MovieChat Forums > Kansas City Confidential (1952) Discussion > Did you think this was a plot hole?

Did you think this was a plot hole?


What a great movie! Very solid. I'm a little iffy about Mr. Big setting up an enormous bank robbery as a way to get back on the force, but it makes sense in a twisted way.

But the plot hole that bothered me more is that our hero {the florist) was willing to get on that boat to get "his cut" when he knew they all knew he was an imposter and were certainly going to try to kill him and take his cut to divide amongst themselves. I know 300 grand is a lot for a starving guy, but still, it seemed to me like getting on that boat was signing your own death warrant. Unless his plan from the beginning was to blow all the bad guys away and take all the money for himself.

What do you think?

[Did they ever say what his prior crime had been?]

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"What do you think?"

Agree....with his identity 'out of the bag', IMO he would have had no choice but to call the police in on the suspects he knew of....and get the reward money from the insurance company....

"A child of five would understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five."

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Also, Mr Big's idea may or may not have been to get back on the force. However, it was certainly to turn the three of them in, return the money (which was too hot to spend) and claim the reward.

Mr Flower-Man's prior crime was gambling related, but they didn't say what it was.

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I thought it was pretty far-fetched for a person who was down on his luck and unable to find a job to go on an extended vacation in another country. His brother didn't give him that much cash. Also, since he had been a suspect he would never have been able to leave town in the first place. His absence would have been very suspicious and he would have made himself look guilty. Yeah, it was a bit of a plot hole but still entertaining.

"First I dream my painting and then I paint my dream."--Vincent van Gogh

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I was wondering the same thing myself - Why the hell would he want to get on that boat?
1. He wanted to get Mr. Big and clear his name. The chances of him coming out alive are almost non-existent, so why not think of something else?
2. He wanted the money. He would just shoot everyone and run.
3. It's a B movie, and he needed to be on the boat with Mr. Big so that we could have the ending we have. This way he clears his name, gets the reward to help with the abuse he had to endure, gets the girl and protects the fragile little thing by lying about her father's intentions. Remember, this is 1952, audiences expected all this stuff. If it makes perfect sense - bonus! If not, oh well...maybe next time.

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It's not a plot hole, it's part of the hole Joe dug for himself going into the situation.





"Madame meets many people, but she usually avoids the mad ones."

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He took a big risk getting on that boat with those killers. I guess he would rather take a risk on his life than be poor without a job. It was a lucky break for him that Mr Big turned up when he did.

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The way those "killers" let themselves be slapped around through the whole picture I don't think it was too much of a risk.

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I don't know that the florist being willing to get on the boat was a plot hole. After all, none of the other robbers (aside from Mr. Big) could have possibly known that he was not who he claimed to be (without the baddies' shared jail time). Since Mr. Big told everyone to bring their masks to the split, I figured that everyone would just wear his mask and our hero would be none the wiser. As it turned out, the hero seemed more intent on sussing out the robbers' identities than collecting the cash.

The big plot hole that I see it this: Mr. Big told the robbers to keep their masks for the split, but he asked them to come to a small town and check into what seems to be the only hotel (which seems to have a very small number of guests) using their real names. It is not a stretch that they would figure out each others' identities when, supposedly, they were never supposed to know each others' names or faces. Once the robbers realized that, they should've been tipped off to the fact that something was amiss with Mr. Big's story and the "split."

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He wasn't trying to get a cut. He was just pretending. His goal was to expose the bad guys and clear his name.

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