Hannibal (2001) - 43 mistakes

Continuity: When Clarice is opening the letter written to her by Hannibal, it is sealed with wax, and not glued down in any way. While she's reading it, Hannibal is shown licking an envelope.

Factual error: At the end of the film, Ray Liotta wouldn't be able to raise his eyebrows as the frontalis muscle had been divided.

Continuity: When Clarice is reading the letter from Hannibal, he does a voice over thing, however, what he says differs from what the letter says..specifically the "your good friend" before the signature, which Hannibal says but isn't in the letter.

Continuity: When Inspector Pazzi is in the phone booth calling the FBI at 1-212-555-0118, he doesn't dial the correct number. 

Revealing: During the scene in which Krendler shows the fake Lecter postcard, look closely and you can read the line: "Sounds like him to me" although this line is part of Krendler's speech, and not part of the message itself. Forgetting your lines, Mr. Liotta?

Continuity: In the scene when Rinaldo Pazzi (the Italian investigator later disembowelled by Hannibal) is searching on the internet, he types in a search "Hannibal Lecter reward", which returns one match.  The match contains the URL and a preview of the page, which gives the first sentence. That sentence however, incorrectly identifies the year of Hannibal's escape as being 1992; however when Rinaldo clicks on the link, the actual page lists the correct date as being 1990 in exactly the same sentence. [An extra comment - if you look closely, as soon as he clicks on the link the page opens, and we see a close-up of Lecter's face - just visible at the top right you can see the date 1992 mentioned. Then it cuts out to a wider shot of the whole page, and the date's magically changed to 1990].

Visible crew/equipment: Near the beginning of the film while Clarice is being interviewed, we can see a black T-shape during a shot of the floor. This is shown to be an actor's mark, as someone steps right into it a few shots later.

Continuity: Dr. Lecter signs M.D. with small letters, but when Clarice is reading it, the letters are much bigger. Also, he originally only does a line across the top of "Lecter", but when she gets the letter it's across his whole name. There's also a hyphen between Hannibal Lecter and M.D. in the received version, but not when he sends it. Note: This is nothing to do with the re-mailing service - all they did was send the letter to a different location, not re-write it.

Continuity: When Francesco is on the pay phone, some of the same people walk past at least twice.

Continuity: In the scene where Pazzi meets with Lecter in the Capponi Library, at one point Lecter walks behind Pazzi while speaking and the white parts of his dark blue pajamas can actually be seen on top of Pazzi's trench coat. This is because the two shots were in fact spliced together to account for the actor's movements on screen as they spoke.

Continuity: In the flashback seen where Dr. Lecter suggests to Mason Verger peel off his own face, Dr.Lecter picks up the broken mirror piece with a navy or black cloth. Then in the next scene, when he hands it to Mason, there is no cloth. Then, when Mason starts to scrape away at his face, the cloth reappears in Mason's hand.

Continuity: The first time we hear Dr. Chilton's tapes of Lecter's conversations with Starling, Hannibal's exact words are, Agent Starling is a deep roller, Barney. And yet, later in the movie we hear Clarice listen to the same conversation once more only this time he leaves out the name Barney after his question. This is infact an entirely different soundbyte, but it is supposed to be the same tape.

Continuity: When Evelda Drumgo's henchmen discover the presence of the police there is a coffee cup and a light blue holdall on the bonnet of their car. The car then reverses at high speed and the cup falls off but the bag shows no signs of budging. Then, a split-second later, the scene cuts to the car reversing into a parked white van. The blue bag has mysteriously disappeared. But, a few cuts later (just after the one where an agent is showered with sparks) you see the car speeding towards the camera and both the coffee cup and the bag have reappeared (although you have to be quick to spot it).

Continuity: When Hannibal attacks Francesco after the lecture, they show their shadows on the screen at the same time as the picture of the man hanging. This is not possible as the picture was projected from a slide projector behind them. In other parts before that scene you can see their shadows blocking the picture.

Continuity: When the Italian Police Inspector is on the phone in the middle of the street with Verger's answering machine, you can see in three consecutive shots the same extra crossing the plaza (a young brunette with a black spaghetti string top).

Continuity: When Clarice got the tapes from Barney, he told her that the doctor had started taping her AFTER her first session with Hannibal. Some of the conversations that she listens to took place on her very first visit to see him so there shouldn't be any tapes at all of those.

Continuity: While Clarice reads Hannibal's letter and Hannibal narrates it, Lecter says, "Do you imagine your Daddy BEING shamed by your disgrace?" but what's written is: "Do you imagine Daddy shamed by your disgrace?"

Factual error: In the scene where the top of Paul's skull and scalp are removed, the scalp looks normal. In order to remove the skull and scalp in such a manner, the blood supply to the scalp would've been completely severed. Without a blood supply, the scalp would've quickly discolored, and certainly wouldn't look nice and normal.

Continuity: Right before Paul says grace, Dr. Lecter checks the time on the grandfather clock. We see a long shot, and the hand's on about 46 minutes. Then there is a closeup of the clock moving past 50 minutes after the hour. When it cuts back to the table, the clock is immediately back to 46.

Audio problem: A mistake with one of the audio tapes: They mixed the dialogue of two scenes in Silence of the Lambs, you can hear Lecter saying "you have not more vacations to bargain" which happens in the cell from which he escapes, and following that sentence asks "what it will be? quid pro quo, poor Catherine is waiting" and other lines that are from the scene when Lecter is still at the glass cell, the first time Clarice gives him the fake offer from the Senator.

Continuity: When Pazzi sits down during Hannibal's presentation, Hannibal puts his hand on his shoulder. It is suddenly in a slightly different place in the closer shot without there being time to move it. It's very slight but still noticeable.

Continuity: While Hannibal narrates what Clarice is reading on his letter, Hannibal concludes by saying, "I imagine you sitting in a dark basement room, bent over papers and computer screens. Is that accurate? Please tell me truly, Special Agent Starling. Your old pal, Hannibal Lecter, M.D." But on the letter's second page he writes, "... 200 hawk, one wiring hanging down. Is that fairly accurate? Tell me truly, Special Agent Starling. Regards, Hannibal Lecter, M.D."

Revealing: When the rich guy is drinking Chateau d'Yquem from a straw, you can see, afterwards, Gary Oldman's lips under the thick mask or whatever. This is really obvious.

Continuity: In the scene where Pazzi goes to pick up Dr. Fell's belongings from Hannibal Lector at the Palazzo Capponi, when the camera is first on Lector he is wearing tracksuit bottoms, and then the camera switches to Pazzi and back to Lector, and he is wearing different trousers - pyjama type.

Factual error: When Clarice is being questioned about the fake postcard, they are supposed to be in Washington DC, but the James Monroe building located in Richmond, Virginia can be seen through the window.

Continuity: When Hannibal takes the Inspector's phone, it's supposedly ringing and he speaks on it, but it's turned off - as he pulls it out past the camera we can see that the screen's blank.

Revealing: When Pazzi is visiting Hannibal, you can see a group of monks at the top of some steps waiting for their cue - the camera gets closer to them and they all start walking down.

Factual error: In the scene where Hannibal calls Clarice and gives her 3 seconds to change the battery on the phone, it is possible to change the battery in 3 seconds but you would have to turn the phone back on and let it initialize which would make the whole process take longer then 3 seconds.

Revealing: When we see the FBI agent running through the woods, if you look at the ground you can see track marks. They are consistently the same distance apart and starts once it goes to the angle from the front. Clearly marks from the tracking camera.

Deliberate "mistake": In Silence of the Lambs Starling was right-handed. In Hannibal she is left handed because we see her writing with her left. Julianne Moore, the new actress who plays Starling is left handed whereas Jodie Foster was obviously right-handed.

Continuity: The letter to Clarice is folded twice when she opens it, yet Hannibal is shown folding it once. (It was not a second fold because we see two edges touch, not a fold and one edge.)

Continuity: When the hogs are attacking the dummy in Sardinia, the dummy's head changes from being orange-colored and very fake looking, to realistically fleshy and brown in the close up.

Continuity: During the dinner when Clarice tries to stab Hannibal, his hand goes from on her wrist in one shot to the back of her head in the next.

Continuity: During the brains-for-dinner scene, Clarice sneaks her knife under the table to use against Lecter. A few lines of dialogue and camera angles later, the knife is back on the table, and Clarice sneaks it under the table - again.

Continuity: The third perfume expert grabs Hannibal's letter with a pair of tweezers on its bottom right corner. In the next shot, he's holding the letter on the top edge.

Continuity: In the scene where Hannibal picks up a meat cleaver to chop off the handcuffs attaching him to Starling; in one shot it is covered with chopped herbs, in the next it is clean.

Continuity: On the letter, the P.S. read by Hannibal ends with, "So I'm not sure how well I should wish you, but I'm sure we'll have a lot of fun. Ta ta H." But when Krendler looks at the letter on the board, the P.S. ends with, "I'm not sure how well to wish you. Ta ta H."

Continuity: When Inspector Pazzi introduces 'Dr. Fell' to his wife, in a wider shot she has her hand on her husband's shoulder, just sliding off as the shot cuts. In the closer shot we cut to, however, her hand's back on his shoulder.

Continuity: When Clarice is listening to the tapes from her conversation with Lecter from the first film, Lecter says "You don't have any more vacations to sell to Anthrax Island". But in the original conversation in Silence of the Lambs, Lecter only says "You don't have any more vacations to sell". He never said "...to Anthrax Island". This is arguably a double mistake, as it's part of the conversation that could never have been recorded in the first place anyway.

Continuity: While Clarice stares at Hannibal's letter, we can hear Hannibal reading it aloud. He says, "Your father, the dead night watchman, figures largely in your value system." Yet on the paper it's, "figures large in your value system."

Continuity: In the beginning when Clarice and co. are in the van, there is a shot of Clarice sleeping on her back. The next shot shows her sleeping on her side in a foetal position, and then it shifts back to her sleeping on her back when she opens her eyes.

Continuity: In the scene where Clarice wakes up in Krendler's house heavily drugged, she looks at her things on the chest outside of the room. Her denim jacket is there. However, we see her take this off and leave it in her car when she decides to go in to the Verger barn.

Revealing: At the end of the telephone conversation between Krendler and Verger we see Krendler with his mobile phone, and through Krendler's phone we hear Verger hanging up. The sound we hear is unequivocally that of a receiver being hung up on a desktop telephone, but in all of the shots portraying Verger in this sequence we see him using a mobile phone. With mobile phones a conversation is ended simply by pressing a button—-there is nothing to hang up.