Glaring Film Gaffs! (Or: The Dry Look in 1917?)

Atomic Age · Dec 2, 2010

funneman said:
Reminds me of Robert Stack's car scene in Airplane when the view changes in the rear window from cars to Native Americans on horseback.

Also, I was watching a movie set in the 50's last week and I could swear a woman called the police on the telephone by dialing 9-1-1!

She probably dialed 9111 which WAS an actual emergency number in the 50's. In fact there is a film called Dial 9111 (1950)

Doug

Atomic Age · Dec 2, 2010

LizzieMaine said:
Very, very few period films showing characters listening to radio ever match the broadcast recordings on the soundtrack to the actual period being shown. I was very irritated by the recent remake of "The Untouchables," when Eliot Ness in 1931 tuned in on Amos and Andy -- and the broadcast heard, complete with live audience, was from 1952. (Had they asked, I could have provided them with an actual 1931 excerpt....)

That may have been more of a rights issue than anything else. Though they probably just thought that no one would be able to tell from the brief clip that it was from the wrong era.

Doug

CharlieB · Dec 2, 2010

Atomic Age said:
Avoiding contrails is impossible. And its only been recently with the advent of computers that they can be removed. So I tend to give filmmakers a little slack in this area.

Doug

You mean those weren't smoke signals?

LizzieMaine · Dec 2, 2010

Atomic Age said:
That may have been more of a rights issue than anything else. Though they probably just thought that no one would be able to tell from the brief clip that it was from the wrong era.

Doug

They were wrong -- the difference was glaring: the program was an entirely different format in 1952 compared to what it was in 1931, as five minutes of research would have shown them.

My second-most-annoying radio gaffe comes in "Paper Moon," which is a shame, because of all movies trying to recreate the Era, it does the most otherwise-impeccable job. But when young Addie, in 1937, tunes in on Fibber McGee and Molly and hears the closet crash, there goes the illusion. That gag didn't exist until 1940. (Sure, it's a nitpicky thing that only radio anoraks are likely to know, but if you're going to go as far as Bogdanovich did to get everything else right, why skimp on details like that?)

If anyone wants to hire me as a technical advisor for their own film project, my rates are very reasonable.

Bruce Wayne · Dec 2, 2010

I don't know if this belongs here or not, but what about the train scene in Casablanca where Bogie goes from soaking wet to bone dry in one second flat.

Widebrim · Dec 2, 2010

I know it's TV and not motion pictures, but...Richard Dawson's sideburns on Hogan's Heroes.

Atomic Age · Dec 2, 2010

LizzieMaine said:
They were wrong -- the difference was glaring: the program was an entirely different format in 1952 compared to what it was in 1931, as five minutes of research would have shown them.

My second-most-annoying radio gaffe comes in "Paper Moon," which is a shame, because of all movies trying to recreate the Era, it does the most otherwise-impeccable job. But when young Addie, in 1937, tunes in on Fibber McGee and Molly and hears the closet crash, there goes the illusion. That gag didn't exist until 1940. (Sure, it's a nitpicky thing that only radio anoraks are likely to know, but if you're going to go as far as Bogdanovich did to get everything else right, why skimp on details like that?)

If anyone wants to hire me as a technical advisor for their own film project, my rates are very reasonable.

I know what you mean. I'm that way about movies that are about movie making. Which strangely they never seem to get right.

Having said that, probably less than 1% of the audience viewing those films would know the difference between a radio show from the 30s and one from the 50's.

Doug

The Wolf · Dec 2, 2010

A lot of times movies will have cars, clothes, etc. correct to a period but radio shows and magazines aren't quite right. They'll be the wrong year, wrong time or a jumble of different times. I believe in "Hoodlum" a baseball game is playing on the radio around Christmas. Sometimes I accept it as "ambience" as long as it's in the background.
In the series "Carnivale" I didn't mind the Shadow radio playing in the background being from the wrong year but I hated a five dollar bill being called a sawbuck twice.

Sincerely,
The Wolf

scottyrocks · Dec 2, 2010

Lifted from COW:

In Raiders, when IJ and Marion are in the ship's cabin after his truck escapade, there is a bottle of Myers Rum on the table with a label from the 1950s. The movie takes place in 1936.

V.C. Brunswick · Dec 2, 2010

In the Gene Wilder film The World's Greatest Lover which is set in 1925 or '26 the song You Ought To Be In Pictures is heard in one scene. It wasn't written until 1934.

V.C. Brunswick · Dec 2, 2010

scottyrocks said:
Lifted from COW:

In Raiders, when IJ and Marion are in the ship's cabin after his truck escapade, there is a bottle of Myers Rum on the table with a label from the 1950s. The movie takes place in 1936.

Don't forget the Afrika Korps uniforms and the Panzerfaust. And if you really want to get technical there's the Type VII U-boat. They borrowed the U-boat mockup from the set of Das Boot which was being filmed around that time.

Fletch · Dec 2, 2010

Some period goofs aren't goofs. They're intentional, demanded by producers or meddling middlemen. This is most often true when a period style - say, hair or dialog - would somehow send a message that is unsexy or doesn't put over a character type.

I always say to watch the extras if you want good period clothing. The duds on characters with any screen time are always overdesigned and usually stereotyped.

bil_maxx · Dec 3, 2010

In the episode of "That 70s Show" where they go to Canada, they sing "O Canada" with the new 1980s lyrics.

scottyrocks · Dec 3, 2010

V.C. Brunswick said:
Don't forget the Afrika Korps uniforms and the Panzerfaust. And if you really want to get technical there's the Type VII U-boat. They borrowed the U-boat mockup from the set of Das Boot which was being filmed around that time.

Yeah, theres a bunch in that movie. Another is the bag he carries. Its a MkVII respirator bag not available until ~1940. The movie takes place in '36.

LizzieMaine · Dec 3, 2010

In "Nowhere Boy," an otherwise very close recreation of late-fifties Liverpool, you see young John Lennon and his aunt go to buy a guitar. The sign on the guitar shows the price as five shillings, but they're charged five pounds for it. That's either -- ah -- quite a markup, or the set dresser didn't know how to show pre-decimal pricing.

David V · Dec 3, 2010

You ought to read the gaffs in films set in the medieval period that I see on an armour board I belong to.

W-D Forties · Dec 3, 2010

A lot of the WW2 films made pre, I was about to say about 2000, but I'm still not sure thats true, are fantastically innacurate. The one that sticks in the mind is Battle Of Britain (on recently), with all the women (hello Susanna York) in 60's hairdo's and makeup and at one point a scene shot outside a 60's aluminuim door with patterned glass. My hubby (and lots of others, hello Bill if you are reading), could point out the technical gaffes re planes, etc. It's like they really couldn't be a**ed.
There's another WW2 film with Christopher Plummer (can't remember the name), where in a wartime nightclub all the women have beehives, and are wearing tight low-cut gold lame dresses split to the thigh.
Grrrrrrrr!

W-D Forties · Dec 3, 2010

Another thing, if you are talking Roman (and as my other half is a Roman Optio), I reckon Carry On Cleo is more accurate than Cleopatra. And yes, I know they borrowed the sets and costumes....

up196 · Dec 4, 2010

Sometimes the gaffe may not be all that accidental.

A few years back, my car was rented for a movie shoot. The car is a Ford Model A "Slant Windshield" 4-door sedan. The "S/W" sedan is very distinctive in appearance, even compared to other Model As, and they were only made about 11 months, starting in April of 1931.

When I got to the set, one of the production staff patted the fender and said "If anyone asks, this is a 1927 model."

It seems the scene they were about to shoot was set in 1929.

Chas · Dec 4, 2010

W-D Forties said:
Another thing, if you are talking Roman (and as my other half is a Roman Optio), I reckon Carry On Cleo is more accurate than Cleopatra. And yes, I know they borrowed the sets and costumes....

Do you mean all those "Hollywood Romans" forever being filmed in Lorica Segmentata? Or is it the bronze torso breastplates?

I've been watching "The Pacific". Many a/c flying overhead that are carrying drop tanks, during the invasion of Guadalcanal. Hmmm. No, they were launched from carriers a hundred or so miles away. There is also a scene about the fight near Alligator Creek that includes a wrecked LVT-2 Water Buffalo. None were used in combat at the 'Canal; only for logistical support and not until well into the battle. They were not used in combat until the landings at Tarawa, which happened much later. A wrecked LVT would not have been sited at the perimeter of Lunga point. The scene of the battle also shows the Marines under artillery fire. There wasn't Japanese artillery at that battle, only mortar fire and that doesn't look like artillery fire.

Sorry if I sound like a WW2 geek.

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