Why did Delly have to die?
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scubadivergeek — 10 years ago(January 06, 2016 03:35 PM)
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Yeah, I kinda agree. It was actually Paula's death that upset me, but then I have a thing for lady scuba divers.
At least they came up with a unique way of killing her (run down by a seaplane while swimming back to the boat). -
wrs6565 — 9 years ago(July 31, 2016 07:23 PM)
"I think it works in Chinatown but here it just seems like random carnage."
THIS. I saw this movie inexplicably added to Ebert's Great Movies section and had difficulty finding it and got it eventually as a birthday present figuring I'd stumbled upon another
Chinatown
or
The Long Goodbye
but both of those movies transcend being mere gritty 70s noirs while still featuring 70s style.
Night Moves
doesn't, it's really stuck in the 1970s and the cynicism and nihilism are nowhere near as well earned. And when Ziegler flies in on the plane trying to machine gun Hackman, the movie just starts to seem ridiculous. The whole treasure-hunt plot is poorly linked to the find-Delly plot.
It also doesn't help that I, personally, did not give a crap whether or not Hackman's character survives the movie; maybe the movie doesn't really care, either. -
cloudslovestarscolors — 9 years ago(August 03, 2016 02:38 AM)
@wrs6565
That's your opinion though, and I don't agree with anything you said. I'm not saying you're wrong and I'm right. I found the ending unexpected and not just random carnage. I did like Moseby and was invested in his plight. I understand why you might find the Delly plot a poor link, I think it's just more complicated than that, and I don't have the answers either. The Long Goodbye and Chinatown are amazing, but so is Night Moves. I completely appreciate how viewers could miss it though. I find this film works better the more you see it.
A list of
My Favourite 100 Films
http://www.imdb.com/list/ls076253329/ -
wrs6565 — 9 years ago(August 03, 2016 10:12 PM)
I've gone back and watched it a few more times and I just don't think the plot is as graceful as
Chinatown
. (
The Long Goodbye
is kind of a satirical comedy, so that's not quite as good a comparison, although it is a very '70s movie too.) I just sort of cringed when the news was broke in the film when Delly diedI checked the display on my DVD and yup, there's like 30 minutes left, so now we're going to see all those people from the early part of the movie again and some plotting is going to happen. Then it turns out to be about some sunken treasure! And you just knew the ugly blonde was going to die, but I didn't figure we'd have Zielger suddenly come rushing in with a machine gun and have that goofy scene with the crashing plane. Hackman's romance with Paula was pretty trite too, like they had to have a little affair just because she's the female lead.
I know that convoluted plots and every character being mysteriously connected is a trope of the noir detective genresee also Chandler, Hammett, etc. But I was cringing by the resolution of the treasure-hunt plot.
But, I like
Empire Of The Sun
better than all other Spielberg films, so the hell with me. -
dwarol — 9 years ago(September 17, 2016 09:20 PM)
Yeah, it's like "The Big Sleep (1946)" where the plot never really holds together. All the fun is in the minute-to-minute action.
But I do disagree with you about Paula. She's obviously feeling threatened by the young and nubile Delly. Delly was destroying her relationship with Tom and she wanted her out of there. Sleeping with Harry was just a way of proving to herself that she was still attractive. You see in her reaction when after sleeping with Harry, he jumps up out of bed to take care of Delly after her nightmare. When Harry comes back, Paula is gone. -
HenryCW — 9 years ago(September 18, 2016 11:15 AM)
It actually became clear later that Tom Iverson ordered his own mistress (Paula) to sleep with Moseby in order to distract him so that he would not notice their night operations of smuggling Mexican art. When Moseby heard Delly scream and went to attend to her and then came back, Paula was gone. Presumably, she had served her purpose and probably gone back to the smuggling.
It was true, through, that Paula resented Iverson having an incestuous relationship with his own stepdaughter. -
sheetsadam1 — 2 months ago(January 03, 2026 04:30 AM)
Why did anything that happened after he returned to L.A. need to happen? Probably because the studio wanted explosions to put in the trailer. It's a shame. This could have been an amazing movie.
Draft Barron Trump -
sheetsadam1 — 2 months ago(January 03, 2026 04:37 AM)
Ah, I wasn't sure anyone else here had seen it. No posts since the IMDb days. What did you think of it overall? I loved the first hour of it, but felt like it took a big nosedive in the third act.
(And why is everything in this thread italicized?
)
Draft Barron Trump -
Paul P. Powell — 2 months ago(January 03, 2026 07:28 AM)
I disagree. Remember that the loutish Marv was her lover as well as playing around with her Mom.
So her reaction when she was swimming –remember, she comes up coughing and choking –this reaction to the sight of her former lover
('having his eyes eaten out by the fishes')
indicates that she recognized his identity when confronted by his corpse.
However, I do agree that Zeigler –by the end of the yarn, when the whole scheme was falling apart –probably wanted everyone silenced.
I applaud you for mentioning this fantastic neo-noir. Always a favorite with me.
Paul P. Powell, Pool Player