Sammo

28th Dec 2019

The Brass Bottle (1964)

Continuity mistake: During the 'simple dinner', the second time that the slaves get on their knees praising Fakrash's name, the seneschal claps his hands to shut them up starting from a position with his hands joined, but the hands were parted in the previous shot. (00:43:30)

Sammo

28th Dec 2019

The Brass Bottle (1964)

Continuity mistake: Harold pitches to the mule a certainly very reasonable idea such as having plastic surgery. In the earlier part of the scene Tony Randall was leaning against the car window, but not in that shot. However, at the cut, there he is, again leaning to the window. (01:12:45)

Sammo

28th Dec 2019

The Brass Bottle (1964)

Factual error: Fakrash is a genie who served under King Solomon and he himself says that he's been imprisoned for 3'000 years. Yet the whole aesthetics of his clothes, decoration, architecture is the stereotypical Arabian Nights one, which would be several centuries posterior to his times and almost as foreign to him as the present day one.

Sammo

28th Dec 2019

The Brass Bottle (1964)

Visible crew/equipment: An angry aspiring home buyer tosses a tomato inside the office of Fakrash and Ventimore, but the rancid veggie boomerangs on him when the genie summoning his powers reverses the flow of time causing the tomato to fly where it came from. Well, that's the idea, while in fact you can see a literal stagehand actually throwing the tomato in the actor's face. (01:17:55)

Sammo

28th Dec 2019

The Brass Bottle (1964)

Continuity mistake: At the hearing, Fakrash starts flying around the room (with a terrible special effect). The men at the prosecution table lean forward to look at what is happening; their arm position changes between shots. (01:23:15)

Sammo

28th Dec 2019

The Brass Bottle (1964)

Other mistake: Mrs Kenton and Sylvia can't get into the study where Mr. Kenton is; there is no reason why the door would be locked. A mule can't lock it with a key and there is no debris or furniture to block the door. Harold opens it just fine from the inside without operating any particular kind of lock.

Sammo

28th Dec 2019

The Brass Bottle (1964)

Continuity mistake: The protagonist gets home with the titular object. Seymour is finishing the sculpture; he casts no particular shadow on the wall behind him, but as soon as the shot changes, his silhouette is projected right on the wall. (00:06:40)

Sammo

28th Dec 2019

The Brass Bottle (1964)

Continuity mistake: Female servants approach the 'table' where the protagonist is having dinner with in-laws and fiancee and sprinkle them with myrrh and frankincense. Continuity mistakes happen at every cut regarding the position of Harold's hands in his lap. (00:45:20)

Sammo

28th Dec 2019

The Brass Bottle (1964)

Continuity mistake: Harold is holding in his arms the bottle still wrapped as he tells his roomies about the wedding being postponed. In the different shots, the bottle is turned differently - just look at the position of the ribbon. (00:07:35)

Sammo

28th Dec 2019

The Brass Bottle (1964)

Continuity mistake: During the scene in front of the restaurant (after the VW van takes Harold's parking spot) every cut brings continuity errors in the position of the passersby. The natural light also changes as you can see by the shadow on the sidewalk. (00:27:10)

Sammo

28th Dec 2019

The Brass Bottle (1964)

Continuity mistake: After Fakrash proposes the partnership in real estates, Harold walks back to the car. Time has passed, because all of a sudden, Fakrash's head does not cast a shadow on his chest like in previous shots. (01:12:25)

Sammo

Plot hole: With over two years spent teaching at school, nobody (students, coworkers) ever noticed the rubber face and rubber hands of 'professor Soneji' - and he teaches computer science, having to get close to people constantly looking at their screens and interacting with them - as shown in the classroom scene. Nothing is also said about the name being an alias and how he managed to teach to the super-elite school where daughters of senators and the Russian President (what is he doing attending middle school in the US anyway?) with no credential, or fake ones (the degree shown is in Mercusio's name). You'd think the vetting for the staff there would be iron-proof. He has also been wearing a fake gut, and something like that would have easily showed up if he ever got as much as a pat-down, which at a place with security so tight, is certainly a possibility.

Sammo

Plot hole: Jezzie has files about Dimitri in her computer and is the one who asks Cross to do the stake-out at the embassy. She knows of Soneji's plan to kidnap the Russian kid, but wants it to fail, since she is more than content with the millions of ransom for Megan. This part does not make sense on any level; she can't know on which day Soneji is attempting the kidnapping, and since she and her accomplice know where he is hiding (or else they wouldn't be able to grab Megan from him when he is away), by all means they should have killed him rather than run the huge risk to let him try to kidnap another kid at the well guarded embassy and have him killed or worse, captured, before they can do their scheme replacing him. For their plan to succeed, Soneji needs to be dead, so he won't mess up for his delusions of grandeur.

Sammo

Plot hole: Devine is in the hideout. It is late evening/night. Nothing in the timeline here makes sense. For starters, the newscast says that "over a week ago" the manhunt for Soneji started. Cross gets on the case the first day, on day 2 they find Mercusio's home, day 3 the failed embassy run and Megan is taken away from Soneji (but nobody knows), day 4 is the jewelry heist, leaving Soneji to be killed the same day or after (the movie messes up on that account but seems to want it to happen the same day, I'd give it another day, making it 5). Moreover, it says that Soneji was killed late in the afternoon the day before; it means that Jezzie waited more than a whole day to go to him, and Devine's comment about the kid being so doped up she didn't realise she is not on the boat makes no sense when it implies she'd have to sleep for 2 days straight instead of one. (01:23:00)

Sammo

Stupidity: Mercusio is looking through FBI files on his computer. The FBI has a horrible database then, since the agents' postings are listed all in random order (otherwise Ben would be working at the White House and not at the school - which is also suspiciously listed without any hint about its location). (01:11:30)

Sammo

Revealing mistake: Cross is between the first two steps of his tour de force following the instructions for the diamond delivery. McArthur says "Unit six, take "K" Street and double back", and we are shown Jezzie in her vehicle. She moves cutting through a traffic island with a forbidden maneuver, and yet you can see on the asphalt wet marks of 'someone' doing the exact same thing before her recently (obvious residual of the previous take). (01:06:30)

Sammo

Continuity mistake: After receiving instructions from Mercusio (when Cross is told to go to the Watergate), agent Ollie McArthur says "okay people, let's move." He says that across two shots; in the first, Monica Potter is distinctly shifting her eyes from looking in front of her to looking to her right, but in the second she is looking straight again, making the lack of continuity quite obvious over such a small detail. (01:03:50)

Sammo

Plot hole: From a logistic and tactical point of view, the whole police/FBI operation revolving around the diamonds does not make any sense. The agents are supposedly spread around and in great numbers, but everyone is simply chasing him, while Cross is speaking freely through the radio and shares the addresses and instructions so they should be -ahead - of him, they know where he is going! Although, during the action, Cross tends to speaks directly with Jezzie all the time, as if all the other dozens of agents did not exist. Jezzie's presence itself is completely illogical, too, since Soneji ordered that nobody would follow Cross or he will kill the girl, and Jezzie is the one agent that he knows (she's been the kid's bodyguard for 2 years!) and is sure to recognize. She should be nowhere near the chase, but nobody objects at all.

Sammo

Continuity mistake: Jezzie's computer that she used for all her operations has the screen seemingly turned on, always of a bright blue even before Cross actually switches it on. When he looks at the password screen with just 'Administrator' as username, the screen is black, like it is not in any other part of the scene. (01:27:40)

Sammo

Continuity mistake: Cross just boarded the train. At the entrance, featured prominently, there's a woman with headphones. To the other side, there's an old pudgy man with a beret, and a black guy in a dark brown suit, looking all serious. Morgan Freeman is between these two guys, but in the POV that follows they are both on the same side, in front of him. (01:09:25)

Sammo

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