Best history movie character mistakes of all time

Please vote as you browse around to help the best rise to the top.

Dunkirk picture

Character mistake: The story arc set on the Mole covers one week. The Highlanders attempt to refloat the beached trawler on the last day of that week. One of them confidently states that the tides are three-hourly. (The audience know this isn't true because we've seen a similar conversation between the Admiral and the Colonel.) At least some - if not all - of those Tommies have been on the beach all week. Have none of them have noticed that the tides are six-hourly?

More Dunkirk character mistakes
The Social Network picture

Character mistake: At Henley, Prince Albert of Monaco is introduced as "His Royal Highness Prince Albert." He is a Serene Highness, not Royal. A British VIP would know the difference and say "His Serene Highness" instead.

More The Social Network character mistakes
The Alamo picture

Character mistake: In a conference with Crockett and Bowie, Travis states that Fannin in Goliad is preparing to relieve the Alamo and will be ready to "march south by the end of the week." Goliad is 90 miles south of San Antonio. To relieve the Alamo, Fannin would need to march north.

More The Alamo character mistakes

JFK (1991)

JFK picture

Character mistake: When Garrison is leaving the house to question Clay Shaw on Easter Sunday, his wife is complaining about his working on the Sunday, and at one point calls Garrison 'Clay'.

DavidRTurner

More JFK character mistakes
Midway picture

Character mistake: When the Japanese attack is imminent, a soldier loads the 50 caliber machine gun rounds into the box backwards, with the rounds facing the gunner.

Robert F Baptista

More Midway character mistakes
Gettysburg picture

Character mistake: When Buster gets hit in the arm the first time, he is busy tying the kerchief below the wound. (02:21:05)

More Gettysburg character mistakes
The Doors picture

Character mistake: In the scene before the New Haven concert, when Jim is talking with the reporter/ love interest about his school history, she comments that Jim attended the University of Florida. In actuality, Jim attended Florida State University.

More The Doors character mistakes
The Amityville Horror picture

Character mistake: When Jackie the babysitter is stuck in the closet, she explains to George and Kathy that the door was locked. George says Amy there's no lock on this door. Her real name is Amy and her film name is Jackie.

More The Amityville Horror character mistakes
The Great Escape picture

Character mistake: When Werner asks Hendley why, as an American, he fights alongside Britain, he mentions that the British burned down the U.S. capital in 1812. While it happened during the War of 1812, the burning of Washington actually occurred in 1814. (00:11:10)

Cubs Fan

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

Suggested correction: The question was intended to demonstrate how far out-of-touch Werner was with United States history.

Charles Austin Miller

You misunderstand. Werner's question in and of itself is not the mistake; it's merely a point of contextual reference. The mistake is him giving the incorrect date of a historical event he claims to have read about; it's hard to believe that every book that he might have read on the topic are all wrong, so he must be remembering, and thus repeating it, incorrectly.

Cubs Fan

More The Great Escape character mistakes
Nuremberg picture

Character mistake: Wilhelm Keitel was a field marshal, not an admiral as stated during the sentencing.

More Nuremberg character mistakes
The Longest Day picture

Character mistake: When Rommel leaves his French headquarters for Germany on June 5th for his wife's birthday on the next day, he erroneously states that date as 6th of July (pronounced yoo-lee), not June (pronounced yoo-nee). (00:29:30)

Daniel4646

More The Longest Day character mistakes
Zero Dark Thirty picture

Character mistake: Dan is supposedly such an expert in Pakistan, but he hands Ammar the cigarette pack with his left hand (unclean to Muslims, and therefore not much of a gesture of hospitality).

More Zero Dark Thirty character mistakes
Miracle picture

Character mistake: While watching a documentary about the Soviet team Herb Brooks says that the Soviets had had 42 games in the last three months with 42 wins. This was supposed to be said in 1979. In the whole of 1979 Team USSR played 24 games only, winning 23 of them and losing Game 1 of the 1979 Challenge Cup, to the NHL All-Star team.

WhiteRussian

More Miracle character mistakes
Battle of Britain picture

Character mistake: Many windows only have 1 or 2 panes taped over to prevent glass from shattering when it's hit. Unless every pane is taped over this will achieve next to nothing.

stiiggy

More Battle of Britain character mistakes
Casino picture

Character mistake: When the high roller Ikachawa returns to The Tangiers, Rothstein said he's betting $1,000 instead of his usual $30,000, so when he won, it didn't feel like he had won $10,000 (10 $1,000 bets), but felt like he lost $90,000, alluding to the fact that betting 1/30th of his normal bets made him feel even though he was winning $1k a hand he was missing out on the other $29k, or losing that. At ten hands won, at $1k/hand, he really would have felt like he was losing $290,000, not $90,000 as Rothstein says.

Michael Prete

More Casino character mistakes
Apollo 13 picture

Character mistake: When Marilyn asks Henry "Do they know they're not on the air?" her finger is pointing just below her face. In the next frame with the camera now facing the pair, her hand is down at her lap. (00:47:00)

Zim

More Apollo 13 character mistakes
The Passion of the Christ picture

Character mistake: During the scene when Jesus is being whipped, the devil is walking through the crowd looking at him, in this scene only Jesus should've been able to see him, however look closely and one of the characters in the crowd's eyes can be seen following him.

More The Passion of the Christ character mistakes
Tora! Tora! Tora! picture

Character mistake: Immediately before the attack, when the flag is being raised on the flagpole, the young seaman who previously rang the bell steps backwards and trips over the concrete step behind him.

More Tora! Tora! Tora! character mistakes

211 (2018)

211 picture

Character mistake: Mike and Steve try to get Kenny out of their squad car while under fire. The driver side of the car is fully protected as it's the passenger side that the merc is shooting at. Mike tries to open the back door on the driver side but says it's stuff and asks Steve to get Kenny out on his side... where the merc is shooting. Kenny crawls to the front of the car, they open up the passenger door and Steve pulls him out. Mike then asks if they can get Kenny around to his side. Only while he's asking this you can see the front door on Mike's side is wide open. Kenny could easily have just gotten out that way and out of the line of fire. He even crawled to the front seats but got out on Steve's side instead of the open door on Mike's side where it was safe. (00:46:30)

Quantom X

More 211 character mistakes
Never Look Away picture

Character mistake: The tour guide inside the "Degenerate art" exhibition ridicules the 'child-like' paintings of the likes of Mondrian and Kandinsky. In particular he stands in front of Kandinsky "Upward." The German name of the work is "Empor", but the tag says "Empore." (00:03:40)

Sammo

More Never Look Away character mistakes

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.