I was channel surfing last night and ran across Flash of Genius on HBO. I'd already seen it, but watched it again because it's so interesting. It's the story of the guy who invented the interval wiper and went through this 20 year process to sue Ford when they stole it from him. Two problems I had with it. A) They had 6 kids yet he drove a '66 Ford 4dr Galaxie sedan. Nope, sorry. They never would've had a 4dr in real life; unquestionably, especially back then when they were such a mainstay of transportation, a station wagon would've been their family ride. B) He goes out and steals the circuit board for the interval wiper mode out of a '75 or '76 Buick Electra. First of all, this was supposed to be in 1971 when Ford first came out with that option, so how could a '75 or '76 Buick be on the road. Secondly, if he was suing Ford, why would he have gotten a circuit board out of a GM car? Makes no sense. I'm sorry, but I hate it when they do that in movies. It takes me right out of the moment and makes me remember I'm watching a movie instead of real life. I'd love to get a position where that's my job; to double check all the cars and such for time period correctness. I'd be great at it too, because I'm always seeing cars too new for the year that the movie takes place. Am I the only one who is bothered by this or are there others out there with the same ocd?! Can anybody remember any other blatant anachronisms they've seen?
My wife has a degree in Media, and she's like a play-by-play commentator on every movie we own or watch. Drive's me nuts!:banghead3: But I agree with you guys, these 'innovative' tweaks to the original facts just take all the intrigue away. Makes you wonder if Ford paid to produce this flick.
I with you, Snoot! Can't stand watching a period movie that cost a fortune to make, expensive cast, good story, location shooting, and then they totally drop the ball when it comes to details like continuity errors or the proper years of cars. The movie "Animal House" is so much fun, that I can overlook the annoyance that though it takes place in 1962, the Lincoln that becomes "Death Machine" is a 1964! Used to drive me nuts!..but I'm over that one. I haven't seen "Flash of Genius" yet, but another Greg Kinnear movie that is really quite good is "Auto Focus". :2_thumbs_up_-_anima "Auto Focus" is the EXTREMELY DARK story of "Hogan's Heroes" star Bob Crane. It features a swanky Mercury Colony Park, I think a '65 (it has been many years since I have seen this...it came out in 2002). I recall this movie had excellent attention to period detail, but even it has a few goofs. Very explicit movie...language and adult content...not for kids. David
Yeah, and his murder is still unsolved. This movie starts with his rise from DJ to TV star and his twisted spiral downward. David
I just saw this movie recently myself, and I did enjoy it, but you ought to do a little google-surfing on it. You'll discover that they took A LOT of liberties with the original story (as what film doesn't, right?). The most glaring liberty is that, in the original story, Kearns (the guy who invented the intermittent wiper) wasn't even present in the courtroom when the jury came back with the verdict in his first trial. He had gone camping in Maryland. He didn't want to be around because he felt that the court hadn't let him properly present his case, and he didn't want to give legitimacy to the jury's findings. Second, the jury in the original trial, after having found Ford guilty, couldn't come up with a damage award amout, and it was a second jury that came up with an award. That jury awarded $6.3 million, which the judge cut to $5.2 million. Kearns DID get the $10.1 million stated in the film, but only in an agreement with Ford where Ford would pay him this amount if he agreed he wouldn't appeal the award amount. The film IS correct in its ending credits when it says he won $ $18 million from Chrysler. He didn't win anything from GM or from any of the other companies he sued because he was too slow in meeting deadlines set by the court for filing necessary documents, and so the court dismissed those cases. The other thing the film doesn't give you a good feel for is the timeline for everything. We know that he had to wait a long time for his suit against Ford to come to trial, but we never really get a sense of just how long. He sued Ford in 1978, but the case didn't actually come to trial until 1990, and it ended in 1992. So it took him 14 years to finally get his due from Ford. No wonder his marriage went up in smoke. He sued Chrysler in 1982, and that case ended quickly in Kearns' favor once the Ford suit ended. Here's Robert Kearns' obituaries in the Washington Post and the New York Times from 2005. Lots of interesting info here that you don't get from the film. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A54564-2005Feb25.html http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/26/obituaries/26kearns.html
I also had trouble following any sort of time line in the movie, and the 76 Buick really baffled me as well. I think there was also a scene in a restaurant where the car parked just outside the window was a much more modern Japanese car.
It's always fun to look for these, but almost any film which tries to portray a certain earlier era with lots of outdoor and everyday scenes will almost inevitably end up with an anachronism or two or ten. There's usually someone assigned during the making of the film to watch for these things, but something always slips through. I remember once reading an interview with George Lucas about his film "American Graffiiti." No specific date is mentioned in the movie as to when it takes place (there's supposed to be a certain timelessness to it all), but all of the advertisements for it at the time it was released used the phrase "Where were you in '62?" He had to make sure that none of the cars appearing in the film were from later than that year, as well as make sure that none of the songs heard were from '63 or later.
Here's a fairly common trick they use which always annoys me. They'll show a current year Crown Vic patrol car driving around, but then when it goes off a cliff or has an accident or catches on fire, it's an older Dodge or Plymouth. I hate that.
Didn't work. Theres a well worn 67 Chevy Caprice parked along the curb in one street scene in American Graffitti.
The most written about instance like this is the 70 Challenger in Vanishing Point that transforms into a 67 Camaro right before it impacts with the bulldozers. If you look at old 60's TV shows and movies, you'll see that an amazing number of 1960 Ford Fairlane sedans give up their lives as the stand ins for 61-69 Lincolns.
