Hamilton "Ham" Nash (James Coburn) is a private investigator working for an agency. The "Old man" who runs the agency sends him to investigate a diamond heist. Nothing seems to add up. One diamond was on the stoop, apparently dropped by the thief. The rest of the diamonds were tiny and hardly worth stealing. Looking around the house, the thief would have to ignore far more valuable stuff to take the diamonds. Nash has an odd encounter with the daughter, Gabrielle, who claims to be suffering the Dain Curse. Nash has hardly begun the investigation when the diamonds are recovered, and the thief is found dead. Nash realizes there is more to this heist than meets the eye.
This made for TV miniseries is a convoluted mess that takes several short stories and stiches them into a single meandering narrative. The 3-hour version is incomplete, having sliced out large chunks from the full miniseries. At the end of one scene, Gabrielle is holding a bloody knife and confessing to a murder while her fiancé and Nash stand nearby. Then, practically the next scene, there is a discussion of her husband's murder and her kidnapping. Huh? When did he get killed? When was the wedding? What kidnapping?! There are several times that Nash or someone else refers to an event or conversation that was not shown. Who edited this cut? Entirely too much time is dedicated to Nash's efforts to cure Gabrielle of morphine addiction.
Nash is a keen investigator and seldom misses clues. However, I had picked out the main villain fairly early and was a bit disappointed that it took Nash so much longer. Coburn is good in the role and may even be terrific in the full cut, but the Amazon cut is confusing and incomplete.
Skip.
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