Factual error: One of Angel's lyrics (in "Today For You, Tomorrow For Me) refers to the movie "Thelma and Louise." Rent (the movie) is set in 1989-90. "Thelma and Louise" was released in 1991.[This was caused when they did the move from Broadway to the screen. What happened was the stage show did not specify the year. So when they adapted the stage show to the movie, they didn't check the references. Plus it just sounds cool. Added info by Todd Loewen]
Continuity: When Mark is editing his film at the end of the movie, there is a segment of Angel when he was singing "Today 4 U," Mark never filmed during that scene. At no point during Angel's performance does Mark pick up his camera and film Angel. We see Mark without his camera just watching Angel.
Factual error: During a pan over midtown between scenes, the camera shows the Metlife building with the Metlife logo. However, in 1989 the Metlife building still had the Pan-Am logo on it. It was not changed until 1991.
Continuity: During "Santa Fe," watch the woman who moves to the seat behind where Collins is singing. She will sit down then a cut later you see her sitting down again, and even farther into the scene she disappears completely for a shot. This is even mentioned on the movie commentary.
Continuity: During the second time Mimi is in the Catscratch Club, she leans back in front of a couple gentlemen at the front of the stage taking some money. Well if you look really close right before the grabs the money in the full body length shot, some money is in the front of her underwear. Yet when she grabs the money, there is nothing there and she's just starting to put money there.
Continuity: During "You'll See" Benny throws a ball of paper at Roger which he then puts on the hood of Benny's Range Rover. Throughout the scene that ball of paper moves too many times to count. A couple of times it disappears from the shot completely, other times it moves far left or right but rarely is it in the same place twice.
Continuity: At the beginning of the film, Angel enters Mark's apartment with Tom and does her (his?) dance on the furniture. Notice that the long table has crumbs all over it. Fast forward one year later when Mimi is carried up to the apartment and placed on the table. Miraculously, the same crumbs are there. After her quick recovery, the crumbs are not only gone, but the table is polished.
Continuity: During the subway scene, Tom is singing and dancing, a blonde lady gets up and moves to the single chaired seat at the back of the train. In a subsequent shot from the same angle, she vanishes completely. She isn't in either her old or new seat or anywhere else to be seen on the train. Then she magically reappears. The director and cast members laugh about it in the DVD commentary.
Continuity: At the beginning when Mark gets on his bike, the camera watches him ride off. A black car is seen going behind him getting ready to overtake. When the angle changes so you see him from the front, it is a yellow taxi that is overtaking him.
Factual error: Although in the shots of Avenue A all the cars are from the late 80's, the cars seen on the street when Joanne, Mark, and Maureen go to the Buzzline office are much newer and certainly made after 1990.
Continuity: In the scene when Roger is inviting Mimi to the Life Cafe, after she says "Yeah?", Roger looks away and laughs nervously then closes his mouth. When the shot changes, he is still laughing with his mouth open.
Continuity: During the first time in the Catscratch Club, when Mimi starts singing "Out Tonight", she takes off her robe and throws it down. However, in later shots it appears and disappears randomly.
Continuity: When Tom is singing in the subway, he picks up a plastic cup and asks for money from Roger, Roger gives him a quarter and Tom gives it back, when Tom is done with the cup, he throws it on the ground to his right. However, right before the blonde lady moves to the back seat, the cup is laying on the seat where she sits.
Continuity: In Santa Fe, right after Collins does the forwards/backwards flip, a man can be seen over his shoulder putting on a black hat. The shot then cuts away then cuts back, and the man is once again putting on his black hat which should already be on his head.
Other: In "La Vie Boheme B", when Collins and Maureen are on the counter, Collins picks up Maureen and spins her to the other side of the counter. When she hits the counter, she nearly falls and breaks character. She even mouths something to him.
Audio problem: In the scene where Mark throws the keys to Collins the second time, he comes back in the window and we can see Roger sitting on the couch. It appears that Roger is strumming his guitar, but there's no sound from it.
Continuity: When Angel is first introduced to Mark and Roger, she hands them both money. When she gives it to Roger, he is holding it in his hand, but when the scene cuts to Angel, you can see over her shoulder, and Roger is tapping on his legs and the money is no where to be found. When it cuts back to the front of him, he's got the money again.
Continuity: After Maureen's protest show, when everyone waits for Mark in the restaurant, the amount of snow on Mark's right shoulder changes between shots while he's talking to Maureen and telling her how her show is going to be on the news.
Continuity: Towards the beginning of "Take Me or Leave Me", notice when Mark and Mimi walk into the background. In the next shot when you see the parents, you can see how close Mark is to them (his shoulder is in the frame). When they cut back to Maureen and Joanne, Mark is a lot further away from the parents. This is also mentioned in the commentary.
Other: At the very beginning, when the lights rise above the cast you can see they're all equally spaced out and the light has the same brightness for each character. At the end of the song, the camera shoots to the back filming everyone from behind, note Mark, he's crammed in the corner next to Angel with out the same amount of space originally he started with and his light is very dim compared to the seven others.