Goofs

(at about 57:00 into the film) Lists is shown having his left hand stomped on very hard by one of Pachenko's crew members, yet the next day, there are no signs of injury.

In both instances that the ejector seat was used in the car (the Monster), the roof flies off. In both of the following scenes, the roof has reappeared.

(at about 52:00 into the film) Right after Jensen Ames tears up the picture of his daughter and starts talking to Coach, there is a shot from behind Coach where he is wearing a Terminal Island prison jacket, even though every other shot just has him in a blue shirt.

(at about 39:00 into the film) In Round 1, when Frankenstein is shoved into something, his car's front bumper and a few other parts fall off, but once the car is out of the building, they are back together again.

(at about 1:25:00 into the film) When Machine-Gun Joe asks his partner to light his cigarette for him, he does so, but in the next scene, his cigarette is not lit.

(at about 24:00 into the film) At the introduction, Coach tells Frankenstein that the back protection plate, a.k.a. the Tombstone, is 6" thick solid steel. There are four plates 1.5" thick each and about 40", 50", 60" and 70" by about 48" tall. That is about 1,972 kg or 4,340 lbs. of steel. That would make the car so back heavy that, at the first hitting of any bump, the front of the car would go up and make controlling it impossible. Besides that, it would also be so heavy that the car would not be fit for the race.

(at about 34:00 into the film) Sections 2204 and 2207 of Title 44 of the U.S. Criminal Code, as seen in the legalese in parentheses at the end of the disclaimer preceding the Death Race ("Title 44, US Criminal Code, Section 2204 and 2207"), actually are "Restrictions on access to Presidential records" and "Vice-Presidential records", respectively.

(at about 25:00 into the film) The twin Gatling guns on Frankenstein's car are more likely 7.62mm and not 30mm, as stated in the film. A 30mm round is 1.18 inches in diameter, much bigger than what is seen being fired.

The front firing weapons fitted to Pachenko's car are World War II vintage German MG-34 7.92mm machine guns and Russian PPSh-41 7.62mm sub-machine guns; the former have Gurttrommel 34 drum magazines each containing a 50 round belt, while the latter can take either a 71 round drum magazine, or a 36 round curved stack magazine. That makes them unsuitable for prolonged firing, as they lack sufficient ammunition and their location also makes them impossible to reload during a race. Plus, they would not even make a dent on the "Tombstone". Also, the flexible navigator-operated machine gun on Carson's car is manually charged and fired, so the activation/kill switch mechanism for it would have to block either the charger or the trigger, but no such thing is visible.

(at about 55:00 into the film) When Machine-Gun Joe says "Thou shall not kill" while cutting his own face, his mouth movements suggest he pronounces each word in quick succession. However, the word "kill" is significantly delayed on the soundtrack for dramatic effect (a slight echo is also applied to it). This is confusing, but clearly a creative decision.

(at about 1:00 into the film) In the film's opening title cards, the word "Colosseum" is spelled as "Coliseum." This is an acceptable, if uncommon, alternate spelling.

Early on (36:50) Coach tells Frank "This is mirrored glass, no one can see in so you might want to take the mask off." Numerous times throughout the movie, the other drivers look at Frank while gesturing appearing to ignore this fact. They can't actually see Frank, they just know he is in the car. If they could see him, they would know he's not the real Frank.

(at about 48:00 into the film; the unrated version only) When Martinez sticks her head through the sun roof during the race, her hair stays in place - not at all affected by the speeding car.

In many scenes in the film where the cars are flipping upside down and in the air, you can see from the undercarriage that the drive train (the engine, the transmission and the drive shafts) have already been pulled from the car.

(at about 44:00 into the film) When Grimm gets out of his crashed vehicle and Machine-Gun Joe's vehicle comes around the corner, you can see Grimm's head exploding/being ripped off by some form of contact with the car. Heads do not explode when being hit by any object at that speed and actually, no part of the car touches his head.

There are copious amounts of mainline railroad equipment all around the race track area, including numerous obviously still in use freight cars (a lot of them Canadian from the clearly visible markings), yet there is no railroad connection to the island, only the narrow road bridge.

(at about 1:20:00 into the film) During the introduction to Stage 3 of the race, there is a close-up of Frankenstein snapping Pachenko's neck, then the camera switches to a wide shot of Frankenstein and a dead Pachenko. This is how the real audience viewing this film saw it, yet since it is included in the preview to Stage 3 the in-film audience sees, they see a close-up shot of Frankenstein killing Pachenko, then a wide shot which shows there was no camera in place to take the earlier shot.

The Gatling guns consistently use the sound of a much lower rate of a firing machine gun, e.g., M60. The sound would be more like "B-r-r-r-r-r" than "Da-da-da".

During their first meet in the prison yard, Machinegun Joe states that "Frank in still in the infirmary with 15 unhealed fractures and wont make the race", yet the very next race, Joe sees "Frank" is seen getting into his car. During their pre-race chat with Frank, Joe doesn't question how he made it to the car, simply states that "guess I have to work a little harder."

(at about 1:20:00 into the film) In the third round, the announcer describes the contest as "mano y mano." That means "hand and hand." It is an all-too-common mistake to think that the real expression (mano a mano) means "man against man"; it does not. It means "hand-to-hand" combat.

(at about 1:20:00 into the film) The characteristics Lists describes for the RPG-7 grenade launcher are incorrect.