Revealing mistake: In the disco scene, the DJ is playing music, but the Pioneer decks and the DJ Mixer are not even turned on, as no lights are showing.
Continuity mistake: The inside of the plane to Japan is a Boeing 747, but outside it's a 737. (00:11:40)
Continuity mistake: At the start of the movie the hole in the back on Sean's car vanishes in some scenes. (00:04:05)
Continuity mistake: In the closing credits, Sean's father was listed as "Major Boswell." However, it was established early in the movie that he is in the U.S. Navy, and major is not a rank in the Navy. Its Naval equivalent is the rank of lieutenant commander. In addition to the wrong rank being listed in the credits, in the scene when he was in uniform, he was wearing lieutenant rank, which is the U.S. Navy equivalent to an O-3 paygrade captain in the other branches of the U.S. military.
Suggested correction: "Major" is the character's name, not his rank.
Continuity mistake: When Sean Boswell is driving the red Lancer for the first time at the docks, right after the guy in the orange sweater says, "Will someone please teach this guy to drift", Sean crashes the back of his car against a pile of wood, and you can see the spoiler falling on the ground. In the next shot, you see Sean's face, and in the background the spoiler is back on the car. (00:45:20)
Continuity mistake: In the final race when the 350Z rear ends the Mustang and rides up on the embankment, as it starts to come back down the right headlight falls out (left one broke when he hit him). In the next scene it is miraculously back in place. (01:29:05)
Continuity mistake: In the scene where Sean is making his first pickup for Han, from the large man in the jacuzzi, he is dressed in only a towel. When the large man throws him out of the establishment, he is fully dressed. Are we to believe that the large, angered man who Sean just demanded money from, gave him time to get fully dressed before throwing him out? Or that the large man dressed Sean before throwing him out? Neither of these scenarios make sense. (00:34:00)
Continuity mistake: In the school canteen scene when Sean is talking to Twinkie for the first time, the food on Sean's chopsticks and the position of them alternates from being in his mouth to back out or on the table between shots, even though Sean is visible in each shot. Also if you watch his drink he takes a sip and puts the glass down, but in the next shot a second later he is drinking from it again. (00:19:00 - 00:19:50)
Continuity mistake: At the end of the movie, right before the race against Vin Diesel, the two cars are placed very close, within a foot or two of each other. A couple of shots later, right before the girlfriend says 'Go.', the cars are a couple of feet further apart, even though they haven't yet started the race. (01:32:40)
Continuity mistake: When Clay throws a baseball at Sean's car, it goes through the rear window and into the front of the car, along with some glass. In the next shot, the ball is instead falling into a pile of glass on the pavement behind the rear tire. (00:04:00)
Other mistake: Throughout the movie we see the mustang rolling chassis in the garage. This is a rolling chassis of a 1967 Shelby mustang gt 500/350. The main ways to realize this are that the car has the cut outs in the front for the 2 fog lights that the Shelby had and that the back end has a spoiler which is built into the body. However the car they do all the driving with is a base model 1967 mustang fastback. While a new grille would've covered up the fog-light cutout, the regular fastbacks didn't have the built into the body spoiler like the Shelby's did. Removing the built in spoiler and making it as smooth as it was would've taken way too much time and supplies. It also wouldn't have served any benefit. You could argue they were trying to eliminate down-force on the back but the spoiler was only about 2 inches, it wouldn't have helped. The directors did this to avoid wrecking the much more rare Shelby mustang.
Visible crew/equipment: In the first race when Sean and the rich kid in the red viper are racing each other the rich kid pulls up to the black ute that is following them and yells "whoooo" and puts his fist up, you can see the camera mounted on the side of the viper through the reflection of the black ute. (00:06:15)
Continuity mistake: During the drive with Han to go 'get his money', the steering wheel inside the black and orange Veilside RX-7 switches sides. When they pull up to the bathhouse the steering wheel is on the left, when they leave it's on the right. (00:40:20)
Suggested correction: The rounded dashboard throws people off, but if you look closely, you can see Han's hands are on the steering wheel, which are on the right side of the vehicle. The production didn't have any left-hand drive RX-7's for this "mistake" to have been possible in the first place.
Visible crew/equipment: In the scene where Sean and Han are getting chased by DK, where Han crashes, a camera man can be seen filming the scene. (01:15:10)
Continuity mistake: When Twinkie is about to show Sean his car, the garage door opens to show a black car. The car holding mechanism begins turning and Twink is shown saying "no" to Sean. When the camera cuts back, there are bicycles where the black car was. Then, there is a red car next. Twink says "no". When the camera cuts back, the red car is now black. The mechanism isn't going that fast. (00:17:35)
Continuity mistake: When Sean is learning how to drift in the mountains for the first time, the spoiler is on, although he crashed the back end of the Evo at the docks and destroyed the spoiler. However, in the next scene, the spoiler is missing, the way it should be.
Continuity mistake: When Sean first arrives in Tokyo, he is carrying a guitar. However, when Sean arrives at his father's house, he has only one small bag. (Though an explanation is given in the deleted scenes, this is still a mistake within the actual film.) (00:12:15)
Continuity mistake: Early during the race at night on the mountain, the road goes from gravel to paved in a matter of one or two shots.
Continuity mistake: At the police station, Sean's mom raises her hand, holding a cigarette. A shot later, it's lowered.
Continuity mistake: When Sean and Twinkie are in the club, talking, the woman in pink behind has her arms up. A shot later, they're suddenly lowered. (00:45:14)
