Columbo - Double exposure

 It wasn’t bad,  but it’s not one of my favourites, for the simple reason that it’s all based on the theory of subliminal messages. Sure, they admit that it wouldn’t be enough by itself, there has to be something more, so that those messages are just the last push you needed, but I still found it rather forced. 

Still, Robert Culp was good.

Plot details. 

Kepple wrote many books on subliminal messages and stuff like that, more broadly about the way you can influence people with commercials I think, all that stuff, “motivational research”. He owns Kepple industries, and he also does a bit of blackmail on the side, I think, because we have Mr Norris quite angry at him because of it, because apparently Kepple set a girl on him with the intent of blackmailing since Norris is very much married. Norris is quite the big fish and won’t bow down easily, he intends to fight back and ruin Kepple. 

So Kepple has a plan to murder him, and this time it won’t be just because of Colombo that he fails, but also because he let himself be seen doing something that brings him to murder a second man… that of course complicated things… and since he did have Colombo on his tail, the end was inevitable. He really thought Colombo was so easy to figure out… and sure he didn’t get trapped in the little things, but the end is the same.

So: Kepple will have Norris and some other people working for Norris come to him to watch a film that had been commissioned, while Kepple will provide the commentary behind the curtains. In preparation of their arrival, Kepple put in that video some subliminal messages, meaning some pictures of a glass of iced tea. He also provided some very salty caviar knowing that Norris loves it. And he also had no air conditioning. 

Kepple used a screwdriver to turn off a surveillance monitor, and was seen by Roger, the man working the tapes. 

Kepple also called Mrs Norris, masking his voice,  to tell her about Norris and the girl, promising her proof if she met him at a specific hour somewhere. 

When the people arrive, Norris is the aggressive type, he eats a lot of caviar and then sits to watch the video, but at some point, he can’t resist and goes out to drink something, and the only thing available is water in the lobby. The other people did not dare leave their post, but they also had not eaten any salty caviar… Kepple had recorded himself reading the commentary, so he sets the recorder and he goes out unnoticed, and shoots Norris, with nobody noticing anything.

He goes back to finish the commentary in person, so that he’s there to talk to them as soon as it’s finished.  

To delete the tape, he takes the recorder and puts it on the table in the lobby, since he always records people’s comments about the videos, hitting Rec when he puts the recorder on the table.

When Colombo arrives, he’s so hungry that he eats every snack he can find, and even tastes the caviar. He seems to like it, and only stops when he’s told how much it costs… he says he’s so hungry becauses he didn’t eat before, he “missed dinner tonight, working late on  that Hayward case”… :) (meaning the episode Candidate for a crime). 

Of course, Colombo being the uncouth that he is, uses the little spoon to get the caviar straight into his mouth, and puts it right back… that little spoon is to be used by everyone, to put the caviar into some cracker or whatever, nobody should lick it…

Colombo investigates of course. Kepple suggests he questions the wife, he very much counted on her as a prime suspect, but Colombo dismisses the idea very quickly. Of course he does talk to her, he never ignores a trail, but he never suspects her. 

They can’t find the murder weapon, and there doesn’t seem to be a reson for the man to go out or a way the murderer could know he would get out right then… 

He talks to the projectionist Roger, who offers him some iced tea… and I’m not surprised Colombo asks for a refill, since the man only poured a few drops on that glass!

Colombo of course checks the weapons Kepple keeps in his office, but none of them are the right calibre.

Roger approaches Kepple saying he knows how he did it, how he murdered Norris, because he saw Kepple near the surveillance monitor that didn’t work and it was the one watching the lobby, and he also found the added messages in the film, and so he asks for some money. It’s amazing that he will look surprised and shocked that Kepple might murder him too! I mean, the man’s a murderer! Kepple shoots him at the theatre where he works using Mr Norris’ gun that he took from his house, to further involve Mrs Norris. 

Colombo learns everything about subliminal cuts put in tapes from people working there, and since he got thirsty after eating the caviar he asked for an autopsy to check if the man had any, and this leads him to the subliminal cuts suggesting he goes to have something to drink… in  this case the nearest water fountain. He had the film examined but there were no cuts, there might have been a second print with the cuts, but he won’t find it of course. 

Kepple’s alibi for Roger’s murder is Colombo himself, because they think it happened later, until Colombo notices that there was no nickle on the floor, Kepple himself changed the second reel but didn’t put the nickle in, he went away, and the murder was discovered when Roger did not change it again…

The trick  used by projectionists, to take a nickle and put it at the bottom of the film and when it falls down the projectionists hear it and know they must change the reel.

Colombo is sure that Kepple murdered both of them, but he still has no murder weapon for the first one, so he takes a photographer and has him shoot pictures of himself looking around in the man’s office, and then he puts the cuts into the film that Kepple will watch in the screening room next, and it works, while watching it Kepple goes out and runs into his office and it’s he himself that reveals how he did it, because now Colombo can see that he had a “calibration converter” hidden in there, and he used it to change his own 45 into a 22. 

Colombo would have never thought of a converter, he thought he had hidden a weapon! Once busted, Kepple smiles like he’s lost it…

Colombo says he likes western movies while talking to Roger, and it also appears he’s the one doing the grocery shopping in his household, Kepple guesses it by his body language when they meet in a supermarket and Colombo confirms it.