If Haskel "took the heat," then why did our man get picked-up by the highway patrol at the end?
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It's a cinematic "deus ex machina"? If I understand you correctly, anyone who kills, must meet their fate and get caught; no reason necessary? This makes sense considering it was filmed during WW2. Allowing him to wander the Wild West aimlessly with a heavy concscience would have made a better "Noir" ending...
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Does he really get picked up by the highway patrol or is was it a representation of his paranoid fantasy. Given the dialogue I prefer to believe that he was never arrested.
shareI wondered if the entire story was either (1) a drug or psychotic induced, paranoid delusion (I mean Vera was SO awful and so obnoxious that she didn't even seem real) or (2) a BS story that he was telling somebody because he really did murder Haskell and Vera???
shareNice ideas. Vera really was that bad wasn't she. I've just been reading on the trivia section that the end where he was picked up by the cops was added on because the censors said they wouldn't release the film unless it was added. So I think Ulmer did an up yours and made the scene a bit ambivalent. I like what you mean about drug induced paranoia. The stuff about the duelling swords does seem like its out of a paranoid dream.
shareThe reason: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Production_Code
"If I were a dog and you were a flower, I'd lift up my leg and give you a shower"
Yeah we discussed this on another thread. The reason for the scene was the production code requirements, but that doesn't stop us from interpreting the scene differently.
my ymdb page
http://www.shompy.com/steppenwolf/l42849_ukuk.html
"but that doesn't stop us from interpreting the scene differently."
Agree, can make it into any variation on a nightmare one would want.
"The Flagon With The Dragon Has The Brew Which Is True"
I don't get him being picked up because of the Hollywood Code. I know that one couldn't get away with murder but he was completely innocent of both deaths.
shareBut doesn't he poison Vera?
What would Steve Guttenberg do?
Nope. SPOILER: He accidentally and unknowingly kills her in a telephone extension cord tug of war gone bad. One of the all-time great noir scenes, in my opinion.
Is it possible to still have a spoiler on a movie this old? I guess it is.
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The pellet with the poison's in the flagon with the dragon; the vessel with the pestle has the brew that is true
The real reason is that back in the 40s, the production code required that criminals "pay for their crimes." Obviously, though, this event in the context of the plot makes no sense, since like you say they were after Haskel and not Roberts. So I like to think the final scene is Roberts' imagining his arrest. It sort of fits in the voiceover narration and the scene where he imagines his girlfriend as a success in LA.
What's the Spanish for drunken bum?
Seemed like the ending was so artificial and tacked on that the filmmakers were winking to us as if to say "just ignore this part; this guy has already suffered enough".
shareThe real issue is, "what is a car cop doing wearing motorcycle cop breeches?"
Answer: the budget was so minuscule that they only had one dark cop uniform available for every cop in the film, including the one at the border when he entered Cali. All the cops are the same size, you'll notice.
All the talk about Code makes sense to me now. I just finished watching it and came here for answers about the end. I thought maybe he had turned himself in and waited for the cops at the diner.
I am still confused about how Haskell died. Some people think it's not explained while others seem convinced that it was from falling out of the car.
Haskell was already dead from heart failure before he fell out of the car. That's why Al couldn't wake him up. The pills he had been taking were heart medication of some kind. Vera was inadvertently strangled when Al was pulling on the telephone cord after she had passed out on the bed with it tangled around her neck. Or, as a lot of people seem to be doing, you can make up your own story based on nothing that is actually in the movie.
shareI have no idea what we’re talking about now! I’ve been meaning to rewatch this anyway, I was just thinking about it this morning. I have it on VHS lol.
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