Film Review
Murder on the Orient Express
was the first adaptation of an Agatha Christie novel of which the
author approved and which does justice to the book on which it is
based. A number of Christie's Miss Marple stories had been
adapted in the 1960s (with Margaret Ruthford playing the amateur sleuth
in a series of films that included
Murder
She Said (1961)) and Hercule Poirot exercised 'the
little grey cells' on screen in
The Alphabet Murders,
in the guise of a hopelessly miscast Tony Randall.
Christie was so unimpressed by these comedic treatments of her
work that she withheld the rights for further
adaptations. With its Art Deco trappings and evocative
1930s feel,
Murder on the Orient
Express captures the essence of Christie's novel and set a very
high standard for all subsequent film and TV adaptations of her work.
Murder on the Orient Express
is a cracking good detective story but for a film adaptation it poses
one obvious difficulty: how to keep the audience interested when
virtually the entire story takes place on a train. The production
team overcame this problem by shamelessly casting some of the biggest
stars in the business, including Albert Finney (his one outing as
Poirot), Lauren Bacall, Sean Connery, Ingrid Bergman (who inexplicably
won an Oscar for this film) and, in a near-reprise of his role in
Hitchcock's
Psycho, Anthony Perkins.
With such an abundance of talent and charisma, the opportunity for any
spectator to get bored is minimal, particularly since each actor is
perfectly matched to his or her role and puts in a very creditible
performance.
The confined setting clearly worried director Sidney Lumet, who does
everything he can to open the story up - by including a lengthy but
stylish montage prologue and frequent exterior shots of the train
making its way across some breathtaking scenery. He needn't have
bothered, though. It is the cramped wood-panelled setting which
provides the tension and atmosphere which makes the film so compelling,
that and the meticulously constructed plot. Albert Finney's
Poirot is perhaps a little too comical to be taken seriously (and looks
decidedly limp when compared with David Suchet's marvellous portrayal
of the character in the acclaimed ITV series) but this is the only
weakness in an otherwise highly enjoyable Agatha Christie adaptation.
© James Travers 2010
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Film Synopsis
1935. After a stay in Istanbul, the renowned Belgian sleuth
Hercule Poirot makes his return to England on the Orient Express.
He is immediately approached by Ratchett, a wealthy American
businessman, who is anxious to hire him as a bodyguard. Poirot
turns down the potentially lucrative job offer, not realising that
Ratchett's fears that someone is out to get him are well-founded. That
night, the businessman is killed, stabbed twelve times by someone who
clearly bears him a grudge. At the request of his friend Bianchi,
who happens to own the railway, Poirot begins his investigation to try
to unravel the mystery and discover who killed Ratchett. To his
surprise, everyone in the victim's compartment seems to have had the motive
and opportunity for doing the deed...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.