Columbo: Undercover

TV Movie
1994
PG
1h 38m

IMDb RATING

YOUR RATING

Cop Drama Police Procedural Crime Drama Mystery

Lt. Columbo goes undercover to solve an unusual double murder in which two men have apparently killed each other over a puzzling piece of paper, which sends Columbo and the homicide bureau i... Read allLt. Columbo goes undercover to solve an unusual double murder in which two men have apparently killed each other over a puzzling piece of paper, which sends Columbo and the homicide bureau into a wild goose chase.Lt. Columbo goes undercover to solve an unusual double murder in which two men have apparently killed each other over a puzzling piece of paper, which sends Columbo and the homicide bureau into a wild goose chase.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

6.9/10

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

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9:57

Storyline

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Did you know

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Trivia
This is the fifth of six appearances by Peter Falk's second wife Shera Danese on the series.

Goofs
When Columbo shows up at Mo Weinberg's apartment, he looks through the key hole and sees Mo straight ahead in the kitchen, and then he sees Mo move across the apartment to his bedroom. The first problem is that a keyhole that can be seen through would require a skeleton key, and no apartment in any big city, such as L.A., would still be using skeleton keys in 1994 -at least not as the sole lock for a front door. However, assuming that the skeleton keyhole was in that door, then the second problem is that Columbo would have been able to see only straight ahead, i.e., tunnel vision. People are not able to pan across the room through a keyhole.

Quotes
Geraldine Ferguson: What's your real name?
Columbo: Lieutenant Columbo.
Geraldine Ferguson: Your first name.
Columbo: Lieutenant.

Connections
Featured in Columbo: Undercover

Soundtracks
This Old Man
Traditional children's song

User reviews39

Featured review

8/10

Ed McBain fans take note:

When you watch this movie, you will immediately notice that it does not follow the standard "Columbo" formula in which you know who the murderer is right from the start. Instead, we get a genuine mystery. That's because this movie is based on Ed McBain's novel "Jigsaw", originally published in 1970. This was one of his 87th Precinct mysteries, which did not originally feature Columbo.

Columbo is substituted for several different characters from the book, alternating from scene-to-scene. Sometimes he's the book's Detective Carella, other times he takes over for Detective Brown, who also appears in the movie. As confusing as this may sound, the movie is actually a very faithful adaptation of the book - even the pieces of the photo are identical to the illustrations in the book.

BTW, this isn't the only recent Columbo movie to be based on an Ed McBain novel -- "Columbo: No Time To Die" is an adaptation of the novel "So Long As You Both Shall Live".