vilafire says > Was the rental agent miscast or somwthing? The younger detective fit the Campbell type better than he did.
I don't know why you'd say that. As I recall, the initial description of 'Campbell' came from Trenby himself. He was the first person they found who had actually seen and interacted with Campbell; what he said carried a lot of weight.
Later, the neighbor, Mrs. Banks, and the grocery delivery guy, gave the detectives a description of Campbell but it turned out to be the the vacuum cleaner salesman. Jean never gave a physical description of the man she had met on the train; she only talked about the twinkle in his eye and how she felt about him. The people who had worked with both Joan and Campbell, as they were still calling him, were interviewed off camera so we never heard what they said but, clearly, they gave the detectives the most accurate description they'd gotten to that point. I believe that's what led the detective to suspect that Tenby might be their guy.
I was expecting a thirty-ish handsome blue collarish man, not a tall and lanky antiquarian!
That's exactly why the movie works as well as it does; especially the reveal at the end. Jean, Joan, and all the other women he had romanced were enamored with the guy. That made it easy for us to accept that he was a dashing young man. We were given a hint early on that he might be a much older man with graying hair but we dismissed it because it didn't fit our stereotypical view of the kind of man we were hearing about. As a result, we never saw what was coming; even as it was unfolding.
Woman, man! That's the way it should be Tarzan. [Tarzan and his mate]
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mikecrisp
8 years ago
Excellent film, which I somehow missed on release (I suppose that makes me an antiquarian plus in vilafire's eyes!) but have now seen twice on TV. However there seems to me to be a plot glitch right at the end which no-one else appears to have spotted so I might be misreading it. Anyhow, here goes.
The murderer more or less confesses but claims that it was an accident, saying that he panicked and bought the tools for dismembering the body AFTERWARDS (on the Monday). The police accept that they therefore have no proof of murder but once his claim is proved to be a lie as he could not have bought them then, it is clearly regarded by them as proof of intent. Nevertheless the opening sequence implies pretty strongly that he resorts to murder only after being told by the girl of her pregnancy and of her wish to make the relationship permanent. If that is the case then surely he would not have arrived 'armed' and, murder though the audience know it to be, the police are again without proof. Although the murderer has claimed to have bought the tools on a day when he could not have done so (that would probably not apply nowadays, by the way), it would surely not be beyond him to claim that he had made the purchase a day or so later and in his panic had forgotten the exact day. Given the events at the start, the actual purchase date claim, though not his assertion of an accident, could even be true.
One further point (I'll ignore what appears to be a fictitious football match missed by Jack Warner) I don't quite follow the claim made elsehere that if one reads the IMDb cast list before watching the film it will reveal who the murderer is. Some way into the film this may be so but surely not beforehand.
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