Goofs for
The Fifth Element (1997) More at IMDbPro »

• Revealing mistakes: In the very beginning of the movie, right before Leeloo punches through the glass that is supposed to be "unbreakable", you can see that the glass is already cracked and ready to be broken.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: When Leeloo has crash landed in Korben's taxi cab, when she looks up through the glass cab panel she has a strand of red hair across her nose and cheek that could be taken for blood, explaining why it "disappears" later.
  
  
• Continuity: When Leeloo throws the box of stones to Zorg, the box is rotating to the left (as seen from the screen), but after the clip just after the throw, the box is rotating the other way.
  
  

• Crew or equipment visible: Reflected in the security window in Korben's cab as he speeds away from the cops and loses the last point on his license.
  
  
• Continuity: In the beginning at the Egyptian temple while speaking to the Priest, the Professor has his cup in his right hand then a brush then the cup again all while speaking the same sentence.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: Reversed shot of buttons (numbers reversed) in airplane cockpit prior to departure for Fhloston Paradise.
  
  
• Continuity: When they arrive at the temple Cornelius holds up a stone with the lines going across the bottom of it, Korben takes it, but in the next shot he is holding a stone with lines running up it.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: Towards the end of the scene set in the ancient Egypt, when the wall in the pyramid closes and crushes the Alien's hand (holding the key), the wall waves and is obviously not made of stone.
  
  
• Continuity: When the diva rubs Korben's cheek she leaves a streak of blue blood. In the next shot of Korben there is more blood and it is in a different shape.
  
  
• Continuity: When Ruby Rhod is fooling around with the stewardess, the medallion he's wearing shifts from the left (his left) of his body to the center.
  
  
• Continuity: As Korben is about to enter the sleeping compartment aboard the craft to Phloston Paradise, we see a shot from inside the compartment of him tossing his jacket into the compartment. One of his feet is visible at the edge of the compartment door, but when we cut back out into the hallway, he hasn't yet started climbing the ladder to the compartment.
  
  
• Continuity: Zorg catches the case containing the four stones, and is seen putting it down on the floor next to the door so he can pursue Leloo. In the next shot, the case has vanished.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Right Arm explodes in the terminal and the smoke clears, he is still standing in the same place in the same position completely unaffected.
  
  
• Crew or equipment visible: When Korben gets into the cab and he opens the "garage door" you can see a grilled light being held by a crewman's hand.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: Since Leeloo was "reconstructed" from a small sample of her DNA, the flaming red hair color is clearly intended to be her natural color. However, inconsistently varying amounts of brown "roots" are apparent in her hair in various scenes. It is perhaps most obvious When Leeloo is about to fall from the ledge into Korben's taxi, where a good half inch of brown "root" can be seen.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Leeloo is standing on the ledge and is being blinded by the police lights she raises her hands right before she jumps. Her hands are very dirty, almost completely black. After that she jumps down, crashes into Korben’s cab, and puts her hands against the glass, here you can see her hands are much cleaner. Also her face seems less dirty.
  
  
• Continuity: When Leeloo is being photographed by the police she has her hands up while they process her ID. However the black and white picture that the cops used to ID her was not a current one and was in fact, a picture of her shocked expression when she first comes out of the tunnel moments before the police even show up.
  
  
• Continuity: At the end of the fight scene in the diva's room, three Mangalores enter the room and there's one still standing inside, then Leeloo knocks down two of them at the same time and the fight ends; one runs back to Aknot saying they were ambushed; the other one is nowhere to be found.
  
  
• Factual errors: At the end of the movie, when the 'evil' is approaching Earth, it's shadow is visible in the desert. This is impossible since the sun is visible in frame. To cast such a shadow the sun would have to be above the evil, well out of shot.
  
  
• Continuity: When Leeloo falls through the cab roof and Korben has to pull over and puts the cab on "automatic", the word "automatic" on the button is worn way down, but later when he pushes the button again to start running from the cops, the writing on the button is almost perfect.
  
  
• Continuity: After Rhuby Rhod's first broadcast in the airport interior, the commercial audio for the Gemini Crocket Contest runs in the background. Since Korben has already won, there is no need to keep running this commercial.
  
  
• Continuity: When Leeloo arrives outside Dallas' apartment she appears on a monitor in plain view of General Munro who, despite having met her face to face earlier, fails to recognize her.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): When Korben tires to kiss an unconscious Leeloo, she wakes up, grabs his pistol and says, "Seno akta gamat." Later, after Vito shoves him out of the apartment, Korben asks him what "Akto gamat" means.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): Zorg's limp switches from his right leg to his left leg and then back again several times throughout the film.
  
  
• Factual errors: At the end of the movie, the control room tells the President that the Dark Planet is dead and 62 miles above the Earth. The shot, though, puts the dark planet at about the same level above Earth as the Moon (and suggests that the Moon is itself a predecessor to the newly-dead dark planet). However, the moon is actually 240,000 miles from Earth. A satellite the size of the dark planet (described as 1200 miles in diameter, about two-thirds of the Moon at 1800 miles) would smash into Earth in almost no time at all from that distance. A stable Low Earth Orbit would have to start at about 100 miles above the surface. At 62 miles, it wouldn't even make a single orbit before entering the atmosphere.
  
  
• Continuity: In Korben's apartment, just after Leeloo rings his bell, there is a back and forth conversation between General Munro and his two aids and Korben. When the camera is behind the trio, the General's male aid is obviously in front of the General. When the camera faces the trio, the male aid is very obviously behind the General. The camera switch occurs several times during the conversation ("Major, who is it?" "My wife." "You're remarried?" "Yes - no . . ." etc. etc). Each time the male aid has switched from in front of the General's shoulder to behind the General's shoulder.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: In the first scene, when the Mondoshiwans arrive to take the "fifth element" statue in the hidden room, the camera pans up and over the statue to an overhead shot. This statue has apparently been untouched for several hundred years, and would naturally be uniformly dusty. Unfortunately there is an obvious clean human hand print on the top of the statue, presumably from whoever put the statue in place for the shot.
  
  
• Plot holes: How did the Mangalores find out the stones were on Pholoston? We know Zorg learned of their location by bugging the President's office, but there is no scene showing how the Mangalores came by the same information.
  
  
• Continuity: During the fight scene when Korben jumps off the bar and send the mangolore through the balcony, this should have left a jagged hole. However, after ruby pushes him though the hole is smooth and when Korben shoots out the balcony hole is much bigger.
  
  
• Plot holes: When Korbin throws the bomb, telling Ruby to count to ten. With the hotel having bomb detectors the alarms should have gone off before the found the bomb in the Diva's room.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: During the scene in the Egyptian temple, when the priest and the professor are about to toast, the priest pours out his water and request a bottle of wine. When the artist is going to get the wine you can see the shadows of the aliens entering the temple even though their spaceship has not landed yet.
  
  
• Crew or equipment visible: In Zorg's office, when he is interrogating Vito Cornelius, near the end of the scene, a boom mic moves slightly in and out of the top left of the frame.
  
  

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