You've erred in the angle of your tin-can jalopy. The angle is not that extreme in either of the two images.
Although your changing-perspective thing is correct, Jackie's head is much closer to the back of the limo in Nix, angle or not.
As I clearly stated in my opening post, the set-up with my 'tin-can jalopy' was just to show how the illusion works. It's not to scale, the angles and positions were not meant to truly reflect what was happening, it was just to demonstrate the illusion.
Something you agree is correct.What seems to have confused people is that Jackie is leaning diagonally across the trunk and this is at the heart of the illusion. The mystery of how they can seem so close and so far apart has been solved.
Were you one of the researchers who bought into the illusion because the statement about Jackie's head smacks of denial. Are you basing that statement on anything more than your interpretation of an optical illusion? Does it 'just look that way' to you? Or do you have something more concrete?