39 horrible technical errors in ‘GI Jane’
SUMMARY
Ridley Scott’s “G.I. Jane” gave audiences an inside look into Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training, with Demi Moore starring as a female trainee.
Except it’s not called BUD/S — the movie calls it CRT for some reason — and th…
Ridley Scott's "G.I. Jane" gave audiences an inside look into Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training, with Demi Moore starring as a female trainee.
Except it's not called BUD/S — the movie calls it CRT for some reason — and the technical errors don't stop there. We sat through two hours of sometimes horrific technical errors so you don't have to. Here's the 39 that we found.
1:53 Senator DeHaven references an F-14 crash at Coronado. Although it is possible that an F-14 could crash in the area, it's worth pointing out that Naval Air Station North Island, Coronado, has no F-14s assigned to it.
3:00 The senator says that nearly 1/4 of all jobs in the U.S. military are off-limits to women. It's actually much closer to 1/5th.
4:31 The admiral makes the first mention of "C.R.T — Combined Reconnaissance Team," which he refers to as SEALs. There's no such thing as CRT. The training program that Navy SEALs go through is called BUD/S, or Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL.
4:37 The admiral says SEAL training has a 60 percent drop-out rate. According to the Navy's own figures, the drop-out rate is closer to 75-80 percent.
11:50 O'Neill says she has survived Jump School and Dive School. As an intel officer, it's highly unlikely that she would ever attend these schools.
13:13 Royce mentions to Lt. O'Neill that BUD/S training is three months. It's actually six.
14:01 Now we're introduced to Catalano Naval Base in Florida. It doesn't exist. BUD/S actually takes place at the Naval Special Warfare Training Center in Coronado, Calif.
14:21 Lt. O'Neill pulls up to the base in a Humvee. If she were going to a training school, she would've just driven a civilian vehicle or taken a taxi from the airport like everyone else. She wouldn't be picked up by a driver in a tactical military vehicle (although that possibility could have happened but it would've been a government van).
14:23 The gate guard says "Carry on." He's enlisted, and she's an officer. If anyone is going to say that, it's going to be the officer, not the enlisted guy.
14:46 Yes, Lt. O'Neill is wearing a beret right now. And no, people in the Navy don't ever wear one.
20:00 Capt. Salem welcomes the new class and says they are all "proven operators in the Spec-Ops community." He mentions that some of the trainees for CRT are SEALs. Why would SEALs be going through initial SEAL training? (This is just another screw-up coming from calling BUD/S the fictional "CRT.")
20:07 Salem mentions that some of the trainees are from Marine Corps Force Recon. You can't become a Navy SEAL unless you're in the Navy.
26:20 A Huey helicopter is about 10 feet away from the trainees who are exercising in the water, but Command Master Chief Urgayle can give a rousing speech about pain that everyone can hear just fine.
26:50 After his speech about pain, Urgayle hops on the Huey and heads out. I wish I could have a Huey as a personal taxi to take me around.
36:27 Using an M-60 machine gun to fire over trainees' heads is believable. The Master Chief using a sniper rifle to fire live rounds at trainees during training? That is not.
36:31 Are you frigging serious with this reticle pattern right now?
36:52 This course looks less like training and more like Beirut in the 80s. What the hell is with all the flames everywhere?
37:19 Now there is a jet engine shooting afterburner exhaust in trainees' faces. Wtf?
39:00 Apparently the Master Chief has moved his sniper position from away in a bunker to the perspective of Lt. O'Neill, looking up at Cortez on top of the wall.
48:56 The instructors throw two live smoke grenades and fire rounds from an MP-5 submachine gun to wake up the trainees. The sound doesn't really match, unless they are shooting live rounds at people. In which case, it's probably not a good idea to shoot live bullets at a cement floor.
53:01 I know Capt. Salem really likes his cigars, but smoking one during PT?
54:19 Lt. O'Neill gets waterboarded as Urgayle explains how effective the technique is at interrogation. This is not something taught at BUD/S.
57:07 The base gate says Naval Special Warfare Group Two. The base in the movie is located in Jacksonville, Fla., but the actual Group Two is based in Little Creek, Va.
1:05:44 Now the trainees head to SERE school, which the movie says is in Captiva Island, Fla. The Navy (or any other branch) does not hold SERE training at this location. Also, BUD/S trainees don't attend SERE school. They would attend SERE after they earned the Navy SEAL Trident.
1:06:00 Instructor Pyro is giving a speech about SERE in the back of a noisy helicopter. The trainees wouldn't be able to hear him.
1:09:36 Lt. O'Neill says over the radio: "Cortez, target ahead. Belay my last. New rally point my location." She didn't give Cortez an order, so saying "belay my last" — aka disregard that order — doesn't make sense.
1:10:00 Slavonic wants to get a helmet at SERE school for a souvenir? Sure he's a total idiot, but no one is that dumb.
1:12:32 Now that everyone is captured at SERE training, it's worth pointing out that SERE is actually a three-week course, one week of which is dedicated to survival. Apparently GI Jane skipped straight to resistance.
1:30:00 Why the hell is there a baseball bat just sitting there next to ring-out bell? Oh, the director wanted to make Lt. O'Neill look like a badass. Ok.
1:40:15 Lt. O'Neill is back in training, and now the trainees are on an Operational Readiness Exercise in the Mediterranean Sea, on a submarine. The Navy isn't going to put trainees on a sub stationed overseas before they are SEALs while they are still undergoing BUD/S training.
1:42:28 The captain asks the Master Chief if the trainees are ready to conduct a real-world mission into Libya. He says yes, and the military viewing audience is — if they haven't already — throwing things at their TVs.
1:49:19 There's a firefight happening and bad guys coming towards them but these almost SEALs are literally smoking and joking.
1:54:29 An M-16 firing doesn't sound like a .50 caliber machine gun. But it does in this movie.
1:54:53 O'Neill fires her M203. The sound it makes is basically a "thoonk" sound. The movie sound effect is like a bottle rocket.
1:55:26 Ok, so basically every sound effect in this firefight sequence makes me want to shoot the TV.
1:56:36 This Cobra attack helicopter can easily shoot the bad guys from a distance. But let's just go to 10 feet off the ground so the enemy has a chance to shoot the pilot in the face.
1:57:03 The helicopter crew chief just shot a bad guy with his 9mm from 100 yards or so. That's a pistol, not a sniper rifle.
1:59:00 Master Chief hands O'Neill her SEAL Trident and says "welcome aboard." Except it's not a trident. It's some weird, made-up badge that says SEAL CRT. This is purely fictional, and made all the more ridiculous by the instructors themselves not wearing that badge but wearing the SEAL Trident instead.
1:59:23 In the very next scene after the class graduates, O'Neill is seen wearing the SEAL Trident. Except she was just handed that fake SEAL CRT Badge.
