THE USUAL SUSPECTS

(1995) rottentomatoes.com/m/usual_suspects

Wkpd- 1 Plot details
Agent Kuljan believes that the whole point of the exercise was not to interrupt a dope transaction, but rather for Söze to kill the man who was going to rat him out, a man named Arturo Marquez who had previously offered the names of many criminal associates including (that of Keyser Söze) in order to avoid jail time. hmm ok. maybe. maybe the point here is not only that Arturo could identify Soze but that he planned to rat him out? and was therefore either more of a threat or perhaps not even that, perhaps just someone who Soze wanted to personally kill in retribution.
that would moot my confusion. it was confusing to me that emphasized that Arturo was only person knew Soze by appearance. and point of whole exercise was to eliminate this threat. but at end Verbal/Soze left a survivor whose description allowed an artist rendering of him *and* an agent with a clue to the fact that he had just been had by the man himself (the clue being that Verbal's story took its specifics from the bulletin board notices in the room - this had to be for the sake of an after-the-fact realization by the agent right? a master criminal doesn't leave himself thus vulnerable to discovery without intending to, right, he does it because he can. he can even give himself away by his story and still walk. anyway the upshot is that at the end there are two people who can identify Verbal, and he seems to have on the one hand allowed and on the other encouraged this. but all the activity of the usual suspects was for the sake of eliminating one person who could identify him? huh?

"The tale of Keyser Söze" ... Verbal Kint: Keaton always said, "I don't believe in God, but I'm afraid of him." Well, I believe in God -- and the only thing that scares me is Keyser Soze.