300 (2006) - 18 mistakes

Continuity: During the first battle against the Immortals, the Arcadian leader draws his sword in a backhand grip with the blade coming out of the bottom of his hand (for an overhand stabbing attack). In the next shot, the sword is in a forehand grip (for a slashing attack).

Continuity: When Leonidas, and presumably all the other Spartans, use their spears to clear their shields of arrows after the arrow shower from Persian archers, the tips of the arrows are still visibly left on all their shields. In the next shot, when the Spartans regroup for the Persian cavalry charge, the arrow tips are gone. (Granted, this is a highly stylized movie based on a comic book, but that does not change the fact that this is a continuity error.)

Continuity: The size of the Spartan's shield changes from the action battle sequences (smaller) to the scenes where they are more stationary, as well as, during the arrow attack (larger), presumably allowing greater mobility while fighting. This was confirmed in the Director's Commentary.

Continuity: When the Spartans push off the last people of the the first Persian rush into the water, the shot changes to the Spartans left and we see the Persians falling off the cliff. The sun is bright and behind the falling Persians. After all the Persians have fallen off the Spartans turn their backs to the sun to see arrows being shot at them. As the camera pans up to follow the arrows, the sun is now in front of the Spartans, thus "blotting" out the sun.

Continuity: The shoulder buckle on the Oracle keeps switching shoulders during her trance scene.

Continuity: Just before Astinos' death, immediately after his father calls to him saying "Astinos, my son", throughout the following shot of Astinos, the horse and rider can be seen in the dust, midway between the ill-fated young man and the right-hand side of the screen, stationary and waiting for his cue. Only after the cut-back to the Captain where he nods in approval is the rider then seen in motion riding towards his target.

Revealing: In the first major battle between the 300 Spartans and the Persians, Leonidas is slaughtering the Persians and the speed of the scene goes from slow motion to fast motion, you see very realistic CGI blood. When the blood hits the the ground it suddenly disappears. This happens many times during this long and awesome scene.

Revealing: When the Persian messenger waits by the large well for the Spartan king to contemplate submission or otherwise, the Spartan king looks at a woman hugging a little girl. The Spartan woman appears to be wearing a modern day cupped bra under her clothing.

Visible crew/equipment: When the camera is focused on an actors face, most of the time you can see white screens and stage lights in their eyes.

Factual error: In at least one scene, near the end of the film, metallic alloy dental fillings can be seen inside King Leonidas' mouth. Fillings of this type were not used until the 7th century A.D.

Revealing: When the baby is being "inspected" in the beginning, it is pretty obvious that in some of the wideshots that it is just a dummy and not the real baby.

Revealing: Leonidas gets cut over his eye during his battle with the Uber Immortal. During several close-ups of Leonidas after the battle you can easily see that the "cut" below his eye is nothing more than a red line. Doesn't look anything like a cut or scratch.

Revealing: After Leonidas pushes the Persian messenger down the rather large hole he turns around to walk away. In that shot (when he is walking away) you can see that the scar on the top left corner of his chest is only a prosthetic because it has come unglued and is lifted up.

Continuity: After the girl in Leonidas's arms tells her story about the town being ransacked, she rests her head on his shoulder. In the next, more far away shot, her head is no longer resting against his shoulder. The transition between the shots was too quick for her to have moved her head.

Revealing: In any close up of the God-King, particularly in the first meeting with Leonidas, it is obvious that all his piercing aren't real. There is flesh-coloured adhesive joining the rings to his face.

Revealing: When a Spartan is climbing down from the walls, he steps on a Persian body, and his foot sinks right into the corpse, showing that this "body" is a stuffed dummy. (The body is not boneless, drained of blood, or crushed by the Spartan's foot. It's a mannequin.)

Revealing: Several of the characters is the film have tuberculosis vaccine scars on their upper left arms. Queen Gorgo and Daxos are the readily apparent ones.

Continuity: Every time Leonidas had his helmet on, he all of the sudden has black make-up around his eyes. This was of course just to make the movie resemble the dark style of the drawings of the comic book, but a mistake nonetheless.