The Day the Earth Stood Still

Factual error: The electrical power grid fails, depicted by a series of shots of city blackouts and equipment shutdowns. When the power goes out, the lights of an oil refinery go out as well as the flare. In actuality the exact opposite happens to a flare when powered equipment such as compressors and cooling devices fail simultaneously. The flare is not an electrically powered device and is designed to stay lit during power outages. All excess pressure is immediately vented to the flare stack within a second, causing an enormous flame and smoke cloud that will be visible for several miles.

Factual error: As Klaatu is walking down the train platform at Newark Penn Station, in the background you can see signs that say "VIA". VIA is the national railway of Canada and does not have a presence in New Jersey. This scene was filmed in Canada, as evidenced by the signs on the platform and the 1950s style streamlined passenger cars on the track. Neither Amtrak nor NJ Transit uses those type of cars in their trains.

Factual error: MQ-9 reapers are prop driven, not jet powered UAVs, and are operated by USAF not the Army.

Factual error: US UAVs twice attack the aliens with Sidewinder missiles. Sidewinder missiles aren't a normal payload on UAVs, aren't meant to attack ground targets, and, being IR guided, wouldn't be able to lock on ground targets in either event. What is more, their warheads are comparatively tiny, further limiting their usefulness in this task. The most correct missiles to use would be Hellfire missiles.

Factual error: Crashing a reaper into a tank would not make the tank explode. In fact it would barely scratch it. The technology required to pierce tank armor is very complex. Simply crashing a large UAV into it will not work.

Factual error: Near the end of the movie, the protagonists speed through a check point at perhaps 50 mph. The soldiers begin a pursuit and in moments are right behind the black SUV, which has not slowed down. Although a military Humvee can travel at 70mph, it accelerates from 0-30 in slightly over 9 seconds, and the soldiers could not have possibly caught up so quickly.

stevewaclo

Factual error: The electrical power grid fails, depicted by a series of shots of city blackouts and equipment shutdowns. When the power goes out, the lights of an oil refinery go out as well as the flare. In actuality the exact opposite happens to a flare when powered equipment such as compressors and cooling devices fail simultaneously. The flare is not an electrically powered device and is designed to stay lit during power outages. All excess pressure is immediately vented to the flare stack within a second, causing an enormous flame and smoke cloud that will be visible for several miles.

More mistakes in The Day the Earth Stood Still

Klaatu: If the Earth dies, you die. If the human race dies, the Earth survives.

More quotes from The Day the Earth Stood Still

Trivia: When Klaatu is shown on the tv as an escaped convict, the phone number shown to call to report him is not the usual 1-800-555 number, rather it is 1-800-472-0391 which is the Alaska Weather Information Hotline.

More trivia for The Day the Earth Stood Still

Question: When Klaatu and Professor Barnhardt are writing on the black board together, are they solving something that we just haven't solved yet, and so answering this question is hopeless, or does anybody know what it is they are supposedly solving, it looks to be something to do with an event horizon.

Answer: As in the original 1951 movie, Professor Barnhardt has an equation on the board that suggests (theorizes) that space travel through inter-dimensional universes is possible. Klaatu solves the mathematical equation thereby proving that, not only is it possible, but that's how he got there. This was brought out in the original movie.

CCARNI

Answer: The equation Klaatu finds on the professor's blackboard is real - an in joke for mathematicians: the "Three Body Problem" seeks to account for all possible relationships among three objects in space (Landon 85).

Not to mention, Reeve's chicken scratch on that board reminds me of an 8th grader. Frankly, they should have CGI'd that bit. For anyone whose spent any time actually doing equations on a chalk board, his sophomoric scribble is hard to watch.

More questions & answers from The Day the Earth Stood Still

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.