Blooper

In the final battle when the Bismarck's guns are out of action, you see the battleship King George V firing on it, and yet shells from the Bismarck are still seen landing next to the King George V.

When the Admiral addresses the crew of the Bismarck, he and the Captain are clad in heavy bridge coats, but the crew, on the exposed deck is wearing much lighter clothing.

When Captain Shepard starts to write to his son, we have a glimpse of the inner room in his office showing a bed made up in there. Anne Davis comes in with a cup of tea. Moments later we get another glimpse of the inner room, but now it contains a desk and chairs, instead of the made-up bed. Shortly after this, Shepard asks for a bed to be made up in his office.

When HMS Suffolk first spots the Bismarck, her captain sends a signal in which he gives Bismarck's course as South. When this signal is received in the Admiralty, this has changed to South-West.

When the Dorsetshire torpedoes the Bismark at the end of the film, it releases torpedoes from its starboard side, starting with its stern tubes. Given the relative positions of the ships, this should mean that they strike the Bismark with the first torpedo hitting the front of the ship and the last at the rear, but they do not; the first strike is at the rear of the Bismark and the last one at the front.

The characterization of Admiral Gunther Lütjens in this movie is wildly inaccurate. He is shown as a zealot, a fanatic, denying reality until the end. In fact, Lütjens was a thoughtful, even morose figure - some survivors claimed that his tendency for fatalism damaged their morale. Absurdly, on screen the Admiral tells his men to "remember you are Nazis!" Lütjens was not a Nazi (very much the opposite, to the extent that he famously refused to perform the Nazi salute for Hitler before the Bismarck set sail), nor were the vast majority of his officers and crew.

The film shows Capt. Lindemann returning HMS Hood's fire after Hood's first salvo; in reality, Adm. Lütjens ordered Lindemann to hold his fire for over three minutes as the German ships closed the range - so long that Lindemann was overheard muttering under his breath, "I will not have my ship shot out from under my ass!"

In the film, Bismarck is attacked by British destroyers the night before she is shelled into a wreck by King George V and Rodney. Bismarck sinks one of the destroyers (the "Solent") after suffering torpedo damage. In the real battle, no British destroyers were sunk in this engagement and German sources indicate no torpedoes hit Bismarck during the destroyer attack.

The film shows Capt. Lindemann dying on the Bismarck's bridge when it is struck by a British shell; however, many survivors recalled seeing him standing near the bow of the Bismarck as she rolled over and sank.

Bismarck's antiaircraft guns never managed to shoot down a single British plane (the film depicts the battleship shooting down several), though it did score some hits.

In the battle, Lütjens and Lindemann are looking through binoculars completely covered with mist. This is a common naval movie method for preventing undesirable reflections from the binocular lenses.

In one scene showing a British torpedo plane taking off, no torpedo is visible. On this type of aircraft, the "Swordfish", the torpedo is carried below the fuselage between the landing gear. However, these aircraft were also used without torpedoes for reconnaissance and for dropping bombs or mines.

When the Ark Royal is shown steaming at speed to launch its attack on the Bismark, the wings of an early Royal Navy Jet Fighter, An Armstrong Whitworth Sea Hawk can be seen over the edge of the flight deck in the folded position.

When the aerial photographs are being developed, you can see the image appear when the print is in the tray of developer. The print is taken directly from the developer tray and the light is turned on only inches from the print. If this were done in reality, the print would immediately turn entirely black from the light unless the print had been transferred to a fixer bath first.

Swordfish torpedo bombers are shown taking off with slung torpedoes, and the torpedo propellers are spinning in the wind. The purpose of the nose propellers is to arm the torpedo. To avoid premature arming, the nose propellers would be wired to prevent spinning in the air. When the torpedo hits the water, the greater resistance would break off the wires and the torpedoes would then be armed after a few rotations.

When Thomas Shepard stands up in the rear cockpit of his airplane searching for the Bismarck, the straps on his head gear remain steady, when they (and other parts of his uniform) should be moving as a result of the airstream.

During the destroyer attack on Bismarck, during shots on the lead destroyer's bridge a ship in the background shows a mirror image hull number.

In the "friendly fire" attack on HMS Sheffield, the appearance of the ship when she is spotted from altitude clearly resembles a battleship like the Bismarck rather that the long slim lines of a cruiser such as Sheffield. The same footage is used for the scene when the aircraft (correctly) Identify and attack the Bismarck.

The Bismarck was finally sunk at 10:40 a.m. on 27th May. Yet when Shepard and Davis leave the Admiralty Building it is about 09:00 a.m., presumably on 28th May. Which means they have spent about 24 hours in the Operations Room. Also Shepard has been told to report to the Prime Minister at 11:00 a.m., yet walks towards Trafalgar Square away from both the Cabinet War Rooms and Downing Street.

In the aerial view of London in one of the opening shots, a Zebra Crossing can seen quite plainly. These types of road safety aids did not appear in the UK until 1951. And the skies over wartime London should have included Barrage Balloons.

About half way into the film the HMS Ark Royal and HMS Victorious are mentioned. Close ups of flight deck operations included a shot that showed the hull number R06. "R" is a NATO designation that was not utilized until after WWII. R06 is the hull number for HMS Centaur which was not launched until 1947.

The British headquarters is full of steel beams, everywhere. These beams are covered with rivets, but none of the beams appear to be attached to anything, making the rivets pointless decoration.

When the destroyer fires the first lot of torpedoes, the Captain says "hard to Port" yet his lips show him saying "hard to Starboard".

When the Norwegian spy spots Bismarck exiting the Baltic Sea, Bismarck is heading in the wrong direction. When viewed from Southern Norway, Bismarck should be headed east to west (left to right on screen), but the scene shows Bismarck heading right to left (west to east).

Prior to the German Admiral's rousing speech, the crew are brought to attention. The officer shouts "Achtung". "Achtung" means attention as in a warning, NOT as a drill instruction. The correct order should be "Stillgestanden".

When addressing the crew, Admiral Lütjens says "Don't forget you are Nazis!". Actually, the term "Nazi" was used as an insult by opponents and foreigners. Aside the film' inaccurate depiction of Lütjens, who in reality was critical of them; real Nazis would have used the term "National-Socialists" to call themselves.

At roughly 18:43 the Captain stated that a troop convey with 50,000 troops was heading to the Middle East. The Admiral said the number of troops was 20,000.