Salah pins the murder on the now-absent Habib, who, as part of the plan, has gone into hiding. He enlists Rachman Habib ( Sal Mineo), a naïve idealist in the Legation, to help him stage the murder of a security officer, then plants evidence to make it look like the work of radicals. Hassan Salah ( Héctor Elizondo), chief diplomat of the Legation of Suari, an Arab nation with a new young king, has a scheme for shifting power within his government. Hector Elizondo as Hassan Salah and Sal Mineo as Rachman HabibĪndré Lawrence as Youseff Alafa and Sal Mineo as Rachman Habib (Columbo lends his badge to a crony whom he asks to go to the range in his place, claiming he cannot pass the shooting proficiency test.) Finally, while Columbo is eating an ice cream cone with his dog, an Internal Affairs officer tells him he has 24 hours to appear at the range or his badge will be pulled. Leftkowitz ( Francine York) whose computer records show the lapses. It is Grace's favorite film, the one playing when she was committing the crime and the one she is watching, mesmerized, at the end of the episode.Īn amusing concurrent side-story concerns Columbo's penchant for not carrying his firearm and his decade-long lapse in going to the range for shooting proficiency. The episode features excerpts from the 1953 musical comedy Walking My Baby Back Home, which starred Leigh. Columbo then leaves the mansion, following Diamond. Columbo's normal instincts thwarted, he makes several half turns – as though to enter the screening room – where Grace, lost in the past, is watching the film, having already forgotten Diamond's confession. Columbo arrests Diamond, both realizing that by the time he is cleared, Grace will have died. Diamond makes his false confession to Grace who briefly becomes hysterical. Nonetheless, Columbo is prepared to arrest her. This is one of the only two episodes in which the perpetrator is not arrested (the other being "It's All In The Game"), as Ned Diamond ( John Payne), Wheeler's longtime song and dance partner who has always loved Grace, falsely confesses to save her after Columbo informs him she is suffering from a degenerative brain disease (the primary reason her husband refused to finance her return as the physical strain of acting would have killed her) and likely no longer even remembers the murder. It was then, Columbo concludes, that she was out committing the murder.
#COLUMBO UNDERCOVER WIKI MOVIE#
Their elderly butler ( Maurice Evans) believes Grace was in a private screening room the entire time, watching one of her classic films.įinal clue/twist: Columbo believes that a discrepancy between the length of the movie and the time it took Grace Wheeler to watch it, including the few minutes it took her to fix the film after it ripped, proves that Grace spent some time away from the screening room. When elderly physician Henry Willis ( Sam Jaffe) refuses to finance a return to the spotlight for his wife, aging former movie star Grace Wheeler ( Janet Leigh) kills him in his sleep, passing it off as a suicide.
The DVD was released by Universal Studios Home Entertainment. The season originally aired Sundays at 9:00-10:30 pm (EST) as part of The NBC Sunday Mystery Movie.
#COLUMBO UNDERCOVER WIKI SERIES#
Series fans should enjoy this entry, though people unfamiliar with Columbo should probably start with some of the older (and stronger) episodes first before watching this entry.Main article: 1975–76 United States network television schedule It's always nice to see this character, who is a little older but still a brilliant and interesting detective. But I'm glad I saw this entry despite its flaws. Also, there are some predictable touches here and there, though that may be because I know the hero so well by now, I have a good idea how he works. And after Columbo starts to make his investigation, there are a few other places where the story seems unnecessarily padded out. The setup takes far, far longer than usual it takes a long time for Columbo to make his first appearance. While you might think that more Columbo would be great, for this particular mystery it is a problem. The most obvious one is the fact that this entry was designed to fit a two hour time slot, while the older episodes were made for a ninety minute time slot. But at the same time I saw some significant weaknesses. Let me make clear that I didn't hate or merely dislike this entry - I was to a significant degree entertained. The Columbo mysteries definitely beat the offerings of many other shows, even the Columbo entries that aren't as strong as others. Although I am not a fanatic about Columbo, whenever I come across an episode while I'm channel surfing, I take it.
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