I apologize for failing to give more warning of this, but today is IMDB Day, referring to the popular Internet Movie Database website at imdb.com. “Database” is just one word, not even hyphenated, but “imd.com” had already been snagged by the band Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark when they weren’t looking closely at what they typed. For those readers not familiar with IMDB, Seriously? What the hell, man? it’s a listing of movies, TV shows, and related ilk that is largely crowd-sourced, meaning Joe Q. Public gets to go in and add details to their little hearts’ desire. This is, presumably, subject to editing by some kind of official staff, though apparently only for accuracy.
While it’s getting less and less frequent now, I still visit IMDB on occasion, mostly to settle the internal nagging of just where I’ve seen that actor before, usually only after a few days of pride not allowing me to before my memory gets fed up and says, “Listen, I just don’t have the time right now, okay? You’re going to be forgetting much worse than this, you old fart.” And in this respect, it’s certainly handy, as well as reminding people exactly how a particular quote goes, rather smugly I believe because no one ever trusts it and end up re-watching the movie just to reluctantly confirm that they’d remembered it wrong.
And while there, I always click on the Trivia section, because I keep believing that I’ll find some interesting nugget within – I’m not sure why. The Trivia and Goofs sections are chock-full of details that you can only obtain otherwise from the wannabe film students (even worse, hard as that may be to fathom, than film students themselves) who can recite the dialogue from Barry Lyndon by rote. 90% of the entries in the Trivia sections can be found by simply clicking on the Commentary menus of the DVDs, so if you ever needed a transcript of those, you’re golden. As for the Goofs section, it’s not really clear what purpose this serves, except to illustrate how many people can’t simply watch the damn movie; you can find them easily by examining their remotes for excessive wear on the ‘Pause’ and ‘Rollback’ buttons, while the phrase, “Netflix and chill,” will always confuse them.
The more regarded the movie, the denser these categories will be, to the point that reading time for either will exceed the runtime of the film itself by a factor of four or more. The site has gotten popular enough now that actors and directors will often indirectly populate the pages with apocryphal details provided in interviews, placing bets on just how quickly they appear on the site.* It is rumored that Philadelphia was funded solely from bets won over the trivia entries for Bachelor Party.
But to get into the spirit of the holiday, I present some of my favorite entries from IMDB, in no particular order. Some of these present instances where the lack of accuracy will take you right out of the movie. The films that they pertain to should be obvious.
DIRECTOR TRADEMARK: The word, “and” is used frequently by the actors in dialogue.
CREW OR EQUIPMENT VISIBLE: At 1:17.21, if you pause the movie and zoom in on the reflection in the squirrel’s eye and enhance this with forensics software, you can easily see that the squirrel is not actually behind the wheel of an ocean liner.
Parkerette Stephens’ order number at McDonalds is 63.
Antoinette Glub’s answering machine is a GE AM-23, particularly known for eating the cassettes, yet she listens to at least 17 messages without issue.
CONTINUITY: At 53 minutes and 82 seconds, you can see that the whoopee cushion on the coffin does not have enough air in it to produce the volume of noise that it emits only seconds later.
Agnes Dorflmetting and Biff Snothausen also appeared together in Platypus Pie.
When the hammer on the Sig Sauer GS-517/AX pistol falls on an empty chamber, it makes a click in the 42 Hz range, not 44 as depicted in the film.
INCORRECTLY REGARDED AS GOOFS: The GE AM-23 answering machine only ate tapes if the capstan rollers were never cleaned; Antoinette Glub would certainly have maintained her appliances.
While finishing off her previous film, director Hortense Snagbigot was sitting in a café looking at a pool of spilled clam sauce, realizing how much it looked like the outline of Indonesia; this served as no inspiration whatsoever for this film.
ERRORS IN GEOGRAPHY: Characters continually say they are from “America” as if this is a specific country rather than referring to the entire Western Hemisphere.
Paul Reubens, Dame Judi Dench, Dan Aykroyd, Clint Eastwood, and Whoopi Goldberg were all considered for the role of ‘Lolita.’
INCORRECTLY REGARDED AS INCORRECTLY REGARDED AS GOOFS: The GE AM-23 answering machine suffered from poor-quality tension roller material that no amount of cleaning could compensate for.
A trained and experienced waste disposal technician would never operate the compaction lever without first examining the entry chute for obstructions.
Director Spangwie Popperfop has admitted in interviews that Robert Fooss was supposed to be slightly bi-curious when under stress.
CREW OR EQUIPMENT VISIBLE: At 13 minutes in, as the camera zooms out on a panning dolly tracking shot, cast members are visible.
DIRECTOR TRADEMARK: Transitions between scenes.
Peter Sellers was on board to play the parts of both Cyndi Lauper and Lou Albano, but had to back out over previous commitments to being dead.
In Greece circa 375 BCE, nobody spoke with a Liverpudlian accent
STOP TRYING TO SOUND LIKE YOU KNOW WHAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT: Replacement rollers for the GE AM-23 answering machine were easily obtainable, something that Antoinette Glub would almost certainly have installed.
CHARACTER ERRORS: “Y’all” isn’t a fucking word.
The director has hinted in interviews that the film is a modern retelling of Captain Kangaroo, with Hermione as the Captain, Ron as Mr Greenjeans, and Harry as that moose puppet.
In the novel that the film is based off of, Everett Fungusballs cooked the sausages before the eggs.
At 36 minutes in, Detective Sangfroid can be seen using a paint stirring stick with little indents for handles, but in 1971 Sherwin Williams did not offer paint stirring sticks with little indents for handles.
During the confrontation with the matador, while you can hear Boss Lady say, “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,” you can see that her lips actually say, “That’s not my aubergine dildo.”
Porgs are not native to rocky terrain as seen here.
As Boofdar confronts the Falwellians about their treachery, you can see that the gem on his ring is 5 degrees right of center in the initial scene, but as the view cuts back to him after the captain feigns indifference, the gem is now 12 degrees left of center, with no apparent twiddling taking place.
The film repeatedly shows nature photographers receiving recognition and a living wage, despite being set on Earth.
In a deleted scene, Rose lets Jack on the door, but he tries to put it in her ass and she banishes him to the water.
So, grab a big drink, get comfortable, and spend way too much time learning fascinating facts about your favorite movies rather than, you know, just watching them. Alternately, you can cue up the movie with a notepad in hand, hit ‘Pause’ a lot, and impress everyone with your remarkable perspicacity and powers of observation! Whatever works.
* This is almost certainly true – I’d do it for damn sure.