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The license plate on the front of the car that Sarah "escapes" in at the end is on the left hand side. But in a brief shot of her driving the car over a jump, the license plate suddenly switches to the right hand side. It then returns to the left hand side. See more...

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The Descent (2005) - 14 corrections

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Genres: Adventure, Horror, 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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In the second half of the film, after the remaining cavers are trying to escape the creatures, there is a scene where one of the girls attempts to slide through a hole. She hears something behind her, turns and shines her torch around the cave and discovers that several of them are there watching her. She then jumps in the hole and starts to crawl away as quickly as possible. The mistake is to do with the lighting. In the shots which face her, with the small hole behind her, the cavern is bathed in green light from the fluorescent tube. However in the shot showing the torch moving around her and revealing the creatures, there is no green light – it is pitch black. – obviously for dramatic effect. The green light is very strong and lit up one of the caverns earlier, why not this one.? [This is more of a question than an actual mistake, and you've pretty much answered it yourself. The shot revealing the creatures does not have the green light for dramatic effect. This is also a deliberate mistake, not a continuity error.]
Edit Corrected by THGhost
In the scene where Shauna Macdonald and Natalie Mendoza arrive at the cabin in North Carolina where they will spend the night before descending into the cave, we see them enter the cabin, and then we see two deer skulls mounted on the adjacent wall - two roe deer, native only to Eurasia and never introduced to North America (but native to Scotland, where the picture was filmed). Likewise, they encounter a deer carcass on the hike to the cave - a red stag, also not found in North Carolina. [The skulls could have been simply brought back from a hunting trip. Hunters do travel to hunt different game than what is typically in their own area. However, the deer carcass is a valid mistake since a whole dead deer is not likely to be found in the wild outside its natural habitat. You could resubmit leaving out the reference to the skulls.]
Edit Corrected by Phixius
When the girls reach the cave, the blue truck parks and the BMW parks on its left side. When the last girl reaches the surface, she gets it the blue truck. When she goes to the truck, the beamer isn't there, But when she pulls out its on the left again. [This scene is a hallucination of Sarah's, as in the final scene we see she is still in the cave. She can be misremembering where the vehicles were parked, and as she is not thinking, remembering them at one point both being present, and at another only the Bronco II.]
Edit Corrected by rswarrior
When Sara is running through the hospital hall at the start of the film and Beth stops her, no medical personnel even give her second glance or offer help. [Why is this a plot hole? Sarah is distraught and her friend is comforting her. The medical staff would most likely be fairly used to seeing upset relatives of their patients and would therefore not approach them unless they were doing something that required their intervention.]
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Obviously these girls are amateurs, I do not believe any responsible caver would throw flares in a first descent, or that a seasoned climber would place a cam upside down (second cam placement shown in first hole crossing) and last but not least, not lock off a belay resulting in her partner's fall and hand injury. [They are amateurs, or at best, novices, who think they are more experienced than they are. How is this a mistake? All the things you mentioned are character mistakes, and things to be expected from spelunkers who get in over their heads.]
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In order for there to be a gene pool diverse enough to allow the creatures to breed successfully for more than a few generations there would needs to be hundreds of them. From their eating habits they are primarily carnivores. It is highly unlikely that there would be enough food for a population of this size within range of the caves. [Although it isn't ideal, species are in fact able to exist whilst lacking a diverse genepool. Indeed a number of species exist today that are descended from either a single breeding pair or a very small number of individuals. Examples include the Golden Hamster, of which the vast majority are now descended from a single litter, and Cheetahs, who are now all descended from a small number of individuals who managed to survive extinction and indeed are now highly genetically inbred. The creatures in the caves could therefore easily have all been descendants of very few indivduals.]
Edit Corrected by jet
Sara falls into a "pool" of blood presumably created by the creatures eating habits. The issue with this is that when blood is released from circulation it coagulates. This means the blood "pool" she is in should be more of a gelatin-like texture. [The "pool of blood" doesn't just contain blood. If you look carefully you can see a small waterfall in the background of the shots. This is just a pool of water that the blood from the monsters "feeding ground" has run off into. It is essentially extremely bloody water, which wouldn't completely coagulate but would still be rather thick. (On a side note, you can see chunks of coagulated blood on the surface of the pool)]
Edit Corrected by Nick Bylsma
When the girls rap down to the base of the entry hole, no one has a Dewalt hammer drill hanging off their harness. At the traverse across the first hole Becca lugs one across which disappears in future scenes. [The extra equipment is in a bag that one of the girls is carrying. It's the same bag that they lose when the cave-in happens. However, they did retrieve a few items from the bag before it was lost, including the hammer.]
Edit Corrected by Jazetopher
Near the start of the movie when the guy is driving, he crashes into the van and the copper pipes go through the windscreen. Blood appears on the back of the seat before the pipes even touch him. [The first pipe actually passes the man's seat just to his left and even though you don't see it, the pipe has hit the little girl, who was sitting in the very middle of the back seat. The blood you see on the back of his seat is her blood splatter. The second pipe hits his head, and his blood comes through the headrest. If you watch in slow motion, you can see this happen at 03:54.]
Edit Corrected by Rochelle McCarty
As the woman is driving away from the cave at the end of the movie, the license plate on the front of the Bronco is from North Carolina. The license plate on the back is from Montana. [The plates on the front and back of the Bronco are both Montana plates. It is very hard to see them, but they are definitely not the "First in Flight" North Carolina plates.]
Edit Corrected by Rochelle McCarty
When one of the girls is looking for climbing equipment, but doesn't have any with her, she says, "Oh f***." but her mouth doesn't move. [Sam's hands are in the way for us to be able to see her mouth when she says this.]
Edit
Near the beginning when the girls reach the first large cavern lit by the red flares, a crew member can be seen in the lower left hand corner hiding behind one of the rocks. It is not one of the monsters, as you can see a well trimmed beard and mustache on their face. [I looked very hard and I couldn't see anybody hiding in the rocks.]
Edit
After the girls get caved in they travel through the cave and come to a drop, one of them throws a rock down to see how far down the drop is and it makes a "Clang" sound. At the end of the film the three of the girls are chased back to that point, two of them are killed by the creatures and one jumps off the ledge but she hits water. Water doesn't make that sound. [Already listed and corrected.]
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After the girls are caved in they come to a huge drop, one of them throws a rock down to see how far down the drop is, when the rock eventually hits the bottom a loud clang sound is heard. Later a few girls are chased back to that point, two of them are killed the other chooses to jump off the ledge, but she hits water. water doesn't make loud clang sounds. [It's not the same drop.]
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