Continuity errors?
I found this info while surfing the net. Supposedly these are observations made by some guy, who apparently watched the film to find the mistakes. The continuity guy, I guess, was asleep at the switch, and some little miscues made their way into the film. I hadn't noticed any of these while watching the movie, but then I wasn't looking for them either. Just for the record I like the movie, love the soundtrack, and have it on DVD.
[FONT=Arial,Helvetica,Sans Serif]Gettysburg (1993) - 25 mistakes
Just before Pickett's charge, there are a number of shots of drummer boys playing the drums. Their drums have plastic drum heads with the "Remo" brand name on them.
A jet trail can be seen just before the fight at Little Round Top, when Chamberlain and Tom are talking.
After Chamberlain's bayonette charge, he sees his aide wounded for a second time. The scene changes angles back and forth during their talking of how brave the boys were. An American flag is over the shoulder of the aide on close ups, but on a longer shot the flag is leaning against the tree.
During the engagement of the 20th Maine in defense of Little Round Top there is a tremendous amount of firing going on as they repel charge after charge of Confederates. Yet, there is not a single leaf, or tree branch, that falls to the ground. With that amount of lead flying around there would have been debris everywhere. There are actual Civil War accounts where whole trees were cut in half by bullet fire.
There are several scenes which show an American flag with way too many stars for that time period.
During the sequence at Little Round Top, the same footage is used twice. The 20th Maine soldiers discharge a volley of musketry and there is a shot of a Confederate soldier being bodily flung backwards. A short time later, the Union defenders send down another volley and we see a close-up of another Confederate falling. Only it's the same actor, same footage.
There are white wrist watch marks on the tan arms of the Confederate soldiers as they reach for Lee as he rides among the troops.
On the first day of the battle when Longstreet and Lee are talking, Longstreet's cigar is unraveling and in the next shot he has a new cigar.
In several scenes where the cannons are firing, they either don't recoil or recoil very little. In real life, they would have a bigger recoil.
In one Pickett's Charge scene the bayonets are obviously rubber.
In the battle of Little Round Top, as the Confederate soldiers are backing down the hill there is one man walking backwards and loading his gun. Behind him another soldier aims his weapon and fires, shooting the first man in the side of the head. The man then ducks and waits for the smoke from the shot to clear and continues down hill.
When the battle is happening at the end, the number of soldiers bodies after they have been killed varies from shot to shot. It shows them falling and dying in some shots, but the bodies are gone in later shots.
In the scene where Chamberlain is walking with his brother just after Little Round Top and before they get to the safe part of the battlefield, there is a jet trail in the sky.
In the first day's battle at Gettysburg, it shows John Budford's Union Cavalry defending their ground from the Confederate Army. Budford's boys use a stonewall for protection from enemy fire. The thing is that there was really no stonewall there in 1863 for Budford to hide behind.
When Buster gets hit in the arm the first time, he is busy tying the kerchief below the wound.
There is one shot where the camera shows the battlefield with a large tree in the middle of it. You can see that the tree has been cut away to make room for a power line, which has been removed for the movie.
The mane on Lee's favorite horse, Traveler, changes from gray to white to gray.
When Buford's cavalry is first riding into Gettysburg, he brings his men alongside a fence. On the other side of the fence, there is a trail with tire tracks from a car or truck. They can't be from wagon wheels because they are about a foot thick each too well formed.
When the Irish/Scottish colonel is lying wounded after the Battle of Little Round Top, the man on the far right helping him is breathing out vapor. I thought the Battle of Gettysburg was in the at the beginning of July, where they mention it's really hot.
In the opening, the spy is watching Union troops at dawn. He rides to Longstreet's headquarters and gets there in broad daylight. They then ride to Lee's headquarters and when they get there it is dawn again. Two sunrises in one day...
The real Confederate General Lewis A. Armistead was quite shy of hair at the front of his head, yet Richard Jordan, who plays him in the movie, has a full head of hair.
Pickett's charge moved from west to east and was made late in the afternoon. When Pickett rides down the line to encourage his men before the attack, it is clear from the shadows that the scene was filmed early in the morning.
When General Longstreet is trying to talk General Lee into redeploying from Gettysburg, General Lee refuses saying that he has never left the enemy in possession of the field. But General Lee did retreat from the Battle of Antietam in September of 1862.
When John Buford's cavalry are engaging Confederate infantry on the first day of battle, they are seen to be firing muzzle loading rifles, something which cavalry in 1863 would not be using. Rather, they would have had Sharps or Spencer breech loaders, the latter capable of firing eight shots before reloading. Later, when you see the cavalrymen firing from behind a fence, they now have breech loaders.
During one of the scenes where Longstreet is talking with Lee, I think on the third day, Longstreet's beard is quite a bit shorter than it was on the previous days.
:shrug:
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