Robert Smythe (Charles Dance) is exactly the kind of chief executive who
worries much more about a dent in his car than firing his employees. But then
he learns a woman is trying to trace someone who drove an MG 20 years ago, for
some unknown reason. & Robert did drive an MG 20 years ago, but not only
that, he caused a hit-&-run accident that killed a 10-year old girl. To
find out what the woman tracing the MG, Jane (Francesca Brill) really wants, he
decides to make friends with her, without of course ltting her know who he is.
He can't find out what she wants from the MG owner though, but sees that Jane's
investigations point more & more towards his direction. All this -
understandably - puts him under a terrible stress, that even affects his
priovate life, & he gets into more & more fights with his wife Margaret
(Zoe Wanamaker), who desperately wants a child from him but he refuses. Eventually
Robert hooks up with Jane again, & finds out she has now finally traaced
him down, with name & everything - only she still doesn't know that he is
in fact himself, so he decides to strangle her in cold blood. The next day:
While Robert reads in the paper about the unresolved murder of Jane, Margaret
opens a letter that Jane has sent before her demise ... a letter that is
telling her that Jane is hr daughter from another relationship, whom she had
given away years before she had met Robert. Now the girl wanted to find her,
but all she had to go on was that Margaret's husband was riding an MG 20
years ago ... The direction is a bit stagey perhaps, & the
story is a bit predictable, sure, but still it is quite effectively told &
of course profits from excellent actors.
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