Questions about specific movies, TV shows and more

These are questions relating to specific titles. General questions for movies and TV shows are here. Members get e-mailed when any of their questions are answered.

Question: When Jane takes Robin to the hospital a doctor mentions to Jane that this commonly happens with HIV patients. I would have thought that would be ethically wrong and against the doctor/patient confidentiality? Surely they can't assume she's family.

Question: Would a doctor bring up Mary's past abortion? Even though Paul is her husband surely that's confidential?

Question: When they go back in time, how come Hermione couldn't figure out Dumbledore also wanted them to save Buckbeak until Harry said it, since they were sent back to before he was executed?

Answer: Because Dumbledore is having the students do an illegal act (helping Sirius escape), he has to be careful of what and how he says it to protect himself and them. He deliberately "implies" what should be done so he can have "plausible deniability." If Harry and Hermione were later interrogated, they cannot say, "Dumbledore told us to do a specific thing." Dumbledore, in turn, can rightfully claim he never told them something and/or they misinterpreted what he did say.

raywest

New Jack City - S2-E19

Question: If Carson is supposed to be a former member in this episode then how was Kim in the dojo during his time (before Jack). In the pilot we see that Jack is the one to get Kim to join. How does this work?

Answer: Kim and Carson knew each other from school, not karate.

Question: Is there a reason why they couldn't just use their suits to get back home? At least Cassie could do it, she is just a kid. Just activate your suit and grow, get out of there. I know eventually they want to stay and help, but at the beginning they were just scared and want to go home, why not do it then?

lionhead

Question: At the finale of The Wicker Man Howie/Edward Woodward is placed in a wooden cage high above the ground. The cage is set alight. When the cage began to burn and disintegrate, wouldn't he have fallen out of it onto the ground? As the cage burns, the wood must become brittle, so why can't he just force his way out? (Yes, he is surrounded by the islanders, but if anybody was being burnt alive, and they could get out of the flames, wouldn't the self-preservation instinct kick in?).

Rob Halliday

Answer: He would likely die from the heat or smoke inhalation long before the wood would deteriorate enough for him to fall out. The film also makes a point to show that Howie has given up trying to fight the villagers and has accepted his fate, so even if he could have forced his way out he no longer had the will to do so.

BaconIsMyBFF

Question: I'm really confused by Eddie's behaviour. Why did he suddenly decide to abandon Vincent and Carmen. And why couldn't he just take the money at the end (and maybe give it to charity if he didn't want it as Carmen suggested). Why did he unnecessarily have to turn it into an issue with Vincent?

Gavin Jackson

Answer: Because it wasn't about the money or a personal issue with Vincent. Eddie had a sudden realization about his own integrity and what he was doing (helping to rig games' outcome to skew betting odds). He wanted to win legitimately against Vincent. Earlier, he had become rather fed up with Vincent's egotistical nature and arrogance, which led to them parting ways.

raywest

Question: Wouldn't Max and the nuns have been tortured and executed for helping them escape?

MikeH

Answer: Quite possibly yes.

LorgSkyegon

Question: What would've happened if they were caught at the end?

MikeH

Answer: The likely responses of the Nazis would have been either to execute them all, or hold Captain von Trapp's family hostage while he served in the Kriegsmarine.

LorgSkyegon

Question: Jack Conrad's final movie, where he and Irving Thalberg say that the movie is terrible or in Jack's words: "a giant swing of mediocrity", how do we know if they're right or wrong on that? Do we we find out whether or not it was a success or is it what Jack and Irv actually say it is? I also ask this because a friend goes up to Jack and says "Jack's back. Way to go, Jack."

Cody Fairless-Lee

Answer: As I remember it, and also checking Wikipedia's plot summary, Ham left at the end and there was no further explanation about what happened to him.

raywest

Question: Is the character of Flynn Rider in any way based on the movie star Errol Flynn? Maybe it's my imagination, but, whenever I watch Tangled I notice a vague resemblance between the two characters. Also, it would seem strange to me that, when they were making Tangled, the production staff would never have thought that, simply by giving a character the name "Flynn", it would make many people automatically recall Errol Flynn.

Rob Halliday

Answer: From the character's Wikipedia page: "Flynn was ultimately developed into a swashbuckling thief inspired by fictional characters Han Solo and Indiana Jones, and actors Gene Kelly and Errol Flynn; Eugene Fitzherbert's alias Flynn Rider was named after the latter."

Question: When Brenda and Esther were fighting over the bible in the school scene and all the pages were ripped out of it, where were the pictures of the men in the bible? Like did no-one see it?

Answer: If you watch closely, when Esther is carrying the bible (before Daniel knocks it out of her hand), it does look like the pictures are in the pages. However, when the papers scatter, the pictures are not visible on the floor. They were covered by the pile of pages on the floor. The pictures must have been there, or else Esther wouldn't have been panicking to gather all of the pages.

Torie White

Question: Why didn't Mr. Thromby feel any effects from such a large dose of morphine via IV? Wouldn't he immediately have a reaction? (00:36:30 - 00:37:00)

Answer: Thromby had actually not been given an overdose of morphine like he and Marta had thought (this was a key twist in the plot). Even if he had, the full effect would have taken 5 to 10 minutes anyway, by which time he had already cut his throat in anticipation of the "overdose" which would not have actually happened.

Sierra1

Question: What was the deal with Dr. Chamberlain? Was he not a real doctor and just a waiter? Or was he possibly a temp and had more than one job?

Answer: He was actually a waiter that Viola paid/bribed to pretend to be a doctor.

Torie White

Question: One thing I have never understood through the entire series is Dr Gordon's test. To pass his test, Dr Gordon has to kill Adam by 6 if not his family is killed and he is left to rot. At 6 Zep calls saying he failed his test. He then cuts his foot off, shoots and wounds Adam. The film end with him having crawled to get help and jigsaw shutting the door on Adam. In Saw 7 we see Jigsaw helped him and he became an accomplice. Why did jigsaw not kill him or leave him to die as he failed his test.

Ssiscool

Answer: The movies don't directly address this. But in my personal opinion, even though he didn't do everything on time, Jigsaw recognized that Dr. Gordon ultimately was willing to make the sacrifices he had to in order to save his family. He also spent hours in the room listening to Gordon and Adam talking, and likely realised that Gordon was a good man despite his faults. So I personally believe that even though he didn't "pass his test" per se, Jigsaw had grown enough respect for Gordon that he saved him. (And indoctrinated him).

TedStixon

Is Hoffman dead or alive?

That's unknown at this point in time.

TedStixon

Question: When speaking with Robbie, Mitch says he thinks he chose his family out of "love." Does he really mean that? Because he seems MUCH more interested in his own self-serving desires at the expense of tending to his family. Surely that should mean he would easily be capable of moving on from his family, as Robbie suggested? He even acted liked his family wasn't a huge importance until Slim called him out on his nonsense.

Movielover1996

Answer: I believe that yes, Mitch really means it. Abusive people often have a twisted idea of love. He loves Slim and Gracie -according to his own sick idea of love. This is one reason why he can't simply move on. Also, as an abuser, he wants to control his family. If he gave up on finding them, Slim would "win", and he cannot tolerate that. He needs for his victim to come back and be controlled by him again.

Question: Primo has the number 11 in a shield branded on his shoulder. Is this something he did himself because the number always meant something to him, or was it done to him, and he decided to wear number 11 in response to it?

Phaneron

Question: Why does Lisle keep the potion's existence a secret? What's gonna happen if the public does know?

Trainman

Answer: As shown in the movie, the potion not only restores a person's youth and makes them immortal, but it would also stop the person from having any type of disease. If the public ever knew about it, everybody would suddenly start fighting to get it without realizing the damage it could do. Ex: At the end of the movie, Madeline and Helen both fall down the church steps and shatter upon hitting the ground. Better to keep it a secret from the whole world than let it get out and have people doing anything that could irreparably damage their bodies.

Question: This may sound a little crazy to the uninitiated, but does anybody have an alchemical interpretation of Apocalypse Now? I remember seeing pages from Coppola's screenplay that were annotated and made reference to transmutation.

Jack Vaughan

Answer: It should be noted that "transmutation" is a word Coppola has used to describe the film making process. Https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LFTQcwgq4CY.

Bishop73

Answer: Could you be a bit more specific? I can give a link to the screenplay if you wish. Http://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/apocolypse.html I hope that helps.

lionhead

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