Schindler's List

Factual error: When the camera took a shot on a train coming to a station in Czechoslovakia, you can see electric cables above the train tracks. There was no such thing in Czechoslovakia as electrified trains in the 1940's. The electrification started in the 1950's. (00:01:05)

Continuity mistake: Amon Goeth pulls out a German Luger to shoot the rabbi. The Luger jams so Goeth pulls out another pistol and pulls the slide back indicating a semi-auto handgun. The second also fails. Goeth gets frustrated and throws the gun on the ground. When the other Nazi picks it up, it's magically a revolver. (01:28:05)

Continuity mistake: When Schindler is leaving the factory, at the end of the movie, he starts to sob "I could have saved more". Two women approach him from the left side and hug him. When the angle changes the women are back behind and repeat the whole movement again.

Sacha

Continuity mistake: At the end of the movie all the prisoners are sitting outside the factory when a horseback rider shows up. Itzhak Stern and a few people close to him stand up. When the angle changes they are seated.

Sacha

Factual error: In the beginning, when the Germans are setting up the tables to record the names, one German puts down a plastic stamp pad. Stamp pads of that era were metal.

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: Not true. Rubber stamp pads were invented in 1866. By WW2 they were easily available.

stiiggy

I do not believe the mistake refers to the stamp itself or the ink pad, but to the container holding the ink pad. The stamp is made of rubber, but the ink pad should be contained in metal.

wizard_of_gore

Personally I think it is a metal stamp pad. Maybe a second pair of eyes to confirm? At 1:31 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UoF6uIQOK8.

lionhead

That is a very tough call. The pad sounds plastic when placed upon the table as the sound is rather light whereas a metal pad would more likely have more of a thud than is heard.

Ssiscool

It could have easily been celluloid or Bakelite - both had been around for decades.

Revealing mistake: In the scene where the women are laying in their bunks in the work camp and one lady is describing what she heard about the horrors of other concentration camps, at the end one woman puts up her hands to her face. You can see her fingernails are neatly manicured, something you'd think wouldn't be possible in a forced labor camp.

Continuity mistake: After Amon shoots the second worker the camera is behind him and shows him aiming for another shot. The angle then changes to below and from the front and he is standing up with the rifle above his head.

AdmRose

Continuity mistake: When the Germans invade the Ghetto, one Jew pretends to be working for the Germans by picking up the luggage. He drops one suitcase right next to his foot when he salutes to the Germans. After the next shot which shows the Germans laughing, the suitcase is much further away from his foot.

Continuity mistake: After Schindler has negotiated with Goeth about continuing with the pot factory, there's a view of the entrance to the camp. In the close shots Schindler is almost alone, with a woman standing on the right. In medium shots there's a lot of people surrounding him.

Sacha

Continuity mistake: When the German commandant is speaking to the female servant in the basement his hands are at his side. The camera angle changes and his hands are in front of him.

AdmRose

Revealing mistake: In the scene where the woman engineer is executed by Goeth's henchman, watch closely. First, her hair goes from being clear of her forehead, before she is thrown on the ground, to hanging in a fringe, so as to conceal the makeup appliance that replicates her being shot. Then, when she falls, a tube can be seen attached to her leg from an appliance on the ground.

Visible crew/equipment: When Schindler and Goeth are having a conversation in Goeth's villa, and Goeth says that he knows that Schindler wants his own sub-camp, you can see the shadow of the camera on Schindler's right arm.

Factual error: In the opening scenes at the nightclub when Oscar is treating his new friends to dinner, they are singing "The Happy Wanderer" ("Der Fröhliche Wanderer"). This song was written by Friedrich-Wilhelm Moller shortly after WWII. The nightclub scene was supposed to have taken place in 1939. (00:09:10 - 00:10:10)

Continuity mistake: In the beginning, a German sets up a table with an ink bottle on it. The cap of the bottle goes from the left of the bottle to the right of the bottle between shots.

Sacha

Factual error: When the train containing the women leaves Krakow-Plaszow and is mistakenly rerouted to Auschwitz (roughly 25 miles west of Krakow), the train is shown passing a mountain range. There are no mountains between Krakow and Auschwitz/Oswiecim.

Continuity mistake: In a courtyard of a concentration camp, a fully-clothed Jewish man wearing an armband steps into a long line in front of a table. The camera shows a quick shot of something else, then comes right back to that same man. Now he is missing his armband.

Factual error: During the liquidation of the ghetto, many German soldiers shout and beat the Jews out of their homes but one of the soldiers salutes a little child saying "Wie heisst du?" (What's your name/what are you called?). However the subtitles from the Deluxe Edition DVD read "hiesst" instead of "heisst" (which is not even the preterit/past form, which would be hieß/hiess). (00:59:45)

Audio problem: When the head of the Nazi forced labor camp is on his balcony shooting workers that aren't working, he fires two shots, kills two workers then reloads for a third shot but doesn't shoot. When he goes back inside, he ejects the live round he chambered onto his girlfriend, but when the round hits the floor, it clanks like an empty shell.

Deliberate mistake: The movie shows events between 1939 and 1945 but the children look the same at the beginning and the end, they don't grow up. Pay attention to Danka Dresner, Adam Levy and Olek Rosner.

Continuity mistake: When Schindler is at a party near the start, he is sitting around a table with some other men. Two women dancers are sitting next to a man, pressing up against him. One of the women is holding a fork and eating something off it. It cuts to Schindler whispering to the waiter and in the background the woman with the fork is now drinking a glass of wine. Then it cuts back to the women and the one with wine is now back to the fork.

Oskar Schindler: Power is when we have every justification to kill, and we don't.
Amon Goeth: You think that's power?
Oskar Schindler: That's what the Emperor said. A man steals something, he's brought in before the Emperor, he throws himself down on the ground. He begs for his life, he knows he's going to die. And the Emperor... Pardons him. This worthless man, he lets him go.
Amon Goeth: I think you are drunk.
Oskar Schindler: That's power, Amon. That is power.

More quotes from Schindler's List

Trivia: The scene with the hinge-maker almost getting shot has a hidden meaning, when several guns that are used misfire. The Nazis used forced labor to produce their wargoods, including officers' pistols. The prisoners manufacturing the guns were known to file down the hammer on the pistols so that they would not fire properly, in an effort to thwart the Nazi regime.

More trivia for Schindler's List

Question: Does anyone know the name of the song which is playing on the radio in the beginning of the movie, when Schindler is getting dressed for the party?

Answer: "Gloomy Sunday".

Kimberly Klaus

More questions & answers from Schindler's List

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