Mistakes In Titanic

  • Crew and cameras reflected in Rose's TV.
  • Jack won his ticket by beating 2 pair with a full house. However, when the we first see Jack's hand, he has nothing that could be made in to a full house, and only draws one card.
  • A strip of desert is visible between the dock and the Titanic when docked at Southampton.
  • When Captain Smith orders, ``Take her to sea, Mr. Murdoch -- let's stretch her legs'', they are standing to the right of the wheelhouse looking forward with the sun coming from their left. When Murdoch walks into the wheelhouse to carry out the order, the sun is behind him.
  • The draft markings on the Titanic's bow when Jack looks at the dolphins later change size and position.
  • Jack claims to have gone ice fishing on Lake Wissota, which wasn't created until five years after the Titanic sank.
  • Jacks claims to have visited the Santa Monica Pier, which did not begin construction until 1916.
  • The pipe frames supporting the third class berths have set-screw speed rail fittings, not developed until 1946.
  • Margaret Brown was never refered to as ``Molly'' until after her death.
  • In the scene where Jack is teaching Rose to spit, there is no spit on his chin as he starts to turn around to face the ladies, but by the time he has completed his turn he has some on his chin.
  • The painting over the fireplace in the Titanic's first class smoking lounge in the film depicts New York Harbor, which was actually the painting on the Titanic's sister ship, ``Olympic''. The painter, Norman Wilkinson, had provided a scene of Plymouth Harbor for Titanic, but no pictures of this work survive.
  • The main characters have lunch in the Palm Court/Verandah on A Deck. These were not used for dining, although passengers could order tea or a small snack.
  • Cal orders lamb with mint sauce for himself and Rose. Lamb was only available for dinner on the ship, while mutton was reserved for lunch. The lamb was prepared in the D-Deck galley and would not have been served in the Palm Court.
  • While Jack and Rose are walking on the promenade the day after he rescues her, a small hill with a building on it is visible over Jack's shoulder and above the ship.
  • Jack takes Rose and Molly's arms to go into dinner. They start walking, but in the next shot they are still standing apart.
  • More crew and equipment is Reflected in the glass door opened for Jack as he enters the dining room.
  • The worship services held at 10:30 on Sunday April 14th, 1912, in the First Class Dining Room were open to all passengers of the ship.
  • ``Eternal Father Strong To Save'' is sung during the worship service; the verse that begins ``Lord, guard and guide the men who fly/ Through the great spaces in the sky'' was written by Mary C. D. Hamilton in 1915.
  • During the scene when Rose ``flies'' from the ship's bow, the sunlight is clearly falling almost exactly straight across the ship from left to right. On the evening of the 14th, the ship would be steaming somewhere between WSW and SW; the lighting in the movie would indicate that the sun is between SSE and SE, when it actually would have been between W and WNW.
  • The length of Rose's fingernails throughout the movie. (It has been brought to my attention that this is because a hand model was used during the flying scene and others because Mr.Cameron thought her hands were too stubby.)
  • The hands sketching Rose are clearly too old to belong to Jack. (They actually belong to director James Cameron.)
  • After the first few lines of the sketch are drawn, a blood blister appears below his thumbnail.
    Factual errors:
  • Workers in the Titanic's engine room had to wear thick protective clothing to shield them from the heat generated by the engines.
  • The gauges in the engine room are fitted with sweated tubing fittings, a plumbing technique not available when the ship was constructed. The fittings should have been threaded brass.
  • There was no door between boiler room 6 and the cargo area (and no access to any but authorized crew). If there had been a door, it would have entered the third cargo area aft, not the one where the Renault was stored.
  • Reflected in a brass panel on the front of the Renault that Jack and Rose find in the cargo hold.
  • The "CQD" disaster message that the radio operator starts clicking out on the telegraph key is not intelligible Morse code.
  • When Captain Smith enters the wheelhouse, the ship's telegraph is set to "Full Reverse" instead of "All Stop".
  • Jack is supposedly held prisoner in the Master-At-Arms office, which is depicted as having a porthole. On the Titanic, this room was an interior room and hence would have no portholes.
  • The porthole in the room where Jack is held prisoner is shown to be several feet below water, yet in a shot from inside the room, the surface of the water is visible inches above the porthole.
  • The broken glass that the axe sits behind.
  • First Officer Murdoch did not shoot anyone, including himself.
  • It is impossible for voices to echo in the middle of the North Atlantic unless there is a large, flat object like a ship nearby.
  • Eyewitness testimony to the sinking conflicted, and until the discovery of the wreck in 1985 the generally accepted description was that the ship had sunk intact. Of those who claimed the ship had broken up prior to sinking, some claimed that after breaking away from the bow, the stern rolled to port, almostly completely turning over..
  • Make-up artists on the film used pictures of corpses from the disaster, but the amount of ice in the hair of victims in the movie seems to be excessive. It was not nearly cold enough to freeze seawater, and the only immediate source of fresh water in the hair would be breath, which would not contain nearly as much as depicted in the short time people survived in the water.
  • When the rescue ship enters New York Harbor and the Statue of Liberty is seen, the torch visible is the new, restored torch (post 1986), which is gold-leaf covered and illuminated from the exterior, unlike the original torch, which was illuminated from within and had an amber stained-glass look.

    Incorrectly regarded as mistakes:

  • Although the Titanic's fourth smokestack was not an exhaust avenue for the ship's engines, it was used as an outlet for the Titanic's massive kitchen. Since the Titanic used coal stoves, some smoke would have been coming out of the fourth smokestack. In one of the flyovers of the ship, it is possible to see that most of the top of the fourth smokestack is sealed.
  • It has been stated that the paintings in Rose's room are famous works that did not go down with Titanic. The paintings were by artists noted for creating many similar paintings.
  • Although her fingers partially obscure it, the coin that Rose gives to Jack is generally agreed to be a Barber dime, minted 1892-1916. The Barber dime is distinctive because the portrait of Liberty on the head of the coin faces the right, not the left.
  • After the iceberg is spotted, First Officer Murdoch bellows a helm order: ``Hard-a-starboard!'' But Quartermaster Hichens, manning the wheel, turns the wheel counter-clockwise, or to port. At first glance this would seem to be a mistake. The order itself, "Hard-a-starboard," was a holdover from earlier days when the tiller of a ship would be used to control the rudder. Pushing the tiller to the right (starboard) would cause the ship to turn to the left (port). So a turn to port was ordered by calling "hard-a-starboard." Sources differ on which way the wheel had to be turned to actually carry out this order. Director James Cameron is on the record as being aware of the possible confusion that turning the wheel in the ``wrong'' direction might create, but decided to include it to be as accurate as possible.
  • The "middle finger" gesture was used as early as the late 19th century.
  • The gun that Cal uses to go after Rose and Jack was a Colt 45M1911, created in 1910. The gun holds 7 bullets in the clip with an eighth in the chamber. Cal did not pull back the slide (which would have ejected a bullet) before shooting and fired exactly eight shots.
  • There is much disagreement over the last song played by the band before the ship sank. Wallace Hartley's family firmly believe that it was ``Nearer My God to Thee'' as shown in the film, and indeed had this inscription placed on his tombstone, as do the majority of witnesses. According to Junior Wireless Operator Harold Bride, the band played the song ``Songe d'Automne'', which has some similar sections.
  • The lifeboats for RMS Titanic were in fact labeled ``SS Titanic''. This is verified by a photograph which appears on page 718 of National Geographic Magazine Vol. 168 no. 6 (December 1985).
  • The credits explain that some dramatic license has been taken; this is apparent with several minor characters. Benjamin Guggenheim's mistress, Madame Aubert, never dined in the First-Class Dining Saloon. She took all of her meals in the A la Carte restaurant on B-Deck. JJ Astor is last seen in the First Class main staircase as the glass dome implodes. In fact, his body was recovered from the North Atlantic a few weeks after the sinking. The body was crushed and coversed with soot, indicating that he had been crushed by the collapsing #1 funnel.

    Editor's Note: I did not figure these out. I got this info from random sources (e-mails and other web pages including The Internet Movie Data Base).

    Back to The Ship Of Dreams.

    This page hosted by GeoCities Get your own Free Home Page


    1