17 Worst Movie Mistakes Ever

When you’re creating a blockbuster movie, it’s hard to get every detail right. But some movie mistakes are so glaring, it’s hard not to laugh at the finished effort.

Here are 17 of the worst movie mistakes to make it to the big screen:

1. Star Wars, Episode 4

Darth Vader snaps the neck of a rebel commander, and tosses the dead man against a corridor wall. This scene would be more convincing if the deceased fellow didn’t throw his hands up to cushion his impact with the wall.

2. Harry Potter and The Sorcerer’s Stone

Inside the grand dining hall, there’s a scene where Harry is sitting directly across the table from Hermione and a boy in a pointy hat. A little later, he has mysteriously moved, and is sitting right between them. That place really is magical.

3. Braveheart

This movie has all sorts of unintentional hilarity, including a not-too-scary battleaxe that is obviously made of rubber. The best blunder of all occurs in a war scene: if you look carefully, you can see a white van parked in the background.

4. Raiders of the Lost Ark

Remember when Indy was swimming in a river and grabbed onto a passing floatplane to make his escape? In the water, he’s soaked to the bone, but when he’s standing up on the wing getting ready to hop in, he’s completely dry.

5. Pretty Woman

Julia Robert’s character (Vivian) is seen sitting in a chair eating a croissant that has been delivered by hotel room service. After a brief cutaway, the croissant has transformed itself into a half-devoured pancake. This highly changeable item later morphs into a whole pancake.

6. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

In a medium close-up of Jack Sparrow talking on the ship’s deck, you can spot a crew member standing in the background, wearing a suspiciously modern outfit: cowboy hat, designer sunglasses and a tee shirt with extra short sleeves.

7. North by Northwest

In this classic Hitchcock spy tale, Eve shoots Roger (Cary Grant) in the cafeteria at Mount Rushmore. Just before the loud shot, you can see a boy seated in the background, covering his ears. After some previous takes, he knew exactly what was coming!

8. Pulp Fiction

After Vincent and Jules enter an apartment building, they are shot at several times. Astonishingly, they both escape the hail of bullets. Even more surprising is the fact that the bullet holes were already in the wall behind them before the shots were fired.

9. Speed

In this Keanu Reeves action flick, things happen pretty fast as the hero and Sandra Bullock try to stop a bus from exploding. In an early scene, the side of the bus is ad-free. Later, there’s a large billboard-style advertisement featuring a zebra and the words ‘Good Vibrations’.

10. Django Unchained

Did you notice the cool shades Django was wearing during this movie? They were very stylish. Unfortunately, this Western was set in the middle of the 19th century, about seventy years before sunglasses were first introduced into the US.

11. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

In a scene where Gandalf is standing on a stone balcony, there is a brief cutaway. When the scene returns to Gandalf, his balcony is unchanged, but the computer-generated buildings next door are totally different in every way.

12. Ocean’s Eleven

Rusty (Brad Pitt) is standing in the Bellagio Botanical Garden with a shrimp cocktail in his hand, munching away. When the scene is shot from a different angle, Rusty hasn’t moved, but his shrimp cocktail glass has turned into a plate of some other food.

13. The Goonies

As this movie winds down, one of the adventurous boys informs a reporter that the most frightening part of all was fighting the huge octopus. Alas, the entire octopus battle scene was cut from the initial release of the movie, so the reference made no sense.

14. Spider-Man

There is an urban fight scene in the rain, where Spider-Man manhandles four muggers who are accosting Mary Jane. He tosses two of them through a couple of chest-high windows. After he takes care of the other two, the windows have miraculously become intact again.

15. Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines

In the scene where John Connor and Kate are at the airplane hangar, there is a blue and white Cessna 172 with a registration number of N3035C. Up in the air, the number has changed to N3973F. Back on the ground, it’s N3035C again.

16. Gladiator

In one of the arena battle scenes, a chariot slams into a wall and tips over. As the dust settles, you can spot what looks like a propane gas tank attached to the back of the chariot. Gas tanks, of course, were not available in the age of Brutus and Caesar.

17. Harry Potter and The Philosopher’s Stone

Riding around on skinny brooms during an energetic Quidditch match can be distinctly uncomfortable. Fortunately, the crew kindly attached ‘hidden’ seats to Harry’s broom (and several others) to make them more comfy. Unfortunately, these seats are plainly visible in several close-ups.