Escape From New York
Escape From New York mistake picture

Continuity mistake: When Snake kills the wrestler he falls forward shoulders forward, next minute his arms are over the ropes, next minute his arms are in a different position again - quite active for a dead man. (01:16:55 - 01:18:10)

Continuity mistake: When Snake kills the wrestler, he does so by jamming the nails of his spiked bat into the back of his skull. Snake releases the bat, which stays stuck to the wrestler's head. The next shot, the bat is now missing as the wrestler falls forward against the net, dropping his own bat to the floor. But Snake's bat is nowhere to be seen. Then a few moments later after Snake activates the tracer, the bat is shown on the back of the wrestler's head as he is slumped over the net, which Snake knocks off. Yet the wrestler's own bat is no longer seen, which was by his feet before. (01:16:55)

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Escape From New York mistake picture

Continuity mistake: When trying to escape the gang on Broadway, Snake and the others are in a yellow station wagon they stole from the Duke's men. They turn the car around to back it through a barricade of cars to escape. One shot shows their car's head lights are on, but just before it hits the barricade, the headlights are suddenly off and then are back on again in the next shot. (00:56:55)

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Escape From New York mistake picture

Continuity mistake: When Snake finally stops the glider on the roof of the WTC, the nose of the glider sticks over the edge several feet but when the shot briefly switches to an aerial view, the nose is entirely on the roof. (00:27:35)

William Bergquist

Continuity mistake: When they steal the yellow station wagon, they are going easily 20 miles an hour. In the next shot, when escaping from the guys on Broadway, they are going at least 55 miles an hour. (00:57:00)

Continuity mistake: After the President gets up the wall, Snake is waiting for the harness to be lowered down to him again. The Duke shoots at him and puts a line of bullet holes across the wall. In that shot, you see the holes are not close to any of the horizontal lines of the tiled wall. But in the shot where the harness is being lowered, you see the line of bullet holes is not only close to, but crossing one of the horizontal lines at an angle. (01:28:50)

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Continuity mistake: On top of the World Trade Center, some "Redskins" are rocking the Gulf Fire back and forth over the edge and cut it loose. You see very large red markings on the Gulf Fire's wings. But when you see it falling in the next shot towards the camera, the red markings are gone and the wings are solid black. (01:19:30)

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Continuity mistake: As Snake makes it back up to the top of the World Trade Center, he sees Brain, Maggie, and the president in a fight with a gang of "Redskins". The Redskins cut the line on the Gulf Fire and it plummets to the ground. Maggie, Brain, and the President are hiding behind some air ducts and tubes. just before the shot cuts, the President pops his head up and looks around, making his head the highest of the 3. Maggie is holding her gun pointing up, and Brain is sitting still just looking at the President. It then cuts to an angle behind them. Suddenly the President is down on his hands and knees again, Maggie is holding her gun lower and sitting up straight, and Brain is leaning back looking like he is about to fall over. (01:19:35)

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Continuity mistake: The revolver that Snake uses in the film is a 6 shooter. But on the bridge in the end when he gives it to Maggie, Maggie fires the gun at Duke's car 7 times without reloading. (01:27:00)

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Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: She only fires 6 shots. Watched the scene 3 times. Only 6 shots.

Continuity mistake: After Snake gets the X-ray to disable the tiny bombs in his neck, he pushes the timer and holds his hand there, pushing it. Then, the next shot shows the countdown timer, but his hand is not holding it down. In the very next shot, he is pushing in the timer button again. (01:30:45)

posty

Continuity mistake: In the Chock Full O'Nuts diner, Snake passes a pack of cigarettes to a woman hiding in the diner. The woman lights a match and Snake tells her to keep her hand over it. The woman then says a line and lights the cigarette. At this moment, she is holding the cigarettes pack with two fingers around the top area of the packet. In the next shot, she is suddenly holding the bottom area of the pack. (00:41:00)

Casual Person

Continuity mistake: When Snake enters the Duke's railcar to find the President, he throws a knife at a guard's forehead. As the camera comes to the knife hitting him, we see a blood trail already on his face from that wound, before he could start bleeding. (00:59:30)

DavidRTurner

Continuity mistake: When the President shoots the Duke with the machine gun from the wall, the first stream of bullets rips up the Duke, as we see multiple exit holes through his torso. The President lets loose another stream, and yet another - but just after the 3rd stream, the camera changes to the Duke, alive and without the holes just ripped through him, only to be 'killed' by this 3rd stream (where we also see the blood pack the actor is wearing). (01:29:45)

DavidRTurner

Continuity mistake: When the taxi crosses the bridge and gets split in two by the mine, the front half does a 180-degree turn and the rear half continues straight. The camera angle changes, and the front half is now going straight, and the rear half turns and slides to a sideways position. (01:24:50)

DavidRTurner

Continuity mistake: When Snake first rescues the President from the Duke's railcar, the two of them walk beside the train. They walk the whole length of car #2205, then they walk it again. The 'new' car has some graffiti on it; either the filmmakers used both sides of the car, or added the graffiti to make it look different, but they forgot to change/erase the car's big yellow numbers. (01:00:10)

DavidRTurner

Continuity mistake: When Snake, Brain and Maggie drive down Broadway, away from Brain's place where the Duke is, a number of people are attacking the car as it drives. Without anyone running down the street with the car, we see a group of people twice, possibly more. Easiest to notice are 3 specific guys in the same position beside each other at both locations. (00:56:15)

DavidRTurner

Escape From New York mistake picture

Continuity mistake: When Snake kills the wrestler he falls forward shoulders forward, next minute his arms are over the ropes, next minute his arms are in a different position again - quite active for a dead man. (01:16:55 - 01:18:10)

More mistakes in Escape From New York

Bob Hauk: It's the survival of the human race, Plissken. Something you don't give a shit about.

More quotes from Escape From New York

Trivia: In the scene where the helicopters come in and they retrieve the President's briefcase containing a message, one of the people in the chopper points down and says "People down in the park. Can you see them?" That guy is the film's director, John Carpenter. (01:07:35)

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More trivia for Escape From New York

Question: What's the big deal about the place Chock Full O' Nuts in this movie? In both commentaries, they make a big deal about it, but never actually go into detail. (00:40:10)

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Chosen answer: It's a chain of coffee shops in the New York area that were around decades before Starbucks. (Their initial business was roasted nuts before they switched to coffee and kept the name.) They would have been as common a sight to 80s New Yorkers as Starbucks is today to everyone.

Captain Defenestrator

More questions & answers from Escape From New York

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