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How have movies gotten something wrong about your home town?

Posted: 2003-06-05 11:23pm
by Shadow WarChief
Most of us live in or near cities in which a number of movies have been produced. What are a few of the most glaring factual mistakes that the filmers have made that only denizens of your area would notice?

I'll start off
In "The Rock", the jets take too long to reach Alcatraz after going under the bridge. Even taking the super slow motion into account, it shouldn't have taken them more than a few second to completely drown the island in plasma

Star Trek IV: The Alameda aquarium where the whales were held was actually the Montery Bay aquarium

Posted: 2003-06-05 11:32pm
by TrailerParkJawa
Movies that show someone driving to LA from SF and the person crosses the Golden Gate Bridge.

Anytime any show takes place in the Bay Area and there is a thunder and lightning. 95% of the storms here involve no thunder or lightning.

In the movie T2, when Arnold shoots at the cops from the second story of the building, that building was in Fremont. Not LA. :wink:

Posted: 2003-06-05 11:53pm
by neoolong
What some of the uni. buildings look like inside. The Angel tv show thinking that one of our science buildings is in LA.

Posted: 2003-06-06 12:26am
by Darth Wong
Whenever Toronto is in a movie, they pretend it's Chicago :D

Posted: 2003-06-06 12:29am
by Darth Garden Gnome
8-Mile is stupid. They probably got something wrong, too. But you'll never get me to watch and find out.

Posted: 2003-06-06 12:29am
by PrinceofLowLight
Not once has New York ever been overrun by Sumerian gods, aliens or the living dead. At least not since I've lived here.

Posted: 2003-06-06 12:37am
by Darth Garden Gnome
Although 8-Mile did get one thing right, 8-Mile is the line in the sand dividing the East and West side. I mean, on one corner there's a gas station and on the coner opposite, there's a STRIP JOINT.

Re: How have movies gotten something wrong about your home t

Posted: 2003-06-06 12:47am
by TrailerParkJawa
Shadow WarChief wrote: Star Trek IV: The Alameda aquarium where the whales were held was actually the Montery Bay aquarium
Minor nitpick, was'nt the aquarium supposed to be in Petaluma?

That brings up something else. Fog horns do not blare constantly all over the city.

Posted: 2003-06-06 12:49am
by neoolong
Darth Wong wrote:Whenever Toronto is in a movie, they pretend it's Chicago :D
That's because it wishes it was Chicago. :D

Posted: 2003-06-06 12:51am
by Raptor 597
Hmm, I'd say New Orleans was overgenerlized. You'd assume from that everyone there is a college student or a gay guy on the Real World...go figure. The only other thing is tht they assume all cajuns live in swamp. Not true, most of us only go there to get drunk on weekends.

Posted: 2003-06-06 12:52am
by Straha
Oh don't get me started about some of the things they got wrong about Manhattan. Some of it makes me SO ANGRY!! :evil: For instence no one in the Subway system would let you shout a marriage proposal across a station. And not all New Yorkers are either rude mean bastards, or absolutley nice and polite people, we have normal people here too. Just not many

Re: How have movies gotten something wrong about your home t

Posted: 2003-06-06 12:57am
by Darth Yoshi
TrailerParkJawa wrote:Minor nitpick, was'nt the aquarium supposed to be in Petaluma?
Petaluma is land-locked, though. I remember seeing the ocean from the aquarium.
That brings up something else. Fog horns do not blare constantly all over the city.
I've never even heard a fog horn, and I've lived in San Francisco all my life.

Posted: 2003-06-06 01:01am
by neoolong
Straha wrote:Oh don't get me started about some of the things they got wrong about Manhattan. Some of it makes me SO ANGRY!! :evil: For instence no one in the Subway system would let you shout a marriage proposal across a station. And not all New Yorkers are either rude mean bastards, or absolutley nice and polite people, we have normal people here too. Just not many
Do you guys have talking apes in New York too? Or was Planet of the Apes inaccurate.

Re: How have movies gotten something wrong about your home t

Posted: 2003-06-06 01:07am
by TrailerParkJawa
Darth Yoshi wrote:
TrailerParkJawa wrote:Minor nitpick, was'nt the aquarium supposed to be in Petaluma?
Petaluma is land-locked, though. I remember seeing the ocean from the aquarium
But most everyone else doesnt know that about Petaluma. I remember when Spock and Kirk got on the bus, they saw an advertisement for George and Gracie. I thought it was in Petaluma, but I could be wrong. In anycase, the "real" aquarium was way far to the south like you said.

Posted: 2003-06-06 01:07am
by Joe
Not exactly in a movie; one time on TV Nation, Michael Moore did a segment on Newt Gingrich's home district (where I live), pointing out how much money it received relative to other districts, essentially ignoring the fact that most of that money went to Lockheed-Martin, which is located here. That wouldn't be a bad thing necessarily but it was presented in Moore's usual snide, suggestive manner.

Posted: 2003-06-06 01:26am
by TrailerParkJawa
I was wrong, it ( The aquarium in Star Trek IV ) was supposed to be in Sausalito.

Posted: 2003-06-06 01:51am
by TrailerParkJawa
Hey check out this site, it lists movies that were made near your home town.
Its not yet complete so I think it only covers about half of the USA.

http://www.usa-movies.com/

Posted: 2003-06-06 03:43am
by InnerBrat
Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me

There are no mountains anywhere near Carnaby Street.

Posted: 2003-06-06 07:53am
by Darth Gojira
Unless they did on-location shooting for a Hemingway bio, no a chance. Chicago yes, but as Mike said Toronto is a frequent sub(?). I guess that's because Toronto is the second coolest city in North America next to Chicago 8)


at least in MY opinion :P

Posted: 2003-06-06 08:21am
by Col. Crackpot
Darth Wong wrote:Whenever Toronto is in a movie, they pretend it's Chicago :D
Mike, there is actually an equasion in play here.

Toronto-Chicago
-------------------------- + Alan Thicke = Cheap made for tv movie
Vancouver-Los Angeles

Posted: 2003-06-06 09:20am
by Joe Momma
The Johnny Depp movie Benny and June was filmed in my town (Spokane WA, USA) and there were all sorts of entertaining geographical oddities. For example, they lived in the neighborhood of Browne's Addition and would casually walk over to the Milk Bottle for shakes...which in real life is a four-mile walk (one way) going up a huge hill and passing through a neighborhood we cheerfully refer to as Spo-Compton because it's one of the two neighborhoods here that passes for a demilitarized zone.

There was also nitpicky stuff like the characters riding a bus on a route that went nowhere near any of the locations they were headed from or going to.

I'm sure all of that shit happens all the time in movies, though.

-- Joe Momma

Posted: 2003-06-06 09:23am
by haas mark
"Roswell" ~ There are no mountains in Roswell, NM. Or anywhere near for another 70 miles.

~ver

Posted: 2003-06-06 09:35am
by Kelly Antilles
There are no evil children trying to take over the town... oh wait... yes there are. ;) (Actually, Children of the Corn 2 was just made where I live. They didn't name the town the same.)

Bull Durham: mostly accurate. Although, you can't take busses on the Parkway and some of the filming of the bus rides was there.

Maximum Overdrive: That's Wilmington, NC. The road where they filmed all the truck scenes was a brand new highway that hadn't even opened up.

Ah! Dawson's Creek: Filmed in and around Wilmington, NC. No where NEAR where they were supposed to be.

Posted: 2003-06-06 09:41am
by Peregrin Toker
I'm not from Detroit, but "Robocop" was supposedly set there even though it was filmed in Dallas. :P

Posted: 2003-06-06 09:44am
by Sea Skimmer
I’m only aware of one movie, which involved my town. They shot a brief balcony scene at the Swarthmore collage observatory and passed it off as being some other place. Though you can’t see anything to show its Swarthmore unless you’ve been inside of that building. All you see of theo utside is a tree and grass