Goofs for
A History of Violence (2005) More at IMDbPro »

• Continuity: When Tom defends himself from being garroted in his brother's house, his hand is clearly injured and bleeding. When he washes himself next morning, there is no mark on his hand.
  
  
• Continuity: At the end when they are sitting down at the table the corn and peas switch places on Sarah's plate between shots.
  
  
• Crew or equipment visible: When the camera cranes down on the black car as it's being pulled over, the camera is reflected in the driver's window.
  
  

• Continuity: Early in the movie, Tom and his family are sitting to breakfast. Tom pours some orange juice into his glass and sets the pitcher down. The view cuts away, but when it comes back the glass is much fuller than it was before.
  
  
• Crew or equipment visible: When William Orser drives the car in front of the office at the beginning of the movie, the boom and some crewmembers are reflected in the front fender.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: When the high school kids are playing softball you can hear the ball hitting the bat earlier than the player strikes.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: In the high school softball game, the bully comes up to the plate carrying a wooden bat, but the sound heard when he hits the ball is the sound of an aluminum bat.
  
  
• Continuity: When Sam (the Sheriff) stops Fogarty's car and talks to him, he looks at the driver's license in his hand. Immediately afterward, Fogarty closes the window, and the car drives away, without Sam returning the license. Yet his hands are empty.
  
  
• Continuity: When Sam the Sheriff comes to the house for the second time (after the second batch of killings), he parks diagonally at the beginning of the driveway, essentially blocking the entrance to the driveway. He and Tom/Joey go into the house to talk, and while they are talking, Edie pulls into the garage, parks and comes into the house. She could not have pulled into the garage with the Sheriff's car blocking the driveway.
  
  
• Errors in geography: There is a Canadian speed limit sign visible when the main character is driving to Philadelphia.
  
  
• Continuity: The bathroom door alternates between open and closed after Edie emerges in her cheerleader outfit.
  
  
• Continuity: While Jack is being bullied by Bobby Jordan after the softball game, he puts on his shirt. In the next over-shoulder shot we can see his bare neck and shoulder, clearly implying that he doesn't have a shirt on. When the shot cuts back to the other shot Jack has his shirt on again.
  
  
• Continuity: In the fight scene at Richie's house, Tom tramples the neck of a thug. The blood oozes from his mouth. In the next scene, the bloodstains around his lips completely vanish.
  
  
• Continuity: When Edie gets up from the stairs after her passionate encounter with Tom, she pulls her skirt down. The next time the camera shows her she again pulls her skirt down.
  
  
• Continuity: As Edie is fumbling to load the shotgun, a white box with extra shells can be seen by the closet door. In the shot of her finally getting the gun loaded, the box is gone.
  
  
• Errors in geography: When Tom is driving from Indiana to Philadelphia, a sign in the highway lists the travel distances as "Indianapolis 36", "Columbus 247" and "Philadelphia 680". But Indianapolis in 170 miles west of Columbus and 585 miles from Philadelphia, so if he is 36 miles from Indianapolis, he's only 206 miles from Columbus and 611 miles from Philadelphia.
  
  
• Crew or equipment visible: When Edie drives up to the shopping center, the shadow of the camera and crane is visible in the driver window as she opens the door.
  
  
• Continuity: When the sheriff is talking to Tom and Edie on the couch, her right arm is between them. The shot cuts to the sheriff and when it comes back, her arm is around Tom's shoulders.
  
  
• Continuity: When Tom throws the pistol into the pond, we are looking at him from the front. He tosses the pistol into the water out and to his left. In the subsequent shot, we see him from behind. The ripples in the water from the gun are out and to his right.
  
  
• Errors in geography: When Tom/Joey arrives in Philadelphia, he says he has been driving for 15-16 hours. From even the farthest point in Indiana, where he supposedly lives, the drive would take about 11 hours.
  
  
• Factual errors: When Carl Fogarty's black Chrysler pulls into the mall parking lot, the required Pennsylvania inspection tags are not on the bottom of the driver's side of the windshield.
  
  
• Crew or equipment visible: Although quite out of focus and in the distance, two police cruisers can easily be seen blocking traffic with their overhead lights on as Tom is driving towards Philly.
  
  
• Continuity: When Tom comes home from the hospital after being treated for a shoulder wound, it is clearly Fall. A short time later the sheriff pulls into the driveway and the trees are all green.
  
  
• Continuity: In the aftermath of Joey's nearly being strangled by a wire around his neck, there were no marks on his neck.
  
  
• Continuity: In the locker room confrontation scene between Jack and Bobby, a front shot shows Jack crossing his arms in front of his chest as he leans against his locker. The scene immediately cuts to a rear right view and we see that both arms are hanging by his side.
  
  
• Continuity: In a close-up shot during the final scene in the dining room, Edie is shown serving a spoonful of corn onto her daughter's plate. In the next wide shot, the corn is gone from the daughter's plate and Edie once again puts corn on it.
  
  
• Continuity: In the first half of the movie, the door in the living room opens swinging to the right in one scene, then the in another scene, it will open swinging to the left. This alternates back and forth many times. One instance is when Tom calls home to tell his wife to get the shotgun and starts running home. When she goes downstairs the door is open, she shuts it (it was opening with the knob on the right). But when Tom gets home and comes in, it opens with the knob on the left!
  
  
• Continuity: When Tom gets shot while holding the pistol, he gets shot in the left shoulder. As they show him in pain, he seems to baby his right arm and has it in a sling for most of the movie. However, as he climbs up the stairs, his sling seems to be missing allowing his arm to move freely.
  
  
• Continuity: In the beginning of the movie when Tom (Viggo Mortensen) is going to the diner, he crosses in front of what looks to be the Middlebrook courthouse. It is supposed to be early in the morning, but the clock on the courthouse is showing 1:15.
  
  
• Continuity: When Tom heroically saves his employees from a pair of robbers/killers at his diner, they are in the process of closing up for the night. When his wife meets him later in the hospital, only enough time has elapsed for him to get his foot bandaged, and it's still dark outside, but he's already on the front page of the local newspaper.
  
  
• Plot holes: When the sheriff visits Tom at his house to discuss his doubts about Tom's story, Tom is working on his truck, which is not in running condition. Tom stops his work at that point and does not return to it, but that same night he gets in the truck and drives hundreds of miles to Philadelphia with no problems.
  
  

• Continuity: SPOILER: After Tom kills Richie there is a shot of Richie lying dead. Richie's mouth is partly open. When we cut back to Richie a moment later, his mouth is closed. In addition, the shot of Richie with his mouth closed establishes his arms in a downward position, whereas the next long shot shows them raised over his head.
  
  
• Continuity: SPOILER: As Tom lies in the hospital and talks about being Joey, Edie goes into the bathroom to throw up. When she comes out, she has a tissue in her hands. The tissue disappears and reappears over the next several shots until she finally throws it down on the floor and leaves.
  
  
• Continuity: SPOILER: After Tom/Joey kills his brother, he goes down to the water, throws the pistol in and the proceeds to take his shirt off. He takes his left arm out of the sleeve twice.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: SPOILER: Towards the end of the film, Richie kills Ruben who is lying on the floor ("How do you fuck that up"). His pistol's slide doesn't move when he fires the shot. (On real pistols the slide moves back to clear the used cartridge)
  
  

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