A Perfect Murder 🎥 1998 Movie Info

Plot Summary

Wall Street trader Steven Taylor is married to the much younger Emily. Meanwhile, a smitten Emily is having an affair with artist David Shaw, for whom she considers leaving Steven. Steven arrives at David’s art studio the next day. Steven not only knows about the affair, but has carefully researched David’s past. His real identity is Winston Lagrange, an ex-convict who cons rich women. Pointing out that he can easily send him back to prison, Steven instead recruits David into murdering Emily for $500,000. Steven takes Emily’s housekey and hides it outside the service entrance to their lavish Manhattan co-op apartment.

David is to use the key to enter the apartment, kill her, and make it look like a robbery gone bad. At his weekly card game, Steven takes a break and uses his cellphone to make a call to an automated bank system, confirming his alibi, while using a second phone to call Emily. Emily answers in the kitchen and is attacked by a masked assailant, but stabs him in the neck with a meat thermometer. Steven returns, but finds the assailant’s body. He takes the key from the body, puts it back on Emily’s keychain, damages the service entrance door, and plants a screwdriver on the assailant. The NYPD arrives, led by Detective Moe Karaman.

They remove the assailant’s mask, but the body is not David’s. Soon after, Steven receives a call from David, who plays an audio tape of the two discussing the plan to kill Emily. They agree to meet at a local deli, where David demands the full $500,000 or he will turn Steven in. Feeling suspicious, Emily confides in her friends that Steven would have inherited her whole $100 million fortune had she been killed. She quietly makes inquiries and learns that Steven’s extremely risky margin trades on the stock market are unraveling.

Meet the Cast