Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Corrected entry: When Jack is going to be hung, and Will throws the sword, he is in front of the platform so the sword should have gone through the front of it, but it went though the back.

Correction: The sword went through the front of the trap door and the tip of the blade comes out the back. Standing on the scaffolding Jack faces Norrington's office and his back is facing the parapet.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: The British Royal Navy have their bayonets fixed all the time. This is not practical. Bayonets were kept in a scabbard on their belt. Loading a musket with a fixed bayonet will skin the soldier's knuckles raw.

Correction: The only time we see the British muskets is when it would be practical to have fixed bayonets. It is also perfectly possible to reload a musket with a fixed bayonet without injuring yourself, you just have to be a bit more careful and it takes a few seconds longer. During the American Civil War, with weapons not very different from those used in this movie, it was a common practice to charge with fixed bayonets and reload the weapons during the battle without removing the bayonet. This was done in case the fight became a melee and the bayonet could be used, and also to instill fear in the enemy.

Corrected entry: Just after Jack and Elizabeth are rescued from the island, in the wide screen version you can see a camera man dressing in a blue short sleeve shirt and tan shorts standing a few feet behind Depp to the far left. (01:40:25)

Aaron Lassman

Correction: When Jack says, "If I may be so bold to interject my professional opinion," behind Jack to his right are two sailors. One with a tan shirt with sleeves rolled up above his elbow, and wearing a black band on his wrist. The second, with a blue shirt with sleeves rolled up above his elbow, not short sleeves. The one with the blue shirt has white pants, not shorts, a dark belt and dark hair with a braid at his back. Those two men, tan shirt and blue shirt, have their arms up holding the line leading to the small boat that just rescued Elizabeth and Jack. Even more sailors wearing similar clothes, tan shirts and blue shirts, can also be seen when Norrington boards the Dauntless, before Jack and Will's escape on Interceptor.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: In the scene where Captain Jack saves Elizabeth they put a shirt over her to cover her, but when Jack kidnaps her she's not wearing it anymore.

Correction: What is put over Elizabeth's shoulders is her father's coat. You can see her remove it and thrust it towards the governor as Elizabeth says, "Commodore, I really must protest."

Corrected entry: Throughout the film, we see that the castle is right directly on the edge of the cliff, but in the scenes where the Commodore is proposing and when Jack falls off, both in the same place, we can see rocks jutting out past the castle base. These rocks are not visible when the castle is viewed from any other angle.

Sol Parker

Correction: Not sure which rocks you are talking about, so I will give 2 answers. If you're talking about the ones actually in the water they could be tidal OR they could actually be under the water, but visible from above because the water is so clear. If you talking about the ones connected to the base, I watched the scene and you can see them attached to the cliff and then sloping into the sea.

Corrected entry: Throughout the movie, people are in and out of the water, but when they are on deck their clothes are dry. The white shirts that they wear should become clingy and translucent when wet and don't dry very fast. An example of the way they look is when Will and Elizabeth return to the Interceptor. The other scenes in the movie where their shirts are free flowing are of dry shirts. (01:16:08)

Donald Jenkins

Correction: When Jack and Elizabeth are marooned on the island, their shirts are very visibly wet. When Will and Elizabeth return to the Interceptor, they had been out of the water for awhile, and their shirts had time to dry a little.

Corrected entry: Hans Zimmer, the composer for this film, also composed the music to 'The Road to El Dorado'. After watching both, it is evident that some of the themes in POTC are almost exact copies of themes from El Dorado. One that springs to mind is the theme - in El Dorado - played whenever the High Priest is on screen. It is the same music played during moments heavily featuring the Pearl in POTC.

Correction: Klaus Badelt composed the score for this film, not Hans Zimmer. Hans Zimmer was the music producer of PotC.

Corrected entry: How would Barbarossa have such nice looking apples? He is on a dirty old pirate ship in an Atlantic setting with no orchards within 100's of miles and yet he has such flawless, ripe fruit. Apples are not a tropical fruit in nature. This means that they have to be shipped from other places by ship, if at all. The voyage would take weeks, maybe months for them to arrive. The stories about sailors having scurvy due to the lack of fresh fruit and vegetables is because fruit like apples only stay good for about a week and then start to go bad. They would never last the entirety of the voyage.

Tobin OReilly

Correction: The pirates just pillaged Port Royal, including the well stocked home of the Governor. It makes sense to think that they stole all the delicious food that they now have aboard the Pearl, including the apples, from Port Royal.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: All the men in the British Royal Navy wear powdered wigs, but Murtogg and Mullroy have normal brown hair.

Correction: As a rule, only the officers wear powdered wigs - if you watch the battle on the Dauntless at the end, none of the enlisted men are wearing the wigs. The troops who assist in nearly arresting Jack after his rescue of Elizabeth have just been at Norrington's promotion ceremony - a special occasion where all the Navy men would wear the wigs. Murtogg and Mullroy were not present at the ceremony, therefore they are dressed normally, without the wigs.

Tailkinker

Corrected entry: When you see the tattoo of the sparrow on Johny Depp's arm that is actual real tattoo. it represents his son who is also called Jack.

Correction: The tattoo of the sparrow was painted on, but after the movie was made, Johnny Depp got one exactly like it.

Correction: There are always rocks surrounding her. Under water, we can see one rock to the far right of the screen. the other rocks are just spread out, as seen from above.

Corrected entry: In the shot where Elizabeth is admiring the medallion (after her dream), she hears her father and runs to get her dressing gown off her bed, knocking down her chair in the process. In the next shot, the chair is upright again.

Correction: While we do see the chair fall over onto the floor, as she reaches for her robe on the bed, the camera never once shows that chair again, in the subsequent shots in her bedroom. That chair has an ornate high back, with a white seat cushion. The chair we see behind Elizabeth as she puts her robe on, is another chair, with a low straight back.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: In the scene where Will is denying that his father was a pirate and Jack swings the wheel over to push Will off the ship with the boom. The ship is running before the wind so the spanker (the sail on the boom of the mizzen mast) should be right out perpendicular to the stern, and it should be held there by both the sheet holding it place on the mast and the preventer holding it in place on the side of the ship, and therefore shouldn't swing over when Jack moves the wheel.

Correction: First, the sheet would not stop the boom from swinging over, I've been hit enough times by the thing to know that. Second, it is reasonable that the preventer wasn't set, there are only two people aboard after all.

Corrected entry: When in the belly of the ship, Will and Elizabeth are talking in the candle light, but if you look at the reflection in their eyes in the closeups, you can see a square white light, most certainly not the flickering yellow of a candle.

Sol Parker

Correction: The door to the hold is open, letting in other light.

Corrected entry: Just before Norrington and his men board the Dauntless, if you look to the left of the screen, you can see a sailor fighting absolutely no one. Apparently, the computer graphic experts forgot to add his particular CGI 'actor'.

Correction: This Marine in blue, does have a pirate 'partner', that is shown in the background, behind skeletal Pintel and Ragetti, when they first come on deck. As for the specific shot you're referring to, that is when skeletal Pintel raises his sword and yells out, "Come on! Gaaah!" The marine is duelling with that pirate, who is now hidden behind the ship's red bell housing. You can actually SEE the pirate's sword swing three times, as the Marine swings his. Go frame by frame if necessary.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: At the very beginning, when you see the close-up of Jack on his sinking ship, he has three dangling braided beards. After that shot he only has two.

Correction: No. In this closeup you see 2 braids on the beard AND 2 shadows of those 2 braids. One is behind a braid, the other is between the two braids, so looks like a third one.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: In the beginning, when we first see Jack, there is a sunset behind him as he stands on the mast of his boat. In the other shots, the sky is blue.

Correction: The opening shot from behind, shows a blue sky with plenty of white puffy clouds. The next shot from the front, the camera is looking up, and it shows the blue sky and puffy clouds as well, with the 'sunrise', NOT sunset. The next shots looking straight out, the sky is still blue with puffy clouds.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: When Will frees Jack from jail, he lifts the door, but the door is directly under another bar, making it impossible to lift straight up.

Correction: As Will is standing right in front of Jack's cell, you can see a gap between the top of the cell door and the cell wall bars. There is more than enough of a gap at the top to lift the door off its half-pin barrel hinges. That is how the door is set into the hinges in the first place.

Super Grover

Corrected entry: When Jack and Will are talking to Anamaria in Tortuga, look behind them and you will see the Interceptor with no canvas visible at all. Then when Will points to the ship and they turn to look at it, you can see canvas.

Correction: The sails on the masts are lowered halfway in all the shots during this scene. When Will points to the Interceptor, we see it from a better angle, and the sails are more visible.

Super Grover

Correction: Will is not tied up anymore, when Elizabeth comes to join him in fighting the pirates and she IS wearing the cloth around her hand during this entire scene.

Super Grover

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl mistake picture

Continuity mistake: Either the first shot has a gratuitous view of the fort or the composite people neglected to add the fort in the second shot. Norrington says, "...this is the day that Capt. Jack Sparrow almost escaped. Take him away." The night shot that follows, shows the bridge archway, and beyond it the pier, Interceptor, the fort and its parapet. After Will breaks Jack out of prison, they approach the same archway and beyond it is the pier and Interceptor, but in this shot we don't see the fort and its parapet, nor the line that Jack slid down the day before. The camera angle is exactly the same. (00:27:15 - 00:44:30)

Super Grover

More mistakes in Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Barbossa: You best start believing in ghost stories, Miss Turner. You're in one!

More quotes from Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Trivia: Johnny Depp uses the phrase "Interesting..." as his trademark in many of the movies he stars in, including Sleepy Hollow. He uses it in PotC when Koehler's skeletal hand tries to grab him in prison.

More trivia for Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Question: Why did Jack cut himself before throwing the coin to Will? I thought the curse only needed Will's blood?

Answer: The curse needs the blood of everybody who took a coin from the chest. All the other pirates have already contributed so, as the movie opens, the only blood needed is Will's, substituting for his father. During the finale of the movie, Jack takes a coin from the chest, adding himself to the curse, so his blood is now required as well as Will's.

Tailkinker

But I didn't see any blood on the coins, and none of the pirates cut themselves, even before Will became part of the mix.

Yes, the other pirates did cut themselves before Will came into it, off-screen. The lack of blood on the coins can simply be explained as most of it dripping to the bottom of the chest, it being washed away by storms blown into the cave, or by the fact that they didn't drop that much blood on it in the first place.

When they had Elizabeth they believed she was Bill Turner's daughter, but they all thought the curse had failed, none of them had cut themselves so it makes zero sense.

They had been collecting back the coins for years. During that time they repaid their own blood. All they needed was the last coin and the blood of Bill Turner to break the spell.

lionhead

More questions & answers from Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

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.