Continuity: Right after Ellie was kidnapped, Dr. Challis runs to a pay phone and dials the Operator to get help, and begins to state, "Operator." and gets a recording. Not only does he get a recording (which would be impossible in the real world), but the recording itself states, "Your call cannot be completed as dialed. Please check the number and dial again, or, call your local operator." Problem is - he was dialing the operator.

Audio problem: During the scene where Dr. Challis goes to visit his two kids, they put on their Halloween masks and his little son says "Let's watch TV." He goes to turn the knob to turn on the TV and a split second BEFORE he turns it, we can hear the intro of the commercial on the television.

Continuity: During the scene where Dr. Challis is at the bar and Ellie walks in to find him, look carefully as Ellie approaches Challis. In the long shot Challis takes a drag from his cigarette and is exhaling the smoke just as Ellie walks up, but a split second later, Challis is not blowing any smoke out. In fact, there isn't even any smoke around where he would have exhaled.

Continuity: Towards the end of the movie, Challis's shirt goes from untucked to tucked several times between shots.

Factual error: The "big giveaway" that happens at 9pm across the whole country would have to happen at least five different consecutive times due to time zones. The "big giveaway" in the most eastern time zone would be successful, but further west it would be earlier than 9pm.

Factual error: Towards the end of the movie, we see Dr. Challis hide amongst some boxes when running from Cochran's men. Challis then finds a phone on the wall and dials his ex-wife, attempting to warn her of Cochran's plans. When he dials her, he only pushes 5 buttons on the phone. Even without an area code in the United States, all phone numbers have always had 7 numbers.

Factual error: The story takes time the last week of October. When Challis and Ellie are on their way to Santa Mira, the trees have green leaves. Even in California, this isn't usual.

Continuity: During the "test" on "little" Buddy, after the family has all been killed the camera switches angles from an in room shot to a monitor shot. In these shots it's clear "little" Buddy's legs have changed their position several times.

Continuity: Ellie and Rafferty stand outside the hotel while Challis goes to check in. The sunlight is seen brightly shining on the windows of the hotel as Rafferty draws attention to Mr. Cochran's car. The scene cuts to an interior shot of Rafferty and Ellie as seen from Mr.Cochran's point of view inside the car. Looking at the windows of the hotel it's obvious the sun is at a different position from where it was just a moment before and, the light of day has faded.

Continuity: When little Buddy and his family are being murdered by the use of Little Buddy's Pumpkin mask, the Silver Shamrock tag on the back of the mask disappears and reappears several times.

Revealing: Watch closely during the scene where Ellie Grimbridge arrives at the hospital room to id her dad Mr. Grimbridge, who the night before had been murdered. As she says, "Let's get it over with", there is a door behind her. On the door is a tag which has the room number. The shadow on the door is about 5 inches BELOW the room number tag. A split second later, the camera switches to a shot of Dr. Challis watching Ellie, and then back to Ellie and the door. The shadow is now EVEN to the room number tag, meaning the scene was probably shot a half hour later, yet the sequence of happenings was only a few seconds.

Continuity: During the scene where Dr. Challis is outside talking to the bum, the camera shot from behind shows us Dr. Challis taking a huge drag from his cigarette as the bum is talking about Silver Shamrock having its "last Halloween." A split second later, the front camera shot now shows Challis replying to the bum, but no cigarette smoke is being exhaled from his mouth, as it should be.

Revealing: At the beginning of the movie we see one of Cochran's assassins enter Mr. Grimbridge's room at the hospital to gouge out his eyes and rip his skull backward. The assassin then wipes the blood from his gloves on the curtains. However, when the camera pans back to Mr. Grimbridge, he is just squinting his eyes closed really hard, and if you look close, his eyelids flinch a little bit.

Factual error: At the very end of the movie, we see Dr. Challis rushing to the gas station phone with seconds to spare, calling the "networks" to try and prevent the deadly commercial from airing. Almost impossible for several reasons. First off, Challis only calls one network (we don't know which one) and yet they seem to pull the commercial from of the three main stations, which is unlikely (not all networks are affiliated). Secondly, without any special credentials, it is near impossible to get something pulled off the air, even in a legitimate emeregency. Third and lastly, it seems even more impossible that given all of the above, any of this could have been done in under a minute's time.

Continuity: During the night scene where Ellie is walking back to the hotel room, a wide camera shot of the entire parking lot shows no cars (not even theirs) adjacent to the walkway. A second later, as Ellie gets closer to her hotel room, Ms. Gutman's car is now there and honks the horn at her.

Factual error: During the scene where Cochran had Dr. Challis tied up in the chair with the mask on in front of the television, Dr. Challis eventually moves the chair close enough to the television, where he literally kicks right through it. This seems highly inaccurate on several levels. First off, Dr. Challis' upper legs were still tied down which would have limited his strength considerably. Second but most importantly, the television itself nor the cart it was on weren't "anchored down" or "bolted down" in any fashion bolstering any leverage for him to be able to put his feet straight through the television. In reality, his feet should have just pushed the tv off the cart and onto the floor.

Revealing: During the part when the day reaches October 31st, various scenes show children and happenings with their Halloween masks throughout various portions of the country getting ready for the big give-away. Included with this is the scene showing Dr. Challis' two kids again sitting in front of the television with their masks on, but they are wearing the same exact clothes they had on when he had stopped over at their house 8 days earlier. This scene was obviously cutting-room floor from that previous scene.

Continuity: After the old man is killed in the hospital, the killer gets into his car and sets himself on fire with gasoline. The car then explodes, causing parts of the car to shoot all over the parking lot. These car parts are on fire and surround the car, but a few seconds later they have disappeared.

Factual error: Right after the assassin kills Harry Grimbridge in the hospital, he walks out to his car to set himself on fire. We see him pour gasoline on his face and chest, flick the lighter, and IMMEDIATELY the car blows up. This is near impossible. In order for the car to blow up, fire would have to reach the fuel tank or lines. The body would have to sit burning in the car for at least a little while in order for the fire to properly spread to certain areas where the car could then blow up. Secondly, there have been many real-life instances where bodies have been set afire inside cars and the car has never 'blown up'.

Factual error: Several times towards the end of the movie. Dr. Challis attempts to call the "Operator" and/or 911 for help, and continuously gets a recording saying his call cannot be completed. Another time, he puts money in a pay phone and gets the same response. This is impossible on both fronts. There are NEVER recordings for trying to reach the Operator and/or 911 for help, nor would you ever have to put money into a pay phone to reach either, even in the early 80's when this film was made.