Paycheck

Paycheck (2003)

33 corrected entries

(2 votes)

Corrected entry: After Rachel hit the police officer with her helmet and knocked him out, whoever was in the helicopter made a comment/joke about the knocked out police officer not having seen this coming otherwise he would have gone on a stakeout. How could he have known what happened to the police officer? He was up in the helicopter and the police officer was in the tunnel.

Correction: They weren't saying the police officer didn't see it coming, they said the Jennings saw it coming, and they wondered if he foresaw a stakeout (bad joke).

Corrected entry: The bullet cartridge cannot be used the way Michael Jennings used it in the movie. It is not possible to fire a bullet without a gun. The casing of the bullet cartridge alone is not capable of sustaining the pressure of the gases produced by ignited powder. In order for the bullet to actually fire in forward direction the side walls of the casing must be supported by the gun barrel. Without the barrel the bullet cartridge will simply burst on the side. The bullet won't go anywhere, it will stay in the cartridge. Plastic cable tie used in the movie to hold the cartridge is not enough to make any difference.

Correction: While a bullet will not be propelled forward in an unsupported cartridge detonation, neither will pressures blow out or rupture the unsupported brass case wall. The weakest point in containing pressures in an unsupported cartridge or case is the case mouth tension that holds the bullet inside the case, not the case wall. An unsupported cartridge will, on ignition, separate the bullet and case, but as a matter of physics with internal expanding gas pressures pushing equally hard against both the bullet base & the rear of the case, the much lighter case will become the projectile, not the bullet. It's the case that will be "shot" away from the bullet, but only with limited energy.

Corrected entry: When Michael sees the "Birthday Clip" it is obvious that he is the one holding the camera towards the bed, but when he sits on the bed we see Michael using both hands. Who is holding the camera? (01:16:35)

Malaver

Correction: Michael doesn't use both his hands, only one. Rachel's hand is holding the cake.

Corrected entry: The entire scene with the fake Rachel is inconsistent with the fact that Jennings met Rachel before the time he was injected with the memory marker. Accordingly, based on the plot, he would remember her just fine.

Correction: He has met her before, but what he remembers is screwing up their meeting. He does not remember that they met up again in the facility and got engaged (a second chance).

Corrected entry: When Affleck discovers that the thing he built is a time viewing machine, there is a long monologue where he explains that seeing into the future is wrong, could be catastrophic, etc. and concludes that he must destroy the machine. Practically a few seconds later when he arrives at the machine to destroy it, he says, "Let's see what our futures hold" and uses the device. If he just came to the explicit decision that future-vision is wrong, to the point of setting out to destroy the machine at the risk of his life, why in the world would he himself choose to view the future? There's no suggestion of "temptation" or anything, he just walks up to it and stupidly contradicts everything he just said.

Correction: In order to properly destroy the machine, he has to figure out what is going to happen in the immediate future.

shortdanzr

Corrected entry: When Ben Afflec gets out of the square-ish taxi right before he agrees to the three year contract, he is in the back of the taxi. Then he opens the back door to get out. This would not be a mistake except that this model is a Honda Element and it has "suicide doors". In order to open the back door you must first open the front, which would make it a horrible taxi.

Correction: Where to start? It is a science fiction movie which means there is no reason that the cab has to BE a "Honda Element", it just may look like one. Also, since he obviously did get out of the taxi by the back door - it cannot have the "suicide doors." Also, since it is a fiction movie and is not necessarily trying to depict modern times, I fail to see how this would be a mistake.

Zwn Annwn

Corrected entry: The pass cards for the complex where Jennings works have what appear to be a bar code along one edge. During most (if not all) closeups of the pass cards in use, that code is swiped through the reader (ie, the edge with the barcode is closest to the wall). However, when Jennings uses the card for the first time (after creating the metal detector diversion), that edge is on the bottom (closest the floor) and is not swiped through the reader, yet the door still unlocks.

Gabbo

Correction: I work at a large company and we use access cards with bar codes on them. Although we do swipe them for access the swipe is for the internal chip, NOT the bar code. The bar code is used by security guards with a scanner.

Corrected entry: After Michael Jennings finishes at Allcom and goes home to check his shares, the date of purchase is 2003. When he signs the release form at Reddy Grant, the year is 2007. That is 4 years and not 3.

Correction: If he starts the job in December '03 and finishes the other job in January '07, that's close enough to three years for people to still say 3 years. In fact, a larger distance between the dates would still count for some people.

Corrected entry: When Ben Affleck tries to open the BMW with the remote control on the key, he repeatedly presses the "close"-button. The "open"-button is the one closer to the key itself, while the BMW-sign in the key is used to close.

Christoph Galuschka

Correction: This is not necessarily a movie mistake. It could be considered a mistake by Michael, pushing the wrong button.

Zwn Annwn

Corrected entry: When Michael is held in FBI custody, one of the agents takes a cigarette from Michael's package and lights it. The resulting smoke sets off the fire suppression system. In the later scene when the attorney is showing Michael the inventory of the items, you can see "cigarettes - smokeless" listed. If the "smokes" are in fact "smokeless", they wouldn't have set off the alarm. (00:33:05 - 00:37:50)

Kyle Pierce

Correction: That is not a mistake. That is the point of that scene. The FBI agent smokes the cigarette thinking it is safe as it is smokeless. In fact they're intentionally not smokeless, to help Michael escape.

Soylent Purple

Corrected entry: Before Rachel goes out and meets up with the guy that Jimmy sends to look after her before she goes to work, she puts her purse on. Initially, the purse is around her left shoulder. After she walks through the door, it is across her chest and on her right shoulder. (01:03:10)

Correction: The strap starts across her body and the bag is on her left shoulder. They remain exactly that way as she exits the door.

Tax Dude

Corrected entry: Towards the end of the movie, Colin Feore was at the controls of the machine that could look forward into the future. While he was on the machine, he was wearing a grey jacket. However, when the machine showed himself getting killed, he was wearing a brown jacket. (01:40:05 - 01:46:25)

Correction: This is a trick of lighting. He's wearing a blue pinstripe suit and a blue striped tie during the last half of the movie. Both are clearly visible as he's standing at the machine as well as on the screen.

Tax Dude

Corrected entry: In the scene where the people from Allcom are chasing Michael on the motorcycle, and the first car flips over, you can see that there is no one in the car.

Correction: If you're talking about the car that's struck by the semi, you can clearly see that the driver is thrown down onto the passenger's seat (out of view). If you're talking about the car that runs into the bulldozer, the driver is readily apparent (you can see his hands on the wheel right before the explosion).

Tax Dude

Corrected entry: When Jennings is being dragged up to the catwalk by the cable around his neck, you can see someone's feet on the catwalk, in the upper right hand corner of the screen. (01:44:15)

Correction: They're not "someone's" shoes on the catwalk. They're clearly Jimmy's shoes and he's standing on the mobile tower contraption.

Tax Dude

Corrected entry: When the machine blows up, Umma and Ben jump from the catwalk onto transparent drapes. Umma's drapes get torn and she starts falling when Ben catches her. You then see Ben's drapes being torn but now they only fall a few feet before hitting the ground. They were much higher up to begin with. (01:48:10)

Correction: They don't fall to the floor (which is what makes this somewhat deceiving) - they fall onto a part of the catwalk.

Tax Dude

Corrected entry: Jennings rents a room after he escapes from the FBI and empties the paper bag onto the bed to see what is inside. When he looks at the slip of paper with the quote on one side and the lottery numbers on the other, the numbers are in red. In the shot of his hand placing the paper back on the bed, the numbers are black. (00:40:20)

Correction: In the shot of his hand placing the paper back on the bed, the numbers are still red.

Tax Dude

Corrected entry: In the scene where Jennings is being chased on the motorcycle, he jumps over a big pile of rocks followed by a police car. The first shot of the car has a perfect body and seconds later it's all torn up before it hits the ground. (01:15:00)

Correction: This scene takes place in the junkyard. First off, it's not a police car that comes over the hill, it's one of the Allcom vehicles. Secondly, it is not "all torn up" before it hits the ground. There is some heavy damage to the passenger's side front (from scraping along the trailers earlier). The front of the vehicle does not "disintegrate" until it actually hits the ground.

Tax Dude

Corrected entry: Michael Jennings has bought the new 3-d TV-screen. He is setting it up, and he is wearing a tie. The angle then changes, and suddenly he isn't wearing the tie. The angle changes multiple times afterwards, and so does his wearing of a tie. (00:03:10)

don_corleone

Correction: The point of the scene is that his work on the 3D screen is taking place over 2 months. It's a montage of all the work he does, so it makes sense for him to be in different states of dress and appearance.

Corrected entry: After Rachel and Michael are reunited after Michael's escape, she asks him in the hotel room if he remembers her. Michael says no, because of the memory wipe. The memory isotope wasn't injected into him until AFTER he had met Rachel, and flirted with her at the dinner party. The memory wipe should have only erased his memory back to the point of the injection, and shouldn't have affected his memory of his early meetings with Rachel.

Correction: First of all, it's entirely possible to forget meeting someone at a crowded party, especially when nothing out of the ordinary happens. Secondly, the method memory wipe had never been used on Jennings before, so it could have made memories around the injection point fuzzy.

Nick N.

Corrected entry: When the machine is being described, it is stated that Einstein's theories proved that time travel is impossible. In fact, his work on relativity show that time travel is theoretically possible and Einstein, not believing or liking this, spent some time trying to find a way to prove otherwise, without success.

jle

Correction: Einstein's theories stated that time travel would be possible if we could travel faster than the speed of light, however, his theories also stated that it is impossible for us to travel faster than light, as we have a mass. However, since light has no mass, it can be (theoretically) accelerated beyond the threshold, which is what the science of this movie is based upon. What Einstein spent much of his life trying to refute is quantum theory, not time travel.

Continuity mistake: When Michael and Shorty are having lunch after Michael is released, he empties the contents of the envelope onto the table. A bit later he puts everything back into the envelope, but the bullet remains on the table under a napkin. Later in the movie, Michael empties the envelope and the bullet is in it.

More mistakes in Paycheck

Michael Jennings: If you love me, if you care about me, go. Have a good life. Remember me.

More quotes from Paycheck

Question: Ben Affleck first met Uma Thurman at a party just before he was offered and accepted the three year job. Surely he would have recognized her after having his memory wiped even if he could not remember any of the time they spent together.

Answer: He does recognize Rachel from the party as well as when he when he saw her at Allcom. The only things he doesn't remember are the last three years of his life since starting the project. So, while he does remember her, the three years they spent together while at Allcom are a total blank. This recognition is shown when he meets with Porter who helps him escape.

But later, when he is going through her stuff, he says he doesn't remember her. Also, if he did remember her, he would have known it wasn't her when the imposter was in the restaurant (also no need to have the imposter try to dress like her either).

Answer: Do you remember every person you've ever talked to at a party? Didn't think so. His memory isn't restored back to perfect condition - he's still had three years to forget about details at the party. He remembers things like the origins of the deal because it was important.

Nick N.

More questions & answers from Paycheck

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