Goofs for
Dead Poets Society (1989) More at IMDbPro »

• Audio/visual unsynchronized: Near the beginning, we hear the honks of geese as birds fly past. These birds look like starlings.
  
  
• Factual errors: The line that Keating refers to from Whitman's poem "Song of Myself" is misquoted. The line actually reads "I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world".
  
  
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: After Keating instructs the boys to rip out the introduction to their poetry textbook, his lip movements do not match the speech.
  
  

• Anachronisms: Although the setting is the 1950s, the chemistry textbook the students use, "Chemistry: A Modern Course" by Robert Smoot, is copyrighted 1987.
  
  
• Anachronisms: The literature anthology, "Literature: Reading, Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and the Essay", edited by Robert DiYanni, was published by Random House in 1986.
  
  
• Continuity: Snow starts and stops, depending upon the camera shot, when Knox is trying to convince Chris to attend the play with him.
  
  
• Factual errors: The Thoreau quote read at the beginning of each meeting is incorrect.
  
  
• Anachronisms: Many mistakes in the band musical instruments used for 1959. Fiberglass sousaphones, metal drum carriers, tenor drums - all about 20 years too early.
  
  
• Continuity: When John Keating has the boys stand on his desk, he gathers his things to leave the room. Behind his desk (waiting to stand on it) are three boys on the left and none on the right. In the next shot of his desk, there are two boys on the left and two boys on the right.
  
  
• Continuity: When the students are stepping up onto Mr. Keating's desk to get a different view of the room, Pitts goes up twice: once towards the beginning and then later when Mr. Keating tells them that they are to write a poem.
  
  
• Factual errors: The bagpiper in the first scene takes his pipes out of the case one moment and is seen playing "Scotland The Brave" during the ceremony apparently the next, without any indication any time had gone by. In reality it takes several minutes to tune a full set of pipes to the tonal qualities expected at a graduation (or similar).
  
  
• Continuity: The lipstick marking on Nuwanda's right cheek switches positions between shots as he is talking to the girls in the cave. The dimensions of the original marking change.
  
  
• Continuity: While Keating addresses the class for the first time outside their classroom, he reads out Pitts' name to ask him to read out a passage. Pitts raises his right hand, but in the next shot, Pitts is raising his left hand.
  
  
• Anachronisms: Although the film is set in the fifties, the tune played by the lone bagpiper by the lake is "The Fields of Athenry." This tune, though considered a classic Irish folk tune was only written in 1979.
  
  
• Factual errors: The first meeting of the Dead Poets Society in the cave is at night but there is light through the hole in the ceiling.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: Keating's impression of Marlon Brando is not an anachronistic reference to The Godfather (1972) but to his role as Marc Antony in Julius Caesar (1953).
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): After the welcoming speech, Todd's father refers to the headmaster as "Dr. Nolan". Everyone else throughout the movie calls him "Mr. Nolan".
  
  
• Continuity: At meal time, when Mr. McAllister is talking to Mr. Keating, they are holding a tray. After exchanging them, when the camera does a close shot on Mr. McAllister, he doesn't seem to hold the tray anymore.
  
  
• Continuity: At the studying group scene, Neil is wearing glasses. After Knox's arrival, there is no more trace of Neil's glasses.
  
  
• Continuity: At the beginning, after the procession arrives where the headmaster is, we can see the two first boys going to sit. Then, when the man holding the candle approaches the pew, we can see them going to sit again.
  
  
• Continuity: When Neil is reading from the introduction to the poetry book, and Mr. Keating is drawing the diagram on the board, Cameron starts to copy the diagram down in his notebook. Cameron draws and shades in the boxes on his notes before Mr. Keating ever draws them on the board.
  
  
• Continuity: At the study group that night, the boys are told to leave. Todd, who was supposed to be in his room because he said he didn't want to come, gets up and leaves with them.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: The school's name is Welton throughout the movie. Various characters call the school "Hell-ton" including the cafeteria's offering of "Hell-ton Hash". It's not a mistake about the name of the school, just boys making fun of their school.
  
  
• Continuity: When Todd receives the desk set for his birthday, and Neil and Todd go to throw the desk set off the bridge, the desk set is clearly covered in plastic shrink wrap. However, when the desk set is thrown, papers and pens still go flying everywhere.
  
  
• Anachronisms: The desk set given to Todd is packaged in shrink-wrap. This did not exist until the 1970s.
  
  

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