This Case Is Closed

Joseph Cotten and Sharon Gless are the guest stars in this expanded 90 minute Rockford Files episode where poor James Garner is left in the dark almost to the end in terms of just what is going on. Cotten and Gless are father and daughter, rich father and rich daughter that is.

Gless is about to be married to a man who never has a word of dialog, but who is described in great detail by Cotten and Gless. Of course their assessments are radically different. Cotten wants his prospective son-in-law investigated as a more than concerned father as the episode reveals.

The very minute Rockford starts poking around though he gets totally stonewalled and given lots of persuasion to be discouraged, the Feds, some gangsters, the Newark Police because Cotten suspects the man originated from Newark, all of them don't help a bit. In fact they're downright unfriendly.

At one point though I didn't see why James McEachin representing the FBI should not have just clued Rockford in as to what he was getting involved in. I won't because you might want to see the episode to find out. I think some will guess, still though it's not a bad Rockford Files show.

This episode is particularly interesting because of the differences between it and most episodes of the series. Right from the top, there is a different camera shot across the desk as the phone machine takes the incoming message. The cards and picture of Rocky are there, but the shot is hand held and wider than the one we usually see. After Jim's trailer is trashed, he asks Rocky to clean it up for him. But in a line written more for Robert Donley's characterization of Rocky in the pilot, Jim then asks: "how much is it gonna cost me?" Noah Berry Jr. immediately answers with all the warmth and love he brought to the role saying "Oh go on, I'm still your father, I ain't gonna charge you!" In one little moment we see how much better this show is with the right man playing Rocky. In other small changes, Rockford's trailer is parked in a different lot than the usual Paradise cove location we're used to seeing and its photographed differently on the outside--the trailer door now faces to the north rather than the south. Okay, maybe these differences aren't all that interesting to you, but they were to me!

The episode itself is rather solid with Joseph Cotton making a wonderful arrogant client for Rockford. It's too bad he did not return to the series. It originally aired as a 90 minute movie. The syndication version cuts it up into two episodes.

While watching this episode I found a new vibe in the soundtrack in the front half. Would not be surprised if some later superstars weren't moonlighting on the set. Groovy sound.

I haven't seen every episode of "The Rockford Files", but it was a consistently high-quality program, with Jim investigating all types of crimes, not just the implausible murders that make most other crime shows generally unbelievable.

Of course, every series has poor episodes, and this one (along with its second part) is a, if not the, series' low point.

The problem isn't the story, which has the Feds trying to keep Jim from learning the truth about a man Joseph Cotton (yes, that Joseph Cotten) doesn't want his daughter to marry. There's only one logical reason why, but Stephen J Cannell's smart dialog effectively distracts the viewer.

A lot of distraction is needed, as this is a five-pound story packed in a ten-pound sack. (Yes, you read that right.) It's spread over two episodes, with plane flights, long car rides, and Jim being repeatedly kidnapped. One suspects this was done for budgetary and/or scheduling problems (not unlike Star Trek's "The Cage").

It's a tedious bore, and the brisk, tight ending suggests that the rest of the original screenplay must have been a lot tighter.

Of course, any "Rockford Files" episode is better than the best episodes from just about any other crime series. But this one is far from the series' best.

Originally aired as a ninety minute presentation, the only print of this episode now available seems to be a version prepared for syndication, which re-edits the material into two one-hour episodes. This means that an extra 25 minutes of footage was needed to fill the new running time...and here's (roughly) how it breaks down:

• An extra opening and closing theme eats up 90 seconds.

• There's a brief episode 2 preview at the end of episode 1, lasting maybe a minute.

• There's a seven-minute recap of episode 1 at the beginning of episode 2.

• Even with the recap, the closing scene of episode 1 (with Rocky and Jim) is partially repeated (though edited) in the opening moments of episode 2. Another minute gobbled up.

• Every single time any character goes somewhere by car (which happens a LOT in this episode), we are treated to long, loving stock footage recreations of their journey. Shots are reused and repeated frequently, in order to lengthen the on-screen travel time; it doesn't take too much skill to notice cars going around the same corner again and again. This footage of cars essentially driving in circles takes up a good ten or more minutes of screen time.

• Stock footage of a plane landing is seen twice. Another minute or so.

• Any time someone retrieves information via computer? Long, tedious footage of whirring 1970s computers and/or punch cards are shown. Another precious 30 seconds added.

• When we see the Federal building, we then see pointless stock footage of office workers inside, stretching things for maybe another 15 seconds

• Most egregiously, three short, completely disposable (and poorly-acted) scenes are ineptly added in. All three scenes are shot so that no character is seen on-screen, even though dialogue is spoken. The first of these scenes has a police lieutenant giving orders to a subordinate (heard over an interoffice talk-box). The second "extra" scene features some particularly terrible voice actors talking about the results of a fire, over much stock footage of ambulances at a night-time crime scene. And the third added scene is -- against all odds -- an even bigger waste of time, with characters in The Federal Buliding discussing Rockford's arrival, again over an intercom. All told, maybe another two minutes here.

That's a grand total of 25 minutes of momentum-destroying footage that makes this two-part episode almost unwatchable. Mind you, there's a good story under all this mess, and some scenes with James Garner and Joseph Cotten that really crackle. (Sharon Gless is very good, too.) But the utterly maddening padding just never lets up; a full quarter of this two-part episode is made up of boring, repetitive, inept, and/or redundant footage, and it just kills any momentum dead.

Why Bernard Kowalski agreed to keep his name on this re-edited farce is beyond me. If ever something called out for an Allen Smithee credit? This two-part hatchet job is it.