MovieChat Forums > Happy Accidents (2001) Discussion > 2 INDISCREPANCIES

2 INDISCREPANCIES

posted 20 years ago by livescollide
51 replies | jump to latest

I loved this movie, and it is one of my favorites. however, i picked up on 2 things that are paradoxical.

1) sam revises his story later in the movie and tells ruby that he didn't find her picture in a curio shop, but rather on the internet while looking up precedents for accident cases. so if he found out about her online, where did he get the image that he drew over and over in his notebook? you see, the picture existed, but he never had access to it.

2) in breaking the causal loop and saving ruby he doomed every future self. let me explain. he found her by researching accident cases, right? so, if she was never killed, no law documenting her death would have been available to him in the future and he would never have known her again. by granting himself one lifetime of pleasure with her, he denies this same access to all of his future selves.

however, since the picture does exist, maybe it is possible that without finding her on the internet, he really would stumble accross her picture in a curio shop. but that's getting into parallel universi; i just think the movie would have held up better if they had kept the story the same about how he came to find out about her.

what do you think?

Vincent D'Onofrio is the best actor in the world!!!

[–] beth_mckinney 20 years ago

i thought he said that he didnt find her picture in a curio shop after all... but did find it on the internet when he was researching accidental deaths, and hasnt stopped seeing the picture since then. (that he found on the database.)

[–] anthrobruin 20 years ago

I can buy that he didn't really find her picture in the curio shop and instead saw the picture on the Internet while performing his research. However, Ruby is really hit by the truth of Sam's story when she sees the back of the picture reads "A happy accident." This is because that's exactly the phrase Sam used when talking to Ruby in the grocery store about finding her photo. Now, if he had only seen the photo on a Web site, he wouldn't have known what was written on the back of the photo. That seems like an inconsistency to me.

[–] 20 years ago

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[–] scofthe7seas 20 years ago

Microssoft will have been bought out by Microsoft, long before they finish fixing all of their software. It's a horrible correction, and makes me sound like an uptight weazle, but come on, beating the microsoft dead horse, is the deadest horse one could possibly beat, I'm having satirical cartoon flashbacks circa 1996.

[–] slimbonejones 20 years ago

Indiscrepancy isn't a word.

[–] 20 years ago

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[–] tebesq 20 years ago

dis·crep·an·cy [ diss kréppənsee ] (plural dis·crep·an·cies)
noun
failure to match: a distinct difference between two things, for example, sets of figures, that should match or correspond

in·dis·cre·tion [ ìndi skrésh’n ] (plural in·di·rec·tions)
noun
1. tactless lack of judgment: lack of tact or good judgment

bom·bast [ bóm bàst ]
noun
pompous language: language that is full of long or pretentious words, used to impress others

-I will not be arbitrary and I will not listen to reason.

[–] scofthe7seas 20 years ago

I can't beleive somebody bashed me for my microsoft joke, I was making more of a comment on the fact that microsoft jokes are dead dead dead. I didn't even have to fix any spelling because someone else did.
And come on, if you're going to try and attack me at least finish spelling out my name, I mean there's a whole word at the end you left off, what if some poor bastard by the name of Scofthe7 comes along and reads this? How will he feel? Did you think about that?

[–] dvilardo2001 20 years ago

dont you guys get anything!!!!!! microsoft is bought out by wal-mart by 2037!!! --- and 5/8s of all US citizens work as white trash retail clerks - then the Indians buy out wal-mart in 2056 and we all work for the country of India!!

[–] loralee_87 10 years ago

some walmart clerks are people's little sisters who work their way through college so that they can go on to be deputy legislative assistants for governors of states and other stuff like it. Not quite so white trash, yeah?

Just some food for thought,
Peace, Y'all!
Loralee :)

[–] jhj-5 20 years ago

maybe both sides of the photograph were shown on the internet.

[–] kmannings 20 years ago

doubtful. and especailly if he finds it under accidental deaths. They're not going to say it was a happy accident. unless tact died instead of the rainforest.

[–] RoidDroidVoid 9 years ago

I literally just laughed out loud while sitting here by myself reading this. People from the past are so much funnier than people from the future.

RoidDroidVoid

[–] iLoveReeseSullivan 20 years ago

That's what I was thinking.

The Internet must be much more advanced and different in 400 years, right? It may have even commented on the irony of what was written on the back.

[–] stringpickin1 15 years ago

Not necessarily so. If it was a record of her accident, they could have easily scanned in the back of the photo also being it was an antique so to speak and an important artifact because it helped change some laws or something. Can't remember exactly what that issue was.. But think of online banking.. you can look at the front and back of your check images..

[–] done_holding_back 14 years ago

Now, if he had only seen the photo on a Web site, he wouldn't have known what was written on the back of the photo. That seems like an inconsistency to me.

The movie was centered on a paradox: the photo. It was taken with him, meaning that in every timeline where he saw the photo, he had also (four centuries earlier) lived out a life with her.

Anything related to the photo is bound not to make sense under linear analysis.

You could say that he wrote "Happy accidents" (using his words from the grocery store) on the photo after they had it developed.

[–] elliest_5 13 years ago

Because I just watched the movie and I still have it playing on my laptop:

The line says that he found her photo "on a historical data-base while researching legal precedents" and it is actually spoken by Ruby not by Sam (she reports his "latest story" to her friend). So, it wasn't necessarily an electronic data-base and he could have read the back of the picture.

However, I don't think this really matters (the way I understood it when I watched the movie was that he marked the back of the picture with the "happy accidents" quote as a way of telling her "I told you so" -I don't see why this had to come from the future, it was just a spontaneous thing: by recognising the picture he remembered what he told her in the grocery store and just wrote it down). What actually really matters is that the picture was taken while SHE WAS WITH HIM on the beach. This is proof that they were indeed stuck in a temporal loop.

As a sci-fi fan of time-travel stories I can tell you that this kind of paradox is common and generally accepted in time-travel fiction: when time travellers try to change an event of the past, a paradox occurs in the form of a loop. The time traveller becomes part of the series of events that lead to the specific "anomalous" event. This means that it is BECAUSE he (a previous version of him) was on the beach with her on the day the picture was taken that his future self found the specific picture and decided to look for her. The loop is an infinitely repeated circle with no starting point (the way we perceive time -linear-, there should have been a point which is the begining of all this and at which he travels back in time and meets her although he hasn't seen that specific picture - in the way these paradoxes work, however, not even this is necessary)

About "breaking the chain of events": now that he broke the chain, as he explained to her, a parallel timeline will be created. In that timeline she doesn't die on that day and there is no more loop (his future self will not travel back in time to find her). However, the old timeline still exists, it is not erased, so, in a parallel universe he will always be travelling back and she will always die (I thought that this is why we are shown the original timeline first, in which the taxi is about to hit her, because this still exists in the parallel universe)

Anyways...I thought it was a really fun movie to watch and I m happy I discovered it because it had some of my favourite themes in it ;)

[–] paultagonist 13 years ago

You get it! Thanks for writing it out.

The real trick to life is not to be in the know, but to be in the mystery. -Fred Alan Wolf

[–] jrr060 10 years ago

Sam didn't write "a happy accident" on the photo, he never even saw it during the course of the movie. Gretchen wrote it, which is explained when she mentions that she accidentally zoomed in on the photo but still thought it ended up being a good photo of Ruby. And as others have mentioned, there's plenty of plausible reasons for why the future record of the photo would include the back as well.

[–] dvilardo2001 20 years ago

he found the picture online. the picture online was the same picture that he drew over and over. the reason he drew Crystie delancey over and over again is because in the Internet article he read, it said that she died on crystie and delancey.

[–] rolyzgomez 20 years ago

He explains all this paradoxes by the future laws and theories. You are thinking the way we think. In order to make sense of the movie, you have to believe that he is from the future.

[–] circe_golightly 20 years ago

not to be a nitpicker...but the word is 'discrepancies' not 'indiscrepancies'.

sorry...that just bugged the heck out of me.

[–] bettypaiger 20 years ago

haha, i just want to know what movie that Ted comment is from. hilarious!

[–] theCount-3 19 years ago

The Ted comment is from "Loaded Weapon 1"

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107659/combined

[–] kalqlate 19 years ago

I'm shocked. What was said that happens if you alter the past? Answer: You create a parallel universe. In the new or second universe the future forks off and can be totally different. Sam may never have need to visit the past. But then you might say, "Well how can that second universe come into existence if he doesn't go into the past?" The second universe begins an instant after the split off from the first. It is caused by the event that caused the split. Or maybe I'm not understanding something here.

[–] leadcrow17 19 years ago

i agree with you. the parallell universes exist onto themselves..he mentioned he had done this time and time again each time failing to save her which i believe would explain why he knew where she died and how and by whom (that's why he went to kill the taxi driver who would ultimately cause her death). when arguing with the man in the art show someone mentioned the grandfather paradox..if you go back in time and kill your grandfather you would negate your own ezistance which sam counters with the parallel universe theory.

[–] TotalBlackout 19 years ago

no holes in this movie that i picked up on after one nearly whole viewing. Sure there are mysteries relating the actual process of back travel, but do you know how an internal combustion engine work. The point is you don't need to know. Not in order to enjoy the incontrovertable evidence that it does work, despite your lack of knowledge.

amazing film

[–] gmleonard 19 years ago

What about the fact that the final photo that Ruby finds is a photo of her sitting with Sam? According to Ruby's friend Sam was cut out of the photo because of a zoom malfunction. BUT the fact remains that in 2470 he says he found a photo of her on the internet and in fact he was the guy in the photo with her. HOW is that possible?

[–] 19 years ago

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[–] leadcrow17 19 years ago

maybe it's just like in back to the future..where marty looks at the photo and as history changes parts of him appear in the photo..at the time of the photo sam deed had never met ruby but as he back traveled over and over again he appeared in the photo piece by piece until it was complete knowing that this time around he would have to try with all his might to cause the one moment in time where time would reverse itself and she would be saved..maybe..possibly.

[–] 19 years ago

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] kentekeroth 19 years ago

Time stuff can never be really explained fully. This is a movie, and sure all those things "the egg and the chicken" problem arises among with many other issues that are inconsistent. It's interesting to talk about them, but they can hardly be used to "critisize" the movie. I'm sure the director and writer of this movie havn't got all the answers on time travel.

If one where to argue about these issues I could say: Why would this time (in the time-loop) be any different from all the other occations before when he had been there? If the same thing happened all those times over, why would it be different now? Because he acted differently? Don't think so since time repeats itself, and thus it should repeat what happened so many times before.

Anyways, all these issues that arise from the subject of time travel really doesnt bother me, since they were handled and explained so good in this movie.

It's really an awesome movie, definately one of the best romance/drama movies i've seen.

Great acting, script and directing!

[–] Rugby5513 18 years ago

he is the one in the photo! It is not a different photo. This is the paradox that he causes her death. There is no problem with it being him in the photo. Just he wouldn't realize that he was in the photo. The second paradox you posted was a good one. Without her death, he never would have found her. The only possible explanation is the parallel universe. In which she dies in one universe and lives in the parallel universe.

[–] miayakuza 14 years ago

I know this thread is from 2004 but I had to comment. That is the photo that he sees on the internet. He didn't have access to it so he commits to memory by drawing it over and over and over. It is the picture that is in her accident file. How did it exist? It was taken in 1999 when she we went to her friend's beach house. She hadn't met Sam and therefore her friend took the picture of just Ruby. It is not until Sam backtravels that he is present for the picture and it is taken and by a "happy accident" her friend messes up the shot and he's not in it. That picture is the key in getting her to realize that he's telling the truth. How did Happy Accident get on the back of the picture? Remember Ruby was telling her friend about her concerns about Sam from the beginning and they were unsure of the relationship from the start. My theory is that her friend wrote "happy accident" on the back because she knew Sam and Ruby would break up and since Sam was supposed to be in the shot and was not, it prompted her to write on the back "happy accident". Bob Ross, the painter, used to say, "there are no mistakes, just happy accidents". It is a term that anyone could have used to describe the situation.

Sam explains that according to Cheeseman, you can have two parallel futures. They explain this over and over throughout the movie. There is a future where she does die and this is how he finds her in the accidents file. He goes back in time to change the future and succeeds thus creating a parallel future. I don't understand why so many of you did not get this?

[–] Kalamata 12 years ago

miayakuza, you will never read this as it is happening almost exactly two years from when you wrote your observation. Nonetheless, on the "off chance" that you do find your way back here, I wanted to thank you for making the last photo - which we don't see - clearer to me (she sees Sam in the photo, and he couldn't be in that photo unless he was, indeed, a "back traveler"... When the movie continues and we see the photo being taken, we are supposed to "get it". But I'm slow and old and bad when things like this are explained in the film itself. So thanks.

ekw

To the originator of this thread: it turns out that your neologism, indiscrepancy, while it does not exist in the English language, nonetheless sparked a lot of discussion. Which is a good thing.

And to any future readers of this thread who fall in love with me, don't try to find me. I like my life as a back traveler and don't want it disturbed by your commenting on my comments (that will cause a tremor in the 5th dimension and we might end up at the same old age home waiting to die. I don't want to do that) Thank you.

[–] Kalamata 12 years ago

miayakuza, you will never read this as it is happening almost exactly two years from when you wrote your observation. Nonetheless, on the "off chance" that you do find your way back here, I wanted to thank you for making the last photo - which we don't see - clearer to me (she sees Sam in the photo, and he couldn't be in that photo unless he was, indeed, a "back traveler"... When the movie continues and we see the photo being taken, we are supposed to "get it". But I'm slow and old and bad when things like this are explained in the film itself. So thanks.

ekw

To the originator of this thread: it turns out that your neologism, indiscrepancy, while it does not exist in the English language, nonetheless sparked a lot of discussion. Which is a good thing.

And to any future readers of this thread who fall in love with me, don't try to find me. I like my life as a back traveler and don't want it disturbed by your commenting on my comments (that will cause a tremor in the 5th dimension and we might end up at the same old age home waiting to die. I don't want to do that) Thank you.

[–] dphelps10 19 years ago

Firstly, it's 'discrepancies'. Also, the plural of universe is universes. It's not like alumnus/i or fungus/i, which like all Latin words pluralized with an 'i', end in 'us'.

1. He did actually find her photo on the internet in an article about her death, but it wasn't the same one she found with "a happy accident" on it. Remember that picture was taken by and belonged to her friend Gretchen, who had written "a happy accident" on the back herself, because Sam had been accidently cut out of the frame. This makes Ruby realize Sam is telling the truth because Sam had previously used the phrase and obviously knew Gretchen would use it on the picture and Ruby would find it.

2. That's logical.

"I'll fight you right here, baby Jesus!" Captain James T. Lunatic

[–] Paul_Jay 18 years ago

>>>2) in breaking the causal loop and saving ruby he doomed every future self. let me explain. he found her by researching accident cases, right?<<<<

Only if you accept the idea that time is linear.