Deja Vu (2006)

ATF Agent Doug Carlin Investigated A Tragic Ferry Bombing, and Was Determined to Save Pretty Claire Kuchever, One of The Collateral Victims Killed by the Domestic Terrorist (Carroll Oerstadt); He Traveled Back in Time To Save Her and Prevent the Ferry Explosion

Director Tony Scott's loud and noisy action thriller (with some paradoxical science-fiction elements) was an exciting murder mystery, although its implausible plot holes in the final, overly-confusing product were numerous. Its misleading trailers tauted the idea of deja vu, although the film had really nothing to do with the concept (the feeling as if you’ve been someplace or met someone, where you’ve never actually been before). Its main real-life antecedent was the Oklahoma City bombing.

It centered on an investigation into a disaster that occurred on February 28, 2006 in New Orleans, LA (this was the first film shot in post-Katrina New Orleans) on the morning of Fat Tuesday. The Sen. Alvin T. Stumpf ferry carried hundreds of uniformed US Navy sailors and their families across the Mississippi River for Mardi Gras celebrations in the city. A ferry explosion at 10:50 am, presumably a deliberate domestic terrorist attack, resulted in 543 deaths of passengers and crew members.

Assigned to the case was maverick ATF special agent Doug Carlin (Denzel Washington), adept at reading the details of bombed crime scenes. At the site of the disaster, he heard his own unique cellphone ring tone inside one of the black body bags.

[Note: It could be that the body was Carlin's own corpse, an earlier time-traveling version of himself. The body could also be that of Carlin's doomed ATF colleague and partner, Larry Minuti (Matt Craven). Minuti, not Claire, was Oerstadt's original source for a vehicle to use in the bombing, until Minuti's Blazer was shot up and deemed unsuitable.]

Also mysteriously found in another body bag were the charred (30%) remains of 30 year old Claire Kuchever (Paula Patton) - it was determined that her body had washed up prior to the explosion.

[She had been dumped in the river by her murderer "so she would appear to be just another disaster victim." Each digit of her right hand had been severed - to eliminate possible DNA identification after she had bloodily scratched her killer across the face.]

Carlin speculated about bomb residue on the female victim: "The bomber came in direct contact with the victim. You solve her case, you solve this case." Did her murder have something to do with the ferry disaster, and could they track the killer through her during her last few days of life?

A sophisticated, brand-new, futuristic system and multi-angle surveillance program (linked to seven orbiting satellites) labeled "Snow White," located at a top-secret government base, was used to relook at past events - it could even track through walls. Physicists explained that the privacy-busting device was limited to looking back only 4 days, 6 hours, 3 minutes, 45 seconds, and 14.5 nanoseconds.

The investigators watched a satellite surveillance tape shot three days before Claire was taken from the Mississippi River - and Doug fell in love with the pretty image of the woman (a thematic plot similar to the one in Laura (1944)) after voyeuristically watching her every move, including seeing her step naked into a steamy shower.

Although the physicists denied that she could detect the surveillance, Claire correctly sensed that she was being watched and wrote in her diary: "Got that weird I'm being watched feeling. It's like someone is out there..." In fact, the device allowed the physicists to view the actual past - to revisit and interact with it - revealed when Carlin shone a red laser-light into the past and Claire reacted to it (the scientists explained: "They found a way to fold space back onto itself...to create an instantaneous link between two distant points" - between the base and Claire's house, for example).

The scientists also described how there were multiple planes of time, or different timelines branching out when one traveled back in time. If a new branch was created, what happened to the old one? "It might continue parallel to the new branch, but most likely, it ceases to exist."

[Note: This presented a major logical problem for the film - if Carlin went back in time and prevented the ferry disaster, with a new branching out timeline, then Carlin in the present wouldn't be investigating the ferry disaster (it didn't happen!) - which would also mean that his time travel backwards wouldn't have been necessary.]

During the early portion of the film, although it was unclear what was happening, Carlin was leaving clues from the past in the future (his fingerprints, bloody bandages, and the answering machine messages in Claire's place, the 'U Can Save Her' message on Claire's refrigerator, etc.) - maybe, as it has been speculated, during multiple trips back to the past.

Doug sent a warning note back in time to himself - an "anonymous tip" to alert his 'past self' to the terror suspect's whereabouts (while surveilling the Algiers ferry dock at 4:40 am) in an attempt to prevent the bombing. The note on Carlin's desk was intercepted by Minuti, who approached the bomber at the dock and was eventually shot to death.

They identified the terrorist as unrepentant and disturbed Carroll Oerstadt (Jim Caviezel), an embittered, unstable anti-social individual with a vendetta against the military after numerous enlistment rejections. He had contacted Claire about her '94 tan/red Ford Bronco SUV for sale, and ultimately kidnapped her in her home, duct-taped her mouth, murdered her (by setting her on fire with gasoline) in his own bait camp in the bayou, dumped her body in the river, and stole her SUV to use in the bombing.

In the most preposterous sequence in the film, an absurd idea with a causal paradox, Carlin also went on an unauthorized time travel mission of his own to change the past. He returned back in time, as the 'future' Doug, to save his obsessive love interest Claire, stop Oerstadt and prevent the disaster ("It's time to prevent a crime before it happens"). Before his transport in the device (resembling a giant spark plug), technician Dr. Alexander Denny (Adam Goldberg) warned: "You don't have to do this." Carlin responded: "What if I already have?" [Note: It was likely that this wasn't his first mission back to the past.]

• Although wounded, Doug prevented Claire's severing of fingers and ultimate murder (burning with gasoline) at Oerstadt's bayou bait camp
• Once Doug and Claire were on the departing ferry a few minutes before 10:50 am, Oerstadt also began a killing spree with guns blazing
• Claire - who had her hands tied to the steering wheel of her SUV and her mouth duct-taped, drove her SUV at Oerstadt, who became sandwiched between the SUV and another vehicle on the car-deck of the ferry; at the same time, he was shot and killed by Doug
• With no time left to disarm the bomb inside Claire's SUV, both Claire and Doug drove it off the ferry before it exploded
• Claire miraculously survived (still attached to the dislodged steering wheel), but Doug died underwater when the explosion occurred (this made it impossible for the two 'twin' Dougs to meet)
• As she mourned his death on the dock, the 'present-day' Doug showed up to take a statement from her - he asked: "You okay?...Have we met?...It's okay. Come on...You okay?...You sure?"
• In his car, she asked: "What if you had to tell someone the most important thing in the world, but you knew they'd never believe you?" He replied: "I'd try. (Pause) No."

They drove away together in the happy ending, as the Beach Boys' "Don't Worry Baby" played on his radio

The Departed (2006)

All The Major Characters Were Killed; Dignam Was the Only Survivor, Who Had Evidence of Sullivan's Treachery (Revealed By His Own Girlfriend)

Best Director-winning Martin Scorsese's viciously-violent Best Picture tale (an adaptation of Siu Fai Mak's Infernal Affairs (2002, HK)) was about reciprocally-planted 'moles' (or rats) within both the South Boston Irish-American mob and the Massachusetts State Police Department. The two moles (and a third) were:

• Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio), the Massachusetts State Police Department undercover 'mole'
• Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon), syndicate informant and 'mole' in the Special Investigation Unit
• Trooper Barrigan (James Badge Dale) (second mole in the police force)

It concluded with a bloody denouement in which almost all of the leading big-name cast members were killed (mostly by a single-gunblast to the head) - some abruptly and by complete surprise.

• Captain Queenan (Martin Sheen) was thrown over the side of a six-story warehouse building
• decadently-evil gangland chief Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson) was shot a few times in the chest by Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon) during a botched cocaine-deal in Sheffield
• Costello's right-hand man Mr. French (Ray Winstone) committed suicide with a gunblast beneath his chin when also caught in the sting and trapped in a burning car
• after a rooftop confrontational scene in which he arrested Sullivan, Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio) was killed by Trooper Barrigan (James Badge Dale), also on Costello's payroll, as he emerged from an elevator
• after revealing to Sullivan that Costello had more than one mole in the Police and suggesting that they must avoid being traded to the FBI, Barrigan was shot dead by Sullivan. Subsequently, all mole activity was blamed on Barrigan, and Costigan was posthumously awarded the Medal of Merit
• Colin Sullivan joined 'the departed' as he entered his Beacon Hill apartment - he was shot by Queenan's assistant Sgt. Dignam (Mark Wahlberg)

The film ended with a view of a real rat scurrying on the outdoor balcony railing of Sullivan's apartment against the backdrop of the gold-domed Massachusetts State House.

One of the film's sub-plots was that police psychiatrist Madolyn Murray (Vera Farmiga) was dating both Costigan and Sullivan. She was living with Sullivan and secretly engaged to him. Costigan gave her an envelope - containing evidence of Sullivan's treachery. She survived, possibly carrying Sullivan's baby (or more likely, Costigan's baby).

Derailed (2005, UK/US)

'Lucinda' Was a Scam Artist (Named Jane) Who Set Up Unsuspecting Victims with Her Violent Boyfriend LaRoche, to Acquire Blackmail Money From Their Adulterous Targets

Swedish director Mikael Håfstrom's suspenseful psychological drama-thriller (his first American feature film) was about the effects of a derailing adulterous affair (deceit, blackmail, etc.). The crime thriller was similar to the themes of classic noirs Double Indemnity (1944) and The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946), and more recently Fatal Attraction (1987) and Unfaithful (2002).

The faux-noir began with a short under-the-credits sequence of an unidentified prisoner in his Illinois State Penitentiary cell beginning to write a story into a blue notebook: "The morning it all began, began like any other morning."

Then, the film flashbacked to tell its fairly predictable tale - specifically it was a long set-up about how the man in the prison cell became involved with the film's main character:

• Charles "Chaz" Schine (Clive Owen), a struggling Chicago commercial executive working for JMD/March, was dispassionately married to distant wife Deanna (Melissa George), a schoolteacher, with type 1-diabetic pre-teen daughter Amy (Addison Timlin) who required expensive medication after a failed third kidney operation

At breakfast, Charles explained to his book-report-writing daughter that storytelling suspense was about the twisting plot seducing you to read further in ways you weren't expecting - it was a clear and predictable hint about what to expect in the way of a plot twist.

"The author devotes a lot of time to developing the characters and he seduces the reader...he draws you in...you wanna know how it ends...The author intrigues the reader by twisting the narrative so you never know what's coming next."

On a commuter train, Charles first viewed a femme fatale's legs in shiny spiked high heels (with black stockings). He was attracted to the intriguing, flirty, smart and attractive brunette Lucinda Harris (Jennifer Aniston) who paid his fare when he found himself broke (his wife had borrowed money from his billfold). She introduced herself as an employee at Avery Price: "I'm a financial advisor. I cheat clients" - a major tip-off to her character. During their next meeting, she told him she was married, and also whispered at him: "Some people just don't know how to appreciate what they've got."

Before long, his sex obsession with the woman led to their clandestine rain-soaked coupling in a $46 room at the seedy Lake Hotel, at three in the morning. She enticed: "I think I wanna f--k you" - and as they furtively got undressed to make love, Charles heard the cocking of a gun. A French-accented, menacing armed man with a devil's goatee named Philippe LaRoche (Vincent Cassel) forcefully intruded into their room, held a gun to Lucinda's head, chided Charles for cheating with the "fine piece of ass," broke Charles' nose with his gun butt and rendered him into unconsciousness as he sadistically and repeatedly raped (mostly off-screen) the fully-clothed Lucinda. [Later, Lucinda falsely claimed that she had become pregnant from the rape and had an abortion.]

The next morning, the guilt-ridden adulterers mutually decided to not report the violent attack to the police, due to their surreptitious tryst. Soon after, the creepy villain LaRoche blackmailed Charles for $20,000 (which was paid from his daughter's medical savings account nest egg), and then six weeks later demanded another $100,000.

Charles attempted to have office mail-room employee Winston Boyko (rap artist RZA), an ex-con, threaten LaRoche, in return for $10,000. (Charles embezzled the $10,000 from an aspirin account that he was working on, to pay Winston.) The effort failed when LaRoche shot and killed Winston in the back of the head, and took his pay-off money.

The next day, Charles was forced to pay the $100,000 to LaRoche as he held Lucinda at gunpoint in her Chicago apartment. And then he was considered a suspect for Winston's murder and doggedly questioned by Detective Franklin Church (Giancarlo Esposito) from the Chicago Police Department.

The film's obvious and laughable twists came next:

• When Charles went to Lucinda's office, he saw the real "Lucinda" who had been impersonated by Jane - she was only a temporary employee for the real Lucinda, and had quit the week before
• "Lucinda's" apartment (where the pay-off of $100,000 was made) was suddenly being offered for rent
• "Lucinda" was seen about to rip-off another unsuspecting victim, rich businessman Sam Griffin (David Morrissey); she was in cahoots with LaRoche, and was seen kissing him
• The same Lake Hotel was used by the scam artists to rip-off the new mark; the hotel's bell-hop Dexter (Xzibit) served as LaRoche's backup for the operation
• During a struggle and shoot-out in the hotel room, everyone presumably died (Jane, LaRoche, Dexter, and the new victim) except Charles, who cleverly retrieved his briefcase of money ($120,000) from the desk clerk
• Charles was accused by his boss Eliot (Tom Conti) of company theft. He was arrested for $10,000 embezzlement (the money he used to pay Winston), and sentenced to 6 months of community service (teaching cons in prison how to write)
• During his writing class to cons a month or two later, Charles had given them a homework assignment: "WRITE YOUR OWN STORY"; one blue notebook caught his eye with the title Sidetracked on the cover; he started to read the story: "The morning it all began, began like any other morning. Charlie was running late, and as a result, he missed his regular train." It was composed by the unknown writer in the opening scene, and described the events of the film involving LaRoche and Lucinda/Jane. The end of the story stated: "But when he finished reading the story, he went to the laundry room."
• Charles met the author in the prison laundry room - LaRoche (who had survived, but was missing one eye from the gunshot wound); LaRoche had lived through the shooting in the hotel room, and was vengeful for "Lucinda's" death ("I loved her, Charlie, when you just wanted to f--k her"); he threatened to continue haunting Charles, stating how he couldn't believe his good fortune that Charles was assigned to his prison ("I'm gonna f--k with your life, because I can...Man, you ended up in the wrong prison, Charlie!")

Another major twist occurred. Charles admitted: "I CHOSE this prison" and stabbed LaRoche to death in the abdomen with Winston's makeshift knife (shank) given to him earlier. To the authorities, however, Charles claimed that LaRoche had tried to kill him with a knife that he had manufactured in prison.

Detective Church was incredulous that Charles had been able to defend himself against LaRoche who had killed Winston and three others ("You expect me to believe that you overpowered him?"). Charles replied: "I guess I got lucky." Church also threatened Charles: "You brought that shank in with you, it's pre-meditated murder. Law don't care who you kill," although the knowing detective then released Charles to return home, realizing that LaRoche deserved retribution for killing his good friend Winston.

Everything was reconciled and restored to normal in the anti-climactic finale, as Amy ran to her morning school bus - after she had been successfully treated with anti-rejection medication.

The Descent (2005, UK)

Sarah's Escape From the Cavern Was Only an Hallucination

Neil Marshall's claustrophobic horror thriller told about a group of six, extremely-athletic female spelunkers (six unknown actresses) including:

• Sarah Carter (Shauna MacDonald), Scottish protagonist
• Juno Kaplan (Natalie Mendoza), macho expedition leader
• Sam (MyAnna Buring)
• Rebecca (Saskia Mulder)
• Beth O'Brien (Alex Reid)
• Holly (Nora-Jane Noone)

The group were trapped deep underground in the dark in an Appalachian cavern after a cave-in. They realized that they were in the wrong place - not Boreham Caverns but an unknown and unmapped section ("We're in the wrong f--kin' cave!"). Juno admitted to everyone: "It hasn't got a name. It's a new system. I wanted us all to discover it. No one's ever been down here before." The six were very concerned that there wouldn't be a way out of the chamber.

Juno - Lost	Creature Attacks

The first intimation of horror was a quick appearance of a hairless, pale creature in the distance drinking water. The horrors were revealed to be predatory, sharp-toothed, whitish, carnivorous humanoid underground beasts called "crawlers" in the thick darkness, who attacked them relentlessly in the maze-like, entrapping lair. Sarah explained:

"They're totally blind, and judging from what we've seen, I'd say they use sound to hunt with - like a bat. And they've evolved perfectly to live down (here) in the dark."

Holly was the first to have her throat ripped out by one of the crawlers. Juno was viciously attacked, and after knifing the creature with her pick-axe, she quickly turned around fearing another creature behind her. Horrified, she realized that she had swung her pick-axe and accidentally speared Beth in the neck. Later, Beth begged to be mercy-killed by Sarah, and her head was bashed in with a large rock. After she had killed one of the younger creatures, the beast's mother (with visible breasts) attacked Sarah and together they fell into a bloody pool. To protect herself, Sarah reached for a jagged bone and stabbed the creature in the eye - killing it.

Sam and Rebecca were the next two victims of the creatures - Sam had her throat ripped while attempting to climb across a rocky roof to safety, and Rebecca was cannibalized alive when her stomach was chomped. Sarah and Juno were left to battle four of the creatures and a second wave of attackers. They were successful, although there was a confrontation between the two (Sarah believed that Juno had purposely harmed Beth), and Juno was injured by Sarah's pick-axe.

In the ending, the wounded Juno died (off-screen) when she was surrounded by the creatures, but Sarah survived after escaping and falling unconscious down a chute. When she awoke, she crawled up a long pile of skeletal bones into daylight, where she emerged from the ground, took a deep breath of air, and then ran hysterically through the woods to her vehicle and drove away. After she stopped by the side of the road to puke, Sarah turned and saw Juno (with a blood-streaked face) in the passenger seat - Sarah screamed - and then the trauma of the vision caused her to awaken underground, where she realized that her escape was only an hallucination.

In one final vision, she imagined her tragically-killed daughter Jessica's birthday (and a candle-covered birthday cake) as she stared into her torch's flame (her daughter spoke: "Mummy?"), and the camera drew backward into the darkness as her flame began to dim. She had imagined that the flickering flames of her torch were the candles on the cake. The sounds of creatures threatening to attack were heard. The credits played atop a black and white group photo of the six cave-explorers.

[In the North American release, the film ended a minute earlier, at the point where Sarah saw Juno. The UK version was considered too dark for American audiences and was modified.]

Detour (1945)

Roberts' Plan to Steal A Dead Man's Identity Was Ill-Advised; During an Argument with Roberts, Femme Fatale Vera Was Accidentally Strangled By A Phone Cord, and Roberts Imagined He Would Be Arrested For Her Murder

In this gritty Edgar Ulmer B-film noir told in flashback, fatalistic, self-pitying, down-and-out, NYC musician-loser Al Roberts (Tom Neal) was seated in a tawdry Reno diner where he told about recent events and imagined his pending arrest.

In Arizona during his westward trek, Roberts had found himself as a hitchhiker in the car of Miami bookie Charles Haskell, Jr. (Edmund MacDonald), while he was on the way to Hollywood to meet up with his girlfriend-fiancee, aspiring nightclub singer Sue Harvey (Claudia Drake); when Haskell died from a heart attack and a blow to the head under ambiguous circumstances, Roberts feared he would be arrested for murder; he dumped Haskell's body along the side of the Arizona road and stole his identity (wallet with cash, clothes, and car).

In California, he picked up vulturous and despicable femme fatale hitchhiker Vera (Ann Savage), who suspected that he had deliberately 'killed' Haskell, the man he was impersonating, since she had hitchhiked with Haskell earlier in the plot: ("You're a cheap crook and you killed him"); she blackmailed Roberts for Haskell's stolen cash - and greedily schemed with more ways to take advantage of the suspected murderer Roberts.

During a vicious argument one night in their rented Hollywood hotel-apartment when Vera threatened to call the Hollywood police station and accuse him of Haskell's murder, he accidentally killed the castrating, drunken and exploitative Vera. After she had called him a "yellow stinker" and accused him of not being a "gentleman," she ordered him to open up the windows. It was a ploy - she grabbed the phone and raced into the adjoining bedroom where she locked herself in.

He pulled on the long phone cord extension through the closed door, which she had inexplicably wrapped around her neck. When she ignored his promise to do anything she asked for, he began yanking on the cord and pulled it as tightly as possibly (with a close-up of his straining fists). Then, he broke down the door and saw her body lying on the bed - reflected in a mirror. This was a a second disastrous twist of fate! He knew his fate was sealed, as he spoke in voice-over:

The room was still. So quiet that for awhile, I wondered if I had suddenly gone deaf. It was pure fear, of course, and I was hysterical but without making a sound. Vera was dead, and I was her murderer. Murderer! What an awful word that is. But I'd become one. I'd better not get caught. What evidence there was around the place had to be destroyed. And from the looks of things, there was plenty. Looking around the room at things we'd bought was like looking into the faces of a hundred people who'd seen us together and who remembered me. This was the kind of testimony I couldn't rub out. No, I could burn clothes and hide bottles for the next five years. There'd always be witnesses. The landlady for one, she could identify me; the car dealer; the waitress in the drive-in; the girl in the dress shop and that guy in the liquor store - they could all identify me.

I was cooked, done-for. I had to get out of there. While once I'd remain beside a dead body, planning carefully how to avoid being accused of killing him, this time I couldn't. This time I was guilty, I knew it, felt it. I was like a guy suffering from shock. Things were whirling around in my head. I couldn't make myself think right. All I could think of was the guy with the saxophone and what he was playing. It wasn't a love-song anymore. It was a dirge

The film ended with Roberts imagining being picked up by a patrol car in Reno, NV for the murder of Vera.

Devil (2010) (aka The Night Chronicles: Devil)

The Devil (Disguised As An Old Woman Named Jane Kowski) Set up a Stalled Elevator Crisis in a High-Rise Building, to Punish Five Trapped and Damned Individuals, Including a Sinful Mechanic Named Tony. Five Years Earlier in a Hit-and Run Accident, Drunken Tony Had Killed the Family of Investigating Detective Bowden. Surviving the Ordeal, Tony Confessed, Repented, and Was Forgiven by Bowden.

Director John Erick Dowdle's low-budget supernatural horror film was based upon a story by M. Night Shyamalan (scripted by Brian Nelson), the "master" of plot-twist films, although Shyamalan was often accused of cheap third-act twists. The edgy thriller was to be the first film in The Night Chronicles trilogy.

Two of the film's taglines told a lot about the plot - that there would be no coincidences:

• "Five strangers trapped. One of them is not what they seem."
• "Bad Things Happen For a Reason."

This theme was similar to many classic mystery tales (i.e., Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None, which was made into two different films with the same title in 1945 and 1974, and also as Ten Little Indians in 1965 and 1989, along with the comedy spoof Murder By Death (1976)), in which a group of people were trapped in an isolated or inescapable location, and one by one, they died off. [Note: Other films with the same premise: Hitchcock's Lifeboat (1944), Cube (2003), Open Water (2003), Buried (2010) and many others, kept a group of individuals in a confined, dangerous situation.] The plot twist often contained the same ingredient - the villain, thought to be dead, was one of the remaining survivors.

The prologue's Biblical quote (inaccurately credited as Peter 5:8) set up the plot:

"Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the Devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour."

A gruesome and disturbing folktale ("old wives' tale") told at bedtime, titled "The Devil's Meeting," was described (in voice-over) in early sequences by a religiously fanatical, superstitious security guard Ramirez (Jacob Vargas). Its premise inspired the storyline: the Devil (El Diablo) was to take human form, hide amongst everyone, and torture and punish various damned individuals who had sinned. Other innocents would die along the way, trying to help out.

The film opened with a striking, inverted helicopter shot of the city of Philadelphia's harbor and downtown, and then a suicide jump from a window on the 35th floor of a skyscraper ("paving the way for the Devil's arrival"). The end credits identified the five individuals who would soon become trapped in the same building's high-rise office elevator, stuck at the 21st floor during the suicide investigation. They were listed by their occupations or descriptions, not by their character names:

• Salesman (Geoffrey Arend), aka Vince McCormick, cocky jerk ("a real scumbag"), a mattress salesman, known for crooked investment frauds and Ponzi schemes
• Guard (Bokeem Woodbine), aka Ben Larson, a claustrophobic, beefy, African-American, temporary security desk guard, violence-prone and hostile with an arrest record for assault
• Mechanic (Logan Marshall-Green), aka Anthony "Tony" Janekowski, disgruntled, suspicious and mysterious, wearing a hoodie, a stubble-bearded former Afghanistan War Marine; he had entered the building for a job interview, didn't sign in and left his satchel of tools in the building's lobby bathroom
• Old Woman (Jenny O'Hara), (aka Jane Kowski), grouchy, elderly, racist, caught on video surveillance in the lobby as a pick-pocket kleptomaniac
• Young Woman (Bojana Novakovic), aka Sarah Caraway, an attractive trophy wife, with three counts of blackmailing rich married men; she was scheming to leave her lying husband who was the head of the building's security company

Called into the case was recovering alcoholic Detective Bowden (Chris Messina) with his loyal assistant Markowitz (Josh Peace). Bowden was still suffering from an incident five years earlier - the hit and run death of his own wife and toddler son, by someone who left the scene after writing an apology on the back of a car wash coupon.

The two officers soon discovered that all five occupants had dark or criminal pasts in some way, were potentially capable of murder, or deserved to be killed. They had all done evil things, it seemed:

Bowden: "So Vince was a scam artist, this woman Jane's a thief, Sarah there is a liar, and our guard is a thug. Quite the crew we have here."

Therefore, according to Ramirez, it was Satan's plan:

"They're bad people, that's why they're here...He never does this in secret. There's a reason we're the audience....He always kills the last victim in front of the person they love most to make cynics of us all."

The elevator occupants were doomed to experience vengeful punishment by Satan posing as a human. There were frequent power failures, hallucinations regarding what was happening (Ramirez saw a "face" superimposed on the elevator, and the Young Woman had a vision of everyone bloodily slaughtered). In addition, there were recriminations and shifting blame, and a rescue attempt by repair technician Dwight (Joe Cobden) in the shaft that ended with a fall to his death onto the top of the elevator. Another guard named Lustig (Matt Craven) was electrocuted.

The elevator characters began dying one by one (each time when the lights went dark):

• Salesman Vince - sliced jugular vein from mirror shard
• Old Woman Jane - hanged by cable wire
• Guard Ben - twisted neck
• Young Woman Sarah - cut throat

Mechanic Tony - the last survivor, repentently confessed to a revived and spiteful Jane (with pupils dilated revealing herself to be Satan), and via radio to Detective Bowden, that he was the drunk hit-and-run driver who had killed Bowden's family years earlier. On the way to the police station, Bowden reciprocated and forgave Tony for his sin. The film's moralizing final line was delivered by Ramirez (in voice-over): "If the Devil is real, then God must be real, too."

The Devil's Advocate (1997)

In a Fearful and Elaborate Daydream, Defense Attorney Lomax Fantasized That He Had Joined the Satanic Services of John Milton; When Lomax Voluntarily Committed Suicide in His Fantasy, He Was Brought Back to Life and the Realization that He Could Change His Behavior - Both He and the Devil Were Now Given a Second Chance

During a particularly difficult trial, young Florida defense attorney Kevin Lomax (Keanu Reeves) fantasized that he had sold his soul. Experiencing an elaborate daydream, he fantasized that he was about to compromise his integrity by representing his guilty client, a schoolteacher named Mr. Gettys (Chris Bauer), in a child molestation case. He was tempted to acquit the child molester by discrediting the victim during harsh cross-examination.

In his fantastic daydream - his vision of the future, he went ahead in the case to acquit Gettys and maintain his perfect trial record. Afterwards, he was recruited into the corrupted service of Satanic John Milton (Al Pacino) (deliberately named to imply his "Paradise Lost") at a law firm in New York. Lomax and his wife Mary Ann (Charlize Theron) were plunged into a life of sex, money, and power after moving to the city. They came under the perversely seductive, tempting, corruptive mentoring tutelage and services of diabolical law firm head John Milton.

Lomax accepted an offer of a high-paying job and the couple moved to Manhattan, where Lomax began a busy schedule of work, while Mary Ann was left at home by herself; they didn't realize that their lives had been totally altered. With Lomax away and hard at work on a high-profile murder case, Mary Ann's increasing isolation caused her distress, and she began to have flashes of demonic faces, especially during a shopping trip with other lawyers' wives.

To console Mary Ann for being away from her for long periods of time, Kevin suggested that they should have children; in a very hallucinatory sequence during love-making with his wife, Kevin fantasized that he was also having sex with pretty and attractive red-headed co-worker Christabella Andreoli (Connie Nielsen).

The Hallucinatory Love Scene with Mary Ann (Charlize Theron) and Christabella (Connie Nielsen)

A number of other unusual circumstances also occurred -

• Kevin's fundamentalist mother Alice (Judith Ivey) urged the young couple to return to Florida, after speaking with Milton
• the very isolated and desperate Mary Ann was diagnosed as being infertile, after experiencing a frightening nightmarish dream about a baby playing with her removed ovaries
• the firm's managing director Eddie Barzoon (Jeffrey Jones), who felt threatened by Kevin's fast ascendancy in the law firm, was found beaten to death in Central Park by ghostly homeless vagrants who appeared as demons
• in the Alex Cullen (Craig T. Nelson) murder case, Kevin accepted the false testimony of Cullen's secretary Melissa Black (Laura Harrington) who had a perjured alibi that she was having sex with Cullen on the night of his wife's murder, and Cullen was acquitted

Afterwards, Lomax discovered Mary Ann in a local church covered by a blanket, claiming that Milton, who had earlier flirted with her, was having sex with her - and then forcefully raped her. Lomax took the side of Milton, although Mary Ann was able to prove the rape by showing cuts, bruises and scratches all over her body; fearful that Mary Ann was inflicting self-harm and injury, Kevin admitted Mary Ann to a mental institution.

the film's major turning point came at Eddie Barzoon's funeral when Kevin noticed that Alexander Cullen was stroking his 14 year-old stepdaughter Alessandra Cullen's (Monica Keena) skin - and suddenly imagined Cullen as the child-molesting HS teacher Gettys who he was defending in his case in Florida; Kevin was also urgently notified by US Justice Dept. agent Mitch Weaver (Vyto Ruginis) that Milton's worldwide firm was corrupt (involved in arms brokering, chemical weapons and toxic waste, money laundering - "Milton is into everything"), and that Barzoon - now dead - was about to testify against Milton; he added that released pedophile Gettys was under arrest for another underage crime - this time a homicide of a 10 year-old girl found in the trunk of his car; immediately after, Weaver was conveniently struck and killed by a car in Lomax's view, as Milton at Barzoon's funeral service dipped his fingers into baptismal holy water causing the liquid to boil, with his hysterical laugh in curtains of flames.

In the next startling scene set in the mental institution, the mentally-ill Mary Ann envisioned her case manager Pam Garrety (Debra Monk) as a demon; she barricaded herself in her room and suicidally slit her throat as Kevin tried to break into her room to prevent her from hurting herself.

Kevin confronted Milton in his law office, who confessed that he had raped Mary Ann; Lomax attempted to shoot and kill Milton with gun shots, but he was invincible - due to being Satan himself; he also revealed that he was Lomax's father ("Call me Dad"); Milton reminded Kevin that everything he had done was of his own free-will choices ("Stop deluding yourself") - he was too busy and had neglected Mary Ann, causing her to be attracted to Milton and ultimately commit suicide, and he had defended the guilty teacher Gettys; Lomax reluctantly admitted that Milton was right.

Milton delivered a climactic, fiery monologue in which he called God an "absentee landlord" and revealed himself as the charismatic, evil Satan himself: ("...Well, I tell ya, let me give you a little inside information about God. God likes to watch. He's a prankster. Think about it. He gives man instincts. He gives you this extraordinary gift, and then what does He do? I swear, for His own amusement, His own private cosmic gag reel, He sets the rules in opposition. It's the goof of all time. Look, but don't touch. Touch, but don't taste. Taste, don't swallow. Aha ha ha. And while you're jumpin' from one foot to the next, what is He doin'? He's laughin' His sick, f--kin' ass off. He's a tight-ass. He's a sadist. He's an absentee landlord. Worship that? Never!"). Lomax asked: "'Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven'", is that it?"

Milton added that he was a humanist through and through, and had been on man's side (as opposed to the absent God), and had made the 20th century his own century: "Why not? I'm here on the ground with my nose in it since the whole thing began. I've nurtured every sensation man's been inspired to have. I cared about what he wanted and I never judged him. Why? Because I never rejected him. In spite of all his imperfections, I'm a fan of man! I'm a humanist. Maybe the last humanist. Who, in their right mind, Kevin, could possibly deny the twentieth century was entirely mine? All of it, Kevin! All of it. Mine. I'm peakin'. It's my time now. It's our time."

As the wall sculpture mural with naked figures came to life behind him, the charismatic, evil Milton further seduced and tempted Lomax with Kevin's half-sister Christabella to have sex with her and offering him the possibility of fathering the Anti-Christ; while referring to his own 'free will' to make the choice.

In response to Milton's offer of "Everything, anything...How about bliss for starters, instant bliss, bliss on tap, bliss any way you want it," Lomax began kissing the nude Christabella, but then asked "What about love?"; Milton interjected: "Overrated. Biochemically no different than eating large quantities of chocolate" and urged: ("It's time to step up and take what's yours").

Attorney Kevin Lomax (Keanu Reeves) Committing Suicide - An Awakening!

Satanic John Milton Shrieking Hysterically: "No!"

Instead, Lomax voluntarily committed suicide by shooting himself in the head, citing his use of 'free will.' In reaction, Milton shrieked hysterically "No!" and due to his hot volcanic rage, he and the wall mural burst into raging flames while a naked Christabella age-withered and died, and Milton was converted into angelic form resembling Lomax

Christabella Age-Withering and Dying in Milton's Hot Rage

After this climactic series of events, in the first of two major plot twists, Lomax was brought back to reality, and returned to the Gettys case courtroom during a recess period; Mary Ann was still alive, and everything previously viewed was Kevin's fears of his future if he defended a known pedophile. In the Florida courtroom, Lomax announced (as part of doing "the right thing") that he would no longer represent his guilty client and cross-examine the witness - thus threatening his own disbarment.

A press newsman named Larry (Neal Jones) who was covering the case summed up Lomax's decision as a future sensational media story: "A lawyer with a crisis of conscience?...It's huge!...You've gotta give me an exclusive. This is wire service. This is 60 Minutes! This is a story that needs to be told. It's you! You're a star!"

"Vanity - Definitely My Favorite Sin!"

After tempting the couple to agree to a news story, the newsman morphed into Milton, the second major plot twist, as they left, gloating with a devilish grin: "Vanity - definitely my favorite sin!" He was insinuating that the Devil still had plans to intervene in the Lomax's lives. He was determined to try again. Milton dissolved into flames as The Rolling Stones' Paint It, Black played.

Les Diaboliques (1955, Fr.) (aka Diabolique, or The Devils)

The Husband Michel Wasn't Really Dead; He Had Conspired With Nicole To Cause Wife Christina's Fatal Heart Attack - But Was Christina Also Not Dead?

French director Henri-Georges Clouzot's intriguing, noirish psychological horror-thriller was one of the earliest films to feature a shocking plot twist in its conclusion. The Hitchcockian, Psycho-like film with the overarching themes of hate, double-cross, revenge and greed, was adapted for the screen from Pierre Boileau's and Thomas Narceja's 1952 novel Celle Qui N'était Plus (She Who Was No More). The film was remade as the R-rated erotic thriller Diabolique (1996), starring Sharon Stone, Isabelle Adjani and Chazz Palminteri.

This film was one of the first to actually contain an end-credits 'anti-spoilers' director's statement (see below) that advised viewers to keep the film's ending a secret.

The opening title screens were symbolically displayed above the algae-infested, fetid waters of an unkempt swimming pool. The film's setting was the run-down, all-boys Institution Delassalle Boarding School in metropolitan Paris (in the provincial town of St. Cloud), where a love triangle involved the three main characters (all heinous, evil, and greedy in their own right) in the curving plotline.

The headmaster of the school was 34 year-old Michel Delassalle (Paul Meurisse) - a despicable, miserly, tyrannical and abusive schoolmaster who was cruelly mistreating his students and employees. He was also involved in a physically-abusive affair with his mistress - the brassy science schoolteacher, an icy cool-tempered, cropped blonde-haired femme fatale Nicole Horner (Simone Signoret) whom he often beat (in the opening scene, she had a black eye that was hidden by her sunglasses).

The film's point-of-view or perspective was from Michel's also mistreated, downtrodden, humiliated, tormented and "delicate" wife/Headmistress-Principal Christina "CriCri" Delassalle (Véra Clouzot, director Georges Clouzot's real-life wife), a devout ex-Catholic nun originally from Caracas, Venezuela with a heart condition; Michel called his wife of eight years "a cute little ruin." The dark-haired, pig-tailed infantilized Christina was the wealthy owner of the school; Christina knew of her husband's destructive affair with Nicole, but tolerated it; one of the other teachers astutely observed: "The legal wife consoling the mistress"

In an early scene in the school's dining room, the mean-spirited Michel made Christina chew and swallow stinking, rotten fish served for dinner (expired food prepared by the school's staff) in front of everyone: "Everyone is looking at you. Swallow!"

During the suspenseful thriller (with a convoluted murder plot), Nicole was finally able to convince her co-battered friend Christina to join together with her to commit the perfect yet sinister murder of their equally-despised tormenter Michel. During a 3-day school vacation break that they took together to Nicole's country apartment (in the isolated village of Niort over 400 km from Paris), Christina and Nicole shared the one bed (the film's mildly-implied lesbian sub-text). They lured Michel by phoning him and having Christina announce her sudden divorce plans for a legal separation.

Later that evening, after Michel arrived by train in Niort, they discussed her unhappiness in the marriage and he slapped her in anger. He was tricked by Christina into drinking alcohol spiked with a sleep sedative before they drowned him in the bathtub. Nicole held down Michel's drugged body as the horrified and more sensitive Christina stood by, but then went to the bedroom with heart pains. [Note: This was Christina's fatal mistake - she did not definitively verify that Michael was actually dead!]

The females concealed Michel's bloated body in a large wicker trunk to drive it back to the school the next day, but were nearly discovered when a piece of string snapped on the wicker trunk as it was being dragged with help from Nicole's upstairs neighbor M. Herboux (Noël Roquevert) to their vehicle, and the corpse was almost detected. As the two drove back, Christina worried: "We are monsters. I don't like monsters," while Nicole replied: "If it's only him, I feel better. I'll save the grain of sand falling from the hands of providence for my morality lessons." A hitch-hiking drunken soldier (Jean Lefebvre) also made Christina anxious when he kept insisting on getting into the back of their vehicle.

Later that night as the two were dumping the weighted body into the school's murky, scummy, neglected and unused swimming pool, they were almost discovered when a young boarding school student named Pascual (Jean-Pierre Bonnefous) turned on an upstairs bathroom light that illuminated the pool area.

Dumping the Body Into the School's Pool

The Pool Was Drained - But No Body Was Found

The Discovery of a Body in the Seine River - Not Michel's!

The two females thought that the death would easily be ruled a suspected drowning once the body surfaced, but it didn't appear as expected. Speculation was running rampant about the missing Michel's unforeseen absence. To force the draining of the pool, Nicole claimed that she had accidentally dropped her keys into the water. As the pool was being emptied by the school's groundskeeper-concierge Plantiveau (Jean Brochard), the distracted and anxious Christina was nervously teaching her math class nearby; when Michel's body was not found, Christina fainted in shock by the side of the pool.

The two uncertain and nervous co-conspirators began to distrust each other, assign blame and make recriminating statements, while becoming guilt-ridden, fearful, and worried about the possibility of being blackmailed by someone who had discovered their secret. Christina blamed Nicole for promoting the murder: "I was insane to listen to you."

Other tense, semi-supernatural and unusual situations began to occur, suggesting that something had gone terribly awry with the murder. Michel's gray, Prince of Wales suit that he was wearing when he was drowned was mysteriously delivered from the dry cleaners. A key found in the suit was identified as the door key to Room # 9 in a nearby, rarely-used, fancy Eden Hotel residential room. It had "no belongings, no bags" and no one seemed to have ever seen Michel there. Christina also found that charges for an unpaid bill two years earlier (shower repair for 80,000 francs) had recently been paid from Michel's account.

Once the remains of a naked body were discovered off the school grounds in the Seine River, Christina went to the morgue to verify its identity, but the body was not Michel's. Nosy, retired police commissioner and elderly, bumbling private detective Alfred Fichet (Charles Vanel) became involved in the case when he insisted that he could help Christina and locate her missing husband: ("If you'd like, we are both going to find your husband....don't worry, I'll find him").

Private Detective Alfred Fichet (Charles Vanel)

Alfred Fichet With the Two Female Suspects

Christina and Nicole listened as a student named Moinet (Yves-Marie Maurin) claimed to have been recently reprimanded and punished by an 'unseen' Michel (and ordered to rake dead leaves) for shattering a window with his slingshot (that was promptly confiscated); teachers were known to often accuse the fanciful-minded boy of lying and being a "mythomaniac": (Nicole: "You forget that this kid is a pathological liar"), and now they doubted his account of the presence of the supposedly-dead Michel. As he walked away, the boy affirmed his sighting: "I saw him. I know I saw him."

Oddly though, a photograph taken at the school seemed to show that the spectral figure of Michel was standing in the window behind the students - was Michel still alive? The fearful, unstable, paranoid and ailing Christina was suffering from nightmares; in her bedroom, she confessed everything to the private detective and told him why Michel wasn't coming back: ("You know he can't come back...because I killed him...five days ago in Niort"); he was doubtful of her story due to help she received from Michel's mistress Nicole; Christina was surprised that Alfred didn't charge her with a crime, and told her to take a strong sedative.

Later that night, in the film's plot-twisting conclusion, after wandering around the school building and her apartment and getting spooked by strange noises and shadows, the trembling Christina heard the sounds of a typewriter's keys; down a long hallway and into Michel's office, she found a piece of paper in the typewriter with multiple "Michel Delassalle"'s typed on the page, with Michel's gloves nearby.

As she screamed and raced away, she was lured into her bathroom, and unexpectedly found Michel's corpse in the bathtub.

Zombie-Like Michel Resurrected in the Bathtub - and Removing His Fake Eye Lenses From His Eyes

The sight caused her (and the audience) to have a fright-induced heart attack, when Michel rose zombie-like out of a bathtub with half-opened, glazed all-white eyes. Was it revenge beyond the grave? She clutched her chest in the vicinity of her heart, and her eyes rolled back as she fell against the wall behind her. She slid to the floor where she collapsed and slumped over dead.

[Note: the scary bathtub scene was imitated in The Shining (1980), Fatal Attraction (1987), and What Lies Beneath (2000).]

The major twist was that Michel was never killed by them - he had faked his own death - with collaborative help by Nicole - so that Christina could be induced into having a fatal heart attack.

Afterwards, Michel popped the fake eye lenses from his eyes, exited the tub, and perfunctorily checked Christina's arm for a pulse. After unlocking the apartment door, Nicole rushed into his arms for embraces and kisses. Their plan was to become rich by selling the "fire-trap" school that he would inherit from his deceased wife (Michel: "Wasn't it worth it? Now, we're rich. Just by selling the school, we'll get a lot").

The film's initial conclusion was that the pair of "Diaboliques" weren't Christina and Nicole as previously assumed, but Nicole and Michel. In the denouement, the two gloating co-conspirators were immediately arrested by Alfred - who overheard them talking about their plotting, and predicted their prison term ("between 15 and 20 years in jail").

In the film's resolution the next day as the school was closing due to the scandalous news, there was another dizzying reversal regarding the fate of Christina. The confused, truth-telling or lying (?) schoolboy Moinet, the same one who had earlier broken a window, declared that Christina had just given him back his confiscated slingshot which he had used to break a second window that morning: ("She's not dead. She came back") - the film's last line as he walked away to again stand in a corner for punishment was: "I saw her. I know I saw her." (translated)

The film viewer was left pondering this additional integral question: Had the retired detective Alfred and Christina devised their own scheme (off-screen) to fool both Nicole and Michel?; it was highly likely that the school-boy - who hadn't really lied the first time about Michel's continued presence - also wasn't lying this second instance when he declared that Christina was still alive.

The film's unique, one of the first of its kind, end-credits 'anti-spoilers' director's statement advised viewers to keep the film's ending a secret (two translations):

• "Don't be devils. Don't ruin the interest your friends could take in this film. Don't tell them what you saw. Thank you for them."
  
• "Don't be diabolical yourself. Don't spoil the ending for your friends by telling them what you have just seen. On their behalf - Thank you!"

Die Another Day (2002)

The North Korean Colonel Moon Was Gustav Graves, In Disguise; Moon's Assistant Miranda Was a Duplicitous Undercover Agent

In this 20th James Bond film (the fourth with Pierce Brosnan), there were two major identity shifts.

The 007 agent was first up against a very crafty, rogue North Korean weapons dealer named Colonel Tan-Sun Moon (Will Yun Lee). He was Harvard educated and cynically bragged about his corruption by Western education ("majored in Western hypocrisy").

After it appeared in the opening sequence that Moon had been killed when his hovercraft plunged off a steep cliff into a waterfall, he later resurfaced in the film as an entirely different character, after having his appearance entirely altered (and his accent too). He secretly underwent painful DNA replacement gene therapy at a "strange" treatment center-clinic on Isla de Los Organos, an offshore facility (later called a "beauty parlor") near Havana, Cuba run by Dr. Alvarez (Simon Andreu). Even his father General Moon (Kenneth Tsang) was unaware of his son's survival and drastic transformation.

Drastic Transformation: From --- > To
Colonel Tan-Sun Moon (Will Yun Lee)	Gustav Graves (Toby Stephens)

Moon's new character was introduced as:

• Gustav Graves (Toby Stephens), a self-proclaimed, thrill-seeking adventurer (a la Richard Branson) - "a self-publicizing adrenaline junkie" and diamond mine industrialist who lived in Iceland and boasted of his Icarus space program with an orbital mirror satellite.

It was a good-will cover for laundering African conflict diamonds, and for carving an invasion path from North Korea into South Korea, by destroying the minefield in the DMZ between the two countries - "creating a highway for our troops" and opening S. Korea up to invasion.

His publicist was mysterious blonde Miranda Frost (Rosamund Pike), a fencing expert - and as it turned out in another minor plot twist, M's (Judi Dench) newest undercover MI6 agent. She had been on the Graves case for three months after volunteering, and claimed: "Graves seems to be clean" although Bond believed differently.

It was at first a surprise when she revealed to Bond that she was a fellow agent, and let herself be seduced by him. Then, when she appeared to be on Bond's side and held a gun on Graves, the villain noted: "Miss Frost is not all she seems" and Bond added: "Looks can be deceptive" - but then she swiveled her gun to face it toward Bond, and was about to follow orders to kill Bond.

She was the traitorous double-agent MI6 mole who had betrayed Bond's identity in Korea in the film's opening (and it was revealed that she had met the Korean General at Harvard when they were students there together). Graves smirked:

"She was right under your nose."

When Bond attempted to fire his gun, Miranda told how she had sabotaged it when they slept together. Graves explained how he fatally poisoned Frost's opponent in the Olympics fencing competition in order to win her loyalty:

"I won myself my very own MI6 agent using everything at my disposal: her brains, her talent, even her sex."

Bond critiqued: "The coldest weapon of all."