This movie is full of silly little plot holes that we're all just supposed to ignore or forgive.
- Neil is cheating with Abby for months and doesn't know what her husband looks like? He doesn't even know that he has an Irish (or Scottish or whatever it was) accent?
Why would you assume he'd know? They met at work. They're having an affair. It's not like Judy would invite Neil and his wife over to have dinner with the family. Unless they ran into each other at a company picnic, they're not likely to have met. Neil isn't likely to be calling her at home and asking the man with the accent if he can put his wife on the phone. So why do you think he'd know anything more than Tom's name?
- Neil is cheating with a married woman for months and can't instantly put 1+1 together that he might be dealing with a jealous husband? The fact is, when you're cheating with a married woman you're always going to have in the back of your mind that one day you might be confronted by him. There is no doubt whatsoever Neil would have jumped to this conclusion the minute they pretended to throw the burning money out the window. Then he would've known this was personal and then he would've know this was the jealous husband.
"Jealous husband" might be one possibility that went through his mind, but how would YOU as a moviegoer, know whether that thought occurred to him or not? Do you expect he'd say to his wife, "Hey, I've been having an affair with a married woman at work. Do you suppose this bloke could be her husband?" Since we're not privy to Neil's private thoughts, we don't know if he considered this possibility or not.
- The police are going to totally dismiss his story about a kidnapping just because the supposed wife went in there and told them not to pay him any attention? That's about the most ridiculous thing ever. At the very least, the police would've worked to contact the wife and get her in the station at the same time, and then perhaps gone with him to his house to check it out.
I'm kind of with you on this one. I thought the pre-emptive police visit was unlikely to work, for one simple reason: Abby didn't have Sophie with her when she went to the police station. Plus, the idea that anyone would go to the police station saying "My husband may be by later, claiming our daughter's been kidnapped" and then just walk out seemed far-fetched. But the thought of a detective being unwilling to investigate a crime that he believes is a domestic situation did seem believable. Some of those guys are lazy; if they can get out of doing work, they will.
- Who the hell doesn't check to see if a gun is loaded when handed to them? I remember thinking the whole time "check to see if it's loaded and if it is, fire off a round into the wall to see if they're blanks." That Neil would not have done this considering all the mind games being played really defies belief.
What makes you think Neil knows anything about guns? Maybe he can check by firing a bullet into a wall, only to find it's the only bullet in the gun. If he's not going to shoot Tom with it, it hardly matters whether it's loaded or not.
- The conveniently leaving the cell phone in the car while he walked off was so obviously a trap. I'm no Einstein so when I see characters in movies not figuring out what I figure out, I feel like I'm being lied too.
Maybe, but then again, I'll bet Neil IS the sort of guy who thinks he's smarter than everyone else.
- I suspected the kid was still at home the entire time. Why the hell didn't he ever just call home himself? He could have called a friend or neighbor to just go next door and check on his house.
I suspected the same, but what's a friend going to do? The babysitter probably doesn't have the kid tied up, and if she answers the door and says the kid's fine, she'll know Neil's not playing by the rules. He might as well call the police, if he wants someone to check his house.
But these things aren't even my main problem with this movie. My biggest problem is that the story doesn't help us feel any sympathy for Tom or Abby and we're mostly just sympathizing with Neil and at the end, that doesn't really change once we learn he's an adulterer. For this type of movie, it's unforgivable. We should have been given much more insight into Tom's character so that we were put into a situation of liking Tom more than Neil even though Tom is being the bad guy. Then they could've really changed things up by bounding and gagging Neil in the hotel room and having Tom have his way with the wife to suddenly make the audience start to hate Tom and sympathize with Neil. They could've gone back and forth this way and in the end, the twist that WE (the audience) along with Neil had been put through this mind frak and the payoff would've been so much sweeter.
But they chose to make Neil into this hard to hate guy who's only real flaw is being an adulterer. In the end you still sympathize with him and you even start to think "damn, if she's the type of woman who would do something like that, who could blame him for cheating on her..." And so it fails.
I don't think Neil was hard to hate at all. He was backstabbing his colleague at work, and playing dirty in other ways to get ahead in his career. Being an adulterer is only the icing on the cake. I didn't find him to be a likable character at all. And I don't like a movie that preaches at me anyway.
reply
share
mobocracy
16 years ago
Why would you assume he'd know? They met at work. They're having an affair. It's not like Judy would invite Neil and his wife over to have dinner with the family. Unless they ran into each other at a company picnic, they're not likely to have met. Neil isn't likely to be calling her at home and asking the man with the accent if he can put his wife on the phone. So why do you think he'd know anything more than Tom's name?
Why assume he wouldn't? Neil and Judy are both career professionals with offices who became intimate over time. At a minimum they have knickknacks, including family pictures, in their offices, which Neil surely would have seen.
I'd go even further and assume that there would have been some kind of office Christmas mixer or other social event where they would have actually met in person or Tom would have come into the office for some random reason.
The idea that Neil would have NEVER seen even a picture of Tom is pretty unlikely unless Judy worked at some other office and they got involved at some convention or something.
reply
share
zeggman
16 years ago
That is frankly nonsense. Most people in offices don't have family pictures. Many of those who do display photos have pictures of children, but not pictures of spouses. So to say "at a minimum" Neil would SURELY have seen a picture of Tom is unsupportable. While it's true that some women would display pictures of their husbands (or, more likely, of the two of them as a couple), it is by no means a given.
Some larger companies have offsite Christmas parties where spouses are invited, but attendance is not usually mandatory. There is no reason to assume that such parties took place here, or that both couples would have attended if they had.
The idea that Neil would never have seen a picture of Tom is not unlikely at all. Of all the dozens of women whose offices I have seen over the years, I can recall only two who displayed pictures of their husbands at work.
Sorry, if you're looking for a reason to dismiss this movie as implausible, that isn't it.
What MIGHT be it is this: How could Tom be certain that Neil would never have seen a picture of him? Even if he's been to the office and knows there's nothing there, how does he know that Tom has never seen a picture on a camera phone, or a packet of photos picked up at the drugstore during lunch hour? Is there some testing that goes on at the beginning of their encounter (or prior to it) to give him confidence that Neil doesn't recognize him? It's been a while since I've seen the movie, so I don't know, and I'm not going to dig it out now to check, but that might be a valid question.
reply
share
mobocracy
16 years ago
As an IT consultant for the last 5 years, I'm in hundreds of offices. I'd say I sit at other people's desks at least 2 hours a day, every day, and pretty much EVERYONE has a picture of their spouse/boyfriend/girlfriend.
A few don't, but they are the exception rather than the rule and usually they don't have pictures of anything at all. Women have far more pictures than men in terms of quantity. Women younger than their mid-30s usually have wedding photos, older than mid-30s it's trips or family snapshots (amsuing commentary on the fading wedding magic?)
The number of pictures tends to be higher in offices with "professionals" like we'd assume the log-home living Judy and the Land Rover driving Neil are; they're usually larger spaces and these kinds of people almost always decorate their offices. Cube dwellers and those with smaller spaces tend towards less "stuff" but not zero.
I'd say that I have a decent random sampling and more experience than most people, so I'd say it's not nonsense.
It's nonsense to conclude Neil would have NEVER seen a picture of Tom. Why wouldn't Neil actually ask to see one? Usually people who have affairs aren't in it just for the sex, it's usually some kind of mutual coping mechanism for bad marriages and they often END UP talking about spouses, and seeing a picture would be highly likely.
As for actually meeting their spouses, often the higher you climb the ladder the more likely you have spousal interaction beyond just an annual party -- business dinners, events, etc. I've eaten dinner with dozens of my wife's co-workers, been to their houses for parties, etc. Cube dwellers and low-level employees would have less opportunities for this, but again, these two are high paid professionals for whom "networking" is as important as the actual work they do.
And of course, all this is the same for TOM'S KID THEY SAW ON THE STREET!
reply
share
amandaschultz
16 years ago
I work in an office environment-very similar to Neil's office environment. I can count on one hand out of the 70 plus employees who have spouse/bf/gf pictures hanging up in their walls or on their desk...only 5, that's not many. The majority of the people have photos of kids, grandkids and pets (and there are plenty who are married here or dating). It is quite possible that both of the parties (Neil & Judy) were in it only for sex and didn't really want to know their family details. I have a friend who had an affair with a married man and never knew what his wife looked like because when they were together they never talked about his family, he didn't want to tell and she didn't want to know.
reply
share
crazzzycurlz01
15 years ago
I have never seen anyone with a photo of their child or spouse at their computer with 1 exception and I've been in hundreds of offices. More people display their pets that their family. Most companies these days don't permit such displays as it clutters the work area and doesn't keep that clear divide between work and home. I wouldn't dream of displaying any family photos, I see my family all the time, why would I need a photo of them at my place of work?!Cathy.
reply
share
mobocracy
15 years ago
Maybe its a regional thing, then, but I see personal photos constantly. I agree about the clutter, I feel like the cleaning lady when I have to swap PCs.
reply
share