of shooting. See more...

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National Treasure (2004) - 75 corrections

starring Christopher Plummer, Diane Kruger, Harvey Keitel, Jon Voight, Nicolas Cage, Sean Bean (add more)

Genres: Action, Adventure, 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.

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After cracking the clue of Silent Dogood letters, while leaving the shopping mall, Riley asks Ben and Abigail, "Who was the first to propose daylight saving time?". They reply "Benjamin Franklin". But, it was George Vernon Hudson in 1895. (Source: Wikipedia). [George Vernon Hudson is credited with proposing the modern system of daylight savings time. Ben Franklin initially suggested anonymously in a letter the idea of saving candles by rising with the sun.]
Edit Corrected by Serious B
When Ben meets Abigail for the first time in her office, he admires her collection of Washington's campaign buttons. In fact, there is no such thing as a Washington campaign button, since presidential campaigns (as we know them today, with a candidate declaring the desire to be president and actively promoting himself or herself) did not come into existence until the mid-1800's. Washington never "ran" for president. In fact, at the time it would have been considered very un-gentlemanly and arrogant to publicly express your interest in the office. There were however buttons made to commemorate his inauguration and his presidency itself (saying "Long Live the President", etc., but nothing like those seen in the film), and these are, indeed, collector's items. [The Washington "campaign buttons" do not refer to the Presidential campaign but to battle campaigns during the Revolutionary War.]
Edit
When Riley uncovers the frozen seaman in his hammock, he gets scared/excited, starts flailing his arms and knocks both hammocks on either side of him as he falls backward. That would have left both hammocks moving/swinging a little. But in the very next frame where Riley is still making noises and turns over on all fours, we see the hammock on the left side of the screen as still as the dead. [There are 2 levels of hammocks, one over the other, Riley actually moves an upper one to see the frozen seaman, and when Riley is scared he only hits the top hammock on his right on his way down. When you do not see it swinging it is a closeup and you only see the lower hammock that he did not hit.]
Edit
When Ben and Riley are trying to figure out Abagail's password to enter the room with the Declaration, Riley reads the result "Valley Frog". Ben says it's "Valley Forge" and that she pressed the E and L twice. This suggests that Riley's password cracking program does not account for the fact that the letters can be used twice. If this is true, then "Valley Frog" should not have been a result in Riley's program because it has two L's. [Whether or not she typed the L twice, the given result would have been pronounced the same (valey, valley) as Riley simply reads what is shown to him. The "typo" only adds to his confusion ("Valeyfrog?!").]
Edit Corrected by Sereenie
In the scene in the Charlotte, the black powder would never have exploded after being buried in ice for 200 years. It also would not burn without creating enormous amounts of thick grey smoke. [Even though it's under the ice it's not exactly in it. It was preserved in the barrels up until Gates and friends opened them up. As far as the smoke, that is in fact true.]
Edit
Ben uses SuperGlue to show up the fingerprints on the glass that Abigail was holding. Once the fumes develop the prints they appear as being black, but this is incorrect. SuperGlue would actually make them white. [He doesn't use super glue, he uses iodine.]
Edit
After Ben takes the Declaration of Independence in its case into the elevator, we see him start to remove screws again. When we see the back, there are two screws out in the two compartments next to the one Ben is taking a third screw out. There's no way he had time to take out 2 plus screws from the time he started while in the elevator and the time we see the back with the screws out. [Ben was planning to take out all the screws in the preservation room so he could roll up the declaration and leave. He had unscrewed two when Riley lost his feeding, so he ran to the elevator, and continued unscrewing inside.]
Edit
When describing the Ottendorf cipher, Ben says the groups of three numbers on the back of the Declaration represent words and mentions that the numbers stand for page-line-word, yet the child ends up reading individual letters from the Silence Dogood letters. [Actually, the Ottendorf cipher refers to individual letters, not words.]
Edit
After Ben mixes the solution, it shows him moving his fingers towards the beaker, in between his fingers is the pin he plans to give to Abagail. A second later it shows only his fingers going into the solution, and the pin has disappeared. [Untrue. We only see Ben's knuckles and the top of his hand as he moves towards the solution the first time (wide & full screen). Then we see him dip the pin into the solution after his smiley face blacklight check.]
Edit
Having recently visited the National Archives, I find it amazing that Ben and Riley entered the Archives as much as they did. Entry to the National Archives requires waiting in a very long line which takes hours and getting into the rotunda where the Charters of Freedom are requires waiting in line as well. I don't think that Ben and Riley had that much time on their hands. [I too have been to the National Archives and there was never a line for me. It depends on what time of year you go. You must have gone during vacation season.]
Edit Corrected by Phixius
In the scene on the ship "Charlotte," the main characters find a pipe with a clue etched on the handle. The clue mentions the number 55 which Ben figures out to be the number of men that signed the Declaration of Independence. There are actually 56 signatures on it. [The fifty-sixth signature was not added to the document until 1781, by Thomas McKean of Delaware. The clue was written before this time; therefore, it is correct in stating that fifty-five men signed the Declaration of Independence.]
Edit Time
While Ben has a well constructed plan to get the Declaration moved from the Display Case into the vault, including faking the thermal sensor reading so that the Declaration would be moved into the Preservation Room where he can access it with little or no resistance, Ian and his crew have no such plan. How does Ian expect to gain access to the document when to the best of his knowledge it still sits in the Display Case? Was he planning on breaking into the empty vault and then crawling up the vault shaft to the Display area? And BTW, the limited amount of C4 explosive that they did show would not be enough to breach the 4 foot thick, steel plate vault, which still doesn't matter because the document isn't in there anyway. [A movie does not have to explain every single detail of what its characters are thinking and doing. Suffice to say Ian did have some kind of plan, it is jut never explained on screen. For instance, it is, as you yourself say, entirely possible that Ian did plan to climb up the vault shaft and break out the Declaration of Independence from below. And just because the amount of C4 shown would be insufficient for this, it does not mean that Ian's gang didn't bring any more with them. For that matter, we don't even know that the C4 would be used on the case, as this is purely an assumption. There could be other uses for the C4, all depending on what Ian's plan really was.]
Edit Corrected by Twotall
When they are searching the Arctic for the Charlotte, there are high mountains visible in the background. There are mountains in Antarctica, but not the Arctic, which is a frozen ocean. [The movie states that they are north of the Arctic Circle, but never specifies exactly where they are. While it is implied that the are on a frozen ocean, those mountains in the background could be on the coast of any of the landmasses north of the Arctic Circle, such as Canada, Alaska, Russia, Scandinavia or Greenland.]
Edit Corrected by Blibbetyblip
When Ben is crossing the street to enter National Archives building for the Gala, the street is wet but the pavement, steps, etc. around the building are completely dry. [There is no indication that it has been raining except that the streets are wet. Washington DC's Department of Public Works has street cleaners that operate on heavily traveled areas routinely or as requested by the public. It would not be unusual for the National Archives people to request a street cleaning before this big gala. The street cleaners operate by spraying a thin film of water on the street before sweeping the dirt, etc. into a hopper on the machine. It makes perfect sense as to why the streets could be wet. Also, they only suspend operations during the winter and this take place outside of that time.]
Edit Corrected by Zwn Annwn
The film shares a few interesting similarities with Lara Croft: Tomb Raider. Besides the fact that the main characters are both treasure hunters, Jon Voight plays the father of the main character in both films. Flashbacks featuring the main characters as children are also present in both films. [Just because this movie is similar to another movie, does not make it trivia.]
Edit Corrected by wizard_of_gore
When Ben Gates toasts the Founding Fathers with Abigail at the scene in the National Archives, the glasses are filled with Champagne. When Gates actually guzzles the drink, look closely - its water. [No it's not. It's still bubbly and has a slight color to it. It's either champagne or a substitute.]
Edit Corrected by CocoCami
As Ben is clinging to the staircase while it is falling apart, there is a close-up of a nail being pulled out of the wood. This nail is round-headed, rather than square as it would have been over 200 years ago. It's also shiny instead of rusty, which indicates that it's galvanized. [Galvanized nails have been in use for hundreds of years. The earliest galvanized nails were made in the Roman Empire, and have been found in ships and archaelogical excavations dating back to 500 AD. America has had galvanized nail factories since 1819.]
Edit
When Ben is running through the graveyard from Ian's men in Philadelphia, he shuts a gate behind him to hamper his pursuer. The man tries to open the gate, but it is locked. However, the gate obviously bares a keyhole for an old skeleton key. In order for Ben to have locked the gate, he would've had to have the key with him. But we see no action of him locking the gate at all. In reality, it should have remained unlocked. [It can easily become locked when the door is shut. There are many doors that have "one way locks" (no matter how old or modern the door is), you can lock them by closing the door without turning a key. However you need a key to reopen it.]
Edit Corrected by Ronnie Bischof
The case that holds the Declaration of Independence changes throughout the movie. This might be explained away except for the fact that the last change, to the black case, would have meant that Ian would have taken it out of the gray/white case that he picked up in the street after Abigail falls and loses it and puts it in a nice, new black case that he just happens to have. The case was originally red with the gray/white case as an inner case or liner for the red case. Ian's character hasn't cared if the Declaration gets shredded to confetti, so why would he care that it gets a nice, new black case instead of the gray/white one he picked up in the street? [Because it's his bargaining tool. Without it in pristine shape, he can't get Ben to cooperate. There's plenty of time between him picking up the white case and meeting up with Ben for him to pick up a new case for it, or he had it from when he'd planned to steal the document.]
Edit Corrected by CocoCami
When Ben leaps into the water and meets the SCUBA diver, sounds indicate that he immediately takes a deep breath from the respirator. If he had actually done this, he would have breathed in the sea water the respirator would have been flooded with. This, as you well know, would not have been very fun at all. [The diver was there waiting for Ben and would be aware of his immediate need for air. Purging a regulator second stage is as simple as pushing the purge button and holding it in a mouthpiece-down position. Some Hudson River water would likely be in it, but a deep breath would be possible without first needing to exhale to purge the regulator.]
Edit Corrected by Greg B Time

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