Movies get so many things wrong, which a writer never would (or would not be allowed to); for instance, I would estimate that of all the occasions I have seen in film, in which a character, supposedly Catholic, has had to bless himself/herself, 3/4 of the actors have done it incorrectly. You'd think someone Catholic on the set would point it out but apparently not.
A great story on period camera etc comes from Roman Polanski's masterpiece Chinatown; early in the picture Jake Gittes (Jack Nicholson) is trailing and photographing a key figure named Mulwray to see if he's having an affair. The camera is a Leica III which is correct for the period; in one scene he's up on a roof with a viso-flex and presumably a 200mm lens and Polanski shows you what Nicholson is photographing with a shot right onto the face or front element of the lens, the reflected image sort of. Only, as Polanski himself has pointed out, the image should be upside down, and he put it right side up so the audience would have an easier tiime. However, he said, given the opportunity to do it now he'd much prefer to have it appear correctly, upside down. (And reversed? This always confuses me....)
See the film. You won't regret it. And watch for the leica.
