Goofs for
Dirty Harry (1971) More at IMDbPro »

• Continuity: In the opening scene, Scorpio is tracking the swimming girl through his gun-sights, which provide the POV for the camera. As he shoots, the gun-sights are removed and the camera shows the girl from the same angle. However, when the girl is hit, the bullet hole is below the right shoulder and as such has to be from a bullet fired from at least 90 degrees to the right of the camera, ie there is no way Scorpio could have hit her where he hit from his supposed position on the other building.
  
  
• Continuity: When facing the cross in the park, Harry's shadow first is directly in front of him, then to one side.
  
  
• Continuity: Before Harry clicks on the empty chamber for the bank robber, you hear and see him pull the hammer back to fire in single-action mode. However, when the camera faces Harry and he actually does pull the trigger, it is in double action, indicated by the fact that you see the cylinder spin again.
  
  

• Revealing mistakes: When the Ford sedan at the bank robbery hits the flower stand and fire hydrant you can see the smoke from the "log cannon" used to flip the car coming out from underneath. Then, in an overhead shot, the wire coming from the trunk used to set off the charge is visible running off screen left.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: Picture of two kids behind Harry Guardino's desk is the same picture of two kids on Josef Sommer's desk, except two small pictures are jammed in the corner to camouflage it.
  
  
• Continuity: Callahan finds the note at the beginning stuck on the prong of an antenna. While the note is being reviewed in the Mayor's office, there's no visible hole made by the prong.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Scorpio robs the liquor store, the bottle that he was going to purchase is used to hit the clerk over the head, but it is clearly empty.
  
  
• Continuity: As Harry crosses the street toward the downed bank robber, the shotgun is a few feet away from the robber's hand and well out of reach. A moment later after Harry delivers his famous lines, the shotgun is only a few inches away from the robber's hand, making it clear why the robber was tempted to go for the weapon.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: Throughout the first scene in the police station (where Harry first meets Chico), Harry is "drinking" from an empty coffee cup.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: In the scene after Harry jumps onto the bus, the bus goes into a gravel and dirt parking lot. Scropio whips the bus around and you hear the tires squeal like they were on pavement.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: At the cross on Mount Davidson, Scorpio makes Harry toss his gun a good distance away onto concrete, which would cause noticeable damage to the revolver's blued finish. However, in the final scene (when Harry again delivers his famous speech,) there is no visible damage to the weapon.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): The Chief concludes his mini-lecture on "sick guys" and their "behavior patterns," by mumbling "it must appeal to their super-ego or something." According to fundamental Freudian theory (Psyc 101), the "super-ego" is that part of the human psyche that restrains humans from doing anything that is evil. "Super-ego" is another term for "conscience".
  
  
• Continuity: In the bank robbery scene as Harry shoots the guy who goes through the window there is a brief shot of his grip on the gun which is hand over hand, in the next scene he is in a hand over wrist mode.
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: In the scene where Harry Callahan shoots Scorpio in the leg on the football field, as he walks towards him, Scorpio shouts out, "Don't do anything more! No! No!" If you look at his face however, you can see his mouth is not moving to what he is saying.
  
  
• Factual errors: After finding the empty bullet shell after Scorpio shoots the swimmer, Harry says "we think it's a .30-06 or something like that". The .30-06 cartridge casing has been used for dozens of "wildcat" loadings over the last hundred years. The actual calibers, the diameter of the bullets, have ranged from .17 to .44, with the neck of the brass casing either being slimmed down or opened up. Handloads or custom cartridges using the .30-06 case would still have the original markings so there is no way that anyone could mistake the cartridge for a .30-06, lest of all an experienced police officer.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: At the end of the bank robbery Harry delivers his famous line which includes "Did I fire 5 times or 6"? Some viewers have suggested that Harry fired only 4 times, but in actuality you only see Harry fire 4 times - if you listen carefully you hear 6 shots.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: Harry Callahan is referred to several times as Inspector 71 but when we see his badge at the end of the film it clearly says Inspector 2211. However, many police departments have set radio IDs for certain positions (e.g. Homicide detectives), and these have nothing to do with the badge number of the person filling that role.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: When Callahan is playing Scorpio's game of running around different locations, Scorpio tells him not to talk to anybody or the girl dies. As Callahan is approaching his final destination at the cross, he tells Chico via wiretap that he sees a couple necking. However, it is possible that Scorpio didn't see this incident, as he couldn't have been watching Harry at this moment in time.
  
  
• Continuity: When Scorpio pays a man to beat him up, there is a moment when the man wishes to stop the beating. We see Scorpio's face, and he is severally disfigured. The man hits him a few more times and then the beating ends. When he arrives in hospital, Scorpio's entire face is in bandages. However, only a few weeks later, Scorpio is released from hospital with only a small plaster across the bridge of his nose. The severity of the injuries seen when he is getting beaten would not have dissipated in only a few weeks, indeed, they would almost certainly lead to permanent disfigurement, yet other than the plaster, Scorpio appears unblemished.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: It is often claimed that Harry is incorrect when he refers to the .44 Magnum as the most powerful handgun in the world. Technically, he is and he isn't. In 1971, the .44 Magnum (developed in 1957) was the most powerful commercially available handgun in the world, meaning it fired the most powerful production cartridge. This means it was the most powerful handgun round made by ammo companies and sold on the market. In 1971, the .454 Casull (developed in 1959) was more powerful than the .44 Magnum, but the .454 Casull wasn't produced commercially until 1983, so Harry is inaccurate in stating that it is the most powerful handgun in the world, but he is accurate in stating that it is the most powerful handgun available for use.
  
  
• Factual errors: In the opening scene, Scorpio is shown using a high-powered rifle with a silencer. When he fires, the sound is muffled, as with a silencer. However, in 1971, high-powered rifles could not be silenced.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: In the famous pull-back shot at the football stadium, as Harry stands on Scorpio's leg, the wind caused by the rotor blades can clearly be seen. In the previous shot, Harry's jacket is motionless, but when it cuts to the helicopter shot, his jacket is blowing back and forth.
  
  
• Continuity: When Harry is following Scorpio's instructions to run from phone booth to phone booth, he boards the subway. When he arrives at his destination, it is the exact same station as the one where he boarded.
  
  
• Plot holes: Scorpio is not charged with any crime, due to lack of evidences. However, in reality, he could have been charged with assault on an on-duty police officer (when Harry is hit on the head as he's trying to deliver the money), and/or assault with intent to kill (when he fires at Chico).
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): When the children aboard the hijacked bus sing "Old McDonald Had a Farm", for the first verse they choose "ducks" as the barnyard animals Old McDonald own, in unison and without any prompting. It is highly unlikely that a group of people singing this song would all select the same animal.
  
  
• Continuity: In the scene where Harry is preparing to deliver the ransom money to Scorpio, he tapes a switchblade knife to his leg. The knife is positioned with the bolster or tip pointing upward. In the later scene at the cross, Harry pulls up his pant leg and exposes the knife - it is clearly pointing downward, the opposite of the way he taped it earlier.
  
  

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