Revealing mistake: When Bullitt is in the Coffee Contata restaurant, he called Delgetti at the grungy hotel. Bullitt didn't look at a note for the supposedly unfamiliar phone number, but it seems as if the number wouldn't take much to remember, either. The number Bullitt dials on the rotary phone sounds as if it is made up of only the digits 1, 2 and maybe a 3, to not slow down the sequence.
Bullitt (1968)
1 revealing mistake
Directed by: Peter Yates
Starring: Robert Duvall, Steve McQueen, Jacqueline Bisset, Robert Vaughn, Don Gordon
Plot hole: The movie is based on one huge plot hole: if it wasn't for the "professional" hitman's sloppy work, Bullitt and his team wouldn't have been needed for much. The hitman enters the hotel room, wounds the policeman, then shoots the target with one shotgun blast to his upper left shoulder area. Any hitman worth his fee knows that this is not likely to be an immediately fatal wound. The hitman had a pump shotgun and should have finished the job right then and there. Surely he had more than two shells. Instead, he sees the target is slumped unconscious, then leaves the hotel room without checking to see that his victim really is dead. Nothing seems to be immediately threatening the hit team, though. The hitman spends the rest of his life trying to finish his job and pays the ultimate price for being lazy.
Bullitt: Who else knew where he was?
Walter Chalmers: What?
Bullitt: Who else knew where he was?
Walter Chalmers: What are you implying?
Bullitt: Well, they knew where to look for him, and they used your name to get in.
Walter Chalmers: Are you suggesting I disclosed his whereabouts?
Bullitt: Well, somebody did. And it didn't come from us.
Trivia: Although we never know the names of the hitmen, Bill Hickman (who drove the Charger) is listed as 'Bill' in the end credits. He was so well respected for his stunt work - and had remained largely anonymous in previous films - he was given an identity for Bullitt.
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Suggested correction: We do know their names. The hitmen are credited as "Mike" (Paul Genge) and "Phil" (Bill Hickman).
Question: How did the bad guy have a gun on the flight? He pulls a gun in the airfield chase scene so he had to have it on the plane as he jumped off it.
Answer: Airport security in the late 1960's was not nearly as thorough as it is in present day. Metal detectors didn't become commonplace at airports until the early 1970's.
In the 60s, my dad would take my brother and me to the new Oakland Airport to watch planes. There was nothing to stop us from walking through the entire terminal. The original terminal was a small building with a 3-foot tall chain-link fence separating spectators from the boarding Constellations, Electras and DC-6 planes 80 ft. away.