Goofs for
Tropic Thunder (2008) More at IMDbPro »

• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): At one point, Tugg says one actor may win a Teen Choice Award, and claims that "they'll slime you and everything!". Teen Choice Award winners get surfboards. The Nickelodeon Kids Choice Awards show is famous for sliming winners.
  
  
• Continuity: When Tugg Speedman talks to Kirk Lazarus, the backpack strap on his right shoulder is sometimes over the carabiner and sometimes beside it.
  
  
• Continuity: During one of the Les' rampages via teleconference, his wedding ring disappears and reappears a couple of times.
  
  

• Continuity: After Tugg Speedman's performance of 'Simple Jack', he is in a room cleaning off his makeup. When he wipes his face with a wet towel, most of the white is gone. However, when he turns around to meet little half-squat, it has reappeared.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): When Lazarus is talking to Tugg about 'Simple Jack' he claims that an actor should never go "full retard" and mentions Peter Sellers (“Being There”), Dustin Hoffman (“Rain Man”), Tom Hanks (“Forrest Gump”), and Sean Penn (“I Am Sam”) as examples. He claims that Sean Penn is the only one of those to go "full retard" and come away without an Oscar after being nominated. However, Peter Sellers did not win an Oscar for his role in “Being There” as well.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): When Tran says "Ni shi biandan Jack," he continues to say it as he turns to his crew/gang members, with "Ni" meaning "You." He should have said, "Ta shi biandan Jack," "Ta" meaning "He/She."
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: When Jeff Portnoy sees the mountain of Heroin he runs over and puts his fingers up by it. If you look at his fingers you can clearly tell that he has already dipped his hands into the fixture; possibly from an earlier take.
  
  
• Continuity: In the scene where Pecker is talking to Tugg about the TiVo, Tugg's slider phone alternates between open and closed.
  
  
• Continuity: In the scene where Tugg is stabbing the panda, he pulls the knife out of the panda but in the next shot the knife is back in the panda and he is mourning the panda's death.
  
  
• Continuity: During the opening scene, the helicopters are seen from the side and are initially "slicks", and empty. No troops inside, no rocket pods or machine guns mounted at the doors. After diving down and seen from the rear, the Huey's now have rocket pods mounted on the skids and machine guns hanging out of the doors. Further scenes show door gunners and some troops now inside.
  
  
• Continuity: After the director and actors land in the jungle the director says he will shoot with his video camera. As he is talking and turning around the position of his hand holding the camera changes. First he holds it from underneath then as he turns and the films camera changes angles he is holding it from the top of his camera.
  
  
• Continuity: When the gang are sitting and talking around the campfire, the water buffalo is behind Kirk. In the next shot the water buffalo is standing next to Kirk and he's petting it.
  
  
• Continuity: In the scene after Tugg (Stiller) split up from the group, the three can be seen walking through the jungle. Jeff (Jack Black) is walking at the end of the group and shot from 3 different angles while claiming he's tired of carrying the gun. The way of carrying changes between shots from hanging from his shoulder to holding in his hands.
  
  
• Factual errors: After the crew first spots the heroin processing plant in the jungle, Sandusky comments that they were in the chopper for hours flying to their drop point, however those Hueys only carry about 2 hours worth of fuel. So they either stopped at various points along the way to refuel (at which point someone might have noticed where they really were or were headed), or they flew for just under two hours and had a refuel point somewhere near the drop point (which also doesn't make sense seeing as how they ended up in/near "the world's hard drug superhighway"). Either way, the copter would have been at bingo fuel and wouldn't have been able to fly them all the way to the drop point, then back to the heroin processing plant, and then used to help them escape.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: Towards the beginning on the movie when the character gets disemboweled with a bayonet in the stomach, when the attacker removes the rifle (supposedly with the bayonet attached) it is obvious there is no bayonet attached to the rifle. However, since this scene is part of a mega-budget movie being filmed, it is likely this goof would be fixed later in post-production with a CGI bayonet.
  
  
• Factual errors: Pandas are indigenous to China, not Vietnam.
  
  
• Continuity: During the assault on the heroin plant, the actors have 4 M16's but there are only 3 people equipped with M16's at the drop-off - Tugg (captured), Sandusky and Alpa. So they would only have access to 2 M16's a shotgun and a M60, not 4 M16's and no other weapons.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: At the end of the film, Tugg is presented his Academy Award for Best Actor award by Kirk Lazarus, the previous year's winner. In reality, the Best Actor award has historically (until 2009) always presented by the previous year's Best Actress, and vice versa. However, the back story for the character of Kirk Lazarus includes that he won 'Best Actress' for his role as Gloria Steinem, because as a true method actor he was so convincing in a female role (though in reality he still would have won Best Actor.)
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: In the opening moments, we are told the location is "South East Vietnam." Later the specific setting is Quang Tri. During the Vietnam War, Quang Tri was South Vietnam's northernmost province. However, it is specified that Quang Tri was the location of the "set" of Tropic Thunder, not that it was the location of the events on which the film was based.
  
  
• Revealing mistakes: In the news coverage early in the film, "province" (of Vietnam) is repeatedly misspelled "provence".
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: When Tugg Speedman is standing in the river, and fires his M16 into the air to shut everyone up, a CO2 cartridge is clearly visible protruding from the bottom of the stock, revealing it to be a prop gun. However, this is not a goof: since Tugg is an actor making a movie, of course the gun IS a prop gun, and there is no reason not to depict it as such.
  
  
• Continuity: After Les Grossman hangs up on Flaming Dragon, him and Pecker sit down to and talk about what will happen if Tugg is killed, and you see the people in the room start to leave the room, then it cuts back to Les and his assistant nods his head to leave and you can see the people leaving the room again.
  
  
• Continuity: Shortly after Cockburn gets punched in the nose, blood drips down to his chin. Next time the camera show Cockburn, there is no blood on his chin.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): The Vietnamese rebels speak Mandarin Chinese throughout the movie.
  
  
• Continuity: When the gang are sitting and talking around the campfire, the rifle leaning on the rock between Alpha and Sandusky appears/disappears between angle shots.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: The north Vietnam flag appear early in the film (the read flag with yellow star). But in South Vietnam, it was not used by the VC. However, the story was that Tayback had been liberated from an NVA (North Vietnamese Army) prison camp, thus it is accurate for them to have a North Vietnamese flag.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): Tran, the child soldier heroin warlord, carries an automatic rifle but wears a bandoleer filled with bullets. Instead, he should be carrying extra magazines, already loaded with bullets.
  
  
• Errors in geography: During the "Access Hollywood" sequence, the map which appears on screen identifies "North Vietnam" and "South Vietnam", even though Vietnam is now one country.
  
  
• Continuity: When Portnoy is cut down off the water buffalo, and he lands on the ground on his back, the stunt double's arms are still bound and are above his head. Next shot shows Jack Black's hands still bound, but are over his chest.
  
  
• Continuity: During the dramatic scene between Speedman and Lazarus in the beginning of the movie, the amount of dirt on Speedman's face constantly changes.
  
  
• Continuity: During the opening scene, the flags behind Cockburn disappear and reappear between shots.
  
  
• Continuity: When Jeff discovers the ox, the mud on his left hand disappears between shots.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): Les Grossman (Tom Cruise) says that "Speedman is a dying star, a white dwarf heading for a black hole. That's physics. It's inevitable." But a white dwarf do not head for a black hole, white dwarf is the final state of average and small stars. White dwarfs will eventually become black dwarfs once they cool off, in a very very long time, so long that there's no known black dwarf existed in our universe.
  
  
• Factual errors: The Gap only sells merchandise under its own label; therefore, Alpa Chino could have not sold a line of "Alpa Chino chinos" at The Gap, as he claims.
  
  
• Continuity: In the scene where Kirk says "I think I might be nobody," you can see Sandusky in the background lower his gun at this quote, then in the next shot, he lowers his gun again.
  
  
• Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): When Four-Leaf is introduced as the author of the book during the video call with Les Grossman, an 82nd Airborne pin is visible on his hat, and a 1st Cavalry Regiment is seen on his jacket. Both of those units are Army units. However, he confesses later on to have been in the Coast Guard. Even if he was in the Army, there is no way he could have been in both of those units.
  
  

• Continuity: SPOILER: When the group is about to leave the landing zone after the director is blown up, Kirk Lazarus is clearly seen removing his shotgun from his side holster. When the angle changes and we see the entire group in line, his shotgun is back in the holster and he removes it again.
  
  
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: SPOILER: "Tropic Blunder" could have been a documentary, since it was about the making of the film. Therefore, Tugg would have been ineligible for a Best Actor Oscar, since he was just telling his own story in the documentary. However, it is more likely that Tropic Blunder is actually a fictional account of the making of the film, with Tugg appearing as himself, and thereby winning the Oscar.
  
  

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