User Reviews

Rita Moreno makes the last of three appearances on The Rockford Files as the series slowly winds down. She was memorable in each one of them as Rita Capkovic the prostitute who finally decides she's had enough and who was Dennis Becker's snitch on the street.

She's full of hope with a new certificate from a beauty school, but gets a rude awakening when a posh Beverly Hills salon turns her down and not too gracefully. She should have taken Rocky's offer to set her up with a job in a salon in Santa Monica.

But that's nothing to the rude awakening she gets from Jerry Douglas her former pimp who won't let her leave the life. After that she seeks help from James Garner.

This is one of the more serious Rockford episodes, lot of pathos but damn few laughs of the cynical variety. Even more fascinating Stuart Margolin actually turns out to be a hero of sorts, though Angel will do the hero thing in his own fashion.

Douglas is a mean psychotic sort, but the attachment of Rita to Garner is quite touching. She doesn't realize she's transferring dependencies in her dealings with him, though everyone can see it, but Rockford.

Rita Capkovic is something special and Rita Moreno more so.

This is one of the last remaining episodes of this great series, and overall, I did enjoy it, although it wasn't as solid as it could have been. Rita Moreno makes her last appearance on the show as Rita, a former prostitute who's smitten with Jim, and once again she needs his help as her former pimp named Al roughs her up pretty bad when she decides to go straight. There's a real touching scene between Jim and Rita right after she gets beaten, and both give fine acting performances, especially Moreno, as he's holding her in the trailer. The story revolves around Rita trying to get a job in a beauty salon after graduating from a beauty school, but is having trouble finding takers; Al is dead set against this and still considers her his property. Rockford finds where Al is and that he's currently working out of a hotel lobby, and Angel goes undercover as a businessman looking for a little companionship, as Al sets him up with Rita; soon after, he and Rockford both get pistol whipped by Al in the room, and then Angel hits him with a chair, then Al accidentally shoots Rita in the shoulder and then the scene basically ends. I expected Rockford to lay a beating on this guy, especially the way Al treated Rita, but all we're left is to assume that Al got arrested shortly after, and that was a bit of a disappointment. It almost seems as if the episode was rushed to the conclusion, perhaps because the series was ending soon, but that was my biggest problem here. I still would recommend this episode to any Rockford fan, but the ending may leave you wanting more. There are more aspects of this particular show worth mentioning, especially several nice scenes with Rocky, many shots of the trailer on beautiful sunny days, another nice shot of Jim and Rocky getting ready to fish, a dinner party hosted by Dennis(donning both Yankees and Giants hats)and Peggy, and an excellent final shot of Jim and Rita walking on the beach on a beautiful day.

Watched this one last night. Super episode, even if the intrigue is relatively standard. It's mainly Rita Moreno and Jerry Douglas, whose performances are so credible. Plus some lovely interaction between Jim and Rita. It made me shed tears, at the end.

The writing started to truly go downhill & this episode was emblematic of that. I gave it a few stars because it's Rockford Files, attributed to my bias, and the plot line outcome of Rita vs Al was semi-interesting. Everything else was a complete waste of time.

Season 6 really started to grate. The writers obviously were running out of ideas.

This episode is dreadful by rockfords standards. Rita is very irritating even by her standards.

Yes it's an unpleasant story and yes it's very badly handled.

One of the most turgid of the whole 6 seasons.