In his 1986 book Narration in Light, philosopher George Wilson points out an odd moment in Orson Welles’ 1947 film The Lady From Shanghai. Two men are driving hurriedly toward an important destination when a woman elsewhere learns of their journey and reacts angrily (50:55 above):

The following three-shot progression concludes the intercut series: (1) a shot from within the men’s car reveals that a truck has abruptly pulled out onto the road ahead of them; (2) the woman’s hand is shown reaching out and pressing [a] button; and (3) the men’s car collides violently with the truck.

“Viewing these shots, it appears as if the pressing of the button has mysteriously caused the accident, but, at the same time, this impression of causality is difficult to reconcile with common sense and difficult also to integrate into our immediate sense of the film’s narrative development at that juncture.” Most films settle these questions for us, but in every film our knowledge of the events is limited; “the potentiality for considerable epistemic complication always remains, and it is actually realized in some of the most interesting films ever made.”