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SPOILERS Why did the murderers confess?
- After Poirot's final denouement explaining the crimes, why did Simon and Jackie admit their guilt? The only hard evidence Poirot had for his theory was the stained handkerchief retrieved along with the murder weapon, as well as Ms. Van Schulyer's stole with the bullet holes that indicated a third shot - while these supported Poirot's interpretation of events, they did not by themselves identify Simon and Jackie as the murderers. Of course, this was the case in the novel as well. But in the novel, Poirot admits that there is no hard evidence and the only way to bring the guilty to book was a confession...fortunately for him, Simon is so shocked that Poirot correctly deduced the truth that he broke down and confessed immediately. In the '78 film, Poirot succeeds in getting a confession by bluffing Simon into thinking he would administer a "Moularge test" that would provide evidence that he had fired a gun. But in this version, neither does Poirot threaten them with any such test, nor does it look like Simon Doyle is weak-willed enough to confess just because he is confronted with the truth - so why do they confess just because Poirot brandishes the stained handkerchief?
- They probably realized everyone else was believing Poirot so even if it couldn't be held up in a court of law, the rest would ensure the truth of it all was spread quickly to ruin them.
- There was also the very real possibility that Salome Otterbourne would shoot them both on the spot as revenge for Bouc.
- To be fair, Simon is indeed shocked when he realises Poirot has figured it all out. As for Jackie, judging by her behaviour as she confesses all, it's strongly implied that her participation in Linnet's murder as well as killing Louise and Bouc herself, not to mention her attempted killing of Poirot while he's chasing her after Bouc's murder, has been taking a severe toll on her sanity.
- The book makes it clearer that Simon was weak and would almost certainly broken under a serious interrogation. Jackie knew it.
- While there is no hard evidence against them there it literally no evidence against everyone else. The soft evidence points to them and only them.
- At this point Jackie realized that she was facing a world famous detective and, worst still, she and Simon had far little to their names and thus would instantly be looked upon as prime suspects even without ANY evidence.
The second gunshot
- Three shots are fired with the .22 toy gun: a blank to simulate Simon's injury, the one to kill Linnet and a third one to really injure Simon's leg. The third one was kept a secret by adding a bullet in the gun and muffling its sound with a piece of cloth, which was later discarded (and found) in the river. Everyone assumed the cloth had been used to silence the murder shot... But it is clearly not the case, as the powder marks around the victim's wound (and the later discovered use of it for the third shot) indicate. Therefore my headscratcher is, if the second shot was not silenced, how come nobody heard it?
- In the book they say with the screaming and running around the second shot would have been hard to hear especially from such a small gun. One person does actually hear it, but thinks it's a champagne bottle and later that it must have been the first shot.
- It should also be noted that the cloth wrapped around the gun for the second shot actually would prevent powder burns, this time on Simon's leg, which would not be there if he had been shot from across the room.
- The scarf wasn't meant to muffle the sound. It was to prevent scorch marks.
- To add to this while it might appear that Jackie is a cold blooded killer and criminal mastermind the film shows that instead she has slowly been suffering from sanity slippage. The murder of Linnet's assistant was sloppy and then the killing of Bouc was clearly spur of the moment.
Why did SPOILER drop the .45?
- After murdering Bouc and being chased by Poirot through the kitchen, by the time Jackie reaches the deck she drops the gun for Poirot to find. Why? It was still loaded, it could have her fingerprints on it, and as shown it was later used against her with as far as she knew the only gun onboard besides Simon's.
- She didn't want to be caught with the gun. She may have used gloves or a cloth to conceal prints. The gun itself implicated the owner. Tossing it overboard was an option, but by this point it was known tossing the first gun overboard didn't prevent it from being found.
- Jackie clearly also didn't plan to kill Bouc, only doing so when it was clear he was about to confess, and she certainly didn't suspect Hercule Poirot to chase her down, nearly catching her several times. It is likely she dropped it in the heat of the moment and didn't have time to retrieve it.
Where did the booby trap come from?
- In the opening scene, aren't the soldiers Poirot and the other Belgian soldiers fighting against running away on the same bridge Poirot's captain gets blown up on. If that's what happened, shouldn't the enemy soldiers have been blown up?
- The bridge was not overly large and the Germans had already fled (that is why the Belgians become more relaxed and talk to each other. The trap was set at the Belgian side of the bridge while the Germans were crossing the other side. And finally the Germans would have known that eventually the Belgians would attempt to retake the bridge and thus set up the trap.
- Furthermore, a classic move in war is to trick your foe into trying to take a fortified position only to destroy what little remain with a trap.
- The bridge was not overly large and the Germans had already fled (that is why the Belgians become more relaxed and talk to each other. The trap was set at the Belgian side of the bridge while the Germans were crossing the other side. And finally the Germans would have known that eventually the Belgians would attempt to retake the bridge and thus set up the trap.
Murderers playing the Batman Gambit
- It seems everything about the murder plot hinged on Linnet being attracted enough to Simon to 'steal him' from Jacqueline and marry him herself, and there was a large chance this might not have happened: Linnet might have simply not liked Simon. Or she might have decided she wasn't going to steal her friend's fiance. Or she might have not trusted a man with no money suddenly dumping his fiancee, who didn't have money, for herself, who did (and she did express several times in the movie that she wondered frequently who was truly her friend, and who was only there for the money.) What was the plan if she didn't take to him?
- In the opening of the film Jackie is trying to get Linnet to hire Simon to work for her, even though he admits later on he is horrible at contracts (thus revealing that he would have been utterly unsuited to work for Linnet}. Considering one person was already stealing from her its most likely Jackie was planning to use Simon to get to the books and then steal the money herself.
