The Purpose Of the Ransom Note

Discussion in 'Justice for JonBenet Discussion - Public Forum' started by Learnin, Apr 5, 2010.

  1. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    But why should they be so similar? None of the ransom demand lines in Ruthless People are memorable in themselves whereas there are a couple of lines in the movie I've remembered for 20+ years, to wit "Nice butt....Your dance card is going to be full every night [in prison]." Even though I've seen it several times over the years, it never occurred to me that Ruthless People was connected to the case until it was pointed out on a website somewhere.

    But similar they are, even though the ransom note appears to have been tweaked away from the original by numerous additions and changes like provocation -> provoke and deviate -> deviation.

    Lou Smit's idea that a sociopath would study up on Ruthless People to learn how to conduct a kidnapping is ridiculous because the kidnappers in the movie are utterly inept and tender-hearted.

    And even if Patsy had viewed the movie recently, it's unlikely she'd remember the details of the ransom demand. My reluctant conclusion is that when Patsy realized she needed to write a ransom note, she cued up Ruthless People and fast forwarded to the ransom demand, which is early in the movie. Possibly her early attempts resembled the movie version so closely that she was motivated to rewrite many times. There are nine pages in the middle of the pad missing before the "practice" note.

    (I realize that this hypothesis hinges on Patsy owning a copy of the movie.)
     
  2. Learnin

    Learnin Member

    "But why should they be so similar?" Million dollar question, Fr. B.

    Let me ask you a question before I make a few observations.
    I've never seen this particular movie. What kind of a person would this movie appeal to? Was it a comedy?

    I agree with you about Smit's comment. No one, IMO, would have to study up on how to conduct a kidnapping. A kidnapper knows what they want, how to get it, and makes it short and sweet as possible. This wasn't a darned kidnapping.

    My gut feeling, if Patsy is the author, is that she was pulling these words out of her subconscious. If this is the case, however, it would mean that the movie made no small impression upon her and that she watched it more than once.

    or:
    If she was trying to frame LHP (and I believe this is a very good possibility), might she have known this was a movie which the Hoffman-Pugh's liked a great deal? Maybe they owned it and LHP talked about it and got Patsy to watch it.

    or:
    Was an adolescent or young adult helping Patsy (John) with the wording? Was she talking with someone on the phone?
     
  3. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    The movie is a comedy starring Bette Midler, Danny Devito, Judge Reinhold and Helen Slater. It's rated "R." It was already 10 years-old by the time of the murder. Patsy might own it, especially if she was a Bette Midler fan.

    I don't think that the wording of the ransom demand is memorable enough to have been committed to memory, but when Patsy was fishing around for a template she might have thought about it. The kidnapping was genuine in the movie.

    I don't think an adolescent helped compose the note or that she was on the phone with anyone composing it. Steve Thomas said that there's evidence of a practice note before the "practice" note. I think Patsy spent the missing nine pages getting the note to sound just right. Try doing that with a child at your elbow or while you're on the phone.

    A large part of the movie is devoted to Sam Stone pulling the wool over the cops' eyes because he's actually delighted that his wife's been kidnapped. He puts his hand over his eyes and peeks over it at one point to see how the cops are reacting.
     
  4. Elle

    Elle Member

    Don't you think the Ramseys could have wandered into the room where this movie was being watched at the White's on Christmas night? Don't hear you guys discussing this one at all(?). I think the idea would have already been in Patsy's head then having just come from the Whites(?) Surely those who watched it may have discussed it.

     
  5. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    Maybe Patsy was glued to it, but looking at the script of Nick of Time, I don't see that its language and structure made it into the note. The closest thing I see is "Listen to me. Carefully" and that's spoken by the hero, not the kidnapper.

    Perhaps Nick of Time did give her the idea to stage a kidnapping when she found herself with a half-dead child on her hands. That's not incompatible with using Ruthless People's ransom demand as a template--if she had the movie.
     
  6. Elle

    Elle Member

    Maybe a combination of all of them, not one particular movie (?), but "In the Nick of Time" had to be fresh in both the Ramsey's minds having just come away from the White's home where this movie was just shown. I'll speak for myself here, when I watch a movie, the content stays with me for quite some time after I've seen it and my husband and I discuss it off and on after the movie and even the next day etc. Especially if there are catchy sayings in it that stand out.
     
  7. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    BTW, In 1997 Patsy said that their favorite type of movie was comedy, or rather that John's favorite type of movie was comedy. She didn't seem to have any favorite movies. She just went along with what the men in the house wanted.

    And she didn't have to own Ruthless People as I suggested before; she just needed to have it in the house. She could have rented it or borrowed it from the library. I believe she would have had it on Christmas night, though, unless she had a photographic memory.
     
  8. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    From my perusal of the script, there aren't any catchy lines in it. I also checked one of those "Memorable Quotes" websites. I can't imagine you and your husband spending too much time on any of those, but it is a memorable movie. I remember the hero confiding in the guy shining his shoes, getting him to understand.
     
  9. Learnin

    Learnin Member

    Just like Patsy was peeking through her splayed fingers....hmmmm.
     
  10. Elle

    Elle Member

    I'm talking about the movie which was shown at the White's house while the Ramseys were there, according to this information fb, not Patsy's house. Bette Middler is not in this movie. There are a few movies with the same title.
    I'm thinking this 1995 may be the one.

    This movie (1995) is not a comedy. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0113972/ Genres:Crime | Drama | Thriller

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCrqRQi73us

    Gene Watson is a public accountant who arrives on a train at Union Station in Los Angeles, accompanied by his 6-year-old daughter Lynn. Because of his ordinary looks, he is approached by a pair of sinister people named Smith and Jones. Pretending to be cops, Smith and Jones kidnap Lynn and confront Gene with a simple choice -- kill California governor Eleanor Grant in 90 minutes or less, or Lynn will die. Watson is given a gun, six bullets, and a name tag, and he is told to go to the Westin Bonaventure Hotel and kill Eleanor, who is giving an afternoon speech. While Jones is watching Lynn in a van, Smith watches Watson in order to prevent Watson from alerting the authorities. Watson must quickly find some way to get himself and Lynn out of this seemingly impossible situation. Written by Todd Baldridge

    Quote:
    <TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%"><TBODY><TR><TD style="BORDER-BOTTOM: 1px inset; BORDER-LEFT: 1px inset; BORDER-TOP: 1px inset; BORDER-RIGHT: 1px inset" class=alt2>http://www.acandyrose.com/crimescene-ransomnote.htm

    Movie "In the Nick of Time"

    1999 February 18 - Lawrence Schillers book "Perfect
    Murder, Perfect Town

    Page 225:

    "On the night JonBenet was murdered, the movie 'Nick of Time' aired at 7:30 P.M. on a Boulder cable channel. The story centers on an unarmed political faction that kidnaps a six-year-old girl. The victim is told, "Listen to me very carefully.' Bill Cox, who was staying with Fleet and Priscilla White, told the police he remembered watching the movie that night."





    </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
    <!-- / message --><!-- sig -->__________________
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Oct 25, 2010
  11. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    I know, Elle. I've seen both Ruthless People and Nick of Time. I looked at both scripts and the "memorable quotes" for both.

    While I think a recent viewing of NoT might have inspired Patsy to stage a kidnapping, I see hardly any resemblance in language between that movie and the ransom note.
     
  12. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    The cops in Ruthless People are impenetrably dense. That must have given Patsy hope.
     
  13. Elle

    Elle Member

    I'm thinking Lawrence Schiller probably picked this movie because it was shown at the Whites that fatal night the 26th December, 1996. because the Ramseys were there and must have either watched some of it or heard the others talking about it(?). It's all assumption, I realize this!
     
  14. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    Yeah. I don't think it's an either/or situation.

    I'm not sure when the similarities between Ruthless People's ransom demand and the ransom note were noticed (or when they became public knowledge). Maybe this was something the police were aware of all along. Maybe it's something Donald Foster noticed. (It would be just like him.) And maybe Lou Smit divulged it.

    According to jameson, Smit said the Ramseys didn't have "such movies [as Dirty Harry, Speed, Nick of Time and Ruthless People] in their home." (That's kind of a funny way to say it. Why not say they didn't have those movies in their home.)

    But the note does show signs of being worked over to obscure similarities between RP and RN. Remember in high school when you wanted to use a line in a research paper, but you already had too many direct quotes? You had to rework lines that already seemed well-nigh perfect. So you get down to the business of changing verbs to their noun forms and vice versa. You change a word here and there. Change active to passive voice. Blend in lines from other sources. That sort of thing.

    If Ruthless People really wasn't in the house, I'd say it went the way of the duct tape.
     
  15. Elle

    Elle Member

  16. fr brown

    fr brown Member

  17. Elle

    Elle Member

    Yes, these youtubes are great! I haven't had the chance to get back here and check them all out. My husband would enjoy this one. He likes comedies. I like suspense!

    I heard the phone call to Danny about "listen carefully" and put the money in a case etc. I can see what you mean about there being more similarities to the ransom note.
     
  18. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    And that's all you remember from it even though you were on the look-out for resemblances. The ransom demand just isn't that memorable (except maybe for the three instances of "if..., she will be killed.")
     
  19. Elle

    Elle Member

    I plan to look at it again fb without rushing through it. I can still hear the guy calling Danny DeVito repeating many times "Do you understand?" more than I can remember anything else right now.

    I can well imagine the panic Patsy Ramsey was in, desperate to create a ransom note from a foreign faction. I wonder just how long it took her to actually write this (?). Just to sit down and copy it would take some time too. Patsy was so desperate to make it believable and all the time she was actually hanging herself. What a terrible situation to be in with your six year old daughter dead from your own actions. It's a wonder she didn't commit suicide (?).
     
  20. DeeDee

    DeeDee Member

    Patsy had stage 4 ovarian cancer. She knew she was going to die at some point. And I think she believed she'd be with JB again. But committing suicide, for Christian faiths at least, eliminates any chance for your soul to reach Heaven. Despite what Patsy may have done to JB, Patsy saw her actions as being the result of tremendous stress and rage, and as such, not subject to the kind of penalty (from God) as it would be for a killing in other circumstances, and if she was only covering up for someone (BR?) she would not have viewed that as punishable either. Or at least that is what she told herself.
    But committing suicide would keep her from JB forever, as it is viewed as an unforgivable sin against God.
    Personally, from my experiences with the afterlife, NO sin is "unforgivable" to a God with infinite capacity for mercy and love. BUT we have to forgive ourselves when we die- and that isn't always easy because we then see how our selfish actions have hurt our loved ones.
     
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