Changeling

Factual error: A woman is shown receiving electroshock treatment ("ECT") in a hospital scene which took place in 1928. Although chemicals were used to induce seizures in psychiatric treatments at the time, the use of electricity for the purpose was not discovered until 1937 and not used in the United States until 1940.

Continuity mistake: When the "substitute" boy gets off the train he is with an older women. The reporters ask the mom and boy to take a picture together. You can see from the camera angle that the older woman is in the background when the flashes go off taking the picture. Later in the movie, the psychiatrist holds up a newspaper article with the picture in it. In the newspaper picture, the older woman is not in the background.

More mistakes in Changeling

Christine Collins: I used to tell Walter, "Never start a fight... But always finish it." I didn't start this fight... But by God, I'm going to finish it.

More quotes from Changeling

Question: Was Mrs. Collins' son ever found?

Answer: No. He was murdered at age nine. The movie uses creative license to bring up the suspicion that he could have somehow survived to create a dramatic hope in the end. Moreover, the killer was very unstable and retracted his testimony more than once. There is no solid proof of the boy surviving the killings. The police even found partial evidence of Walter Collins at the burial site. See the Wikipedia article for more information.

Earthling

Question: Warning: Spoiler. At the end of the movie, it's found that three of the victims had managed to escape; only one was actually returned to the parents. It isn't known if the other two were recaptured by the killer or managed to get away (but went into hiding). Why didn't the police just go back and question the killer's accomplice? He'd likely be able to reveal whether any of the boys had been recaptured. (We're never told if the accomplice had died by that point, or whether he was unavailable, or whether nobody bothered asking him.)

Answer: When the accomplice is originally questioned he says that killer told him a few 'may have escaped', implying he never knew if they were caught.

Also, it's implied his accomplice a young boy himself was scared of ending up like the boys himself, sadly I think it was done for survival.

Question: When Mrs. Collins opens the fridge, is there a sandwich in a plastic bag in there?

Answer: There is a sandwich in a bag in there as well as a full jug of milk. It's one of the ways that she knows that her son isn't there.

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