MovieChat Forums > Sense and Sensibility (1996) Discussion > Strange error -- "debtors"

Strange error -- "debtors"

posted 9 years ago by Raincrow11
2 replies | jump to latest

In the scene in the film where Brandon explains to Elinor what he knows about Willoughby, at one point he says that Willoughby was “...in danger of losing Combe Magna, and all the money that remained, to his debtors.” Huh? Since when does Willoughby have debtors? I think it’s clear that “creditors” was the intended word here. Willoughby himself would be the debtor. A somewhat shorter version of the “debtors” line appears in the published screenplay, as well, so the mistake evidently wasn’t due to a line flub of Alan Rickman’s. Considering how, in the Blu-ray special features, Emma Thompson goes on at length about Ang Lee's slight difficulties with English at that time, I wondered for a while if perhaps Rickman had flubbed the line and Lee, not being familiar with the word, had just not noticed the mistake. Well, apparently that wasn't quite what happened, since the word was in the actual writing! It’s still very odd that no one noticed it, especially since this film had such a lengthy pre-production period.

"Courage is found in unlikely places." ~ The Fellowship of the Ring, J.R.R. Tolkien

[–] ScrystaLz 9 years ago

a mistake perhaps? almost every movie I've seen has some sort of little blooper mistake, sometimes they're so minor you can barely notice or not notice at all, and sometimes they're very noticeable. I did not pick up on this mistake in the movie but obviously you have...

[–] Raincrow11 9 years ago

Well, of course it's a mistake. I understand that all movies contain errors. 😃 I simply wanted to talk about this one, since it isn't mentioned anywhere else, at least to my knowledge. It's amusing to me that the filmmakers used a word that means the opposite of what they clearly intended.

"Courage is found in unlikely places." ~ The Fellowship of the Ring, J.R.R. Tolkien