Last night, we found a fast-moving murder mystery called "Murder at 3 am"(1953). Demonstrating this, a woman gets out of a taxi at that time of night and walks to her door, clearly tired from the late hour. As she fumbles with her house key, a lurker sneaks up behind her, and with a karate chop to her neck, she's dead. "Inspector Peter Lawson" (Dennis Price) is at an all-night club drinking sham-pag-knee with his singer girlfriend when he gets the call, arriving at the murder site soon after with his partner "Sgt. Bill Todd" (Rex Garner). They compare details with other recent killings and determine that a serial killer is at work.
The next night, at a restaurant, Lawson casually discusses the case with his sister "Joan" (Peggy Evans) (with whom he shares a flat) and her new fiance "Edward King" (Philip Saville), a writer of detective novels. Protective of his sister, Lawson doesn't much like "Teddy", a handsome chap who offers his own clever theory as to the killer's "pattern", based on the letters in the names of local nightclubs, which Lawson politely derides. "Unfortunately Teddy, I don't have the luxury of working from fiction as you do. I have to operate on facts." Later at home, he tells Joan, "The man's only published one book. How is he going to support you?"
We see Teddy eavesdropping on the Inspector's conversations with Joan and his partner Sgt. Todd. Teddy becomes an obvious suspect in the serial killings, but there's also the problem of the "sharp-blow-to-the-neck" karate chop the killer employs; Sgt. Todd says "It's taught in Commando school," therefore the killer had to have been Special Forces. But was Teddy?
Meanwhile, the River Thames becomes a character in an important part of the plot. When they can't figure how the killer keeps escaping police stakeouts, Lawson and Todd decide that it can't be by car cause they've had all the roads blocked. Could he be using the Thames? Voila! They start checking the waterfront, and interview an old salt who lives on a riverboat, a night watchman. Sgt. Todd plies him with hooch to open him up, and the old guy explains about motorboats and the tide. This part of the movie is fascinating because who knew rivers had tides? But we learn that the Thames is connected to the North Sea, and the tide rises and falls twice a day by up to 30 feet! Holy smokes! Riverside buildings go underwater. Buildings from centuries past are permanently submerged. The old salt says "you can only get a rowboat or motorboat out of a boathouse at 3 pm or 3 am, during high tide, otherwise, it's a mud flat by the banks." 3 am - Bingo.
Now Lawson and Todd have the killer's escape route narrowed down. He's certainly working from the river, and as a side note, we get some great location shooting there. Besides Teddy the detective novelist, there is one other possible suspect, whom the director shows looking nervous in reaction shots. The police finally decide to use a female as bait, and you'd think they'd use an officer but Lawson's sister Joan volunteers, wanting to help prove fiancee Teddy isn't the killer. Joan goes to a club and takes a taxi home at 3 am, as did all the other victims. Boom, she's attacked, and she (and we) recognize the killer, who doesn't even try to conceal his identity. A dragnet is formed that tightens at the river, yet though we've just seen Joan get attacked, our two main suspects remain in place. Because then, a major-league plot twist occurs, and when it does, you go : "Man, this is how these movies should be done: super tight, fast, and without let up (except for a pause so the old salt can drink a bottle.) For playing Gentleman Inspectors, they don't get any smoother than Dennis Price with his perfectly low-key London accent. Two Big Thumbs Up, and again, very interesting stuff about the Thames. The picture is very good. When the killer is finally cornered, the actor playing that part gives a very convincing portrayal of a desperate psycho on a power trip, and when you find out who it is, read his Wiki acting history, its very interesting, as well. ////
The previous night, we had a top-notch (if overlong) heist movie called "Piccadilly Third Stop"(1960). Fancily-named "Dominic Colpoys-Owen" (Terence Morgan), a pretty boy professional pickpocket, presents the image of a rich playboy, but really he lives in a shared flat with his fellow pocket-picker, the less-assured "Toddy" (Charles Kay), and Toddy's girlfriend "Mouse" (Ann Lynn), a dim blonde. As the movie opens, Dominic and Toddy have crashed a wedding party, looking like they belong in their expensive suits which are tools of the trade. Dominic has gotten them this job through an American fence named "Mr. Preedy" (John Crawford), who's married to wealthy German painter "Christine" (Mai Zetterling), who is secretly having an affair with Dominic (because it's in Mai Zetterling's contract to play the Lustful but Ice Cold Blonde). At the wedding, Dominic and Toddy are working under contract for Mr. Preedy. They're supposed to "pick" a pair of valuable earrings given to the bride as a wedding present. They do this and leave, mission accomplished, but when they meet up with Preedy at Dom's uncle's casino, Preedy has run up a 9000 pound poker debt that he can't pay. Dom's uncle (Dennis Price again) threatens to have him "dealt with."
Meanwhile, just prior to this, at the wedding party, ladies man Dominic shared some sham-pag-knee with a gal he met offhand, one "Saraphina Yokami" (Yoko Tani), the daughter of an East Indies ambassador. As a side note, in the early sixties, it was hip to have either an exotic (sexy) or demure (sweet and naive) Asian woman as a love interest. That cultural motif is used here, as scene after intercut scene in the first half hour is used to build up a romance between Dominic and the sheltered Fina (as he calls her), who's lived most of her life in an embassy. She barely knows London, though she tries to compensate with articulate conversation, made endearing by her heavy accent. The motif of the East meets West romance was popular when the United Nations was coming into being and the whole Pacific Rim thing was consolidating, pre-Vietnam.
Anyhow, the filmmakers build up this romance between Dominic and Fina, but we know from the beginning it's one-sided. He's using her, and he's already sleeping with the blonde-but-hard Christine on the side (and using her too; the only thing he's in love with is the mirror), and by the time we find out it's a heist movie (which we don't know going in), we could've saved 20 minutes and had a tighter 66 minute flick if they'd cut out the extended romance. When the plot does tighten at the 35 minute mark, the movie gets damn good. Mr. Preedy is in debt to Dom's uncle the casino owner, who's gonna have him messed up big-time if he doesn't pay. Dom, formerly in Preedy's employ, finds out from Fina about 100,000 lbs in cash stashed in the embassy safe. Normally a good "Oriental girl", who would never break a law, she now is willing to help Dom steal the money because she's all charged up with being in love, something she's never ex-schperienced.
So now the heist is on. Dom figures out all the logistics, which includes subway tunneling and avoidance of the electrified third rail (and once again, if the makers of "Pelham One Two Three" didn't see this film, my hat will be tomorrow's lunch). Regarding artistic steal-age, ya gotta remember: its done all the time. In music, just consider Deep Purple lifting the entirety of It's a Beautiful Day's song for "Child in Time". We aren't talking just a riff or a melody but lifting the whole song. Now, DP made it their own, but it was still a 100% steal (not 99%), and the same thing goes on in movies or any other art form, business model or what have you in the world of commerce. So yeah, "Pelham One Two Three" (one of the top ten heist movies of all time) was influenced by this flick, zero doubt. And of course, as in Pelham, there are complications here as well. It's established early on that Mr. Preedy hates Brits, thinks they're pompous, and was acting like an Ugly American big shot before he got in debt to the leg-breaking club owner. But then all of a sudden, he needs Dominic (who's poor but pretending to be rich) to go through with the 100 grand heist. At the end, it boils down to a two-man battle for the money, and then, with Mai Zetterling as the getaway driver, all goes to hell as you'd expect. Two Bigs, almost Two Huge if they didn't waste so much time early on. The picture is razor sharp. ////
Now, an interesting question regarding September 1989 concerns Lillian's work. At the time The Event began, she'd only recently started at Priority Records, a major employment change for her that's a story in itself, because she went from working in a doctor's office to being an executive assistant at a record company, and she seemed to make the change seamlessly. Lillian was (and no doubt still is) highly intelligent, capable, and trained in business at CSUN, so I suppose her ability to jump into her new career should not be looked at askance. On a side note, I never did trust her boss Bryan Turner (I thought he was a shady character), but the bigger deal was that, even though we'd been together for 8 1/2 years by then, there was never any explanation on Lilly's part for how she got the job. One might expect it was through a CSUN placement, being that she'd just graduated from their business school. But you'd think, if that was the case, that she'd have been all excited: "Hey Honey, guess what! I just got placed at a record company!" Instead, I heard about it second hand, off hand, after she got back from France, right in the middle of when all of our post-graduation stuff was going down (see past blogs). She just casually remarked, "Yeah, I'm now working for this company called Priority." It was like she was telling a friend she hadn't seen in a while. She went on to say, "We're talking rap music, hard-core rap. They've got this group called NWA." Lilly, of course, took to promotion like a duck to water. She was a natural at selling rap, and indeed is one of those most responsible for it's success and persistence in American culture, but for our purposes the points here are twofold, given everything else we know about Lillian, the summer of 1989, and her transition from college student to record executive in training.
She started at Priority in late June/early July 1989, so she was still a newcomer there when, just eight or nine weeks later, she got attacked by Howard Schaller on the night of September 1st. He slapped her, she fainted, and was out cold. I was by her side on the parking lot pavement. An ambulance came and paramedics gave her oxygen. Her sister Ann was very concerned. I don't know what happened to Lillian after that, on that night, but she was driven away in an ambulance, so maybe she was kept overnight in the hospital or treated and released late that night. Howard slapped her pretty hard, but it was open hand, so I don't think there were cuts or bruises, and no fractures. One night in the hospital would've likely been sufficient, so theoretically, she would've been sent home that night or the next day, but still bearing the psychological damage of being assaulted by a linebacker-sized madman, which is huge. You don't just "get over" being attacked like that.
And all of this leads to my question: how, and when, was Lilly able to return to work? As noted, she'd only just started at Priority 8 weeks earlier. If she was treated and released on the night of September 1st, it's possible she'd could've returned to work on Tuesday Sept. 5th, when the three day Labor Day weekend was over, without missing a single day. However, she'd still have been carrying the psychological weight of watching me nearly die on Friday Sept 1st. and of getting attacked herself, by Howard Schaller, on that same night. And she was almost certainly questioned or talked to by the FBI or CIA agents who responded, and who made me sign a Federal non-disclosure oath at Concord Square on Saturday morning September 2nd. Surely Lillian (and Ann and possibly Lys too) was subjected to similar questioning and/or advisement. So, how did she return to work after all of this? And when?
And if she did not return to work immediately, on Tuesday September 5th, then what was Bryan Turner told about her absence?
I've long wondered about this, and it's an interesting question, because if her absence was in any way extended, she would've had to have given a reason. Or, she went right back to work without missing a day, but with a world of worry on her mind, in the middle of while The Event was still happening.
You see, the culmination of The Event began (all evidence indicates), on the evening of Saturday September 9th, when the evil David Friedman tricked me into accompanying him to the Wilbur Wash house so he could visit Gary Patterson, whose connection to Lillian is already established. The Wilbur Wash Incident, which began later that same night, was the biggest and most bizarre of the entire Event. We shant get into it now (way too detailed), but I've always wondered if Lillian was there that night, and I've always thought she might've been, in the area where onlookers were cordoned off on the other side of Wilbur Avenue. I've always believed, based on evidence, that Lillian's friend Malia S. was there (Malia has since passed away and was a nice person). And if Malia was there, as an onlooker, then Lillian was likely there also. And the Wilbur Wash Incident, all by itself, was Big Deal enough, and weird enough, and National Security enough, to make The Event into the biggest secret in American history. And everyone who was present at the Wilbur Wash was sequestered the next day at the Howard Johnson motel on Reseda and Valerio. And that became an incident in itself that lasted all day Sunday, September 10th.
So, how the heck did Lillian return to work with all of this going on? And if she was out for more than a few days, how did she explain it to Bryan Turner?
Just wondering 'cause it's always perplexed me. ////
And that's all I know for tonight. My blogging music is "Fool's Mate" by Peter Hammill and "Pudding En Gisteren" by Supersister. My late night is still Handel's Admetus, King of Thessaly Opera. I hope your week is off to a good start and I send you Tons of Love, as always. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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