Corrected entry: In the scene where Graham takes off his shirt there are no visible signs of the stab wounds that Dr. Lecter inflicted.
Corrected entry: In the Silence of the Lambs, Benjamin Raspaile had a full head of hair. In Red Dragon, he's shown as a bald man (the flautist in the beginning). Something doesn't add up there.
Correction: He was a transvestite - the hair is a wig.
Corrected entry: During the scene were Ed Norton goes to the Leeds house for the first time at night, he walks into the kitchen and turns on the light, but the switch is hidden under a counter top - how did he know it was there?
Correction: It's possible he spoke with a cop who had already been in the house, and they warned him about the hidden light switch, or that it was mentioned for some reason in the case file.
Corrected entry: When Will is in the woods by the Jacoby's house he looks down and finds the pull tab of a can of soda/beer. When the movie is suppose to take place in 1980 the types of pull tabs on cans were the kind with the round opening and teardrop end that came completely off the can in one piece. The one that Will picked up was from the newer style of cans that did not come out until the very late 80's. This one piece tab stayed on the can to cut down on litter.
Correction: The beginning of the movie is set in 1980, but after Hannibal's caught, there's a very clear caption saying "several years later", placing it potentially in the late 80's.
Corrected entry: When Edward Norton's character goes to see Hannibal for the first time, he says he has a flight back to Birmingham at 4:15. The first thing that Norton's character wants to do after seeing Hannibal is visit both crime scenes, which he does. However, when he returns, he visits the Atlanta crime scene first (The Leeds' house), then the one in Birmingham. Wouldn't it have been more time efficient the other way around?
Correction: He went to examine the more recent crime scene first, since the evidence was more fresh.
Corrected entry: It is said that they found out that the dead body is not Dolarhyde because of DNA tests; however, DNA couldn't be taken in those days.
Correction: This film is set a 'few years' before the events of 'Silence of the Lambs' and as noted elsewhere appears to be set in 1988. The first paper suggesting DNA 'fingerprinting' as a method of identification was published in 'Nature' in 1984. DNA identification was first used in a criminal case in the UK in 1985 and in the US (in a rape case in Orange County, Florida) in 1986, years before the events of this film.
At that time, forensic DNA tests took 6-12 weeks, so if nothing, at least the timing of events is unlikely.
Corrected entry: In the final shoot-out, Graham's gun appears to be a revolver. When he tells his wife to shoot Dolarhyde, the gun she picks up from beside her husband appears to be a semi-automatic.
Correction: Will Graham has two pistols, a revolver and an automatic. When he gets his guns from the closet, you can see that he takes out two weapons.
Corrected entry: Why does Dolarhyde's house explode suddenly when it's on fire? It's not as if he keeps vats upon vats of chemicals or gases in there. It's just a cinematic effect to look cool. It should just keep burning steadily without exploding.
Correction: While the other correction isn't valid (something from the book can't explain away a movie mistake), it's entire possible that a gas line in the house went off in the blaze. That has happened in real life, and it can be pretty dramatic.
Correction: In the book, his safe is full of explosives. I can't recall if there was some visual reference to this in the movie.
Correction: It's on the left underneath his ribs.