Columbo: A Bird in the Hand

TV Movie
1992
TV-PG
1h 38m

IMDb RATING

YOUR RATING

Peter Falk in Columbo: A Bird in the Hand (1992)

Cop Drama Police Procedural Crime Drama Mystery Sport

After his request for money is refused, the nephew of a wealthy football team owner plants a bomb in his car, but the uncle dies from a hit-and-run accident instead, while the car bomb kills... Read allAfter his request for money is refused, the nephew of a wealthy football team owner plants a bomb in his car, but the uncle dies from a hit-and-run accident instead, while the car bomb kills the gardener. Columbo is on the case.After his request for money is refused, the nephew of a wealthy football team owner plants a bomb in his car, but the uncle dies from a hit-and-run accident instead, while the car bomb kills the gardener. Columbo is on the case.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

7.2/10

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

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Featured reviews

7planktonrules

Harold sure isn't one of the smarter killers on "Columbo".

Harold is a real putz of a nephew. He has a serious gambling addiction and no foreseeable way of solving it...unless he is a crafty guy. So, he begins sleeping with his uncle's wife (Tyne Daly) and figures if the uncle dies, she'll be more than happy to bail him out of his financial mess. So, he plans on a rather sloppy way of killing the guy by planting a pipe bomb in his car! But something very weird happens...before the bomb can be detonated, the rich uncle is killed by a hit and run driver! And, to top it off, the putzy nephew isn't able to remove the bomb...and a poor innocent guy is blown to bits when the bomb does go off! For Columbo, he is assigned to the bombing case and a different detective is assigned to the hit and run. And, you wonder, if the two cases are more related than this.

The best thing about this episode is the surprising way that the bomb goes off but killing the wrong guy. So what is really going on here? Otherwise, it's a pretty ordinary installment of "Columbo"...though I did appreciate how the makeup and costuming folks did a great job of making Daly look her sexiest.

8blanche-2

A slightly different Columbo that doesn't follow the pattern

"A Bird in the Hand" from 1992 is a terrific late episode of "Columbo," but it doesn't follow the formula.

Greg Evigan plays Harold McCain, the gambling nephew of Big Fred (Steve Forrest), the owner of a football team. In trouble with mobsters, Harold realizes he doesn't have much hope of getting money from his uncle; however, since he's been romancing his alcoholic aunt by marriage (Tyne Daly), she might be good for it. He devises a pipe bomb to place under his uncle's Rolls.

This episode has a couple of major twists. Just don't think about the denouement. I can't say much else without involving a spoiler, but having dealt with dead weight myself, what is described would involve two people huffing and puffing.

The acting is terrific from everyone involved, with one unsung hero - G.F. Smith, the salesman in the Rolls Royce showroom where Columbo goes to figure out how the bomb was planted. The look on his face when Columbo unfolds a sheet of paper and starts talking about "the bomb" is priceless, as are his efforts to get Columbo out of the showroom to perhaps investigate more privately. A brilliant scene.

Very entertaining, right down to the beautiful rendition of Rags to Riches by a young Tony Bennett.

8scottschada@yahoo.com

Lesser Falk Role But Others Fill In

I found "A Bird In the Hand " a refreshing change from my addictive Columbo habit. Yes, there is a lot less of the great Peter Falk, but Tyne Daly is wonderful to watch, and as others have said, the photography is fine, and the story kept me interested. The initial "bad guy", nephew of a wealthy sports team owner, was well played, and good looking at least; certainly not unappealing, and overall, the action moved along at a good pace. Good show.

78-Foot

A different twist: two bodies more than usual.

This episode may have been weakened by three people being killed off, with possible multiple culprits.

As in some other episodes, there is delightful chemistry between Columbo and his quarry, in this case played by Greg Evigan. Evigan's reactions and timing are impeccable.

Tyne Daly works hard, but not too convincingly at first, at being a middle-aged boozy ditz. However, when her husband is killed, she takes control of his football team and his money, the latter always needed by her younger lover, Evigan, for gambling debts; this transformation has a perverse appeal.

Noteworthy, too, is a scene when Columbo, in his rumpled coat, walks into a very proper Rolls Royce showroom and is all over the engine compartment and underneath the car threatening to take something apart, all this to the delight of a gathering sidewalk crowd.

7bkoganbing

Just one more murder

Three different killings happen during the course of this Columbo story. Just as Peter Falk and the rest of the LAPD starts on one, another occurs.

The first is that of Steve Forrest multi-millionaire owner of a football team whose death would solve the problems of his wastrel nephew Greg Evigan. He's run down while jogging on his block in fashionable Beverly Hills. Looks very much like a hit and run, but of course Falk holds out for a bigger story.

While trying to get that gardener Leon Singer is blown up along with the late Mr. Forrest's car after Columbo asks him to move it. There's a very funny scene while Columbo is at an auto dealer's shop trying to simulate how a bomb would be placed. Just doing that action yields him a valuable clue.

Finally Evigan himself is shot to death and at that point it all falls in place after Falk traces his movements the 24 hours before he's killed.

Tyne Daly is in the cast as a most needy wife and one who has every indication of charting her own course when she's a widow.

Lots of twists in this Columbo tale, more than usual still great viewing.

Trivia
The football footage, which shows two mock American football teams, is excerpted from an actual Canadian Football League game shot in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada between the Saskatchewan Roughriders and the Edmonton Eskimos.

Goofs
Tyne Daly's "Southern accent" comes and goes throughout the episode.

Quotes
Harold McCain: Hey, why would you need me at all? Your job here is to keep people away, isn't it?
Columbo: Oh, the traffic boys, they handle that. No, sir, I'm just waiting for more of my crew. Look at that. Even the tires are custom. Oh, I don't mind admitting, sir, this buggy sure caught my eye. See, I got a foreign car, too. It's French. I don't know if you noticed it. It's parked down there in the street?
Harold McCain: No, I didn't.
Columbo: Oh.
Harold McCain: What is your job, Lieutenant?
Columbo: Homicide.
Harold McCain: On a hit-and-run case?
Columbo: Oh, don't let that worry you, sir. And particularly not Mrs. McCain. But the violent death of anyone as well-known as Big Fred, we gotta look into it, just to make double-triple sure, that's all. Besides, our chief... he's the biggest Stallions fan in Los Angeles, if you understand what I'm saying.
Harold McCain: I guess so.
Columbo: Yeah.
Harold McCain: [a police car approaches] That's your crew now, right?
Columbo: No, no, no, no. That's the accident detail. There must be a dozen of 'em in the neighborhood by now. But, you know, I was just thinking. When the people start trampling around here...
[opens the door to Big Fred's car]
Columbo: ... we don't want 'em poking into this. There's gotta be some button you can push to lock the doors.
Harold McCain: Yeah, that's a good idea. Yeah, this was Uncle Fred's pride and joy.
Columbo: Yeah. And if we have to move it, I'm sure we can find a key.