User Reviews

For me this is one of the better Columbo episodes. It is not a perfect episode, it does take too long to set up and some of the clues are rather obvious(how many mistakes does a murderer need to make?). I know some may find the ending downbeat, but I had no problem with it personally. Even with the faults, Troubled Waters is a very interesting episode. It is a refreshing change of pace, taking place on a ship, which is a quite sumptuous setting in itself, and it is slickly filmed. The music is fitting with the period and with the jaunty and haunting moments you'd expect. Apart from some of the obvious clues and slow start, the mystery rolls along and is diverting, and the dialogue is still clever and intelligent. Peter Falk is as wonderful as ever, some of his trademarks are not on display here such as the raincoat, but his shrewd, observant and cunning personality still remains. Robert Vaughn is good in his role and this is the better of the two appearances he gave, if not among the best guest villain performances of the series(McGoohan, Gordon, Cassidy, Culp, Clark, Leigh, Wilkinson and Torn), but if I were honest I found Dean Stockwell to be a little more at ease here. All in all, one of the better episodes with not much troubling about it. 9/10 Bethany Cox

TROUBLED WATERS is certainly one of the finest of the COLUMBO episodes from the 1970s, a story in which a change of venue breathes new life into the story format. The story goes that Columbo and his wife (who remains unseen) take a cruise ship voyage to Acapulco, where Columbo becomes involved with the murder of a singer that's taken place on board.

This is a snappy mystery, with a simple execution and involving denouement. Falk gives one of the finest performances yet as the likable and dogged detective and there's plenty of 'fish out of water' humour to get you liking him. Robert Vaughn is always reliable and that's no different here, and the excellent supporting cast incorporates the likes of Patrick Macnee and Dean Stockwell. I've always enjoyed thrillers and mysteries that take place on moving vehicles in which the passengers are trapped on board and TROUBLED WATERS carries on that fine tradition.

Columbo and his neverpresent wife win a trip on a cruiseship. I say 'neverpresent' because you never see her on this or any other "Columbo" episodes....and the Lieutenant spends much of the trip looking for her!

Since Columbo is aboard, the same thing happens to him as other TV investigators like Quincy and Mannix....crime occurs aboard the ship. In this case, a singer is murdered and the killer concocted an elaborate scheme involving hanging out in the infirmary to allow him to slip into the victim's room unnoticed. His only real mistake? Rubber gloves.

This is a very good episode and provides a nice change of venue for the series. The only shortcoming is a common one for "Columbo"....he narrows in on the real perpetrator too quickly. Still, it was entertaining and worth your time.

As a Columbo fan I've seen pretty much every episode and most of them multiple times...this one is still my favorite. The setting on the ship, the clever story line and the supporting cast make this my favorite episode.

The pacing is good and the show is well-filmed.

At this point anytime Robert Vaughn shows up Columbo should just arrest him on sight - as he has been the culprit at least three times and he is good at it.

Also worth noting that this is one of the few episodes I can think of where many of his trademarks are missing: the raincoat, the Peugot, the dog...it's just Columbo being Columbo.

-B-

This is the best Columbo. The mystery is great, and the way Columbo figures it out and befriends Mr. Danziger is perfect. Danziger does not know whether to like Columbo, or hate him. The pace of this episode is perfect, it rolls along just like a cruise. The ship itself is also a wonderful backdrop for the episode. No question, the best episode of the best show ever produced!

This is a typical example of a Columbo episode and other users comments cover the story line and plot etc.I just wanted to comment on the overall atmosphere of the episode.

I think someone has already pointed out the fact that, because the action takes place in a confined area, it works better. I thought that it was a great idea to make Columbo to have to use his detective skills to their utmost without any backup from forensics, photography or any other colleques to help him. The business with the fingerprints was a depiction of detective work reduced to it's most basics, using whatever you can find and having to fall back on your training.

I didn't understand the fact that Robert Vaughn's wife did not visit him in the hospital area.

I thought that Dean Stockwell's hair style was incredible.

A few plot holes here and there but overall a good episode.

As a kid in the Seventies, it was bedtime after Disney when the Sunday Mystery Movie started. I remember the show beginning with eerie (to me) opening music and a man approaching the audience with a searchlight. Well, 50 years later I get to watch on IMDB whenever I want. This particular episode was an especially fun Columbo for me, employing all the Columbo tropes except that they occur on the sea. Mrs. Columbo should make an appearance on a small ship, but she never does. Robert Vaughan is one of Columbo's great villains and his villain here is cold-blooded, calculating, and over-confident. But the best parts are the Seventies throwbacks: the nurse who smokes, Dr. Bombay, and Dean Stockwell's goofy even for the Seventies hair. A nice escape-especially for us oldsters.

**SPOILERS** With his wife winning a raffle where she got a trip for two on a pleasure cruise in the tropics Let. Columbo, Peter Falk, is looking forward to a week of rest and relaxation. Still like a magnet murder follows him even on the cruise ship. Looking for his wife who got lost in the crowd Let. Columbo gets involved in a murder almost by accident.

Telling the ship's Captain Gibbons, Pactrick Macnee, which for some reason to Capt. Gibbons displeasure Columbo keeps referring to his ship as a boat, he's contacted the first evening by him in helping solve the murder of the ships star entertainer singer Rosanna Wells, Poupee Bocan.Rosanna was found dead in her dressing room with a bullet in her back. With Capt. Gibbon as the man in charge of Rosanna's murder investigation, since the murder occurred on the high seas, Columbo could only be an assistant to him and not have any authority in the inquiry making things a bit stressful for the L.A police detective.

We learn right from the start that big time car dealer Hayden Danzinger, Robert Vaughn, had a affair with Rosanna on a cruise a few months earlier. Rossana was blackmailing Hayden by threatening to tell his wife Silvia (Jaen Greer), who's the one with the money in the Danzinger marriage, about it if he doesn't pay up. Hayden concocts a scheme to kill Rosanna and then frame her boyfriend pianist Llyod Harrington, Dean Stockwell, for her murder and then end up being home free. He didn't realize that Let. Columbo was on the ship and he's an old pro in exposing and bringing to justice high class and arrogant schemers and murders like Hayden.

Faking a heart attack, by sniffing ammonium nitrate capsules, at poolside Hayden is brought into the ships hospital for treatment and observation for 24 hours. During the time in sickbay Hayden sneaks out and, with a master key that he stole from the captains quarters, gets into Rosanna's dressing room and shoots her to death leaving the red letter L with her lipstick on her mirror. This implicates her boyfriend LLyod, whom she had a fight with just hours before.

Slipping back in his room in the ships sickbay, without anyone seeing him, Hayden now has the perfect alibi to where he was when Rosanna was murdered. Like all criminals, who think that their too smart for their own good, Hayden made some stupid mistakes that had Let. Columbo hot on is tail setting him up for a very unceremonious fall. Hayden plants a receipt, in his cabin, for a gun that Llyod "bought" in Las Vegas in oder to implicate him for Rosanna's murder The planting of the receipt wasn't that bright on Hayden's part since it was obvious, to Let. Columbo, that it was planted there because it had nothing at all to do with all the other receipts that Llyod had in his cabin. The receipt that Lloyd had was to do with tax write offs for his work as an entertainer, the gun receipt could not be used to write off any of Llyod's taxes but only to implicate him in Rosanna's murder! There's also the fact that Rosanna died instantly so how could she have written the letter L on her mirror after she was shot unless it was written by the killer himself.

Hayden's wearing surgical gloves when he shot Rosanna was also very foolish on his part showing that it wasn't Lloyd who killed her. Why would he go through all this trouble to cover up his crime and then forget not to get rid of a receipt for the gun, minus the fingerprints, that murdered Rosanna? Hayden trying to shift Let. Columbo away from himself and towards Llyod, as being Rosanna's murderer, only made Columbo suspicious of Hayden not Llyod

P.S By the way Let. Columbo did finally find his missing wife at the end of the movie but we, the audience, never got a chance to see what she looked like.

Troubled Waters is a troubling episode as it leads me to conclude that some of the classic Columbo episodes were maybe not all that good. A case of the memory cheats.

Columbo is on a cruise with Mrs Columbo and she is nowhere to be seen, always getting lost. I doubt Columbo was ever with his wife in this story.

Hayden Danziger (Robert Vaughn) is a wealthy car salesman who is on board with his older wife. This is more than a holiday as his sales force are also on the cruise, it is a business function for him, in more ways that one. Danziger is being blackmailed by the lounge singer that he once had an affair with. He has concocted a plan to get rid of her which includes feigning a heart attack and framing a member of the band (Dean Stockwell) who also had a brief affair with the singer and then got dumped.

Bad news for Danziger, Columbo is on the case as he is already on the boat, a bout of a troubling tummy for Columbo means he comes across a loose feather in the ship's hospital.

We are at the height of 1970s fashion. The cast are wearing long collars, Stockwell has weird hair. The story is a little bit flaky and even a bit dull. It is almost a perfect murder but Danziger he wants to frame someone else and leaves loose clues behind. Mrs Danziger seems to have got lost somewhere in this story, she does not come to see her husband at the hospital when he has an heart attack, she is not concerned when he leaves it. Heck even his sales force seem to have disappeared, in fact we never ever saw any of them. I wonder if they were all partying with Mrs Columbo.

Hayden Danziger has it made. He is a successful businessman with an older, very rich wife while also getting a bit of spice with his secret lover Rosanna Wells – who works on the cruise as a singer. However Rosanna is threatening to expose him to his wife and Danziger cannot risk losing it all over a fling with some silly showgirl and plans to kill her. He fakes a stroke by the pool and gets confined to the medical centre where he is the only patient and under 24 hour supervision of the nurse. When the ship band take their break, Danzinger slips out unseen, heads to Rosanna's cabin and shoots her dead. The Captain turns to one of his passengers of help – a certain Columbo, who is taking the cruise with his wife who won it in a competition. Columbo starts to investigate the best he can and, despite it all looking like an open and shut case, he can't get passed the problems that scream out at him.

As with many TV film series (such as Perry Mason), if you like one or two of them then you'll pretty much like them all. This entry in the Columbo series pretty much follows the usual formula – we know the killer and the "perfect" plan but then watch Columbo follow his hunch and gradually starts to pick holes in the story he is told before eventually finding enough to prove his suspicions. Knowing this ahead of time won't ruin anything for you; it is simply what happens in all the films. With this strict adherence to formula it is usually down to several factors whether or not the Columbo film stands out or if it is just average. With this film the location switched to a cruise and it makes for a nice contrast to the landlocked locations of the other films. One other reviewer has commented on the limitation of the location but for me, like By Dawn's Early Light, the limits make it more enjoyable and tight. The plot is solid enough but hardly anything special. The link with Danziger is a big jump to get him into the usual cat'n'mouse role and from there the clues seem to come a little easily to Columbo but it still manages to produce a fairly enjoyable story.

Falk is his usual good self here and he seems to do better thanks to the doubts of the captain and the fact that he is more out of his element than usual. Vaughn is a bit weaker and doesn't quite engage with Columbo as well as he should. Yes, the two of them interact well enough together but it doesn't work as well as the better partnerships do (although it is miles better than his other Columbo appearance). The support cast are impressive with small but valuable contributions from Stockwell, Macnee and Fox.

Overall an enjoyable film that plays it right down the formula line without doing anything that interesting or special. About average for the series and will please fans as a result but there are much better Columbo films out there than this one.

This famous quote from "The Godfather Part II" occurred to me when watching this outstanding episode from Season 4, which is arguably the finest season of the "Columbo" series.

Robert Vaughn makes an excellent, albeit novice, villain. His plan to murder his lover was pedestrian, but he didn't expect Lt. Columbo to be on board the boat--I mean ship.

I think the script was sublime in placing Columbo in an environment to solve a crime via primitive methods. As is usually the case, Columbo's first instinct about the identity of the murderer was correct. Vaughn's character was a bit naive to see through Columbo's feigned innocence as Columbo confided in Vaughn the problems he encountered to solve the murder. The ending is great. The supporting cast was also first-rate. This is for me the peak season for the series ("Negative Reaction", "An Exercise in Fatality", "A Deadly State of Mind").

Robert Vaughn stars as Hayden Danziger, a used car salesman on a cruise to Acapulco with his wealthy wife Sylvia(played by Jane Greer) who has decided to murder his recent mistress, a lounge singer on the ship who is blackmailing him. Danziger concocts an elaborate alibi to establish his innocence, and implicate another boyfriend of hers(played by Dean Stockwell). By chance, a vacationing Lt. Columbo(Peter Falk) is also aboard, and asked to investigate the murder until the ship reaches Mexico. Can Columbo solve the crime before then? Patrick Macnee and returning actor Bernard Fox costar as ship officers. Mediocre entry has a good cast but a slack pace.

Probably an unique thing is that the movie features the Columbo character from about the first shot on. He just happens to present at a location (aboard a cruise ship) where a murder gets committed, like a Jessica Fletcher type of murder-mystery. This is a new sort of approach for a Columbo movie. It's unfamiliar and new ground for a Columbo movie and doesn't follow the usual patterns of a Columbo movie, which makes this a bit of an odd Columbo movie, when compared to the others. It also puts Columbo outside of his familiar environment. Not of course that this movie is horrible but I just prefer the old fashioned Columbo approach over this.

As soon as Columbo gets introduced in the story, as soon as he disappears out of it again, until the actual murder occurs. It takes for too long for the murder to occurs and on top of it the entire build up to it and the complexity surrounding it is just a bit overdone. The clues that are left out for the lieutenant also are a bit too obvious, which makes the murder far from the perfect one and not halve as clever as most other murders committed in a Columbo movie, despite its long and complex execution of the murder in this movie.

I've always liked Robert Vaughn. He's just one of those actors that don't seem to have changed ever since the '60's on till now. He also always plays the same sort of characters. Besides Vaugh, the movie also features other well known and respected actors such as Dean Stockwell and Patrick Macnee as the captain.

It's fun to see Columbo out of his usual environment for a change, which obviously adds some nice comical touches to the movie. Of course he gets seasick and remarkably enough he keeps his famous trademark trench-coat on during for most of the sunny trip. It are not necessarily the settings that are bad but it's more that it does not really work out for a Columbo movie, or perhaps it could had, if it had a better script to work with.

A different but definitely not better than average Columbo entry.

7/10

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Enjoyable Columbo episode with the policeman out to sea. His unseen wife wins a raffle of sorts and both are rewarded with a cruise. The episode is unique in that, as another reviewer noted, Columbo has none of his signature trademarks with him. No raincoat. No old car. No funny dog. It is just Lt. Columbo. He also does not have a forensic team, additional police help, or technology at his aid either. He also is NOT expected to work in this episode at the beginning. He is on vacation here. These differences allow us to see him perhaps at first with a bit of his guard down. But murder makes its way into the picture, and the Lt. has a mystery to solve. The story here is quite inventive. The direction quite taut. Robert Vaughn plays the killer with his usual aplomb for such roles. He is a good actor but I really do not think there is a role where I found him affable. He always plays the kind of guys you like to see proverbially cut in half. The cruise ship is captained by the Avenger himself Patrick Macnee in a very officious but humorous at times role. And then there is Bernard Fox as another officer aboard bringing his charm too. The murdered woman sings Volare a bit long but she is foxy Dean Stockwell is here too as a red herring looking incredibly eccentric. Definitely a fun episode.