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Picture of a movie: Death on the Nile
Picture of a movie: 8 Women
Picture of a movie: Gosford Park
Picture of a movie: Sleuth
Picture of a movie: Green for Danger
Picture of a movie: The Lady Vanishes
Picture of a movie: Murder on the Orient Express
Picture of a movie: Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery
Picture of a movie: Knives Out
Picture of a movie: The Last of Sheila
Picture of a movie: Deathtrap
Picture of a movie: And Then There Were None

12 Movies

Whodunit

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Picture of a movie: Harper
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Harper

1966
Lew Harper is a Los Angeles based private investigator whose marriage to Susan Harper, who he still loves, is ending in imminent divorce since she can't stand being second fiddle to his work, which is always taking him away at the most inopportune of times. His latest client is tough talking and physically disabled Elaine Sampson, who wants him to find her wealthy husband, Ralph Sampson, missing now for twenty-four hours, ever since he disappeared at Van Nuys Airport after having just arrived from Vegas. No one seems to like Ralph, Elaine included. She believes he is cavorting with another woman. Harper got the case on the recommendation of the Sampsons' lawyer and Harper's personal friend, milquetoast Albert Graves, who is unrequitedly in love with Sampson's seductive daughter, Miranda Sampson. Miranda, whom Harper later states throws herself at anything "pretty in pants", also has a decidedly cold relationship with her stepmother, Elaine. As Harper begins his investigation, he is often joined by one or two new sidekicks, Miranda, and/or Allan Taggert, Ralph Sampson's private pilot who was the last person to see him before his disappearance. Living on the Sampson estate, Taggert is also Miranda's casual boyfriend, although his heart lies elsewhere. (Harper nicknames Taggert "Beauty" for the latter's preppy good looks.) It is finally confirmed that Sampson has been kidnapped after a ransom note is received. As Harper follows leads, he ends up in the underbelly of Los Angeles, which includes encounters with Betty Fraley (a junkie lounge singer), Fay Estabrook (an ex-movie ingénue now an overweight alcoholic), and Claude (a religious cult leader). At each of Harper's stops, people seem to want to beat him up and/or kill him. The case takes a turn after they decide to pay the $500,000 ransom to see where it leads.
Picture of a movie: Murder by Death
movies

Murder by Death

1976
Despite not knowing him, the world's most famous detectives can't pass up the offer of a "dinner and murder" invitation from wealthy Lionel Twain (Truman Capote). Each has no idea until their arrival at Two Two Twain who else will be in attendance. Those detectives are: amateur sleuths and New York City socialites Dick (David Niven) and Dora Charleston (Dame Maggie Smith), accompanied by their pet terrier, Myron; Belgian detective Monsieur Milo Perrier (James Coco), accompanied by his chauffeur, Marcel (James Cromwell); Shanghainese Inspector Sidney Wang (Peter Sellers), accompanied by his Japanese adopted son, Willie Wang (Richard Narita); frumpish Brit Miss Jessica Marbles (Elsa Lanchester), accompanied by her invalid nurse, Miss Withers (Estelle Winwood); and San Francisco gumshoe Sam Diamond (Peter Falk), accompanied by his femme fatale sidekick, Tess Skeffington (Eileen Brennan). The dinner part of the invitation runs into problems due to the non-communication between Twain's blind butler, Jamesir Bensonmum (Sir Alec Guinness), and Twain's new deaf-mute and non-Anglophone cook, Yetta (Nancy Walker). On the murder side, the guests initially believe Twain will try to kill each of them. However, Twain eventually announces his rationale for the gathering: that one of the people at the dinner table will be murdered before midnight, and that Twain will consider himself the greatest detective if his guests, who are now trapped in the house until dawn, cannot figure out who committed the murder, that person also at the dinner table. If one does figure out who committed the crime, he or she will be the recipient of one million dollars and the exclusive rights to the story. So the guests anxiously await the stroke of midnight, with those still alive after that time trying to figure out motive and the opportunity to murder before the rise of dawn, and before the murderer has the opportunity to strike again on one or all of them.