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Mistakes

When Bond is fighting the twin on the top of the train, there is a carriage behind them, but when both of them fall off the train, the carriage has suddenly disappeared. See more...

Trivia

At the end of the pre-credits sequence, Bond says to the gas station attendant "Fill her up". Director John Glen initially removed the quip, but after he went to his local cinema and caught the trailer for "Octopussy", he realised it went down well with the audiences and decided to reinstate it. See more...

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Octopussy (1983) - 17 corrections

Directed by John Glen, starring Desmond Llewelyn, Lois Maxwell, Louis Jourdan, Maud Adams, Robert Brown, Roger Moore (add more)

Genres: Action, Adventure, Thriller

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.

Mistakes
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When Bond falls between the railway carriages fighting the man with the scimitar, the brake hose is sliced and Bond sprays him with the air rushing out. If these lines are cut or broken, the brakes in the entire train come on automatically and stop the train, they cannot be cut and the train keep moving. I am a train driver, and this is called (obviously) "Losing all your air" and stops a train quick smart. [As this is a steam train, and given the henchman's reaction to getting the gas in his face, I suspect these may be steam heat pipes rather than air brake pipes.]
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The performance of the Octopussy Circus is amazing. After the performers left K-M-Stadt by train, the Russian soldier explains in the train that the maximum delay of explosion for the bomb is four hours. After the train has crossed the inner-German border, Gobinda activates the bomb, which will be deactivated by Bond just in time. Within these four hours: 1) the circus goes about 100 km from the border to the US base "Feldstadt" near Nürnberg (to be seen by the "N" on the numberplates of the police cars) 2) the circus celebrates a parade through Feldstadt 3) the circus people put up the tent 4) the circus performs a whole show. [Most circuses had more than one train so that the tents etc could be set up by the time the rest of the circus arrived. Octopussy's Circus also has more than one train as there are no vehicles in the train for carrying animals, yet the circus has elephants and horses. So it's likely the tent had already been erected at the air base by the time the circus train arrives. It also wouldn't be too much of a stretch to assume the train doing an average speed of 60mph, which would have it arriving in Neustadt at around 1pm - plenty of time for a parade before the circus begins at 3pm. And there isn't a complete show performed - the bomb is timed to go off 45 mins in whilst most people are in the tent. However the performance is cancelled after the bomb is discovered.]
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There is no way Bond has time to switch the Faberge eggs. You can see his fingers the whole way below the booklet. His finger position does not change. It is impossible that he opened his fingers and grabbed the other egg in that motion. [I have re-watched this scene dozens of times; in the fraction of a second that his hand is behind the booklet a person with good sleight-of-hand skills could drop one egg and pick up another. Not very likely that he could have made the switch and positioned his hand on the fake egg exactly as it was on the real egg, but not impossible.]
Edit Time
At the end of Octopussy, in the credits it says "James Bond will return in From A View To A Kill"; but the film he returns in is just called "A View To A Kill." [Trivia, not a movie mistake. At the time of Octopussy's release, the upcoming film was still called From A View To A Kill until its title was changed later on.]
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Q isn't a field agent, so why would they send him over to keep surveillance on Bond while he's in Octopussy's island mansion? [This is a question, not a mistake. Q was already there to give Bond his equipment. This was a low-risk assignment keeping watch on Bond from across the lake (even though it did prove fatal to Vijay). It is never specified in the series if Q is or is not trained as a field agent, but he does relish the opportunity to get out in the field on several occasions.]
Edit Corrected by BocaDavie
Kamal says, "The egg has been recovered" to Octopussy. And then, "You should be pleased." She replies, "I'm not pleased; it was stolen in the first place." Well, Kamal just brought the original egg back - but it was the fake that was stolen. [She's pissed that her security wasn't good enough to prevent it from being stolen, real or fake.]
Edit Corrected by Grumpy Scot
How does old Q manage to float into the middle of a gun battle in the castle, knocking out some soldiers, without being at least shot at by a stray bullet? He doesn't even take cover in the basket. And when he lands, his balloon stays inflated and still nobody shoots at it. Fat chance of the bad guys hitting James Bond if they can't hit a hot air balloon. [This happens during the most intense part of the battle. Khan's henchmen have their hands full with Octopussy's gang, who have already taken out all the men on the walls and towers - thus clearing the path for the balloon.]
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When Bond and Khan are playing backgammon, Khan says that Bond "must" throw a double 6. But Khan's pieces are on the 3&4 spaces, which would not guarantee him a win. [Bond has four pieces on the board at 2, 3, 6 and 6 (a close-up shows this). So a double-six is the only single roll that would win.]
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When Bond is taking off with his Mini-Jet he nearly hits the jeeps and trucks that are chasing him. The landing gear is still down. After the cut you can see the scene from the other side and now the gear is up. [This is normal. He retracted the undercarraige as a matter of course, and it can happen that quickly sometimes.]
Edit
When Bond is taken prisoner in the opening sequence, all we see in the background is flat ground and some hills. But when Bond flies the mini jet back to the base, he seems to be flying over what looks like a canyon. Talk about changing geography. [The ArCo Starjet Bond is flying can do 600km an hour - if we was in the air for ten minutes he'd be 100km from the Air Force base from which he escaped. Plenty of space for a major change in the geography.]
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When Bond first visits the circus the scene opens with the knife-throwing act. If you slow the dvd/video down you can see the holes made by the knives before they hit the board, proving that the scene was shown in reverse ie the knives were really pulled out of the board. [If this mistake can only be seen using the slow motion playback, it really can't be considered an error. Using slow motion to "prove" that special effects were used instead of the real thing doesn't really constitute a true movie mistake.]
Edit Corrected by BGraz
In the beginning of the movie Bond's predecessor is killed in the line of duty while clutching a counterfeit Faberge egg. In an effort to sniff out the counterfeiters Bond attends a Sotheby's event where the real egg is being put up for auction. When bond returns to headquarters, we're told and Bond modestly brags to his superiors that through careful slight of hand he switched his counterfeit egg with the real egg during the bidding process. So the buyer (the bad guy) purchased the fake egg instead. Back at headquarters (after the auction/switch scene) Q inserts a bugging device in what would have to be the real egg. Later in the movie however, the fake egg is destroyed over an argument between the two bad guys which results in the bug being exposed. How did the bug get implanted into the fake egg? Q put the bug into the real egg after Bond came back to headquarters from the auction. [General Orlov destroyed the real egg. That is why Kamal Khan is so "shocked" when he does it since he wanted to keep the real one. General Orlov believes it is the fake egg though and crushes it.]
Edit Corrected by Zwn Annwn
When Bond flies the mini-jet through the hangar, he banks the wings to get through the closing doors, to the point where the wings are vertical as the plane exits the building. The problem is, aircraft are turned by banking the wings; if the wings are banked, the aircraft is turning, and the greater the bank, the tighter the turn. The hangar would have had to be almost u-shaped for Bond to have made it through. [The Arco Starjet seen in the film is perfectly capable of flying with the wings vertically inclined as shown. The Aerilons on the wings are used to compensate the roll and the rudder to stop the turn.]
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When Bond's mini-jet runs out of fuel, he coasts into a back-water gas station and tells the attendant to fill it up. However, jet engines do not run on gasoline. They burn jet fuel, which is essentially kerosene. [Yes, but you never see the attendant fill up the plane either. The statement from Bond is a joke - he knows he will not be able to refuel here, but in his usual style he wisecracks a little. After all, he is relieved that he succesfully completed his mission and escaped across the border.]
Edit Corrected by Twotall
Near the start where Bond is trying to evade the missile in his mini jet plane, the sound becomes the distinctive discordant scream of a diving propeller driven plane (think World War II dive bomber), rather than the whistle of a jet engine it should have. [The "distinctive discordant scream" is the airflow over the wings, not the sound of the engine. Some low-speed jets make this sound, and the Arco Starjet Bond is flying is one of them.]
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"All Time High" is the only James Bond theme song that does not contain the title of the film within its lyrics. [Not true, it's one of two instances. OHMSS's theme is Louis Armstrong's We Have All The Time In The World - which does not contain the words 'On Her Majesty's Secret Service' anywhere in its lyrics.]
Edit Corrected by Chimera
After James and the Yo-Yo assassin fall into the water, one of them is eaten by a crocodile/alligator. We see the arms of the victim being pulled under and he has sleeves. This must be James, as the Indian had no shirt on. [Soon after Bond is eaten by the alligator, there's a shot of Q on the bank where he was fishing. The alligator pulls up next to Q and Bond pops out. It was just an invention, not a real alligator.]
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