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Ben Stiller got the idea of Tropic Thunder during filming of the 1987 war movie Empire of the Sun. See more...
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Tropic Thunder (2008) - 24 mistakes
Directed by Ben Stiller, starring Ben Stiller, Brandon T. Jackson, Jack Black, Robert Downey Jr., Steve Coogan, Tom Cruise (add more)
Continuity: Just after the ambush scene, Speedman walks towards Lazarus and speaks to him, the camera viewing from behind Speedman's point of view. The very next shot shows it from behind Lazarus with Lazarus looking back in suspicion. There is a noticeable difference in the level of day light between these shots. Like an hour has passed with the sun going down.
Continuity: In the scene where the group is first attacked by the heroin terrorists, if you look closely at the two scenes where Speedman is shooting back at them, you can see two men wearing a pith hat behind Speedman. In the first scene, the man is on Speedman's left, and in the cut back scene, the pith man is seen on his right.
Plot hole: In the scene where Speedman and Lazarus are discussing their acting and Lazarus tells him to never go full retard. It shows these two leading the group, however they stop and talk for quite a while, and the rest of the group are nowhere to be seen until Speedman and Lazarus start moving again. The group finally caught up with them. If at this time, Speedman was still leading the way with the map, how could the group even find these two after being left behind enough distance that this conversation could take place?
Other: After the part where Cockburn explodes to bits on a mine, Speedman finds and picks up his walkie talkie as Cody is trying to communicate through it. The device is not only smoldering hot, causing Speedman to have to drop it, but it even appears to be melted. With the amount of heat it went though, much less the jar of the explosion, it should not have been still working at all. The 'actors' should not have heard Cody though it. Not only this, but the establishing shot of it on the ground shows the antenna snapped and broken over.
Factual error: In the helicopter scene at the end of the movie, after the RPG is launched at the Huey Helicopter, Danny McBride pulls back violently on the cyclic stick between his legs to avoid the rocket, but instead of moving backwards, the helicopter ascends in altitude, which would only happen when the pilot pulls up on the collective stick, located on his left. Pulling back on the cyclic with that amount of force would have certainly caused the helicopter to crash into the trees located behind the aircraft.







