Continuity mistake: When Ben finds the glasses at Independence Hall, it is 3:20 because of daytime savings time. However when the bad guys chase Abigail and Riley in the market they pass a large clock showing the time to be 2:37. (01:12:15 - 01:17:10)
Suggested correction: Actually, many places at a market like that sell old antiques and even old clocks. That could simply be one of them. Even if it was supposed to tell time, people often forget to set their clocks forward or back for Daylight Savings Time, and that could have happened here. Many of the clocks at my home and school are currently like that.
Factual error: In the scene when Ben, Abigail and Riley are on the tower of Independence Hall, they look at the shadow marking the secret place where the glasses are hidden. It is 3:20. The shadow of the cross is in the second third of the pillar. When Ian is on the tower the shadow has already moved to the top of the wall. As the others have left Independence Hall at 3:28 the shadow must have traveled the distance in about 4 minutes. This is far too quickly. (01:12:20)
Continuity mistake: When Gates is arrested by the FBI you see Riley and Chase coming around the corner twice. (01:21:50)
Continuity mistake: When Ben and Ian stand at the corner of Broadway and Wall Street, while they are talking to each other, you can see people in the background passing Ben, but they never pass Ian. And, when Ian asks Ben where the treasure is, you can see a black guy wearing a blue shirt passing Ben in the background. 10 seconds later you can see the same guy pass Ben again. (01:31:00)
Continuity mistake: When the guy is smashing Parkington Lane's headstone, the number, size, and location of the holes change from one shot to the next. (01:39:10)
Continuity mistake: In the catacombs under Trinity Church, the lift Ben and Abigail are standing on falls. When it jerks to a stop, Abigail falls and Ben catches her. The lift is stationary at an angle. However, in the next shot, the lift is swinging forwards, allowing Ben to throw Abigail to safety. (01:40:00)
Revealing mistake: When the stairs built on the walls of the dumbwaiter shaft start to collapse, Riley makes a jump onto a stable one. In the first shot of him jumping you can see a thick stunt wire attached to the back of his shirt. (01:43:35)
Revealing mistake: When Ben is pulling the dumbwaiter to the secret room with the rope, there is a shot showing the bottom of it. In this shot there is a somewhat visible black wire that is pulling the dumbwaiter, rather than the thick orange rope that is pulling it. (01:46:15)
Continuity mistake: In the treasure vault Riley stands in front of that emerald statue, and on its chest you can see a part which is not covered in dust. In the next shot the whole chest is covered in dust. The clean area coincides with the later placement of Riley's cheek, which means the first shot was actually taken after the embracing and implemented before. (01:50:45)
Factual error: As Ben is clinging to the staircase while it is falling apart, there is a close-up of a nail being pulled out of the wood. This nail is round-headed, rather than square as it would have been over 200 years ago. It's also shiny instead of rusty, which indicates that it's galvanized. Galvanization as an industrial, metal-preservation process was not patented until 1837, and was not used in building materials until well into the late-1800s. Since the film states the staircase was made by "the Founding Fathers, " and there was no galvanization of iron nails in any industrialized nation in 1780s-1830's, this is a huge anachronism.
Factual error: When Ben, Abigail, and Riley are discussing the correct time to be at Independence Hall, they would need to know the exact date, not only the time, of the painting to be sure to see the correct shadow.
Factual error: When Ben and the rest of the group start to climb under the church, Ben moves some spider webs out of the way with his torch. The dust on the spider webs would have burst into flames when he did this, but instead they just fall to the side.
Factual error: The sun's location horizontally changes throughout the year. Because of this, Ben, Abigail, and Riley shouldn't know where the shadow is falling, horizontally.
Factual error: When Dr. Chase receives the Washington campaign button from Ben Gates, she immediately picks it up with her bare fingers and rubs it with her thumb. An expert collector would *never* handle metal objects with their bare hands like this, as the acid on the fingers will corrode the metal. Cleaning the coin afterwards is also not an option, as this presents an even higher damage risk to the coin. See http://www.stujoe.com/content/view/30/34/ for more details on this subject.
Continuity mistake: When Ben is first confronted at his father's car by the FBI, you can see Chase and Riley in the background standing there and then turning around and leaving. Then as they arrest Ben against the car, you can see Chase and Riley just turning the corner, noticing Ben being arrested, and leaving.
Continuity mistake: The actor who plays Ben as a child has brown eyes, but Nicholas Cage has blue eyes.
Continuity mistake: When Ben and Riley go down the smuggler's hold in Charlotte, Riley's bag gets set on fire, the flap side. But in any of the following shots where we see his bag, it is not burnt.
Continuity mistake: When Ben walks in to the bathroom to remove his overalls, he slams the tool belt up in the corner of the counter next to side panel wall and tile wall. When Ben unzips the overalls, the tool belt is now behind the last sink's faucet with part of the belt and fastener in the middle sink. None of the tool belt is next to the side panel wall. We next see a shot where the tool belt is almost entirely in the last sink, then back to being behind the faucet.
Factual error: When Ben finds Charlotte buried in the ice, he would have encountered solid, thick ice. The small pick-ax he uses seems to easily break through the ice. Also, he seems to be digging through packed snow, rather than thick ice, which is indicative to the Arctic ice shelves.
Continuity mistake: As Ben is grabbing Abigail from Ian's vehicle, we see Shaw shoot at Ben and Riley's red van. He hits the top right corner of the sliding side door. When we see the side, sliding door again, there are no bullet holes, scratches, etc.
