Best horror movie mistakes of all time

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The Fly picture

Plot hole: The whole problem with the teleporter occurs when fly DNA is mixed in with Seth Brundle's DNA, starting his transformation into the Brundlefly. Brundle is on a hiding to nothing from the word go, and the fly is irrelevant. Humans are a walking talking mass of foreign DNA - we are host to one trillion bacteria all of which has a complete complement of DNA, as do various tiny mites that live in our hair follicles and all sorts of single cell organisms in our gut. If the transporter serves to mix the DNA of all living creatures which are in the transporter pod at the time Brundle would turn into a half-man, half-bacteria. Incidentally, DNA from a bacteria, an amoeba or a hair follicle mite would be just as 'compatible' with human DNA as that from an insect. It's quite a simple chemical, really.

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Suggested correction: Being as how the bacteria and mites and such were IN or ON Seth, the machine was able to organize those symbiotic relationships accordingly as teleporting one would teleport all. The fly was separate, not touching. The machine was not programmed to anticipate two separated entities and so combined them into one on the other side.

Phixius

We leave behind a vapour trail of bacteria and viruses (among other things) as we walk, in our breath and emanations from pores in our skin, and Brundle isn't trapping any in his clothes as he isn't wearing any. Brundle has an invisible cloud of DNA floating around him in that teleportation chamber and as far as the machine is concerned their DNA has exactly the same status as that of the fly.

We don't know enough about how the machine works to determine how it might differentiate different DNA types. Unexplained science means it's somehow able to do it. Willing suspension of disbelief for the win.

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Chernobyl Diaries picture

Factual error: The idea that anyone survived living long term in Pripyat Hospital is absurd. At the time the film was set the hospital was still radioactive and prolonged exposure by living there would be fatal. Nobody could survive on the grounds for more than two or three months without receiving a lethal dose of radioactivity. Incidentally, prolonged exposure to radioactivity doesn't turn you into a deranged zombie - it turns you into a corpse.

PEDAUNT

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The Purge: Election Year picture

Continuity mistake: When the Senator is about to be sacrificed, the cloth on her mouth immediately disappears for a split second. (01:29:35)

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The Wicker Man picture

Other mistake: During his conversation with the landlord of the pub he ends up staying in, Sergeant Howie makes it clear that he did not intend to stay on Summerisle overnight, that he had been delayed and so needed accommodation. Makes you wonder why he packed his pyjamas. He's wearing them when Britt Ecklund does her famous naked song and dance routine, and they are not new so we know he didn't buy them that day. When he arrived he didn't even think he'd be on Summerisle for more than a few hours - we don't see him with so much as an overnight bag.

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The Texas Chainsaw Massacre picture

Factual error: This movie states that it is during the year 1973, yet in the beginning of the movie when they are driving in the van they are listening to "Sweet Home Alabama" by Lynyrd Skynyrd. This song was not released publicly until 1974. (00:03:10)

juiicyyxo

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Darkman picture

Other mistake: At the carnival, you can see an African-American man staring at the camera for a while. I am unsure if he is a crew-member watching over the scene, or if he is just an extra trying to get onscreen.

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Suggested correction: He isn't staring at the camera. He's glancing over at Peyton and Julie as they are joyously dancing upon exiting the ferris wheel.

Phaneron

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The Ring picture

Revealing mistake: In the scene when the main character is in the library on the internet, she goes to a couple of websites. When the shot shows the URL up top, it is C:\windows98\mydocuments\etc.html. Instead of actually searching on the web they used a premade html page and accessed it from their computer.

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Jaws 4 picture

Factual error: At the end when the shark is attacking the boat and the electronic device is used you can hear the shark roar. Sharks cannot produce this sound since they have no vocal cords.

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Blade picture

Continuity mistake: When Frost has the head pure-blood vampire on the beach, after he pulls out his first vampire tooth you see blood all over his mouth, but when it shows the close up of him pulling out the other tooth, there is no blood. (01:04:22)

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An American Werewolf in Paris picture

Plot hole: When Andy turns into a werewolf, he kills both Amy and Detective Benbou. Later in the morgue, Amy tells him because of this that she is forced to become his "rotting sidekick." If this is completely true, then Detective Benbou should also be following Andy around but he isn't seen after Andy manages to escape from the morgue.

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A House on the Bayou picture

Factual error: Towards the end of the movie, two characters finally make it to a Louisiana sheriff's office. The sign out front reads, "Vierge County." There are no counties in Louisiana, only parishes.

TXTerry

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The Evil Dead picture The Evil Dead mistake picture

Continuity mistake: When Cheryl is running through the woods, she is wearing slippers that stay on up until she reaches the cabin door. However, in following shots, she is shown barefoot, and when Ash opens the door her foot is dirty as if she'd been running barefoot the whole time. (00:28:05 - 00:29:10)

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Cube picture

Deliberate mistake: Leaven spends too much time thinking about if 645 and 372 are prime numbers to be believable. But she knows the factors of 649 and the result of 26 to the power of 3 almost immediately. Plus anyone with any maths knowledge whatsoever would know that any even number (or one divisible by 5) can't be prime, so 645 and 372 could be dismissed without even thinking about it.

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Jeepers Creepers picture

Continuity mistake: About 10 minutes into the movie, when the truck is chasing the 2 college students in the car and starts ramming them, the bumper and the trunk is smashed in. The shot changes and shows the car's rear end and it is in perfect condition. This repeats at least 3 times.

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The Haunting picture

Revealing mistake: Right after Nell sends Hugh to hell, Dr. Marrow and Theo come out of hiding behind a pillar. As Marrow puts his hand on the pillar, it squishes in as if it was made of foam rubber, instead of stone. (01:39:50)

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Resident Evil: Afterlife picture

Continuity mistake: Right after Bennett takes off in the plane, Claire throws a gun to Alice. Between the slow-motion shots, the gun switches position in mid-air before Alice catches it. In the shot of Claire throwing it, the barrel is facing to the right, meaning that it should be facing to the left in the shot of Alice catching it. But it still faces the right when she does. (00:58:30)

THGhost

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Halloween picture

Factual error: Federal institutions have strict rules for inmates or patients based on the reason for their incarceration, including substituting metal utensils with safer plastic ones. Despite being convicted of brutally killing his family, Myers is still trusted with a sharp metal fork - resulting in the nurse's death.

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Scream 3 picture

Other mistake: On the back cover of Scream 3 in the Scream trilogy on DVD, the town of the original killings is referred to as Greensboro twice. The correct name of the town is Woodsboro, of course.

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Suggested correction: I'm not "correcting" this per se, but I'm wondering if there should be either a separate type of mistake for things like DVD/Blu-Ray cases or posters (Ex. "Multimedia and Marketing Mistakes" or something like that), or if these things would be better classified as trivia? Especially since it's not something everyone can necessarily observe watching the movie itself. (Ex. My Blu-Ray and 4K releases don't have this mistake.) If not, feel free to downvote/delete this. I've just seen a few of these mistakes over the years here, and it always seems a little off to me since it's not something wrong with the film itself.

TedStixon

I agree these aren't valid movie mistake if the studio wasn't involved in the mistake. It could be trivia if only certain home releases had them. These mistakes are like when episodes are aired out of order creating continuity issues,, streaming services make changes, or closed captioning (not subtitles) gets something wrong. It can't be considered a mistake of the film or TV series.

Bishop73

It's tricky - largely, if I'm honest, because adding new types to the site is incredibly fiddly. :-) There's also room for endless debate about what's a "mistake", whether it's about assigning specific blame or just looking for interesting stuff. Likewise things that can only be seen in slow motion, which arguably warrant a category to themselves because there are plenty of them, but then the "mistakes" section gets cluttered. Becomes a user interface issue as much as anything! Will think.

Jon Sandys

I'm not disagreeing with this post, it's the only way I can reply. But yes, for the first run of the VHS and the DVD of Scream 3, there is that typo on the back cover. Now knowing that, is that version worth more money?

Probably not, the chances of there being a collector's market for it is slim.

Ssiscool

While misprints can sometimes add to something's value, I don't think this would necessarily make this release more valuable. Perhaps the VHS version just because there is something of a collector's market for VHS tapes now. But the movies have been released on DVD, Blu-Ray and 4K so many times, I don't see the DVD version being worth significantly more. (Unless you find a really weird collector who would specifically want THAT version.)

TedStixon

Yes, there is that typo. They were the first run of the VHS.

I didn't say there wasn't a typo. I was questioning whether a typo on the cover would technically qualify as a movie mistake, since it's not part of the actual film.

TedStixon

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World War Z picture

Factual error: An An-12, the aircraft the main character uses to fly all over the world, has a maximum range of about 3,500 miles. Hardly enough to fly from the US to South Korea or from South Korea to Israel. The An-12 also miraculously transforms into a C-130 in a couple of filler scenes. And why is this ex-Soviet aircraft marked in USAF markings, assigned to McGuire AFB?

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Suggested correction: Can't speak to the second half of your paragraph (should really post as 3 separate mistakes) but as for the first, a range of 3500 miles, aircraft such as the kc-135 exist and aerial refueling is fairly common place. Considering it's a mission supported by the acting UN Secretary General to stop a world crisis, resources could have been diverted for refueling.

The initial launch from the carrier is a C-130 which can do this (if empty, minimal fuel, has the full length of the flight deck and the carrier is steaming full ahead into the wind). It then morphs into an AN-12 and back to a Hercules. They make the point that this small fleet is what is known to remain of allied forces so not sure where any tanker support will come from. Many movies have ridiculous range issues with aircraft anyway.

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