MovieChat Forums > Summer's Lease (1991) Discussion > Plot discussion (spoilers)

Plot discussion (spoilers)


The ending is ambiguous. Did Sandra Kittering kill her husband, Buck? Was Bill Fosdyke murdered?

Buck Kittering could have been killed by accident, since earlier in the film someone says lorries are always hitting people.

We know Sandra sent the English couple to spy on Molly in Urbino and report back the whereabouts of Buck. But why would Sandra want to kill him? It could been because Buck may have killed Bill Fosdyke/Fixit, who may have been Sandra's lover. But Sandra is Italian, and we have been told that Italian women appreciate it when their husbands get murderously jealous.

So maybe she killed him over the water corruption scheme, which we know Sandra is running now. But why would Sandra have to kill Buck over the water scheme? Unless Buck was careless in exposing his power to shut off water by emptying the pool at Fosdyke’s house to make his death seem accidental.

I wonder if reading the book gives any more definite answers to these questions.

Please let me know if I am missing some important clue in the movie that ties things up better.


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It's been a very long time since I read the book, but as best as I recall it's left somewhat ambiguous in the novel as well.

...The point being, I suspect, that Molly will be left for the rest of her life wondering if she really had anything to do with Buck's death, wondering if she really wants to know the answer-- and learning to accept, however reluctantly, that likewise, she will never know with 100% certainty whether her husband can be trusted to remain faithful to her, whether he really loves her, wondering whether her kids will be okay, etc., etc., etc. Lots of et ceteras.

I see "Summer's Lease" as a sort of parable about the ultimate unknowability of what's really going on inside other people's minds and hearts, and what they're up to when you're not looking. That kind of thing. It's a tough lesson for everybody. ya know?

"I don't deduce, I observe."

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