U-571

Continuity mistake: When the plane flies over the U-571, an overhead shot shows Tyler and Mazzola looking up at the plane while Trigger and Rabbit wave from beside the deck gun. Then Tyler orders the men to wave at the plane.

Continuity mistake: When the Americans are first diving U-571, the Chief recommends "closing main vents". Tyler runs over and starts spinning two large red wheels. Each time the scene cuts back to him, he is spinning the wheels in a different direction. Left than right, than left again.

Grumpy Scot

Continuity mistake: When Mazzola dies, his eyes are initially open. The German captain pushes him away, and just before Mazzola's face goes out of camera he closes his eyes. In the next shot of him lying on his back on the floor, his eyes are open again.

Continuity mistake: Mazzola has just been killed and when Tyler helps Tank, first he holds Tank using his left hand, then the next shot by his right.

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Mistakes

Character mistake: At the beginning of the movie, the German sub gets surprised and severely damaged by a destroyer. The sonar man first notices the enemy destroyer approaching, but only a short time before the destroyer is already literally on top of the sub. German sonar at the time had the capacity to detect ships up to more than 7 miles away, so the sonar man really had to be asleep at his sonar station not to notice the destroyer approaching. (00:03:40)

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Quotes

Lieutenant Andrew Tyler: What the hell are you doing, huh? This is not a God damn democracy.

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Trivia

Trivia: Matthew McConaughey didn't like his character's background, so he asked that it be changed from the original, not being promoted because he was a drunk, to basically never making a decision that might cost someone their life.

David Robertson

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Questions

Question: Throughout the film you can see that Tank, played by Dave Power, has funny-looking thin black scars on both cheeks. Was this a makeup effect for the character (and if so, why did they do it), or does the actor really have these scars on his cheeks (and if so, what from)?

Answer: The scars you see on Tank's face are fake, pure makeup. They wanted the character to have a gritty look.

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