Answered questions about specific movies, TV shows and more

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Question: Serious spoiler alert: these questions summarise the entire film. During the Second World War Sgt Joe Gunn (Humphrey Bogart) and nine allied soldiers (plus one German and one Italian captive) are crossing the North African Desert. They discover a well, but this has nearly dried up and only provides a small trickle of water, barely enough to keep them alive. They are besieged by over 100 Germans. Since the Germans have no water at all they surrender to Joe Gunn. At this point a stray shell lands in the well. The resulting explosion brings hundreds of gallons of water bubbling up, more than enough for Joe Gunn's company and all the Germans. Two questions. 1. Could a well in the Sahara dry up until it only gave a small trickle of water? 2. Could an explosion really open a water supply like this?

Rob Halliday

Answer: Thank you for that! I first saw Sahara on television when I was eleven, with my mother, father and younger brother. When we saw the shell explode in the well to re-open the water supply, we all dismissed this as Hollywood hokum. But sometimes it is amusing to be proved wrong. You put a smile on my face when you informed me, and quite convincingly too, that the well really could have dried up but then opened up again.

Rob Halliday

Answer: 1. Yes it could, as water flows into the well, it could easily bring sediment and other bits of small debris and eventually block the flow of water resulting in only a trickle. 2. Again, yes. If the explosion weakens the surrounding walls holding the water back, the pressure of the water could easily rupture through the walls and result in the flooding mentioned.

Ssiscool

Question: I have been trying to obtain a copy of this movie with English subtitles that is available to watch in my region. I live in the UK and I own a Region B Blu-Ray player. This means it can only play Region B Blu-Rays and also Region 2 DVDs. Are there are any versions available in a Region B Blu-Ray or a Region 2 DVD with English subtitles, or places to watch it online with English subtitles?

Harris

Answer: Google your player model, you may be able to make it region-free by pressing certain keys in a certain order. The home media of this film has what it says "New and improved English subtitle translation", but it's almost certainly going to be either Region A (Blu-Ray) or Region 1 (DVD). It is part of the Criterion Collection, spine #576. All of this being said this title is showing on CinemaParadiso.co.uk, the DVD rental company, with English subtitles and in Region 2.

Neil Jones

Answer: No. Sean Casey "died in a car accident" according to Fletcher, but he actually killed himself after feeling traumatised by Fletcher's teachings.

Home - S4-E22

Question: Why would Angel and his friends agree to work with Wolfram and Hart considering that the law firm has been committing atrocities and also been butting heads with Angel Investigations?

Answer: They figured they could root out of the real evil that infects the place and do some good with it. Like an undercover cop that joins the mob underworld.

Question: After "sucking" Henderson, he's almost fully regenerated. Why does his mouth become decayed again when he kisses Evie?

Answer: Because Imhotep was still an undead at that point, it was the curse's way of motivating him to finish killing everyone who opened the chest. It explains why Beni told Burns earlier that Imhotep does not like to be touched and prevented Burns from doing so.

Answer: You answered it, he was almost fully regenerated, just some minor skin aliments.

Question: At the beginning, what was the old nun trying to do with the cross key in the dark room with the door that says "God ends here"?

Bunch Son

Answer: The nun was trying to find the relic. The deceased nuns had no actual idea where it was. That's the whole reason Irene was summoned by the Vatican because she had visions about "Mary pointing the way" also the "ghost nuns" more than likely have something to do with her clairvoyance as well.

Answer: Are you talking about before she opens the door? She's just making the sign of the cross, but using the same hand she's holding the key in.

Bishop73

I'm asking about what she was going to do in the dark room, what her plan was, what the cross key was for.

Bunch Son

It was to open the chamber that kept the vial of the blood of Christ so they could try to send Valak back to Hell.

Bishop73

The gateway to the relic was near the state of Mary, and it wasn't located inside the chamber seeing that Burke and Irene found the relic before crossing the passage leading to the chamber with the sign "God ends here." If there's someone who must have known where the relic was, it has to be the abbess. Then, why didn't she take it if she was going to?

Bunch Son

From everything I understood, the cross key opened the chamber that had the blood of Christ. The room with the sign "God ends here" was not the chamber I was speaking about. I was only addressing the question about what the key was for.

Bishop73

Question: Would it really be possible to trick someone's brain, the way they did with the number 55?

MikeH

Answer: Absolutely. There are many people (especially people who work on high commissions and con men) who are well practiced in subtle cues with body language. The elaborate process they went through in the movie greatly increased the chances he would make such a pick, but there was no guarantee. However, it was constructed with personal knowledge of the target. Even more strange was the fact that a string of some of his reasonable bets went bad (the missed extra point, the pick of the card, etc). Had they all not gone bad, it would have disrupted his faked desperation to the multi-million dollar bet.

Question: What was wrong with Marco Flint's daughter? She is laying in bed and is connected to oxygen and numerous bottles of prescription drugs are and she is also seen leaning on a crutch. I have always been curious as to what was wrong with her to begin with. Does anyone know?

Answer: It's never revealed other than a terminal illness. Her character doesn't exist in the comics, so there's nothing to reference either.

Bishop73

Question: Completely ignoring the fact that the road assist thing in the car wouldn't work due to the networks being down, why did Matt go through all that trouble? Wouldn't it have been much faster for John to speak to them and say something like "This is officer John McClane, badge number ***** I need to use this vehicle for a police emergency" or something like that?

Answer: There was no guarantee the operator would believe John was really a cop, even if he gave his badge number. Also, for the purpose of the movie, Justin Long's bit as a scared little boy, is just funnier, and meant to inject humor into the plot.

raywest

Answer: His full name was Richard Tracy, but it was used seldomly.

Chosen answer: It's a bit ambiguous. Tracy's creator, Chester Gould, originally named his character, "Plainclothes Tracy," until an editor suggested changing it to Dick Tracy. A "dick" is a dated slang term for a cop or a private detective. Dick appears to be Tracy's first name, but it is also descriptive of his profession. This is called a "double entendre." It's typical for authors to contrive a name that reflects their characters.

raywest

Question: Why did they keep holding signs up to the camera? Burnham's company builds the rooms and security systems, wouldn't he have known he can speak to them using one of the security panels like Meg does later in the film?

Answer: Meg was using the P.A. from inside the panic room and it only works one way; everywhere else would have a room-to-room intercom system. If there was another P.A. system working the other way, it would have been too loud, as the cop mentioned when he spoke to Meg at the front door. The neighbors heard Meg broadcasting on it. Burnham would know that it would draw unwanted attention and, if heard, could be incriminating.

raywest

Cop didn't say anything to Meg about neighbors hearing her on the PA. They were only there cause the husband called the cops after she was disconnected from him.

There are two possible reasons that I can think of 1) Burnham probably simply forgot that he could do it, the same as none of them thought to smash the cameras until Raoul saw Meg doing it. They were under a lot of pressure as the plan had changed so it probably just slipped his mind. 2) Burnham knew he could do it but didn't want the other two to know. The other two seemed like loose cannons and Burnham seemed to be the only one who didn't want to hurt anyone. He might have been worried that they'd use the intercom to send threats or something.

It was a one-way PA system, as mentioned by the original answer.

No, it's not. After the burglars get into the room with Meg's daughter, Meg uses the intercom in the bedroom to talk to Burnham who is inside the room. This indicates that it is very much an intercom and not a one-way PA system.

Question: Why didn't Meg quietly leave the room with her cell phone and go somewhere else in the house to phone the police? She had plenty of opportunities, like when they were running around trying to disable the phone lines, when Raoul killed Junior, etc.

Answer: It was too risky that she would get caught and she would not leave her diabetic daughter unattended. Even with the security cameras, she could not know where each guy was all the time. As she had already left the panic room to retrieve the phone (and was nearly caught), they would be aware she might try it again. Burnham would know that the cell phone would not work inside the room.

raywest

Question: At the beginning it's seen that the autopilot knew about the whole "meteor field" in front of Avalon, as the rocks are visible on the projection of the ship right before the autopilot converts energy to main shield. It even "saw" the big meteor that hit Avalon. So why didn't the autopilot fly around and then return to the original heading? (00:02:27 - 00:03:00)

Kathi

Answer: The ship was traveling far too fast surely to change course in time, at half the speed of light.

Answer: The ship was designed to fly through meteor fields and had protective energy shields to repel them (shown at the beginning of the movie). Meteor fields are large and flying around them would add decades (if not centuries) to the journey. As Jim Preston noted, one meteor somehow broke through the shield and damaged the ship.

raywest

Question: How does Mrs. Smith get to know that her husband is the shooter?

Answer: She notices that he shakes his right leg twice after peeing, just like her husband.

Answer: It comes down to a deleted scene. And I remember it as clear as day from when I saw it at the cinemas. There is a scene where Jane is brushing her teeth at the basin. John walks into the large bathroom and begins to take a leak. As John finishes up, Jane looks over her shoulder at him, just in time to see him lift one leg and give it a couple of sharp shakes. Later in the movie, after the ailed assignment/shootout in the desert, Jane is watching the footage of the other assassin doing the very same memorable action. Right as she is in the middle of replaying it back a couple of times, John turns up at her building, and one of her agents who has answered the intercom says, "Jane, it's your husband." And that is when the penny drops! For some bizarre, unknown reason, they removed that very important key bathroom scene from every TV and DVD release, leaving people who did not see the theatrical release at the box office asking the question of how Jane realized it was her husband.

Answer: From the way he stands and moves, height, weight and general mannerisms.

Answer: They worked for different agencies and were unaware that they had been given the same target (Diaz?) to kill in the desert. Mrs Smith initially thought that Mr Smith was a civilian that just happened to interfere with her assignment. She was given 48 hours to identify and eliminate (kill) the "witness." While reviewing the videotape of the scene, all Mrs Smith could see was the back side of the "civilian." While still looking at him, a secretary or similar employee yelled from outside the room that Mrs Smith's husband was on the phone and was back from his trip to Atlanta. By the secretary saying, "It's your husband" during the time Mrs Smith was looking at his back side on the tape, plus the information that he was back from Atlanta, it became obvious to her... and she wondered how she could have been so stupid to not know before this time.

KeyZOid

Question: How did Kirill know Bourne was in India?

Answer: In the script, Kirill shows a photo of Marie when he poses as her brother and says there has been a death in the family. He does this at a specific telegraph office, and says that they know Marie called from there. Kirill was a Russian FSB agent, so presumably he used that agency's resources to tap the phone of Marie's brother and traced her call to the telegraph office in Goa. This is not clear in the actual film, where Kirill shows a photo of Bourne and says he is a friend.

Sierra1

Question: Who is the actor playing Billy that was shot by Travis in the police station interrogation room?

Answer: Billy was played by Mark Pellegrino.

Bishop73

Question: What does Buster mean that he'll be put in a foster home with people who don't love him? What's gonna happen to him if he lives with them?

Trainman

Answer: He was just saying it pessimistically. Although, depending on which reports you read, 1 in 3 children are abused by their foster parents. In addition, many children in the system also get placed into several different homes during their childhood (since fostering children is not the same as adopting them), leaving the children to feel unloved by their foster parents.

Bishop73

I don't know the frequency with which it actually happens, but there are also neglectful foster parents whose sole motivation is the monthly stipend from the state, rather than a genuine interest in their wards' well-being.

Cubs Fan

Answer: Foster homes are meant to be temporary. While, hopefully, foster parents will be kind and caring to the children in their charge, they cannot form overly strong attachments that would only cause emotional trauma for a child when they transition to another living situation.

raywest

Question: How did Eddie find out about Peter and Mary Jane's relationship? He never saw them together and, when he kidnapped her, she and Peter were somewhat estranged.

Answer: The symbiote, traditionally, knows all of Peter's secrets including his identity. This is how Eddie knows who he is, as well as his relationship with Mary Jane.

Rob245

Answer: Yes, in the "Blacklist" series, it's said Christopher was 3 when he disappeared.

Bishop73

Question: How did Reavers fly those space ships while they are just zombies. How did they manage the whole Reaver community?

Answer: The reavers are not just zombies, they reacted to the drug in a way that caused them to become insane. They are angry, cannibalistic, violent, hysterical. You can't communicate with them, but they can still think. They do have a society, a community. Their community is based on pillage and plunder however, finding new victims to cannibalise.

lionhead

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