Best thriller movie questions of all time

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Shooter picture

Question: In the movie they state the colonel cannot be charged because the crime was committed outside of the United States. All active members of the US military like the colonel are subject to the uniformed military code of justice no matter where the crime was committed, so how did the colonel prevent the military justice system from being able to charge him?

Answer: You are completely correct. This is a clear mistake, the colonel could (and would) most certainly be charged for his crimes.

BaconIsMyBFF

Though unlike the movie, it's not up the attorney to decide if a military member gets charged, it's up to the judge advocate general.

Actually it's not a mistake. The colonel is not a member on active duty in the service. He's ex military. He's the one running the contractor group that carries out the senator's dirty deeds.

Answer: Receiving retirement pay and being in the IRR confers jurisdiction, even over retired military personnel.

Answer: "The colonel" was not active duty military, BUT as a retiree he is still subject to the UCMJ.

How are retirees subject to the UCMJ?

They're not, generally. Some service members who've served for more than 20 years but less than 30 are or were subject to the UCMJ. There was a recent legal opinion overruling this though. https://www.military.com/daily-news/2019/08/09/new-bombshell-legal-opinion-says-military-retirees-cant-be-court-martialed.html.

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Child's Play picture

Question: When Chucky confronts John, he say he "prepared" for it, meaning he made the voodoo doll himself, but then he says John shouldn't tell people where he hides them. Was this a mistake during production?

JohnShel91

Chosen answer: This isn't a mistake. John made the voodoo doll himself. When Chucky said he was "prepared" for it, he meant that he was prepared to do whatever it takes to get information from John about his being wounded. Even killing him as we see.

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The Mummy picture

Question: Anyone know what Beni said to Rick? I'm referring to what he said (I'm assuming Hebrew) before Rick said "What did you say?!" followed by "I'm not gonna tell you" by Beni.

Answer: Beni: As long as I serve him, I am immune. Rick: Immune from what? Beni: Piszkos állat [this is Hungarian for "filthy animal," an insult directed at Rick]. Rick: What did you say? Beni: I don't want to tell you. You'll just hurt me some more.

Charles Austin Miller

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Collateral picture

Question: I noticed from the previews that this movie looks very different. What is it? Is it a digital camera that has been used? Or no lighting effects used? The movie really has a "behind the scene" feel.

Kirill Ostapenko

Chosen answer: It was shot with a digital camera. IMDB is a great place to answer questions like this. Go to *Technical Specifications* in the *Other Info* section of the menu on the left hand side of the screen. In an interview in American Cinematographer, Michael Mann said that as far as he was aware, this was one of the first movies to attempt to make a "look" out of digital video rather than trying to make Digital Video look like film. This approach meant the movie could be shot in the low-light scenes of urban desolation Mann wanted - because Digital reacts much better to low light than film. The approximately 20% of the picture that was shot on film was mostly, according to Mann, the portion set in the "Fever" nightclub - because this is the scene with the brightest lighting states, a condition in which Digital Video does not perform as well.

J I Cohen

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The Boy Next Door picture

Question: The blonde girl Noah hooks up with - is that Ali, the girl Kevin likes?

Answer: Yes it is.

BaconIsMyBFF

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Scream 3 picture

Question: Was Roman just playing dead in the coffin or was it a dummy? Hard to believe that he could be pretending because Gale checks his pulse.

Answer: No it was Roman. There is a technique you can do where if you apply pressure on the correct artery you can stop the pulse. EXTREMELY dangerous though.

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The Thing picture

Question: Why did Kurt Russell sound the alarm when the thing was attacking the dogs? He was nowhere near the area and could not see what was going on. Also before he pulled the alarm, the sound he would hear was too faint to think something was wrong.

lartaker1975

Answer: Remember that he'd just spent the whole day investigating how something mysterious and horrible destroyed the Norwegian camp, so he's already in a spooked state of mind. Hearing the dogs screaming at night is already unusual on its own, and also reminds him how this whole episode all started with a crazed Norwegian trying to kill a dog. Deep down he knows whatever happened to the Norwegians is now starting at their own camp.

TonyPH

Chosen answer: He sensed something was wrong and wanted as much help from the others as possible.

Answer: Having investigated the Norwegian camp, he could have conceived that the use of fire would be helpful. As such, he would need fire extinguishers after combating whatever the thing might be with the flamethrowers. It could have been foresight on his part that by ringing the fire alarms, somebody was more likely to bring fire extinguishers with them, thus allowing better control of the fire.

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The Butterfly Effect picture

Question: I'm guessing that Evan can travel back to "memories" an infinite amount of times as he has been to the junkyard and the basement memories at least twice, but what I don't get is why, after he saw the horrible repercussions of giving Lenny the shard which led to the psychotic brother's death, why didn't Evan just NOT give Lenny the shard, but still give the bro the moving motivational speech that made him rethink the burning of the dog? Then the dog would be safe and the bro wouldn't be killed traumatically, damaging Kaylee? Why didn't he keep that bit that seemed to work out, but not give Lenny the weapon?

Answer: The point of the movie was that, no matter what he did and how he tried to change things, they always ended up bad. If he went back and did that, something unforseen would have happened to make things terrible. Evan realized that everything bad that happened to them was because of him. He then decided the only safe way to make things right is if he just took himself out of their lives all together. That's the logic the filmmakers went by, if you don't want to accept that, then you will just have to consider it a plot hole.

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Casino Royale picture

Question: What was the *exact* recipe for Bond's cocktail in the casino?

Answer: From the novel: "Three measures of Gordon's, one of vodka, half a measure of Kina Lillet. Shake it very well until it's ice-cold, then add a large thin slice of lemon peel."

Captain Defenestrator

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Answer: As a reward for besting the Predator in combat, he proved himself a fierce warrior worthy of praise and the gun was a token of their respect for his strength.

Answer: It's a reference to the comic where a pirate and a predator became somewhat friendly. The gun was given to the elder predator by the pirate as a thank you gesture. The elder predator then some few hundred years later gave it to Glover as a congratulations.

The comic came out years later to give a back story to the pistol. The only significance of the pistol is to show how long the predators have been coming to Earth.

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Fight Club picture

Question: If Meatloaf is shot in the head, how would they get him back to the house and why would they bother? Did the security guard just leave after he shot him?

Answer: Most likely they either went back afterwards or chased the security guard off somehow. It's also possible with all their inside connections that they stole the body from police custody.

Greg Dwyer

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The Prestige picture

Question: In Angier's final performance Borden watches Angier's duplicate drown in the tank. Does the other Angier still reappear for the audience, and take a bow? They never explain this in the film. If he does take the bow, Borden would never have been accused of murder. If he doesn't take the bow, how does the duplicate know not to do so? The duplicate would have no idea that Borden was below stage.

Answer: Angier always wants to take revenge on Borden as he is the reason behind the death of his wife. He knows that Borden is in the crowd the two times, first time, Olivia suggests Borden to watch the new "Transported Man" trick of Angier, where Borden finds out the trap door in the bottom of the machine, second time, Borden wants to know how Angier flies that distance with in seconds through the trap door. As expected by the Angier in the final play, Borden reaches the back stage where actual Angier is drowning (it is as always actual Angier drowns and the replica of Angier appears at some distance in every performance). So, as per the plan the replica hides to create an impression that Borden intentionally murders Angier. Note: the replica of Angier has the same ability and sense like actual Angier.

Rajesh v

It's never stated whether the "real" Angier drowns or takes the bow, but it's implied that it doesn't matter - as the clone is a perfect copy, they are both "Angier." Angier at one point says, referring to toll the trick has taken on him, that each time he did it, even he himself didn't know whether he would be the man in the box or the prestige. Similarly, when Angier asked Tesla which hat of all the duplicates was his, Tesla replied "They are all your hat."

Answer: No, he does not appear to take a bow. The set-up is as follows: Angier invites the audience on stage to observe the machine, but in reality it is so he can watch for Borden trying to work out the trick. When he sees Borden in the audience, he also knows Borden will not learn anything from the stage, and will go backstage. He then clones himself, and the clone is created with the exact knowledge he had at the time of the cloning, including Borden's presence and the trap the original Angier had set. So the "new" Angier hides away the best he can, letting Borden be framed for the murder of the "original" Angier. Had he appeared, not only would it ruin his plan of framing Borden, but it would also reveal how he had done his trick, and he would not allow any of those to happen, no matter what.

Twotall

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Saw (2004)

Saw picture

Question: This question applies to the whole series. Why do some of the people who actually manage to survive Jigsaw's traps end up working with him instead of either helping capture him or killing him and insuring that no more innocent people get killed?

Answer: Jigsaw's traps would more than likely leave a person mentally unstable, which could result in Stockholm Syndrome, a condition which involves a victim sympathising with their captor. In fact, after Lawrence Gordon escapes the bathroom after severing his own foot, Jigsaw nursed him back to full health, thus gaining his trust (this is shown in Saw VII). He also plays mind games on people, which is shown in a flashback in Saw III in which he convinced Amanda to side with him. In her unstable state of mind, she realised that he was the first person in her life she could actually relate to, and thus became an accomplice.

EK8829

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Predator picture

Question: This bugged me for years, when Billy said there is something in the trees to Dutch and in the next shot it shows the trees, is the Predator there, as in visible onscreen?

ezorro

Chosen answer: Yes. The predator can be seen not in the immediate shot after, but the one a few seconds later as they are seen walking away.

XIII

Before or after Ramirez gets hit in the face with the branch?

About 3 seconds before. If you look VERY closely (probably needing to pause the screen around 00:40:55 - about a minute after Billy said, "There's something in the trees"), there appears to be a transparent image of The Predator in the background above the major's (Arnold's) right shoulder. If this is meant to be The Predator, its body is curved around a tree trunk and its arms are extended toward the right of the screen (near Arnold's right ear), camouflaged as green leaves.

KeyZOid

The Predator - in a recognizable form - really wasn't visible until another minute later @ 00:41:55 when it was on the ground approaching Hawkins and the woman.

KeyZOid

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Now You See Me picture

Question: Would the FBI have let the French banker go after they found out the bank the Horsemen robbed was actually fake? He hasn't even done anything wrong. (00:36:10)

Chosen answer: They would, yes.

Phixius

Answer: Yes.

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All the Boys Love Mandy Lane picture

Question: ***SPOILER WARNING*** I don't understanding the ending to this film. What was Mandy's reason for killing people? Is this a flawed character motivation, or did I miss something?

Answer: The reason for Mandy and Emmett killing off the characters is pretty much left open for interpretation, but it seems the reason they killed them was because before Mandy became "hot over the summer" (as Dylan says at the beginning), Emmett and Mandy were treated like outcasts, and after Dylan's death, Emmett probably took a lot of the blame. It's possible that Emmett and Mandy were tired of how the popular crowd had treated them before. At the end, they made a pact to kill themselves. But after finding out that Emmett is just like the others, Mandy backs out and decides not to, but Emmett doesn't take it very well and decides to kill her too. Mandy fights him off, and she saves Garth, who seems to be the only one at the ranch who saw her as a human being and treated her with respect. So any of these reasons may have been motivation (although their actions are extreme), but overall there seems to be no obvious reason.

Hamster

Answer: It's likely that Mandy developed a taste for murder subsequent to the Dylan incident, in which she evidently was more complicit than would seem at first glance.

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Law Abiding Citizen picture

Question: I never really understood what the motive was when Clyde murdered his cellmate. Why did he do it? What did this act have to do with the plot of this movie?

Answer: To make sure he was placed in solitary confinement. The warehouse that he owned and operated out of that was next to the prison also had a tunnel connected to every cell in the solitary wing. Clyde needed to be in one of the solitary cells so he could leave the prison whenever he needed to unnoticed, which also served to make it look like he had an accomplice on the outside.

Phaneron

When Nick is talking to a spook later in the movie, he is quoted as telling Nick: "That cell-mate that he killed, you think that was random? No. That's a pawn being moved off the board. Anyone who had anything to do with that case, he's gonna be coming after you." Just as all deaths played roles in Clydes game, as the audience we are led to believe this inmate played a role, but were never given any resolution as to what significance it was. Not a big deal in grand scheme of things, but unexplained.

I don't know if you just didn't read the answer thoroughly or if you didn't pay close attention to the movie, but Clyde killing his cellmate was far from being unexplained. He can't leave the prison if he's in a regular cell with the general population, so he kills the cellmate in order to get placed in the solitary wing, because every solitary cell is connected to the tunnel in his warehouse that is next to the prison, which allows him to leave whenever he needs to.

Phaneron

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The Bourne Supremacy picture

Question: When Bourne interrogates Nikki (under duress) in the underground station, Nikki insists that Bourne had never worked in Berlin, much less completed his first mission there. But it is established that Bourne had killed the Neskis in Berlin on what is described by Conklin as his first mission. Assuming Nikki has no reason to lie and that she would have accurate information about Bourne's activities, what might explain that issue?

Dusibello

Chosen answer: Conklin ordered Bourne to kill the Neskis, telling him it was a training mission, when in fact it was an unofficial, off-the-books assignment to cover up his and Abbott's corrupt dealings with Gretkov, which Neski was about to expose. Nicky did not know about this Berlin mission as it was not an official Treadstone operation.

Sierra1

Conklin did not tell Bourne that it was a training mission. Conklin told Bourne "this is not a drill soldier...this is a live project, you're a go."

Partially correct. After Bourne eliminates the Neskis, Conklin says "Congratulations soldier, training is over." This implies that while the mission was real, Bourne was still an asset in training, and off the books.

By "not a drill" and "live project", Conklin is telling Bourne to actually kill the Neskis - like killing the hooded man for Hirsch, it's training him to do anything for Treadstone. It could be that the edit is out of chronological order, but the order of the scenes implies that after Bourne has done the job and returned to the car, Conklin says "Congratulations, soldier. Training is over."

Sierra1

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Chosen answer: Nope. It was deliberately left vague.

Brad

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Hannibal picture

Question: How did Hannibal manage to make it onto a commercial airplane at the end of the movie? Even if he had a fake ID, wouldn't being on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list make it virtually impossible for him to get through a high security place like an airport, where the feds would likely instruct security staff to stop anyone that even remotely resembles him? The fact that he cut off his own hand at the end of the film would make him easier to spot, as the FBI would definitely share that new detail about him.

Phaneron

Answer: As seen in the first film and in this one, Lecter demonstrates an almost supernatural ability for eluding the law and seemingly being in two places at once. This film was made in the year 2000, before airport security became extremely tight in late 2001. At that time (before 9/11), it was still possible to enter an airport's main concourse through the baggage claim or even from the tarmac without passing through rigorous security. As ingenious as Lecter was, he could have accessed the airport in a number of ways back then. Relieving another passenger of his boarding pass and identification would be no problem for Lecter, either (simply leave the passenger's body in an airport toilet and assume his identity). For the most part, it was Lecter's calm, self-confident charm that allowed him to slither through society always ten steps ahead of the law.

Charles Austin Miller

Answer: Perhaps he bribed his way through security onto the plane. Or maybe he murdered anyone who even remotely challenged him. He was probably wearing a disguise. It's possible that he had been planning this whole thing for an unspecified amount of time. And don't forget: he is a genius. And determined. He wouldn't let a little thing like protocol get in the way of his escape.

Alan Keddie

Answer: There is an assumption that he cut his hand off in the end. Ask yourself this for a very graphic movie why did they not show the chopped of hand. You just hear the chop but no sound from Lecter and only an emotional reaction from Starling. It is only alluded to and even if he did happen to chop it off he would be in so much pain as he acknowledged this was going to hurt he would not have been able to escape without help from Starling.

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