National Treasure (2004) - 8 major mistakes

Continuity: When Ben and Riley go down the smuggler's hold in Charlotte, Riley's bag gets set on fire, the flap side. But in any of the following shots where we see his bag, it is not burnt.

Continuity: When Ben walks in to the bathroom to remove his overalls, he slams the tool belt up in the corner of the counter next to side panel wall and tile wall. When Ben unzips the overalls, the tool belt is now behind the last sink's faucet with part of the belt and fastener in the middle sink. None of the tool belt is next to the side panel wall. We next see a shot where the tool belt is almost entirely in the last sink, then back to being behind the faucet.

Continuity: When Ben puts his tool belt on the conveyor belt to go through the X-ray machine, we see the gloves are on the left and pointed down while the red, rubber encased plyer handles are approx. in middle leaning slightly to the right and no space between the plyer handles. As we watch the tool belt go through the X-ray machine, the gloves are on the right side with the plyer handles almost directly above the gloves, both handles visible and the rest of the belt all to the left.

Factual error: The security to get into Independence Hall is very strict, since the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. Security would not have allowed Ben to keep his pocket knife when he entered it. This should not be confused with his disguising as a janitor, as this happened at a different location (National Archives) earlier in the film.

Continuity: When Ben ducks into the Gift Store, there is a blonde lady in a black dress standing at the counter between Ben and the door. She steps forward out of the picture as Abigail goes by. Then as Ben starts to turn to leave the store you see her arm come back into the picture. But as Ben walks by that part of the store and the clerk says to Ben, "Are you trying to steal that?" the lady has disappeared.

Factual error: To reveal the invisible ink on the back of the Declaration, Ben and Dr. Chase use pure lemon juice before warming the surface. This is best seen when Chase first test it out on the corner, where the Mason symbol is placed. Lemon juice is in fact also used as invisible ink (that you have to heat to make visible), and this procedure would have ruined anything written on the back of the document.

Continuity: When Gates takes out the champagne glass after making the fingerprints visible, the time on his watch changes from 9:11 to half past something.

Continuity: In the treasure vault Riley stands in front of that emerald statue, and on its chest you can see a part which is not covered in dust. In the next shot the whole chest is covered in dust. The clean area coincides with the later placement of Riley's cheek, which means the first shot was actually taken after the embracing and implemented before.