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Mistakes

In District Attorney Trotter's opening statement he asks the jury to convict William Gambini of murder in the first degree and Stan Rothenstein of accessory to murder in the first degree. There is no such crime in the Alabama criminal statutes. It has to be either Capital Murder or just Murder. Alabama does not have different "degrees" of murder. Also the arraignment and trial are both conducted by the same judge. In the Alabama court system a District judge would have conducted the arraignment, while a different Circuit judge would have conducted the jury trial.It's ironic since the director brags about his attention to detail in the DVD director's commentary. He obviously didn't check it too closely. See more...

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During the stuttering lawyer's opening statements, if you look in the backround, you will see Vinny, Stan, and Ralph Macchio laughing. It's really obvious when the lawyer is walking back to the table, and Stan has a smirk on his face, trying not to laugh. See more...

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My Cousin Vinny (1992) - 18 corrections

starring Joe Pesci, Marisa Tomei, Ralph Macchio (add more)

Genres: Comedy, Crime

Comments made in brackets are corrections from other visitors. To submit your own corrections for mistakes, just click "edit" under an entry, then choose "correct entry". You can also submit corrections for corrections, if you think a mistake has been unfairly removed.

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When Vinny calls and questions George Wilbur (his second time on the stand) Vinny noticed Sheriff Farley as he came back into the court. The Sheriff nods at Vinny, and Vinny excuses George Wilbur. Jim Trotter III would have had a chance to ask Mr. Wilbur questions before he would have been dismissed. [Only if he asked for it. Seeing how his case has completely collapsed, he wouldn't even bother.]
Edit Corrected by LorgSkyegon
Right at the end of the movie when Vinny is trying to leave, the judge comes out holding a file and goes to talk to Vinny. We see him come out of the building and then congratulate Vinny on being a good trial lawyer wearing his robe. It even flaps in the breeze slightly. As Vinny and Lisa pull away in the car, the judge in instantaneously wearing a light coloured suit. [I watched this scene closely and he is not wearing his robe. He comes out of the door with a fax in his hand and he is wearing his light colored suit. When he shakes Vinny's hand, he is still wearing his suit, but it only appears darker (because of the angle). When Vinny and Lisa drive away and they're standing on the sidewalk saying goodbye, he is in his suit and it looks lighter.]
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In the final courtroom scene, Vinny writes a note and gives it to the sheriff just before calling Lisa to the stand. While testifying, Lisa reveals that a Pontiac Tempest had to be the only car possible to make the tire marks. Next, the sheriff returns to the stand and testifies that "on a hunch" he runs a check on a blue Pontiac Tempest, which just happened to be involved in another crime. How did the sheriff know, and how did Vinny know to have the sheriff check on a blue Pontiac Tempest if Lisa didn't reveal this information until after Vinny wrote the note? [Vinny apparently knew enough about cars to have made the connection about the Pontiac Tempest. Obviously, his note was asking the sheriff to check if any cars of that make had been involved in any other crime. Then while the sheriff did so, Vinny had Lisa give her testimony. The sheriff's claim to have checked "on a hunch" was slightly tongue-in-cheek.]
Edit Corrected by Chanteuse66
Both Sheriff Farley and George Wilbur are in court when Mona Lisa gives her pivotal evidence regarding the car's skid marks. As both were witnesses (Wilbur was 'still under oath' when he gave his second round of evidence, so he had not been dismissed) they would not be allowed in the court room during any part of the proceedings except while giving their own evidence. [You are correct under normal circumstances, but these witnesses are kept as rebuttal witnesses. They are experts for the government and may be allowed to stay by the judge. Seeing as this judge was a stickler for process, Vinny must have requested they remain in case he required them to address or rebut a specific point, even though they are not his witnesses. Highly unusual in a big city, but not in this town where experts seem to be a premium.]
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The D.A. ends the court case by dismissing the charges against the defendants. Prosecutors don't dismiss cases - they can offer no evidence, effectively ending the case under trial, but only a judge can dismiss charges. This is not a character mistake - the legal difference is critical and no lawyer as highly placed as a state DA would ever make a mistake like that. [His actual words were "The State would like to dismiss all charges". He simply requested that the judge dismiss them, which the judge did.]
Edit Corrected by jhoffman100@yahoo.com
Mona Lisa repeatedly swears while giving evidence, referring to the prosecutor's questions as 'bullshit', amongst other things. Regardless of how careless the judge is about running this case, that would get her a citation for contempt of course, if not worse. [A contempt citation is based entirely on the opinion of the judge. And this judge is smitten with Mona partly because she is hostile towards Vinny.]
Edit Corrected by Rlvlk
Near the end of the trial, when Lisa meets Vinny in Dave's-BBQ, she says she just got her pictures back. These pictures are from the beginning of their trip, because Vinny says one of them is of their first hotel room. However, Vinny used her camera to take pictures of one of the witness's windows and had those developed already, so the pictures of the tire marks and hotel room would have already been developed, too. [Not if the film roll had been changed. She may have filled a roll and swapped it for a fresh one, which Vinny then used to take his pictures and had them developed before Lisa had hers done.]
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Tire marks and a few eye witnesses alone are not enough evidence to take to trial; the prosecution would have needed fingerprints, recovered the money or a gun, gun shot residue, ballistics reports, etc. Lawyers never go to trial unless their case is air-tight, and Trotter's case was all based on circumstantial evidence. [Not all the time do they go with an air-tight case. If they are desperate to get them convicted they are going to try as soon as possible.]
Edit Corrected by Starchild
When the prosecutor meets Vinny in court for the first time he asks him "Is your attorney present?" This would make no sense considering (3) things. (1) He would have had a photo identification of any suspects prior to trial. (2) The sheriff was right behind him in court when they met so the sheriff should have interceded and told the prosecutor that Vinny wasn't the person on trial. And (3) he should have know that he was prosecuting 2 teenagers, not a single grown man. [This statement is intended as an insult. He is mocking Vinny's ability to represent anyone.]
Edit Corrected by wizard_of_gore
In the trial it was mentioned that one of the boys was charged with first-degree murder, and the other was charged with accessory to murder in the first-degree. Because of this the boys would not have been tried together, since the charges are not the same. [Not true. States, in order to cut down on time and court costs try accomplices with the criminal. Also, because that way they don't have to call the same witnesses to two different trials.]
Edit
Why is Joe Pesci referred to as "Mr. Gambini" continuously by the judge, if he is supposedly "Jerry Gallo" and later "Jerry Callo"? Why doesn't the judge call him "Mr. Gallo" if that's who he thinks he is? [Early in the movie, Joe Pesci explains to the judge that Gambini is his "working name" and the name he is registered under is "Gallo" and later, "Callo." The judge buys it. Why? Who knows? But because they explained it that way, the judge is not making mistakes by calling him Gambini.]
Edit Corrected by Zwn Annwn
When Lisa and Vinny are driving from the courthouse they are talking about how he didn't win the case by himself. In one shot a piece of her hair is stuck to her lipstick and in the next shot all of her hair is behind her ears. There are other moments where her hair changes position between shots. [She's in a convertible driving down the road. We should expect to have her hair change positions between shots - and continuously for that matter.]
Edit Corrected by Zwn Annwn
When the two boys, William and Stan, drive away from the "sack-o-suds" they do so in a controlled manner and never "burn rubber" as they leave. They never put any tire marks on the ground as they leave. A huge error considering that the trial turned on the 2 sets of tire marks. [That is the whole point. Those two didn't make the tread marks. But they had to prove that their car was incapable of making them because no one would believe them if they simply said they didn't.]
Edit Corrected by shortdanzr
In the scene where Vinny and Lisa are in the hotel room and Vinny is revealing that he is scared about the trial, Lisa kisses Vinny goodnight and crawls in the bed. As she reaches over to turn off the lamp on the night stand, it shows an ash tray with cigarette butts in it. Neither Lisa or Vinny smoke in the entire movie. [Just because they are never SHOWN smoking doesn't mean that neither of the characters do not smoke. Not a mistake.]
Edit Corrected by Damian Torres Time
At the end courtroom scene where Vinny is questioning Lisa, after she looks at some pictures he asks "does the defense's case hold water?", and she answers "no, the defense is wrong..." What Vinny and Lisa seemed to forget is that THEY were the defense - they were in fact saying that their own case didn't hold water. We can only assume that Vinny meant to ask "does the PROSECUTION'S case hold water", since that's who he was really opposing. [This is not an error. Pesci's character was asking "Does MY argument hold water?" He wanted her to disprove his claim, which would allow for a detailed explanation.]
Edit
The judge does not arrest Vinny in the end because Marisa Tomei's character has called the clerk's office and told them to say that Vinny practices law under the name Jerry Callo, which is the name Vinny has told the judge. However, before Vinny gets the chance to tell Marisa Tomei that, she runs off mad at him. Vinny never shares the infornation with Marisa Tomei, yet she somehow knows it. [This was done intentionally to demonstrate how well Lisa knows Vinny.]
Edit
In the scene where Vinny is describing how the trial will work, using the "brick" explanation, he pulls the Ace of Spades out of the deck and shows it to the camera. Later in the scene, he is waving the card around. Somehow it has now become a Joker. [the change from ace to joker is intentional - vinny is doing a card trick to emphasize his explanation of how the case works.]
Edit
The night before the final day of trial the prosecutor calls Vinny and tells him he "just found out" about "new evidence" that he intends to introduce the next day at trial. However this "new evidence" turns out to be an expert witness who testifies about the type of tyres the shooter's car had. This expert discusses tests he had performed, comparisons he had made, and the results he discovered in reaching his opinions (all past tense). There is simply no way the prosecutor could not have known that an expert had been hired to do the testing and comparing and that all this was going on, so it can't be "new evidence". [It is new evidence because it is testimony from a witness who was not questioned prior to trial, like the other three witnesses.]
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