Category Archives: IMDB

Top 10: Mistakes That Could Ruin Your Favorite Movies

Also, footballs should not be thrown on roofs.

Movies get a lot wrong. And when I say a lot I mean a lot.

Jumping off of my piece from the other day, what you make of those mistakes is up to you. I try to avoid them because while they are probably better to know, they can also ruin the movie. However, they can also be hilarious depending on how wrong they are. I decided to do some research on IMDB, and I compiled ten of my favorite mistakes, and another list of five “mistakes.” Did I just ruin your favorite movie for you? Well good, it’s ruined for me, too. Let’s bond over sadness.

Read the list below:

21 Jump Street- “ In 2010, the Supreme Court ruled that if a cop neglects to read your Miranda rights, that is not necessarily grounds for release from charges. So the cops’ mistake at the beginning is not accurate.” (IMDB)

Casablanca: “There was never any such thing as a “letter of transit.” (IMDB)

Django Unchained: “Stephen (Samuel L. Jackson) uses the word “motherfucker” four times throughout the film, This is a linguistic anachronism as the word didn’t exist until the WWI era (the Oxford English dictionary lists the earliest use in 1918).” (IMDB)

No Country for Old Men: “In the scene where Anton is chasing Llewelyn through the streets at night, a modern day Dominos Pizza sign can be seen in the background.” (IMDB) [Note: I would pay lots of money for a scene where Josh Brolin and Javier Bardem eat Domino's together while in character.]

The Big Lebowski: “The first sex offender laws, like those which would require Jesus Quintana to notify his neighbors of his paedophilic record, weren’t implemented in California until 1996.” (IMDB)

The Room: “Johnny claims that he couldn’t cash a check because it was “out of state.” However, it is entirely possible to cash an out of state check. Johnny, a banker, should know this.” (IMDB)

The Room: “Mark asks Lisa “what’s going on” with “the candles [and] the music”, but neither music nor candles are present.” (IMDB)

Braveheart: “Primae noctis has never been used in the entire history of the British Isles.” (IMDB)

Braveheart: “In reality most of the Irish fought against Wallace.” (IMDB)

Braveheart: “At the funeral of Wallace’s father, the child Murron plucks a thistle, the national flower of Scotland, and gives it to the boy Wallace. This is both physically impossible (every species of thistle in the British Isles is so prickly and so tough-stemmed that you could only wrench one from its stem wearing protective gloves) and symbolically absurd (the toughness and prickliness of the thistle is its whole point as a symbol of Scottishness).” (IMDB) [Note: I really wanted to put "Braveheart" in its place. And I guess "The Room" needed to be, too.]

And Five “Mistakes”

Elysium: There are actually no machines that exist in real life that can cure both cancer and paralyzed legs.

Inception: When traveling through other people’s dreams, people do not actually yell confusing lines of exposition at each other.

Inglourious Basterds: Hitler was not actually shot hundreds of times in the face by a man named the Bear Jew. In fact, Bears are legally not allowed to be Jewish.

Taxi Driver: Robert De Niro is not actually a taxi driver. He is, in fact, a very talented actor.

There Will Be Blood: In one scene, Daniel Plainview tells Eli Sunday that he is going to bury him underground. In fact, the practice of burying the dead underground did not exist until Warren G. Harding passed it into international law on July 17, 1923. Before that, bodies were stacked up in wheelbarrows, similar to what is seen in “Monty Python and the Holy Grail.”

What are some of your favorite mistakes in movies?

The Reel Deal Goes To Cannes Update #6: There’s a First Time For Everything

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The less glitzy side of The Red Carpet.

“Hitting the wall” is the Cannes related phenomena in which a while’s worth of no sleep comes together in spectactular fashion.

I have not quite hit the wall yet, but I feel that I am on course for collision.

Today was yet another rainy day, yet it was also a day of many lessons. I learned that Macedonia has a film industry, the Czech Republic gives out generous amounts of free wine, and that the end of “Inception” is (SPOILER ALERT) undoubtedly reality. This is a fact that most people probably knew about three years ago. More on that coming up.

After the Jump: Meeting IMDB’s creator, Col Needham, and walking out of a movie for the first time.

One of the main highlights of my trip occured today. I met a man wearing a jacket with an IMDB pin on it. I asked him if he worked for the site. His response was something along the lines of “actually, I created it.”

Col Needham created IMDB for the exact reason you’d expect: he was a film buff who needed a convenient place for all things film. He told me about the experience of seeing “Aliens” in theaters for the first time. And that “Inception” thing. In every scene in which DiCaprio is wearing his ring, it is a dream. When he isn’t, it’s reality. At the end, he is not wearing his ring. While this ruins the fun of the ambiguity, it made me appreciate the film much more, as this displays Nolan’s attention to detail. I still maintain though, that the real point of the ending is that it doesn’t matter whether or not the top fell, all that mattered is that he was exactly where he wanted to be. I now proclaim the “Inception” debate officially over [Editor's Note: I'm being told that it ended two years ago].

Unfortunately, I come with few new screenings to share stories of. “Rust & Bone” is the most talked about film around, but good luck finding a seat for it. After an unsuccessful attempt at seeing that, I decided to be a little impulsive and see a screening with basically no prior knowledge of it. I landed on “White Elephant.” All I heard in advance was “Argentinian movie about drug cartels” and I was sold. I still can’t even decide if it was actually about that. Don’t get me wrong, I like slow-burning films, and Cannes is the perfect place for that. However, there is slow, and then there is too slow, and “White Elephant” falls into the latter category. Nothing happens for a while, and when it does happen, I just felt myself shrug, and want to go back to sleep.

That is another thing about “the wall”: it can hit at anytime, during the events you don’t want it to happen during. It is usually hardest to fight it once the lights go off in the cinema. It can be resisted by seeing “Lawless” and not “White Elephant.”

“White Elephant” marks a sad turning point in my life, as it was the first film I ever walked out off. I don’t plan to indulge in this behavior normally, but walking out of a film early feels nornal at a film festival. Once again, slow and tortorous are two very different things. I will review “White Elephant” no further, as I did not see the second half, and it is entirely possible that I could have missed something worthwhile. Also, a film must be reviewed as a whole. Missing any of it and the intended bigger picture is sullied.

The only reason I feel less terrible for walking out is that this seems to be a commonplace action in Cannes. I have never seen this many walkouts per capita in my life over the span of the Festival. While there is usually value to seeing a bad movie, as it makes you realize what it takes for a movie to be good, there is just so much to see at Cannes that any amount of time spent in a bad film feels like time wasted. As the phrase that I never wish was invented goes, “YOCO” (You Only Cannes Once).*

*I strongly reccomend never using this in daily conversation.