MovieChat Forums > Guarding Tess (1994) Discussion > What am I missing? Is this a plothole?

What am I missing? Is this a plothole?

posted 13 years ago by JayfromtheBay
5 replies | jump to latest

The whole kidnapping sequence doesn't make sense. Did I miss some important dialogue? First Tess apparently falls asleep/passes out in her chair at the lake. Doug can't wake her up, puts her in the car and returns for the chair. His back is turned for a matter of seconds and the car speeds off. During the hospital interview with the driver, did the driver say that the "kidnappers" just appeared out of nowhere, drugged him, and managed to move him to the passenger seat and speed away all while Doug's back was turned? Doug never mentions he hears or sees anyone else in the car speeding away so wouldn't they automatically assume the driver was involved from the start?

When the driver hooks up with his sister and brother-in-law and they assumingly drug him and leave/stage him on the country road with the abandoned car, does he not say anything about being burned in the back of the neck? Wouldn't this be a very obvious clue that he was involved and they needed to go to a plan B?

Did the CIA and FBI not check for fingerprints in the found car? If they did, obviously they wouldn't have found anything suspicious so isn't that a giveaway no one else was in the car? What about additional footprints in the soft/muddy ground around the parked car at the lake before the kidnapping? There's clearly no traces of anyone else being there so what gives? What did I miss?

I know it's just a silly moving, but come on!

[–] jimifanwing 13 years ago

Well the driver's story doesn't make a lot of sense because it is a fabrication. Doug doesn't appear to have believed anything. The crime scene forensics should have indicated a single perpetrator but perhaps the CIA/FBI were focused more on responding to a ransom, tracing the call, ect. The director may have not wanted to get too "murder mystery" about it, since the film was more about Doug and Tess's relationship. But I agee with your point, perhaps a couple of lines of dialog may have helped a bit.

[–] sparrowsprinklers 13 years ago

Well, it could be the the driver rushing away with the sleepy Tess and halting at a designated point where his sis and bil drug and take her to the farmhouse. Then his sis/bil traveling with him to a completely different location where the driver was drugged and the other person destroyed all evidence and left.

Now the cops find the unconscious driver in a totally different part of the area and think the syringe was used on him by the kidnapper. And it looks as though the driver was forced and left behind, and has no hand in any of the occurrences.

[–] Promontorium 13 years ago

The kidnapping didn't take place at the lake. That was supposed to look like Tess ordering the driver to speed off. This way it would pin the blame on the SS who would look incompetent, losing her, and in their lapse of security she's kidnapped. You see this was the driver's plan, when they talk to him he mentions how they would fight. The only way this story would hold up is if Tess never gets out alive.

As for checking the car, no man, CSI is in your brain. In reality DNA and incriminating evidence isn't so easily and readily found. We don't have the science to conclusively prove, especially in 1 day, exactly how many people get near or briefly in a car. Unless they dropped hair or blood, unlikely, and cloth doesn't pick up fingerprints. If the kidnappers wore hoods and gloves, you would only be lucky to find something.

[–] imdb-6674 11 years ago

Exactly. The story was that Tess woke up, said "Go, Earl!" and they sped off, ditching Doug. She's done this before.

They go for a joyride, to the same place they did last time, which apparently (gasp!) kidnappers have been staked out. They attack Earl, drug him, burn him, and leave him.

Tess is never found alive again, so cannot contradict this story. It's sure not perfect, but with Doug's reputation already tarnished, they actually could have got away with it.

Except I don't know how they expected to collect the money and get away with that.

[–] paramitch 7 years ago

Perfectly put. The whole kidnapping was staged by Earl in light of their other joyrides -- that they did this, people knew about it (believable) and they kidnapped Tess and nearly killed him to perpetrate it.

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