Goofs for
The Living Daylights (1987) More at IMDbPro »

• Continuity: As he leaps out of the flying car, James Bond deploys his spare parachute, but in a later shot is shown hanging from his main one.
  
  
• Continuity: The left front tyre of Bond's car is shot out, but in the jump that follows the tyre is normal.
  
  
• Factual errors: James Bond's laser slices under the body of a Czech police car so that the wheels and underframe come off when the brakes are applied. He only cuts in the area between the wheels, but the body would not be attached only in that area. If the wheels go one way and the brake pedal (with the body) another, then the brakes could not be applied because the brake lines must have been severed.
  
  

• Audio/visual unsynchronized: When the engines of the cargo plane die, a coughing, sputtering sound is heard. The aircraft in question is a C-130 Hercules, equipped with turboprop (a jet engine whose power turbine drives a gearbox that drives the propeller)engines. When a jet engine dies, it just winds down (as the only moving parts are the compressor and turbine and the entire reaction stops when the fuel is cut off). Only engines with pistons make a sputtering sound as they run out of fuel (this comes from certain pistons not receiving fuel while others still are).
  
  
• Continuity: When James Bond says there's no place to land, the forward view of mountains confirms this. But after a brief intercut to the cockpit interior, the landscape is different. The cliff now ahead of the plane is topped by the level ground James and Kara are aiming for.
  
  
• Errors in geography: Upon leaving the plane they see a sign saying that it's 325 km to Islamabad and 200 km to Karachi. In fact Islamabad and Karachi are almost 2000 km apart.
  
  
• Miscellaneous: As Bond pulls up to the side of the road near the hotel when he is following Pushkin's car in Tangiers, you can clearly see him knock over a pedestrian.
  
  
• Continuity: At the end of the film when James Bond is confronting Whitaker at his mansion in Tangiers we are led to believe that it is night time. However when we see James Bond standing behind a bush outside the mansion it is daytime and the sky's blueness can be seen.
  
  
• Factual errors: When Bond is in the cockpit of the Hercules, the throttles are shown as about 1/4 open. This would mean the plane wouldn't be traveling particularly fast. When he sees the other aircraft heading toward him, Bond puts full power on, and manages to lift off about 15 seconds later. A Hercules needs to be traveling at over 100mph to take off.
  
  
• Continuity: The interior layout of the cargo plane Bond steals in Afghanistan differs from the external view. It is clearly shown that it's a straight line from the rear hatch opening to where the jeep is parked to the cockpit (views visible through open doors). Yet exterior views clearly show the cockpit is on a second level from the rest of the plane.
  
  
• Continuity: When Kara has taken over the controls of the airplane, she pulls the aft freight door lever. Cut to interior of plane where Bond if fighting, and we see the freight door open. Cut to exterior view of plane, now the doors are closed. Cut to interior again, the ramp is now fully open.
  
  
• Errors in geography: While escaping from Bratislava, Bond and Kara drive through dramatically mountainous terrain to the Austrian border. There is no such terrain encountered while traveling West from Slovakia to Vienna.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Bond hits the sentry in the final attack, the guard turns his head to imitate being hit before he actually is.
  
  
• Continuity: When the Russian assassin kills the second British guard in order to steal the Land Rover, the guard is shoved aside and falls alongside the idling vehicle. But when Bond arrives on the pathway above and looks down to see killer driving off, the murdered British guard is now laying a few feet further in front of the Land Rover.
  
  
• Continuity: Bond loses one boot in the fight in the plane, but when he later walks around in the plane, you can hear the sound of boots against metal from both feet.
  
  
• Factual errors: After the first movement of Mozart's Symphony No. 40, the concert goes to the interval. While it has been known for a concert to include, for example, a single aria from a whole opera, it is never the case that a concert includes only, as in this case, the most famous movement, an extract, from a whole symphony. (Or, if there are any concerts like this, they would not be attended by the social elite, as depicted here.)
  
  
• Continuity: When the "00" agent is dropped down Gibraltar in the opening sequence by the bad guy cutting the rope above him, we never see the rope falling after this initial cut. Yet Bond grabs the end of the rope and notices it has been cut. It should be falling with the body, or at least at the same time (if it has slipped out of the harness loop).
  
  
• Boom mic visible: After exiting the plane, Georgi Koskov tells Kara Milovy he will try to have her assigned to the Siberian Philharmonic Orchestra. There is a huge gray microphone visible in front of her. It's pulled back when he finishes talking and everybody starts walking towards the camera.
  
  
• Continuity: Near the end of the movie, when Bond is taxiing down the runway trying to take off, he's in an American C-130. His girlfriend Kara catches up to him in a Jeep and he signals her to drive inside the airplane. As she approaches the rear of the plane, the C-130, which has a cargo ramp (tailgate) about twelve inches in height, turns into a C-123. Its ramp tapers to a wedge so rolling vehicles can drive on without the ramp-toes that a C-130 requires.
  
  
• Continuity: Just after Bond crashes his Aston Martin in the snow, and he gets out, the wing mirror on the door is bent downwards. But a few seconds later, the same mirror is in the right position again.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: When James Bond cuts off his shoe during the final airplane fight the guy is screaming with his mouth closed.
  
  
• Continuity: When Bond drives into the shed and onto the lake, a militia car follows him. This car is Lada VAZ 2103. Later, when the car is shown from the back, it is Lada VAZ 2106, an updated version of the VAZ 2103. But when the car starts to sink, it's VAZ 2103 again.
  
  
• Continuity: During the C-130 flight from the Russian airbase, most of the shots show the landing gear down, but a few show the landing gear retracted. This is especially visible as the plane passes and circles the bridge.
  
  
• Continuity: During the fight scene between Bond and the assassin when they are hanging behind the airplane, the nets varies in position from hanging far out and hanging just a bit out.
  
  
• Continuity: A plane that is speeding down the runway, just after barely missing a collision with the plane Bond has commandeered, crashes into Koskov's jeep with such force that the jeep literally explodes into a huge ball of flame, inside and out. However, when the smoke clears, the jeep is still intact with no flames at all on the inside and Koskov is only singed.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: At the "Soviet" airbase in Afghanistan, there are several American aircraft instead of Russian made ones, including an OV-10 and of course the Hercules C-130 that serves double duty as the RAF C-130 at the beginning of the movie.
  
  
• Errors in geography: The landscape during the episode with the Afghan Mudjahidins is incorrect. Palm trees wouldn't have a chance of surviving the terrible Afghan winters.
  
  
• Continuity: When Bond parachutes off the Rock of Gibraltar at the beginning we see him slowly descending towards a moving yacht in the sea below. However, the moment he lands, the yacht is clearly moored in the harbour next to other boats, and going nowhere.
  
  
• Continuity: When Bond bails out of the burning truck on Gibraltar, the truck continues falling and then explodes and nothing is visible in the water below. A moment later Bond looks down and there is now a yacht below him (but no truck debris). Then we cut to the lady on the yacht telling Margot how boring things are - apparently oblivious to the truck exploding just above her yacht and falling into the sea no further away than about 100 yards.
  
  
• Factual errors: In the end of the movie, Bond looks at the sign posting showing the distances of Islamabad and Karachi. The words written in the other language on that board should be either in Urdu (Pakistan's national language) or Pushto (Afghan).
  
  
• Continuity: The length of Kara's bobbed hair changes continually by 2-3 inches, often in mid scene.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: As James and Kara slide down the snow on the cello case, there's a shot of them from behind and you could tell a dummy is in place of Kara while a man in a black jacket maneuvers their cello case downhill.
  
  
• Factual errors: During a battle in the Soviet base, machine gun bullets should easily pierce a shovel of a bulldozer, that was raised as a shield by its driver.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): Whitaker tells Bond that the Duke of Wellington needed German mercenaries to defeat Napoleon. In fact, the only German troops to serve under Wellington's command, the King's German Legion, were part of the regular British Army. (King George III of Great Britain was Elector of Hanover in Germany; when the French occupied Hanover and disbanded its army, many Hanoverian troops fled to Britain and were formed into the KGL). The only other German troops to fight alongside Wellington were the Prussian contingent of the Allied Army at Waterloo.
  
  
• Continuity: When Bond is shooting at Whitaker the bullets appear to bounce off the armour without marking it, yet in the next shot the armour is damaged.
  
  
• Continuity: In the scene where Kara hands Bond a poisoned vodka martini, when we can see both characters, they are both holding cocktail glasses. Kara holds hers close to her chin. In the intermittent shots focusing on Kara, no glass is visible.
  
  
• Continuity: When Bond and Cara are being chased in the cello case it is clearly obvious the bullet punctures a hole in the bottom right area of the cello. But at the end of the movie, the bullet hole is located in the top left part of the cello.
  
  
• Continuity: Bond is shot with a paint-ball gun, and get splattered with paint. In the following shots, there is no paint on him.
  
  
• Continuity: When Bond is parachuting down towards the ship, his parachute is burning and full of holes. It goes to a different camera angle, and Bond is using a different parachute, which is smoking, but does not have any holes in it.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: Saunders asks Bond, "You'll want the soft-nosed ones, I imagine." Bond replies, "No, the steel-tipped." Bond's mouth movement does not match the words he is saying.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): There is no reason for Saunders to use the night vision goggles, the outdoor area is extremely well-lit, even for night time.
  
  
• Continuity: During the ice chase, Bond loses the rim on his vehicle, but in later shots it is restored.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: The ice is revealed to be about 5 or 6 inches thick, at least. The rim on the wheel of Bond's vehicle appears to be about one inch thick. There is no way it could have sliced all the way through the ice in one lap.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: There is no way Bond's car could have gotten "stuck" in the shed. It would have driven straight through. Even when it is traveling, you can see that the walls have been lifted a good half a foot off the ground, and Bond's car would not have done that.
  
  
• Errors in geography: The producers made a special effort to make Vienna look like Bratislava. They did so by parking a lot of Trabants on the street and putting up Cyrillic-lettered street signs. However, Trabants were East German cars and, while there would have certainly been some in 1987 Bratislava, most of the cars would have been the Czechoslovak "Skoda" brand. Secondly, both Czech and Slovak use Latin letters, so street signs in Bratislava never would have had Cyrillic lettering. The tramways are clearly old Vienna streetcars, nothing similar ever served Bratislava's public transport.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): Whitaker claims that the first outing of the automatic machine gun was 1895 in Afghanistan, however the British Army had already used the maxim in the Matabele War, 1893-4 in Africa, and the weapon had been in the Army since 1888.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): When the unconscious Bond is loaded into the plane, we see his identity card with a name "Jerzy Bondov," combining a Polish first name (Russian would be Georgiy) with a Russian last name (Polish would be Bondow).
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: When Bond is escaping with Koscov, he asks Saunders where he put him. He replies, in the boot. Bond replies, no, that's the first place they would look. Bond takes Koskov out of the trunk and puts him in the passenger seat, in plain view. This is the old criminal technique known as "hidden in plain sight," which presumes that people looking for a hidden object won't recognize this same object if it's out in the open.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Necros hits the British agent with the frying pan, it misses very badly, but sound is played as if it connected.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Bond is about to assassinate Pushkin, and his guard comes in, Bond pistol-whips him twice. The second hit misses very badly, but sound is played as if it connected.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: Bond shoots Kara's gun, and not her. Later on, Kara's arm is injured, supposedly from this incident. However, when the rifle was shot out of her hands, the butt of the gun slammed into her forearm and badly bruised it (this is the injury Bond sees later).
  
  
• Continuity: When the 00 agent is killed at Gibraltar, he falls far down the mountain, with the assassin high above him. Bond runs down to the dead body, and then he sees the assassin stealing a truck BELOW him, even though the guy couldn't possibly have gotten down that far that quickly.
  
  

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