Animal House
Animal House mistake picture

Revealing mistake: When Bluto is watching the sorority girls have their pillow fight and he falls down with the ladder, you can see him land on a grass mat that is cut into the lawn. It's funny because you can see the grass push in. (00:40:00)

Animal House mistake picture

Continuity mistake: During the classroom scene, Donald Sutherland writes the word "Satan" on the board. In the first shot, the "t" in Satan in directly over the crease on the chalkboard. In the next shot, it is clearly on one side of the crease. (00:18:00)

Animal House mistake picture

Continuity mistake: When the Fraternity house is being taken down, the Greek letters switch places. (01:06:05 - 01:06:55)

Factual error: The car Flounder drives is a 1964 model, built beginning late in 1963, but the events of the movie take place in 1962. (00:45:40 - 01:08:25)

Factual error: At Professor Jennings' place, the stoned Boon and Katy sing "Hey Paula." The song was only pressed in November 1962 and didn't break into the charts nationally until late December of that year, whereas the scene depicted takes place sometime in the autumn of the same year, before the song would've even been recorded.

Animal House mistake picture

Visible crew/equipment: In the scene just prior to the food fight, as John Belushi goes through the cafeteria line putting the food on his tray (which moves frequently), note the cameraman's feet in the mirror over the food following him. (00:33:30)

Animal House mistake picture

Continuity mistake: When Bluto is looking through the window of the girls' bedroom, the shot from behind him shows his shoulders are just above the window sill. The shots from inside the room show him to be a lot higher than this. (00:38:35)

Animal House mistake picture

Factual error: In the scene where Pinto buys/shoplifts food from the grocery store and meets the Mayor's daughter, the cash register has an LCD display. A little too futuristic for a flick set in '62. (00:47:30)

Animal House mistake picture

Continuity mistake: In the scene where Otter and Boon are hitting golf balls near the ROTC drills, Otter puts down the golf bag he is carrying and draws a club. The camera moves to the ROTC trainees, and when it comes back to the golfers, the bag is back on Otter's shoulder and there is no club out of the bag. (00:20:10)

Revealing mistake: In the scene where the Mayor is giving his speech just before the parade begins, there is a man sitting in the bleachers behind him making bizarre faces and hilarious facial ticks in plain view of the camera. (01:34:05)

Continuity mistake: When Otter is making out with Shelly from Dickinson college, in the back of the car she is shown with her bra off, and it is hanging on her right arm by one strap. When the guys come running out of the club seconds later to make their escape, Shelly is shown jumping out of the car and diving through the window of the car parked next to it, but her bra is now on and hooked as if it hadn't been removed yet. (01:16:30 - 01:17:15)

Visible crew/equipment: Near the end of the movie during the parade riot and Bluto is trying to escape, he jumps up on top of a building. You can see one of the uniformed soldiers bending down to give him help up onto the awning. (01:40:05)

Continuity mistake: During the toga party, the mustard stain on Bloto's toga, disappears and reappears. (00:55:45)

Factual error: Boon is using a payphone and behind him, at the left of the screen is the front end of a 'coffin-nosed' 1974-78 AMC Matador sedan, a car built a dozen-plus years after the events of the film. (01:18:10)

johnrosa

Continuity mistake: When Bluto is spying on the girls of the sorority house, all of the blinds are up giving him a good look. In the next shot when he moves the ladder to a nearby window, all of the blinds are down.

Animal House mistake picture

Continuity mistake: Before the hearing, Katy and Boone are talking at the bottom (half) of a stairwell when Otter comes down with a briefcase in his right hand and he puts his left hand on Boone's shoulder. In the next shot the briefcase is now in his left hand with his right hand on Boone. (01:00:55)

Factual error: When Karen Allen is in the kitchen she passes a fridge that has a Bicentennial sticker on it. The movie was set in 1962 and the Bicentennial didn't happen until 1976. (01:21:40)

ShooterMcGavin34

Factual error: When Larry and Kent first arrive at Delta house, and again after the new pledges are accepted, the Kingsmen version of "Louie Louie" is heard playing. This version was not recorded until April 1963, but the movie takes place in the autumn of 1962.

Factual error: After trying unsuccessfully to call Katie at the all-night cafe, Boone questions where she could be at six in the morning. The scene occurs during broad daylight. If the time were accurate, this could not be so, since it occurred in November. (01:18:30)

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: Depending whether or not daylight savings time has ended at that point. If it has and the clocks are an hour earlier now, then it would be brighter by 6 a.m. then if they had not yet. There's no sun in the scene so this could explain it as a possibility.

Katy: Boon, I think I'm in love with a retard.
Boon: Is he bigger than me?

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Trivia: During the scene where John Belushi is sneaking around, you see him slip and then get back up. The slip was accidental but the film makers left it in the movie.

manthabeat

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Question: Near the end, when Dean Wormer and Mayor DePasto are in the grandstand, officially launching the parade, there is an elderly gentleman in the background (also in the grandstand, about 2 levels up, on the left side of the screen) who is making odd, excited gestures and comical facial expressions. His appearance and odd mannerisms are so striking that he draws my attention away from the dean and the mayor every time that I've seen this film, and that's a lot of times. Surely, director John Landis must have been aware of the gentleman and his antics in the background through multiple takes, so it would seem Landis intended the peculiar distraction. Who was that gentleman, and was there any significance to his appearing in the scene?

Charles Austin Miller

Answer: Sometimes these things get left in because it's simply the best take. (The child covering his ears before the gunshot in "North by Northwest," for example.) It could also be that John Landis cast the extra because he wanted someone with goofy expressions in the crowd. He simply could have told the extras "Ok, be excited that you're at a parade," and that's how this extra did it.

Captain Defenestrator

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