Is the tale of the frog and the scorpion not one of Aesop's?  It ought
to be if it isn't...  It has the quality of the wry, even amusing moral
fable characteristic of African tales about the creatures that surround
country dwellers.
 
At all events I suspect it has wide, folkloric currency outside cinema,
and that Neil Jordan would not have needed to go to Mr Arkadin to have
picked it up.
 
John Izod
Film & Media Studies
University of Stirling