In the final scene there is a male onlooker dressed in blue on the left near Schrank's car. In the next wide shot he is standing on the right near the uniformed police car
After the war council meeting, everyone leaves; then soon after, Tony and Doc lock up the candy store and are shown walking away in different directions. Then, before the rumble while the rumble song is being sung, various people are shown, and Tony and Doc can be seen back in the candy shop.
The length of Riff's cigarette in the lead up to the Jets song/dance. It starts out short and stubby, and just before they start singing and he flicks it away, it is much longer.
In the opening number, which was shot on location in NYC, the playground is easily 300 feet x 300 feet in size. Later on, when it is obvious they were on the studio back lot, the playground has shrunk to around 30 feet by 30 feet.
A knife cut on Baby John's face changes sides.
Chino visits Maria on the rooftop, saying that there was no one home. Maria says that her parents are at work. Only a few moments afterwards voices are heard: "¡Mamá, Mamá! ¡Bernardo está muerto!" "¿Bernardo? ¿Muerto?", the latter apparently said by the mother.
This post is incorrect. Maria says to Chino that her parents are at the store, not work. In addition, the building is populated by several families, not just Maria and Bernardo's. Had it been their mother talking to the boy at the bottom of the stairwell, there undoubtedly would have been more of an emotional response from the woman as Bernardo was her child as well.
This post is incorrect. Maria says to Chino that her parents are at the store, not work. In addition, the building is populated by several families, not just Maria and Bernardo's. Had it been their mother talking to the boy at the bottom of the stairwell, there undoubtedly would have been more of an emotional response from the woman as Bernardo was her child as well.
When The Jets are first seen in the playground as they are snapping their fingers to the music, it is very bright, and their shadows face towards the screen. When they cut to the next shot as they start walking and the camera moves behind the fence, the sunlight is not the same as the scene is not as bright and even the shadows' positions are different, pointing away from the screen.
Towards the end of the America number, there is a shot of a side view of the dancers and there is a metal structure to the right of the screen that has 3 people standing in front of it, one of them a lady with a blue skirt, but when the shot changes to the front and the structure is now in the back, those 3 people standing there have vanished from the shot, instead seeming to appears now towards the left side of the screen off-camera.
In the opening scene/s when 4 of the Jets have yellow paint poured on them by the Sharks, the next time they are seen, there is no sign of paint on their clothes.
Near the end, when Maria yells "Don't you touch him!", two different voices can be heard at the same time in the first half of the phrase (in fact, this is singer Marni Nixon overdubbing for Natalie Wood).
When Doc says, "What are you doing there?" after stopping the Jets from taunting Anita in the drugstore, his lips actually mouth, "What are you doing now?" which was the line in the original stage script.
There are several instances of gang members (most notably the Jets) mouthing the wrong words during the songs. However, this is due to the use of dubbing.
During "Tonight," Tony and Maria are frequently out of sync with the lyrics, especially in the two-shots.
At the end of "America" the top of the backdrop can be seen in the upper right corner of the screen.
The door of Doc's store has a screen to keep out thieves, but the windows do not.
At the end of the film, hard-nosed policeman Schrank lets witnesses and perpetrators simply walk away from a murder scene.
The Jets sing "The Jets are gonna have their day tonight. The Jets are gonna have their way tonight". One of the voices sings "way" instead of "day" in the first line, so the result sounds like "dway".
At the end, when Maria meets Tony, with whom she is planning to run away, she is not carrying anything. (The remake fixed this by having her carry a handbag and suitcase.)