Production Mistakes I think they Made on the Movie

[delalluvia]

It might have been just a matter of keeping a 'balance.' As for them jumping off the cliff - if it were up to me I'd never have let either of them do it. Even a sprained ankle could have thrown a monkey wrench into the shooting schedule for days.

Who knows?  None of the actors were star-caliber enough to be insisting on anything in their contracts.  Now, of all them, I understand the women the most.  Anne wanting to break out of her teen/children movie rep, what better way to do it?  Michelle is right up there with wanting to break out of her TV persona.  It's harder to determine the men's motives.  Enough stars have said 'If my face isn't going to show, why do a nude/action scene?'  I heard Jake was scared of heights as well to jump off the ledge, but he also was still shooting or in pre-production on 'Jarhead' wasn't he?  So insurance on that much bigger budget movie that required Jake to be very physical might have constrained any physical risk-taking on BBM.

[David]

I'm surprized nobody mentioned the missing sideburns on Ennis?

There is a quick scene of Ennis at work tossing bales of hay to the cows and he has no sideburns!     Oops!

[belbbmfan]

I'm surprized nobody mentioned the missing sideburns on Ennis?

There is a quick scene of Ennis at work tossing bales of hay to the cows and he has no sideburns!     Oops!

OMG, i never noticed this. But you're right. Those (awful) sideburns are missing in that scene. Make up mistake? Or maybe they intended this scene to be earlier in the movie? 

Oops indeed.

[moremojo]

OMG, i never noticed this. But you're right. Those (awful) sideburns are missing in that scene. Make up mistake? Or maybe they intended this scene to be earlier in the movie? 

Oops indeed.

I also find it interesting that this is the last time in the film, with the exception of the dozy embrace flashback, that we see Ennis wearing the off-white cowboy hat that he wore in Signal and up on the mountain. Previous to this, we last see the hat in the grocery-story scene. So maybe the haybaling scene was shot as an earlier scene than what it actually ended up as.

[Phillip Dampier]

Goofs for Brokeback Mountain (IMDb)

[These are submitted by individuals, so I don't know if this is completely reliable.  I thought, for example, the Steve Earle song mentioned below had a faster paced version recorded in the 1970s, and that is what appeared in the film.]

Crew or equipment visible: When Ennis tells Alma that he and Jack are going fishing, he hands Alma Jr. to her. While in her mother's arms, Junior's pajama top hikes up and you can see her microphone cord.

Continuity: Jack is chopping wood when Aguirre approaches to give news of his sick uncle. Jack places the next log on the chopping block as he turns to speak to Aguirre. After the conversation is over and Jack turns back to chopping, the log is gone and he replaces the log that was never chopped.

Anachronisms: When Cassie dances with Ennis the first time, the jukebox is playing Steve Earle's "The Devil's Right Hand". In the movie it is set in the late-'70s, but that song wasn't released until his album Copperhead Road came out in 1988. Steve Earle wrote the song in the late 70's. It was one of his earliest. There are two versions. The raw, less produced version with a young Steve Earle appears in the movie version. It was released on an album called early tracks in 1987. The studio enhanced version appeared on Copperhead Road in 1988.

Factual errors: Early in the film (1963, Wyoming) a train is seen crossing the screen without a caboose. Cabooses were required by law on all trains into the 1980s.

Continuity: During Jack's first and second bull rides, his free hand alternates several times from being his left or right hand. Since he's obviously not letting go to switch hands, either some shots are flipped or the sequence is edited from several takes.

Continuity: When Ennis and Alma are playing in the snow after sledding down the mountain, Ennis's hat is covering/not covering his ears between shots.

Anachronisms: When Ennis was driving his daughter Alma home from the bar where Alma and his waitress girlfriend have met, along the path in the background was a Dodge Neon. This can be seen through the window. Alongside the Dodge Neon was a RV or trailer car. These had not been introduced yet.

Anachronisms: When Ennis gets into a fight in front of the bar after leaving Alma's house on Thanksgiving, the "Budweiser" neon light in the window of the bar is one of the newer logos. The italic logo was introduced in the late 1990s.

Continuity: When Jack is in Mexico, the same boy (in a blue striped shirt) runs behind him twice.

Continuity: When Ennis and Jack are fighting on the hill, the day they leave, and Jack knees Ennis in the nose, he gets up to help him. He puts his hands on Ennis' shoulders, but in the next shot, his right wrist is being used to soak up the blood from Ennis' bloody nose.

Anachronisms: Leading up to the argument that sparks the Del Mar divorce, Ennis is lounging on the couch watching an episode of Kojak and Alma states that it is Saturday night. Kojak didn't air on Saturday nights until its 5th season (Fall '77 to Spring '78) and the judge reveals to us that the Del Mar divorce takes place on November 6th, 1975.

Anachronisms: Ennis gets a postcard from Jack which reads, "Ennis, see you in a couple weeks, fish should be jumping. Jack." The postmark is from Childress, Texas, dated July 1972. A couple of weeks later, Jack is driving a blue Ford truck. Ford only produced this specific truck grill in 1976 and 1977. In a following scene, Ennis and Alma's divorce is granted 6 November 1975. The blue truck should not appear in a 1972 scene.

Continuity: Supermarket scene. An end row of bottles is hit/broken. When the camera moves back, the bottles are again upright and intact.

Anachronisms: When Junior drives to her father's trailer to announce her wedding, as gets out of her car we can hear a beeping sound (warning the driver that a door is open). Such features were not introduced in cars until much later.

Anachronisms: The tractor trailer rigs are too modern for the time period. At the beginning of the movie the tractor used in the film wasn't the kind rolling along the highways in the 1960s.

Miscellaneous: The first post card from Jack is postmarked CHILDRESS TX SEPT 1967. The second from Jack is postmarked AUG 1972, also with the date not indicated. Postmarks always have the month, day and year, not just the month and year.

Continuity: The first postcard from Jack has no address. The only clue to his address is the post mark. Yet when Ennis writes back, he addresses his card to RFD 2, Childress, Texas. He would have had no way of knowing Jack's rural route number.

Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Ennis says, "I can't stand this any more, Jack," he is crying, but his lips are not moving.

Continuity: Ennis, standing in the river washing a coffee pot with a rag, pauses to look up and spots Jack on horseback in the distance on a mountainside. Ennis then slings the washrag over his right shoulder and starts to exit the river. In the next scene, as he exits the river onto the riverbank, the washrag is gone from his shoulder and back to being held in his right hand.

Miscellaneous: During the hail storm scene on Brokeback Mountain, although one can hear the wind blowing very hard, the trees in the distance remain still.

Continuity: When Jack rides into camp complaining that he is "commutin' four hours a day" he takes off one glove, the one on his left hand, to feel the coffee pot. It then shows him drinking coffee with his left hand and the right hand glove is still on and he is holding the glove from the left hand with his right hand. When Ennis says (the second time) "I wouldn't mind being out there" it shows Jack with the coffee cup still in his left hand but the glove from his right hand is now off.

Miscellaneous: In approximately 1967, four years after the time line of the movie begins, there is a scene in which Ennis and Alma are talking in the kitchen of their apartment. In one scene you see her put down a folded newspaper on the table and there is a close-up of the newspaper. It is an advertisement for Carl Budding lunch meat, two for 99 cents. You can find those kinds of deals today, so in 1967/68 that would have been a lot of money.

Anachronisms: When Jack is at the bar, turning around to eye Lureen, just before she approaches him for the first time, soft contact lens are visible in his eyes.

Continuity: At the beginning of the movie where we first see Jack Twist driving up in his truck, the window on the passenger side is up as evidenced by the reflections off the glass. Then as the truck turns into the parking lot, the same window is now down.

Factual errors: The first reunion of Jack and Ennis is on 24th September 1967. On the next day 25th, they went onto the mountains and at that night there was a full moon. However, the full moon of September 1967 should be at 18th day, not 24th or 25th.

Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Jack rides the bull (at the same rodeo where he meets Lureen), he is thrown to the ground before the eight-second buzzer sounds. Had this been real life, he would receive a no-score.

Continuity: Towards the end of the movie when Alma Jr. visits her dad in his trailer, he goes to the cupboard to get them a drink and cups. The cupboard door at Ennis' head is seen alternately opened and closed without him touching it.

Crew or equipment visible: When they are being viewed from a far as they play with their shirts off, on the far left there is filming equipment visible within the trees.

[Jeff Wrangler]

Goofs for Brokeback Mountain (IMDb)

[These are submitted by individuals, so I don't know if this is completely reliable.  I thought, for example, the Steve Earle song mentioned below had a faster paced version recorded in the 1970s, and that is what appeared in the film.]

These are all interesting. I'm glad somebody besides me noticed the lack of a caboose on the train  . Possibly railroad union contracts/work rules that mandated the number of people on a train crew may have had something to do with making cabooses a necessity in 1963.

Now, really, who on earth is sharp enough, sitting in a theater watching a movie, to tell that Jake is even wearing contact lenses, let along soft ones? 

[southendmd]

These are all interesting. I'm glad somebody besides me noticed the lack of a caboose on the train  . Possibly railroad union contracts/work rules that mandated the number of people on a train crew may have had something to do with making cabooses a necessity in 1963.

Now, really, who on earth is sharp enough, sitting in a theater watching a movie, to tell that Jake is even wearing contact lenses, let along soft ones? 

Jeff, I may know nothing about no cabooses, but I did notice Jake's contact lens.

I guess we all focus on different things; I was more focused on Jake's caboose.

[Jeff Wrangler]

Jeff, I may know nothing about no cabooses, but I did notice Jake's contact lens.

Well, good for you. My eyes are only sharp enough to notice Heath's lack of underwear lines.

[Kelda]

These are all interesting. I'm glad somebody besides me noticed the lack of a caboose on the train  . Possibly railroad union contracts/work rules that mandated the number of people on a train crew may have had something to do with making cabooses a necessity in 1963.

You know I've read the IMDB pages a good few times and every time I read that I always assumed you had submitted it to IMDB Jeff! But now I know you didn't!!

[Jeff Wrangler]

You know I've read the IMDB pages a good few times and every time I read that I always assumed you had submitted it to IMDB Jeff! But now I know you didn't!!

That's correct. I have to plead innocent on the caboose. I've mentioned it a couple of places, but I never submitted it to IMDb.