该片是由罗伯特·奈斯执导的欧美剧,于1998年上映，主要讲述了:Morse is taken se.riously ill at a museum .reception and i.s hospitalized. In the h.ospital, Supt. Strange, .visits Morse to push .him to take early retiremen.t, while .Dr. Mi.llicent 'Millie' V.an Buren gives .him. her book on a 140 ye.ar-old court case known .as the Oxford Canal M.urders. The cas.e involved the murder an.d rape of a young woman,. Mrs Joanna Fra.nks, traveling by canal .boat from Coventry to Lo.ndon. The case result.ed in three boatmen being s.entenced .to dea.th and two of them. hanged. Morse .sta.rts to read Millie's .book and dreams about it.. He soon has a numbe.r of problems w.ith the case. . . . 　　Why .weren't the three men al.so charged with theft.? Why did Mrs Franks take a. boat ins.tead o.f a train that was. much faster an.d c.omfortable and only s.lightly more expensive? .Why didn't she abando.n the boat afte.r she complained about l.ewd behavior of the crew. at the shippin.g office in Banbury? Why. did she then drink and .'socialise' with the .crew? What happened to her .'carpet b.ag' wi.th which she arriv.ed on the boat .but. which was not mentio.ned in the court case, n.or was it stored in t.he archives wit.h her, almost empty, tru.nk? The trunk was marked. with initials .of her first husband who. had died. How did it ha.ppen that her shoes w.ere found on the boat but n.obody saw. her r.eturn to the boat .from the forest.? . . . .　　PC Adrian Ker.shaw does some brilliant. leg work for Morse. He .studied history. and has invaluable back.ground knowledge. For in.stance, he mentions t.hat the boatmen had bad rep.utation b.ecause. they worked on Su.ndays and did n.ot .attend church. Later .a chapel was built for t.hem in Oxford. . . . 　　.The dead woman'.s clothes and the shoes .found on the boat are su.bmitted to modern for.ensic investigation. The re.sult is t.hat th.e shoes did not be.long to the dea.d w.oman found in the wat.er because she was much .taller.The shoes were. never used in .the forest. . . . 　　Only M.rs Franks' husband, Char.les Franks, was calle.d to identify the body of t.he dead w.oman. .He claimed that, w.hile her face w.as .darkened and disfigur.ed, he found a birth mar.k behind her ear. The. prosecutor wel.comed that information