North by Northwest

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North by Northwest Goofs/Mistakes

Movie Goof (continuity error): As Thornhill walks along the 20th Century Limited at Grand Central Terminal, he passes a car that's numbered 10006. But after he gets on the train and looks out the window, we see on the adjacent track another New York Central passenger car that also is number 10006. Two passenger cars of the same railroad will never have the same number.
Movie Goof (revealing mistake): The right side mirror on the bus that picked up the other man along the Indiana highway is in two different positions. As the bus approaches, it is adjusted correctly. When the man gets on and the bus pulls away, the mirror is turned and pointing toward the front of the bus, where it would be useless to the driver.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When Thornhill and his secretary are in a cab in front of the Plaza Hotel, a 1958 Ford cab is parked behind them. But when Thornhill exits the taxi, the car behind them has changed to a 1957 Dodge.
Movie Goof (continuity error): Following the crop dust scene, Roger goes to Eve's hotel room. She makes drinks for them. His is "scotch, water, no ice." She makes 2 drinks, putting ice in hers - which is on her right. When she finishes, she picks the one with the ice (hers) up with her right hand, and Roger's with her left. She then turns and walks toward Roger. She hands him his drink with her right hand. Hers, with the ice, is in her left hand.
Movie Goof (continuity error): The angle of the driver's side windshield wiper on the tanker truck (during the shot when the truck's hit by the crop-duster plane) is different from the angle in the next shot - even though the wipers aren't turned on.
Movie Goof (revealing mistake): The shot of Thornhill's car racing past the police car during his drunken escape is run at a higher than normal speed: the movements of the police officer are hurried and jerky and the red light atop the car is flashing at a much faster rate until Thornhill's car passes, at which point the film abruptly reverts to normal speed, as the cop moves and the light flashes at a noticeably slower (i.e. normal) rate.
Movie Goof (continuity error): Thornhill's hands jump around on Eve's hair and shoulders between shots in her train car.
Movie Goof (continuity error): Vandamm's left arm continually switches positions back and forth between the table and his chest while he's sitting with Thornhill in the Mount Rushmore cafeteria.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When the crop-duster plane hits the tanker truck, the truck's shadow on the road extends several feet across the center dashed white line. In the next shot, the shadow reaches only a few inches across the white line, without the truck having moved at all.
Movie Goof (continuity error): At Cary Grant's character's table in the Mount Rushmore cafeteria the salt and pepper shakers move around constantly from shot to shot, yet neither character ever touch them.
Movie Goof (continuity error): In the scene after the auction, where Roger is taken into a police car, we clearly see that the inner parts of the car are mostly brown. However, in the following scene, where they arrive to Northwest station, the inside of the car is clearly gray.
Movie Goof (continuity error): As Eve is being led to the plane with the house in the background, the sky appears to be very dark, but when the angle shifts with the plane in the background, the sky appears to be very bright.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When Thornhill is looking through the telescope at Mount Rushmore, during the first and last shorts, the Professor is sitting on the far side of the bench, but on the close-ups, he is sitting very close to Thornhill.
Movie Goof (continuity error): In the UN stabbing scene, Thornhill pulls the knife from Townsend's back with the blade pointing down. When the camera cuts to a wider shot, Thornhill is holding the knife upright.
Movie Goof (continuity error): Escaping from two thugs, Thornhill dashes out of the Plaza, grabs a cab, and it drives off. The thugs get into the next cab and go after him. From inside his cab, Thornhill then looks back at the hotel but the thug's cab is not there. It should be just pulling away from the curb.
Movie Goof (crew or equipment visible): At the Chicago station when Eva tells Thornhill to take a bus to meet Kaplan, in the long shot with the column behind them, the boom mic is clearly visible wobbling above.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When Roger gets out of the first cab with his secretary, the secretary is not in the backseat of the cab when it drives away.
Movie Goof (continuity error): Inconsistent shadows during the crop-dusting scene.
Movie Goof (errors made by characters, possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): In the first scene at Mount Rushmore, where Roger is watching it through a telescope, he says "I don't like the way Ted Roosevelt is looking at me." Based on the angle of sculpted face, Roosevelt is watching at a completely different direction.
Movie Goof (crew or equipment visible): In older copies, Thornhill's taxi ride with his secretary is a bit too revealing. At points, you are able to see blue sky above their heads while they're still in the cab. Only their exit from the taxi appears to have been shot using a full-length automobile. This mistake (as well as several others) were apparently fixed when the movie was re-mastered for DVD.
Movie Goof (continuity error): Every indication is given throughout the film that the action takes place in the summer - the trees in NYC are in full flower, ditto the foliage at the Long Island estate, the Indiana cornfield landscape is scorched, etc. - yet the newspaper which the Professor and his colleagues read recounting the murder of Lester Townsend carries a late November date.
Movie Goof (continuity error): Thornhill complains that he only has one suit for his stay in Chicago, yet when he heads out into the prairie he has a different colored suit on. Director Alfred Hitchcock claimed that it was actually the same suit that just looked a different color due to film color-matching techniques. However, according to Eva Marie Saint, Cary Grant loved clothes and didn't want to see the blue suit from the hotel scene in Chicago trashed from crawling round in the dirt to avoid the crop duster. So, a different suit was used for that scene (which happened to be a different color).
Movie Goof (incorrectly regarded as a mistake): Someone who resembles Thornhill gets off the train without a suitcase; it's possible to confuse that person with Thornhill, who has a suitcase under his arm.
Movie Goof (audio/visual unsynchronized): When Thornhill escapes from the Mt. Rushmore house and runs over to the black Ford, he is shown opening the car door and just starting to get in while on the soundtrack the sounds of the door being closed and the ignition being turned on are heard.
Movie Goof (revealing mistake): There are a couple of shots looking out over the tops of the monument's heads. In one of them, two presidents face the other two. The actual monument has three presidents facing one.
Movie Goof (continuity error): The flowers on the dining car from NY to Chicago change with every shot.
Movie Goof (errors in geography): As the drunken Roger is placed in the car by the kidnappers, waves can clearly be seen crashing into a rocky coast line with a large drop to the sea. The scene takes place in Glen Cove, New York, as evidenced by the police car, but there is nowhere on Long Island that has a coastline like this.
Movie Goof (plot holes): When Thornhill returns to the Townsend house with the detectives, they are introduced to Vandamm's accomplice who calls herself Mrs. Townsend. She tells them their version of how Thornhill was drunk when he left the house the night before. Later, at the U.N., The real Mr. Townsend tells Thornhill that his wife has been dead for many years. This fact would give Thornhill's claims credence, since the detectives could verify that a woman was in Mr. Townsend's house claiming to be his wife.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When Thornhill is about to get out of the cab leaving his secretary there, the cab behind is bright orange. After he gets out, the cab behind is a different color and make of car.
Movie Goof (crew or equipment visible): During the climactic Mt. Rushmore scene at the end of the film, the top of the mountain set, and equipment, are clearly visible for a number of seconds.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When Thornhill is writing the message on the matchbook, it matchbook is approx. half full with the matches concentrated in the middle of the book. When Eve opens the matchbook below, the matchbook is full of matches.
Movie Goof (errors in geography): When Thornhill steals the pick-up truck to drive back to Chicago, he makes a U-turn on the road and heads off in the same direction as the bus on which he arrived at the scene, meaning he is driving away from Chicago instead of towards it.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When Thornhill is writing the message on the matchbook, the message takes up three lines and reads "They're onto / you - I'm in / your room." When Eve opens the matchbook below, the message takes up four lines and reads "They're on to / you / I'm in your / room."
Movie Goof (revealing mistake): In the Chicago P.D. patrol car after Thornhill's arrest at the auction house, the cop on Thornhill's right forgets to lean as they simulate a turn. Cary Grant can be seen giving the errant actor a poke in the arm.
Movie Goof (miscellaneous): The "Townsend" sign outside the estate is on the opposite side of the entrance and facing away from the car carrying Thornhill, so that he could not possibly have read it from inside the vehicle, especially from the sharp angle at which the car pulls into the driveway.
Movie Goof (continuity error): Positioning of the three men and their wine-glasses seated in the banquette when Thornhill joins them, prior to being escorted away by the henchmen near the start of the film.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When Thornhill starts talking with the Plaza housekeeper Elsie, his left arm is bent. In the next shot, it is straightened at his side.
Movie Goof (revealing mistake): In the opening scene when Thornhill is taking a cab to the Plaza hotel with his secretary, the cab makes a U turn on Central Park South right in the middle of heavy traffic. A NYC Cop can be seen holding up traffic and then letting it pass as they pull in front of the hotel.
Movie Goof (revealing mistake): When Cary Grant leaves the train in Chicago, the Redcap uniform he is wearing is a perfect fit (if anything with the sleeves a little long). Yet when you see the man he got the uniform from, he is a very short little man whose clothes would never fit Grant, who of course is very tall.
Movie Goof (revealing mistake): When Vandamm's henchmen put the drunken Thornhill into his car, intending him to drive over the cliff, their heads disappear, as the footage of the actors protrudes into the matte cliff background.
Movie Goof (continuity error): The view out the window during the dinner scene on the train is not consistent.
Movie Goof (factual errors): The Southern Pacific passenger train leaving South Dakota in the last shot is incorrect. Southern Pacific did not and does not travel to this area. The actual train could have been Union Pacific or a local regional railroad.
Movie Goof (audio/visual unsynchronized): The airstrip at Vandamm's place clearly seems to be a gravel strip. Yet, as the plane touches down, a brief tire screech is heard, as from a plane setting down on a concrete or asphalt strip.
Movie Goof (revealing mistake): During the scene in the diner at Mount Rushmore, a young extra boy in the background anticipates the surprise gun shot, fired by Eve. The diners are supposed to be unaware this is going to happen but the young extra boy covers his ears way before she draws the gun. The young extra boy must have known there would be a loud bang from the blank-filled pistol from previous takes and therefore covered his ears on the "printed" take.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When Thornhill is getting dressed at the hospital, as he steps into his pants you can clearly see the belt is already threaded. In the next shot he has the belt in his hands and he threads it through each belt loop.
Movie Goof (crew or equipment visible): When Thornhill and his mother are changing elevators you can see a crew member bend over in the reflection on a pane of glass.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When Thornhill is being examined for intoxication, his position changes from sitting up in one shot to leaning forward in the next shot.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When Cary Grant is getting dressed in the hospital after getting "shot", he unwraps a new shirt but it is already wrinkled from where it had already been tucked into his pants.
Movie Goof (continuity error): When Thornhill is speaking to the real Lester Townsend, at first they are separated and facing each other then in the next shot they are much closer together and angled differently.
Movie Goof (continuity error): In the struggle on Mt. Rushmore, Eve slips and tears Roger's right back pocket from his trousers. In later shots his trousers are intact.