Corrected entry: When Faramir is talking to his generals regarding battle plans he is informed that a very large army has emptied out of Orthanc. Later in the movie Aragorn arrives at Helm's Deep and tells Theoden the same. How can a small army near Mordor find out about the Orcish army before the Rohirrim, who are next door to Orthanc?
Corrected entry: During one of the first movie shots of the outer wall of Helm's Deep, a voiceover of Grima Wormtongue (who is now back at Orthanc with Saruman) discusses that the barricade's one outside weakness is a 'drainpipe' that leads from inside the fortress to a nearby river. In this shot, the drainpipe cannot be more than a couple of feet high, as seen in comparison by the many rats running about inside of it. During the battle of Helm's Deep, however, when the Uruk-Hai are placing Saruman's explosives inside the pipe, and later when the Berserker Uruk is running in to light them, the pipe towers over the heads of all the enemy-much larger than the 'few feet' clearance seen earlier in the film.
Correction: In the first shot, the drainpipe is shown from inside the barricade, where the ground is higher than on the outside. During the "bomb" scene, the drainpipe is shown from the outside of the barricade, where the ground is "deeper" than inside, so the mouth of the pipe, which travels horizontally, is higher.
Corrected entry: When Shadowfax runs to Gandalf you can see two tyre tracks in the field. Were these caused by the horse trailer and truck that took Shadowfax to middle earth?
Correction: The action here takes place in Rohan, which is mostly settled farming country. There is no reason this could not be a cart track used by the people of the district.
Corrected entry: At the very end of the movie, Gollum says he would bring Sam and Frodo to 'her' (if you don't want parts of the next film to be revealed, you should stop reading). 'She' is a monster that lives in the tunnels. Earlier in the movie Gollum said he knew about another way to Mordor through the same tunnels. However, at the time he was being faithful and helpful, before he turned evil/conflicted again. Was he planning to get them killed all along, even when being nice?
Correction: They would have to go through the tunnels anyways. In the book, (spoilers ahead) Gollum deserts the hobbits in the tunnels and awakes Shelob; At the point in time you're thinking about he was probably thinking he would lead the hobbits all the way through and protect them.
Corrected entry: As Arwen's father describes his vision of her future with Aragorn, a few tears stream down Arwen's face. Seconds later, she lays her head on his shoulder, and her cheeks are dry.
Correction: No, actually, they're not. You can see faint tear tracks and the slight reddening that the tears left behind.
Corrected entry: When Aragon convinces Theodin to ride out of Helm's Deep with him at the end of the battle to meet Gandalf, Legolas is the only rider with a white horse. Looking at the downward shot of them riding through the Uruk-hai on the bridge out of Helm's Deep, there are two riders on white horses, and both look suspiciously like Legolas.
Correction: They're two different people, but worth keeping an eye out anyway - the other character was originally Arwen, filmed as being in the battle, but removed/edited out later in the process.
Corrected entry: In the scene when Frodo wakes from his dream and takes a drink from his canteen, you can see what looks like an electric cord and plug dangling from the bottom of the canteen.
Correction: Why would a canteen have an electric cord on it? It's the plug for the canteen and the string connecting them.
Corrected entry: In the scene where Frodo and Sam are captured by Faramir, it begins with Sam cooking rabbits in a pot. He realises that Frodo is missing, and he and Gollum rush to find him, leaving behind cooking equipment and backpack. All three are then captured. When released by Faramir however, Sam once again has his backpack, and proudly hitches it up when leaving.
Corrected entry: After the attack by the wargs and Aragorn has fallen off the cliff, we see him floating in the river. When he reaches the bank, we see his wound is on the left arm. When he arrives at Helm's Deep and talks to Gimli whilst on his horse, his wound is on his right arm. It changes between shots from the river scene to the scene at Helm's Deep.
Correction: Both shoulders have wounds.
Corrected entry: In the shot of the orcs pouring into helms deep after Theoden orders the final retreat we see the main gate doors at the top the ramp pushed open by a mass of orcs. The previously smashed doors are completely intact.
Correction: This shot is from overhead and you mainly see the intact part above, but as they swing open you can see the ragged hole that has been broken in them. Look for the outline of the left gate against the inner wall.
Corrected entry: In the scene at Rohan where Legolas is giving the Evenstar pendent back to Aragorn, Aragorn's ring is on his finger in the shot where Legolas's hand passes it to him, and gone in the next, when he looks down at it.
Correction: In the second shot the view is lower so Aragorn's fingers are not so fully in frame - hence the ring is also not visible.
Corrected entry: It makes an amusing scene when Saruman stops Wormtongue from putting his candle too near the explosives, but why is he walking round with a candle? He even takes it outside with him to view the army. No-one else seems to need extra light in Orthanc.
Correction: Grima Wormtongue is merely trying to make himself 'equal' to Saruman. In the scene Saruman is carrying a wizard's staff and Grima is holding the candlestick in the same manner. Even the way he walks is similar to Saruman.
Corrected entry: In the scene where Legolas kills a warg that Gimli was about to kill, the warg falls behind Gimli. When Gimli kills a warg and it falls over him, Gimli should have fallen over the warg Legolas killed before, but it's nowhere to be seen.
Correction: You can't see it in the close-up shots, but when the camera is back a little you can see the dead warg lying on the ground, right where it should be.
Corrected entry: Right after the battle with the Wargs, we return to Eowin as she sees Helm's Deep from a distance, and we can see that she carries nothing, but in the next shot, as she enters the castle, she has a large basket tied on her back.
Correction: She was also leading a horse, but no longer is - she would have taken the horse to the stables, removed whatever was necessary to take into the fortress (ie the basket) and gone through the gates to the main part of Helm's Deep.
Corrected entry: When we first see Shadowfax, the horse, come into the film outside of Fangorn Forest, it has only a small amount of black on its muzzle. This remains the case when Gandalf is about to leave with Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli, as they set out for Helm's Deep. Yet, at the end of the film after the Helm's Deep battle, when we see Gandalf, Theoden and the others come over the hill, Shadowfax has a black muzzle which covers about half of it's face. (01:44:10)
Correction: Although it is a fact that during filming there were two horses used for Shadowfax, we can forget about it in this case. Light grey horses like Shadowfax tend to turn much darker when sweating profusely, especially on the face. Since the shot is taken right after battle, we can consider that Shadowfax is just sweaty. If you look closely, you can see that all the horses are sweaty all over, so I wouldn't count it as a mistake.
Corrected entry: During the Warg fighting scene, if watched in slow motion, when Aragorn is picking up the spear, some of the Wargs and horses 'behind' Aragorn, seem to be pass in front of the spear or the spear disappears in those areas. (00:12:10)
Corrected entry: During the castle siege, the orcs place a few containers of explosive in the sewer outlet. As the carriers leave the tunnel, you can see multiple orcs in the immediate area with torches that would be able to ignite it right away with nearly no chance of being stopped rather than an orc running in like an Olympic torch carrier, drawing extra attention which catches Aragon's attention to try bringing him down. It of course is much more visually entertaining this way, but made no practical sense when there were already torch bearers right there.
Correction: Thermite cannot be ignited with a simple match or lighter. Something that burns much hotter, such as magnesium, is required in order to start thermite burning. In a similar manner, these bombs were very likely made with a material that couldn't be ignited with a mere torch in order to avoid an accidental premature detonation. This torchbearer therefore likely had the one and only torch which was burning whatever was necessary to light the bombs up.
Corrected entry: After the battle at Helms Deep some of the main characters, including Gandalf, Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli, ride a short distance away from Helms Deep, looking directly away from the city and out towards Mordor. That is impossible, because Helms Deep faces North, which is the way they are facing, and Mordor is to the East. Even if the group did look to the East it would be highly unlikely that they would see Mordor even then, as it is too far away.
Corrected entry: When Pippin and Merry are on the backs of the Uruks, Pippin takes off his brooch with his teeth, leaving his cloak untied. In subsequent shots, however, the robe is tied; this is impossible, as his arms were tied around the front of the Uruk, while his cloak was on the back of the Uruk.
Correction: The brooch is purely decorative - the cloak was always fastened by the strings.
Corrected entry: When Saruman is speaking to the "tens of thousands" of Orcs from atop the tower, watch the shots closely that were taken from behind Saruman. If you watch his head and the side of his face, you can see his head moving like he's talking, but all you hear at that point is Orcs yelling, obviously alluding to the fact that he was saying a line when that shot was filmed, but it was edited out.
Correction: People's voices get drowned by a yelling crowd all the time, both in real life and in movies. Just because he is a main character in a movie, it does not mean everything he says will be heard.
Correction: SPOILER: You have to remember that Denethor, Steward of Gondor, has his own personal Palantir at his service and likely was watching Isengard even before the troops spilled forth. Indeed, since Sauron was 'guiding' his searches, he probably would have drawn Denethor to the spot in order to deflate his morale.