Original subtitles

(siren wailing)

- I heard some talk back there.

How can this be a hunting accident?

Hunting's a hobby of mine.

I didn't know anything was in season.

- Just us.

- They know who did it?

- Yeah, they know who did it.

(siren wailing)

(siren wailing)

- Murdock.

I got the girl's statement, I need yours now.

- It can wait.

- So can heaven.

I know how you feel.

- Do you?

I'm sorry.

- We all put in an eight hour day,

part of mine is your statement.

Let's go sit in the car.

(traffic noise)

Names, places, times, the whole enchiladas.

- Where you want to start?

- From the top.

From the time you and Stiles met her last night.

- That's not the top.

You gotta go back before that.

Yesterday afternoon.

You ever had a day when you're grateful just to be alive?

And you get your kicks from just breathing the air?

Well that was us yesterday.

Here we were, about as far as you can get with four wheels

on Route 66.

A little richer, if you figure 632 bucks in the bank

is rich.

A little older, but not much smarter.

We were sure about only one thing.

We were going to spend three full days

in one of the plushest pads on the coast,

eating only what comes under glass,

drinking nothing but champagne,

working on nothing but our suntans,

and whatever other little chore we might pick up

here and there.

We checked right in.

First cabin, a suite on the beach.

(waves crashing)

- If you gotta comb a beach, this is the place to do it.

- What to do and where to do it.

We don't need their advice on that.

Hey.

Isn't this the same chick who paraded by us upstairs?

- [Tod] In the flesh.

- Song stylist Kitty Parker.

Appears nightly at 8 PM in the Surf Bar.

- We got plans for 8 PM?

- I got plans for 8 PM.

The Surf Bar.

- I dunno.

She looks more like my type.

- Your type?

Who's the music buff in this wing?

Who speaks the language?

- Who wants to talk?

- With a chick like this, you gotta play it glissando.

- Translation?

- Cool.

Like I say to her, "baby, I don't dig the fuzzy stuff,

but the hard bop really knocks me out."

Now she tags me for the progressive time.

How are you gonna gas her if you don't know the difference

between a flatted fifth and a raised seventh?

That's a stout fellow.

You'll find something else.

I'm sure.

- Here.

Unpack.

(grunts)

(slow jazz piano music)

♪ I don't know why

♪ But I'm feeling so sad

♪ I long to try something I've never had

♪ Never had no kissing

♪ Mm, what I've been missing

♪ Lover man, oh where can you be

♪ The night is cold

♪ And I'm so alone

♪ I'd give my soul just to call you my own

♪ Got a moon above me

♪ Need someone to love me

♪ Lover man, oh where can you be

♪ I've heard it said

♪ That the thrill of romance can be

- Mr. Murdock.

♪ Like a heavenly dream

Thank you.

♪ I go to bed

♪ With a prayer that you'll make love to me

- I finish this set at 8:30.

Kitty.

How'd you do it?

- Sent her a note.

Told her I was a pupil of Sticky Mack.

- Sticky Mack?

- He's one of the greatest.

Played with a full left hand.

Cover a lot of keyboard.

- Sticky Mack.

- Sticky Mack.

♪ Then whisper sweet little things in my ears

♪ Huggin' and a-kissin'

♪ Ooh, what I've been missing

♪ Lover man, oh where can you be

(crowd applauding)

- [Buz] That's when it started.

When I made the date with Kitty Parker.

If I hadn't, none of the rest of it would've happened.

At least, not to Tod.

It turned out Kitty preferred a crowd to company,

so the three of us took off to a jazz spot on the highway.

She said she had a surprise for me

if I really was the jazz aficionado I claimed to be.

Gabe Johnson?

Gabe Johnson here?

Hey.

- You pass.

I thought maybe you were just a tin ear.

- Oh.

- But you dig Gabe Johnson.

- Wow.

- Incandescent.

- I don't get it, what is he doing here?

- Oh, Gabe lives in Malibu Canyon.

He always jams at the lodge the night before a concert.

- Wow.

- You're not going tomorrow night?

The Civic Auditorium?

The whole program's Gabe.

The pure Gabe.

- Well look, we're not straight yet,

we just got on the scene.

- Oh.

- Hey, who's Gabe Johnson?

- What?

- A kite with no string.

A horn full of helium.

- Hey square, did you ever hear of Maynard Ferguson?

Miles Davis?

Chet Baker.

- Trumpet.

- Well you put Gabe at the top of that list.

Maybe the all-time greatest.

Right?

- Right.

- [Host] Hello Kitty.

- Hi, how are you?

- How are you?

- Fine. - Good to see you.

Have a nice table for you.

- Thank you.

(band playing jazz music)

(crowd cheering and applauding)

- [Buz] We left about 10 before midnight.

Kitty didn't want to leave because,

well, Gabe had a couple of hours more left in his horn.

(chuckles)

But I managed to convince her.

(engine starts)

That's what bugs me.

Just one minute, either side of that split second,

either before or right after, we'd have missed it.

(tires squealing)

(crashing)

- Please call the sheriff.

- Maybe we should call a doctor.

- [Woman] No, I want the sheriff.

- The sheriff?

- My husband did it.

He set fire to the house,

and then he fixed the brakes so they wouldn't work.

He knew I'd run, so he fixed the brakes.

He wants me dead.

My husband wants me dead!

- Jana.

- Get away.

You get her away from me.

You're all friends of his.

You all want me dead!

- I heard she was a flip.

Man, they weren't kidding.

- Leave me alone.

Please leave me alone!

- Who is she?

- Jana Johnson.

Gabe's wife.

Isn't that the end?

- Okay, I'll call the sheriff.

(suspenseful music)

- Does she have to take all of this down?

- [Sheriff] Attempted murder.

It's a serious charge.

- Are you sure they called the right number?

- South Hampton, Long Island, 1420.

Check.

- Mother's always there in May.

And even if she weren't, there's the cook and the chauffer,

and Mrs. Allen the housekeeper, now somebody should answer.

- Why don't you try the townhouse?

- No.

No, she wouldn't be there this time of the year.

Of course, I have been away two years.

People do change, even Mother.

Yes, why don't we try that, it's Plaza 43264.

- That's Manhattan, and collect.

I'm holding a notebook in which I have written, I quote,

"my husband tried to kill me tonight."

Let's fool around with that a little bit, okay?

- I don't want to talk anymore.

- I do.

Back at the highway, you were a whole lot more talkative.

- I just want Mother.

I know that sounds infantile, but that's really all I want,

just to be home and to forget.

- "Gabe left at 8:30, as usual he locked me in."

- It's hard to believe.

The great Gabe Johnson, so jealous

he has to lock his wife in every time he leaves the house.

- "About 11, I smelled smoke.

I ran into the bedroom and saw flames

coming from the bathroom.

I broke a window and managed to climb down to the ground.

I discovered Gabe's car in the carport."

- I should've known he left it there deliberately,

just as he set the fire deliberately.

The fire didn't get me, the car would.

- He left the keys in the ignition?

- Well, it's 10 miles down that mountain road,

he knew I'd be afraid to talk down there alone in the dark,

so he left the car with the keys.

- And gimmicked up the breaks.

- Lieutenant, there's no answer on that Plaza call.

- Thanks Red.

(phone ringing)

- She must be there.

- For you, Lieutenant.

- Excuse me.

- Mangano, Malibu.

Oh yeah, Chief.

Mhmm.

Thanks.

That fire you say Gabe started

turns out to have been a short in the wiring

behind the wall, Mrs. Johnson.

Now maybe he got it going good and replastered the wall

and repainted before he kissed you goodnight

and went down to the lodge, now how does that sound?

- I don't blame you for being fooled.

Look at me.

I'm the queen of fools.

I fell in love with him.

- Now look, Mrs. Johnson, I'm a vet.

14 years married and I got the scars to prove it.

We all do crazy things when we have a spat at home.

Now Fred's gonna take you back up the mountain.

Oh you're lucky.

The fire burned itself out

before it could do too much damage.

- I'm not going up that road again.

As long as I live, I'm not going back to that house again.

- Jana?

They just called the lodge.

See what happens when you go out without me?

- She says you locked her in, Gabe.

Anything to it?

- It's personal, Frank.

- You left your car tonight, why?

- No brakes, those hills up there burned them out.

I asked Cooty to come up and pick me up tonight.

Charlie's Garage is supposed to tow it in tomorrow

and reline them.

- Thanks fellas.

Miss Parker.

- Hi Kitty, I saw you come in tonight.

- You must've used a telescope.

You were on cloud nine.

- Yeah.

They tell me you boys helped Jana, I wanna thank you.

- They're gonna keep on helping me, Gabe.

I'm going with them.

- Jana, cut it out, you're embarrassing me.

- I'll give you $1000.

- Jana, I don't want to say anything, but--

- I can get it.

My mother will send it to me.

- Sure honey, sure.

Look, you gotta be as embarrassed as I am.

- Why is she shaking?

- I don't know.

- It might just be she's frightened.

- Look, why don't we leave it this way for now.

We'll give her a lift.

- How about that, Lieutenant?

Any law against it?

- As long as you keep it under 55.

- Come on Jana, let's go.

- No!

No, no!

(dramatic music)

- [Buz] Jana latched onto us like somebody riding the subway

for the first time, standing up,

each hand looped in a strap.

So we took her back to our place.

It was just past two.

It's hard for me to realize that's two this morning,

and that this is still the same day.

- I'll close those.

- No.

No, he could sneak in here.

We wouldn't be able to see him coming.

No, this way he can stand out there in the dark

and look in and see I'm not doing anything.

Just sitting here, waiting for Mother to take me home.

- Well how about a fire?

- Yeah, or maybe a drink.

- Yeah.

- I'm not crazy, you know.

- Nobody said anything.

- He put me on a pedestal and put an ivory tower around me.

- What's so bad about that?

- It is when you have to live alone in it.

You can't escape.

I'm just a defeated minority of one.

The fan who got away.

Great Gabe Johnson.

Naturally around here, you'll only hear his side of it.

People call me the flip Gabe found at Carnegie Hall.

Imagine being married to Gabe Johnson, they think.

Who can be unhappy?

Who needs friends or family or money?

Who needs anything, as long as you've got Gabe?

- I know a lot of chicks who would just jump at that chance.

- I don't blame them.

I worshiped at that shrine once too.

I'd sit at his feet and just feel myself being lifted

right off the floor,

just listening to the music he can make.

I'd think to myself,

Jana, you got a bird from outer space.

A spirit in a man's body.

Something from a place that the mind can't even reach.

The more I'd listen, the more I came to know Gabe,

the more I knew he's hardly human.

He's searching to get back to wherever it is he came from.

And he plays like that.

As if he knows that the perfect combination of sounds,

the perfect tempo put together just right

will take him off in a sudden flash of light.

It's like he says,

"when I get it going right, Jana, I start to move up.

Like riding moon beams.

I start to disappear."

- Here.

This is all there is in the house, but maybe it'll help.

- You mustn't think I feel sorry for myself.

Just that I'm sick of his jealousy.

I'm glad to get out.

- If you're out of it, why the gun?

- Because I'll never be out of it until I leave California.

I am leaving this time, no matter what he says.

Even if I have to use this.

- [Buz] She didn't leave that chair all night.

Just sat there, holding the gun and waiting.

(waves crashing)

- Look, why don't you go ahead?

I'll stick around, otherwise she'll really flip.

- All right.

She ought to get some sleep.

If she does drop off, see if you can get

that gun away from her.

Gee, it's been a long time since I rode a downwind force.

Come on out with me, she'll be all right.

- Nah, I don't think so.

We promised one of us would stay around.

Besides, the world may lose a number one trumpet.

She hasn't taken her finger off the trigger all night.

Come on, I'll give you a hand.

- I'll take it out for about an hour

and then you can give it a whirl

and I'll stand guard over Mob Barker.

- No thanks, I can't steer one of these things.

Besides, who needs China?

- They need you.

You know you could start a whole chain of car washes.

- Yeah?

Why?

- They're ready for them.

They got a whole chain of brain washers.

So you make a tie up, get your car and your brain washed

all at the same time.

Two for the price of one.

- Coat the barge.

(jazz trumpet playing)

- [Woman] Morning.

- Is he up there with you?

- Yeah.

On stereo.

- Oh great.

- You like it?

- Yeah, I might even vote for it.

- The solo.

- You gotta needle her this morning?

- You had breakfast yet?

- Yeah, all night long.

Three pots of coffee.

- I don't like to eat alone.

I'll meet you by the pool.

- I'm going upstairs to get some breakfast.

Look, why don't you come along?

House rule, you have to check your gun

before you get orange juice.

It was just Kitty upstairs with one of his albums.

- I gotta hold onto something, Buz.

Let me hold onto this.

- When you got a tiger by the tail, Jana,

you get rid of it.

- It's his, he doesn't know I have it.

- But I do.

Come on, wash your face.

Come on up for some breakfast.

- What time is it in New York right now?

- 11:00.

- You go ahead, I'll be up in a minute.

(suspenseful music)

- How's the coffee?

- Fine.

- Mind?

- No.

You're being taken.

- Oh?

- Has she asked you for money yet?

- With a rich mother?

- Oh.

I got a picture of that rich mother.

- Okay, so maybe she exaggerated a little bit.

So they don't have a townhouse.

- Oh, and all that jazz last night in front of the sheriff,

about how jealous Gabe is.

Why, it's the other way around.

And that blue beard bit.

Quote, "As usual, Gabe locked me in," unquote.

Isn't that a gasser.

Oh, Buz honey, you've got a flip on your hands.

- Last night when we were waiting for the daylight,

she kept calling and calling.

- Trying to reach Mother?

- That and other people.

Some of the names flipped my buddy Tod,

right out of the top 20 social register.

She knew them all, she called them all.

- So?

- Well, she didn't score.

They all turned her down, that's what bugged me.

She kept getting more desperate and insistent,

angry at them.

She just couldn't believe they wouldn't answer her.

- Well, I'm a couch job too.

A four year case.

But I'll find myself.

- Be glad to help you look.

- Where would you start?

- Well that depends on whether it's a question

or a challenge.

(chuckles)

- Silly boy.

(suspenseful music)

- I'll use it, Gabe.

(dramatic music)

I'll use it, Gabe.

- If you have to, honey, better that way maybe.

All night long I wanted to go in there and get you.

- I could feel you outside.

- I stayed out there and I kept saying, now cool it,

cool it, decrescendo.

Oh Jan.

You'll never know.

It was cold out there at the window with the water.

Who were you talking with?

- Mother's friends.

My friends, I thought.

Just goes to show, when Mother cuts you off,

you're cut off from the ankles.

Nobody would talk to me, Gabe.

I've been exiled.

- Come on.

(waves crashing)

- Gabe, tell me I'm wrong about the brakes.

- Baby, when are you gonna learn?

It's just us, just you and me, in our own private universe.

Do you think I could hurt you?

- You and me and whatever it is you're afraid of.

- What do you mean, afraid?

- Afraid of my leaving, for one thing.

- Come on now, deny you haven't tried.

You're always telling me how lonely it is

living on a mountain top,

and how things aren't working out between us,

how much you miss Mommy and all the goodies

Mommy can buy for you.

- Oh, don't start in on me again, Gabe.

- All right.

All right, but don't deny you haven't tried to leave me.

- I don't like being locked up.

And you act as if I'm some medieval lady

and you're off on a crusade.

You've got to lock me in a tower.

I can't stand that, Gabe.

- All right, baby.

I'm sorry.

We'll cut it out, it's kids' stuff.

Let's go home now.

- What else are you afraid of?

When sometimes I feel as though

you're trying to hold onto time.

As though if you let go of it, it'll fly away from you,

or you from it.

Which is it, Gabe?

When you let yourself get so far out,

you don't even know I'm around,

why try to hold onto me?

What do you want?

- You heard of Gabriel?

Blow your horn?

That's me.

If I can blow bright enough or blue enough or pure enough,

something lifts and I can see right out

across the footlights.

All the way up to where it never ends.

That's a place to go.

- Only you can go, Gabe.

- Come on baby, let's go home, huh?

- [Announcer] Telephone for Mrs. Jana Johnson.

Telephone for Mrs. Jana Johnson, please.

- Hello?

Yes, this is Jana Johnson.

Yes, I would like to talk to him.

Henry?

Oh, I'm so glad to reach you.

Well I tried to call Mother all last night,

and no one would answer.

I called everyone I could think of.

No one would talk to me.

I didn't think you'd call me back.

Well, being Mother's attorney and handling all that

messy stuff, cutting me out of the will.

How is she?

Henry, why didn't you let me know?

Yes.

Yes Henry, I'll meet you when you come in.

Yes, send me a wire.

Well no wonder no one would talk to me.

Why didn't you tell me?

- You would've left me.

Gone back to all that money.

What would you want with me anymore?

Jan, if I can't have you, nobody can.

- I gave her up for you.

- Please.

Please.

Sure, on the stand, I'm great.

As long as I'm up there, I'm great, I know that.

I can feel it and be sure.

When I come off, I'm nothing, I'm nowhere.

I need you, Jan.

I need you to lean on, I need you to get me through.

You.

I've got to hold onto you.

- Two whole months.

Two whole months she's been dead,

and all that time you hid it from me.

You wouldn't even let me go to my own mother's funeral!

You get out.

If I ever see you again, if you ever come near me again,

I'll kill you.

So help me, I'll kill you!

- Kill me, what do I care?

Kill me, what do I care!

- [Buz] There's a thing they say in jazz circles.

The guys who speak the inside language,

when they figure somebody's too much,

they say "he's something else."

It's the most compliment they can give.

If any side men had been with us this morning

and seen how Jana held onto herself,

how she kissed off a husband

and buried a mother inside a few seconds,

if they'd have seen her like we did,

they'd have said "she's something else, this kid."

- What time does Mr. Gleason's flight get in?

- 11 o'clock tonight.

- Listen, how long has it been

since you had something to eat?

- Well I know she hasn't had breakfast.

- I have too many things to do before tonight.

- [Buz] Oh?

- The most important things in the world.

- [Buz] Like what?

- I have to stand on street corners

and enjoy being jostled by real flesh and blood people.

Strangers.

Where else can you turn but to people in the street?

People like you, Buz, and you, Tod.

- Jana?

I feel like last season's swap tune.

All I can say is, you can fool all the people all the time.

Anyway, I tore up my ticket to his concert tonight,

and I'd break his records, but they cut them

on some kind of plastic.

They bend, but they won't break.

- When I get back, we'll burn them.

- I'll keep the home fires burning.

Anyway, lots of luck Jana.

- Goodbye Katie.

- Bye bye.

(upbeat jazz music)

- [Buz] It was 10 past 11.

I know because when I turned on the radio,

I saw the clock at the same time.

We all got one of those little kicks in the teeth

life hands you now and then.

One of those ironies that's only supposed to happen

to somebody else.

(jazz trumpet playing)

- No.

No, leave it on.

This is gonna happen wherever there's music.

I can't go around not listening,

or turning off all the radios.

(dramatic music)

- Jana!

(gun fires)

(tires squealing)

- Well, Tod was shot.

I saw the blood, but I just couldn't believe it.

Car stopped, crowd gathered,

somebody said something about

it was a hunter up there in the hills,

and we looked, we saw a car.

The back end of a car was going up a dirt road.

- Cooty's car.

He must've borrowed Cooty's car.

- I got that down here, Mrs. Johnson.

She thinks Gabe did it, trying for her.

What do you think?

- I think I'll find him and ask him.

- No.

You won't do that.

We'll do it.

- Is there a law against looking?

- Me.

- Oh.

- Not good enough?

Oh, now you know the problem here in the hospital,

they're short of beds.

You go looking for Gabe Johnson,

they may not have room for you

when they carry you back in.

Feet first, that is if you're lucky.

Now, down at the morgue, we're not so crowded.

Go the message?

- So long, kid.

- I'm going with you.

- She didn't hear you either.

- Very brave.

- What else can we do?

- Let us do our job.

You two stay in protective custody until it's done.

- But he's got a gun.

- We've got a couple of our own guns too.

- I don't want him dead.

Look, haven't I got enough to forget already?

- We're going upstairs, Lieutentant, be with Tod a while.

I'd appreciate if you get one of your men

to bring the Corvette over.

We'll be needing it later.

Thanks.

(slow jazz music)

(tires squealing)

- Get out.

Back!

Back!

Jana, come home, please!

(honking horn)

- Gabe, no, please!

(siren wailing)

(waves crashing)

- Find him.

- Are you all right?

- Yeah.

- Couldn't shoot?

- Something like that.

- Well, he won't get far.

Of course, we're still looking for the one guy

I said that about three years ago.

Now look, Mrs. Johnson.

If we're ever gonna pick up your husband

so we don't hurt anybody else and we don't hurt him,

please, lay off the grandstand stuff, okay?

Why don't you go sit in a bar somewhere, the two of you?

And wait for your lawyer to take you back to New York.

They did a good job on your buddy.

They took the bullet out.

- How is he?

- Oh, he's sore.

- Well, a couple of hours, you'll be on a plane to New York.

- No.

I can't leave him now.

Not with the police after him with no place to go,

all alone, no one to go to.

I gotta find him.

- You know, just looking at you,

you'd never take you for an heiress.

I was sure.

Mean that as a compliment.

- Oh, we're trained not to show it.

- Think Gabe married you for your money?

- No.

No, Gabe never cared anything about money.

Just music.

- And you.

- Buz?

I think I know where he might be.

- Waiter?

Can you bring me a phone?

(knocking)

(jazz trumpet playing)

- No, let him play.

(crying)

- Where do they go from here?

- Who knows where a judge or a doctor will send him.

She goes East.

- Oh?

Or does she stay and wait?

(slow jazz piano playing)

♪ I want a Sunday kind of love

♪ A love to last past Saturday night

♪ I'd like to know it's more than love at first sight

♪ I want a Sunday kind of love

♪ I want a love that's on the square

♪ Can't seem to find somebody to care

♪ I'm on a lonely road that leads me nowhere

♪ I need a Sunday kind of love

- We have your call now, Mr. Murdock.

- Oh, thanks.

How you doing, old buddy?

- Nevermind that.

Just tell them to cut our room rent in half.

Why should we pay the full 30 bucks a day

when only half the group is there?

- Already taken care of that.

As a matter of fact, with the money we're saving,

we can afford champagne.

- Yeah, why champagne?

- Why champagne?

Tod, I'm drinking to your speedy recovery.

Oh, Kitty sends her best.

♪ I need someone to unfold

♪ To keep me warm when Mondays are cold

- You like that?

Well, maybe not her very best seeing as where

you're hardly in condition for that.

Night.

♪ Want a Sunday kind of love

(crowd applauding)

(upbeat jazz piano music)

- [Announcer] This has been a Screen Jams film presentation

from Columbia Pictures,

Herbert B. Leonard, executive producer.