Deliberate mistake: When Leonard snaps a picture of Jimmy's body his head is lying between his shoulders looking straight up, but in the polaroid his head is lying to the right, and it is, in fact, a different actor altogether. (01:39:10)
Deliberate mistake: When Denzel Washington is in the bathroom, he discovers the camera monitoring him from the air vent, by seeing the light on the front of the camera. Any spy with common sense would not install a hidden camera with a light on it.
Deliberate mistake: As Nancy and her Mum are leaving Rod's funeral, you can see the shot of them leaving the funeral has been sped up. Watch the Volvo "jerk" as it pulls away as the speed is rapidly increased.
Deliberate mistake: In Raymond's flashback to "when he was once loved" there is a scene where he is having dinner with the Senator and his daughter. Evidently someone didn't feel that this scene was quite long enough as shot. Raymond picks up a piece of meat on his fork, puts it in his mouth and then begins to laugh. Then he puts the empty fork back into his mouth, removes the piece of meat and replaces it onto his plate. Obviously, the film was reversed briefly to give the illusion of a longer scene.
Deliberate mistake: In the beginning, the police chief says "The six members of the family were found last night, in bed, shot and killed." As he says this, look to the left of the screen. In the background, the real Amityville house (dark brown with white windows and trim) is shown instead of the house used in the rest of the film. That segment was from actual news footage of the murders from 1974; apparently, the director didn't want to recreate it.
Deliberate mistake: When Rachel researches Anna Morgan in the Seattle PI newspaper archives she looks through hardback books. The PI has not only been using microfilm and computer archives for years but archives are available on line at www.seattlepi.com.
Deliberate mistake: After the killer nails Shannon to the ceiling, he apparently has time to remove all the nails from the wall where he originally shot her, spackle, paint and clean up all the blood before the police arrive and examine the apartment.
Deliberate mistake: When Alex is in the cabin opening the can the pull tab is already lifted up making it easier to open because he is wearing gloves. It was already up when he took the wrapper off.
Deliberate mistake: The extras used in the scene when Danny gets assigned the case appear again as members of the jury. If Danny's colleagues were called as jury members for a trial all would have to declare a conflict of interest and be ineligible to hear the case. (00:09:30 - 01:03:25)
Deliberate mistake: As the sub rises backwards to the surface, the stern emerges from the water at a steep angle, then rises near-vertically so that the boat is virtually standing on the tip of its bow. Anything left loose on a countertop would surely fall off. But when the boat falls onto its belly, a close-up shows a pistol sliding off a sink counter into the hand of the Captain- because it's dramatic and cool looking, yet extremely improbable- especially considering that an open tin of shaving foam, its lid and a foam brush all lay on the same counter, undisturbed. (01:27:30)
Deliberate mistake: It's not particularly believable that the away team to stop the assassination would consist of the ship's entire senior staff, and raises the question of who was left in charge of the bridge (the answer: apparently nobody, as they return to a completely deserted bridge). Of course this is dramatic license, and at this point the audience won't care or likely even notice.
Deliberate mistake: When White almost fights with Exley in the street and is pulled away, the public mailbox by the side of the road is all blue. Mailboxes back then were red on top and blue on the bottom.
Deliberate mistake: When Ringo sprays his assassin with orange juice, it doesn't reach as far as the sofa. But it still splashes over the inch-high Paul. Even if it had flown that far, Paul is on the far side of the sofa and the angle is impossible.
Deliberate mistake: Towards the end of the movie, when Van Damme and the Sandman are fighting in the boiler room, the Sandman gets kicked into an open furnace for some time and then jumps out covered in flames. It's noticeable that he still has a full head of hair, which is impossible. Hair would be the first thing burnt right down to the scalp within a matter of seconds.
Deliberate mistake: In the facial morph, the faces don't come anywhere close. The face was morphed with no feature of either resembling the other. The only matching features were the hair and neck which were not touched by the morph. The midpoint of the shift wreaks of Photoshop-like effects (softening of the face alone). (00:41:50)
Deliberate mistake: The mystery begins as Winston points out the postmark on the envelope that Dan receives, it is too faint to see where it's from. But whenever we see a close up of the envelope, there is no postmark at all.
Deliberate mistake: In the scene where the FBI agents are transporting Lester Cowans in a car and telling him all his friends have confessed, for about three seconds the scenery goes by backwards. For some reason, the shot is played in reverse.
Deliberate mistake: When the CA. trooper is at the front of her car, the Arizona license plate is shown. In 1989, Arizona began issuing a single license plate and that plate is always on the back of the vehicle. This is deliberate, as the remake follows the original movie shot by shot, and there the trooper checks the front license plate.
Deliberate mistake: At the beginning, Alice turns on the tea kettle and it starts whistling less than a half a minute after it's turned on. It'd take alot longer. (00:10:00)
Deliberate mistake: When Leota is in the front seat of the automobile, the air bag is still full. Air bags will deploy and then immediately deflate to prevent people (or women in crystal balls) from being trapped. (01:10:45)