A Caribbean
Mystery (1983) – 5.0
It strikes me as odd that Miss Marple (Helen Hayes) would even want to spend
a week in a Caribbean resort. She would burn terribly in the sun. It is the
most boring thing in the world just to sit around all day soaking up the sun
at her age. No deep sea diving. Shuffle board, darts, croquet and gossip.
And of course murder. Three of them. Miss Marple brings murder along with
her no matter where she goes like we do a cheap paperback. Based on a 1964
novel by Agatha Christie. Most of the time I read the book and then watch
the movie but not this time so a tiny bit more suspense in the TV movie -
the first of two with Helen Hayes. The murderer seemed fairly obvious to me
anyways. A simple matter of deduction as Holmes would say.
Agatha Christie vacationed in the Caribbean a few times. So have I. In much
less style, I imagine. Back then it seemed kind of fun though I can't remember
why. Once was at Club Med in the Bahamas - worst vacation in my life - what
was I thinking. As soon as the group arrived and the staff broke into Kumbaya
I knew I was screwed. Well, Miss Marple isn't at a Club Med but nearly as
bad stuck with a bunch of annoying people and having activities scheduled.
After Christie's divorce from her husband she had a trip to the Caribbean
planned to recuperate when a friend persuaded her to go to the Middle East
and work on an excavation. That changed her life as she met her archeologist
husband in Iraq. Lesson learned - go somewhere interesting.
It isn't long before an elderly man with an endless array of boring stories
latches on to her. But one story sticks out. About a man who marries women
who later kill themselves. He tells Miss Marple that he has a picture of the
man and he pulls it out and looks around him and turns white. You know he
is a goner. And only Marple suspects murder. Until the next one. Decent enough
for a TV movie though I was a little disappointed with the cast. They usually
bring on a number of past their prime stars as they did in the other Hayes
Miss Marple film. Here we have Bernard Hughes, Jameson Parker (Simon &
Simon), Season Hubley, Brock Peters, Swoosie Kurtz, Zakes Mokae and Lynn
Moody (Roots). The screen play was written by Sue Grafton - one of the better
mystery novelists with her alphabet series of books.
Murder with Mirrors
(1985) – 5.5
Aka - They Do It With Murders
This is based on Agatha Christie's book They Do It with Mirrors published
in 1952. For me it is one of her duller books with a clever crime but much
too long to get there. The Joan Hickson version which I saw not too long ago
wasn't much better and this one is at best so-so. There were much better Miss
Marple books to adapt. This one tries to give it a bit more energy but having
Miss Marple taken hostage at the point of a gun wasn't a great idea. Now
if she had disarmed him with a karate chop that would have been ok. But they
basically just make Miss Marple into a snoop who keeps intentionally eavesdropping
on everyone. And looking embarrassed when she is caught.
She is played by the actress tagged at one time as "The First Lady of the
American Theater". Helen Hayes. I expect few people who are alive saw her
on the stage - though they give us about 30 seconds of that here - so who
can say. She began in film during the silent period but she never became the
star in films that she was in theater. She was to make two Miss Marple TV
films - this one and A Caribbean Mystery. They team her up with a few other
fossils - ok that is mean - but Bette Davis looks like she got off of the
morgue table to be in this. Honestly, it was sad seeing her like this. Getting
old sucks. She had had a few strokes and her speech is very slow and clearly
a struggle as she enunciates every word carefully. Still give her credit
for still being out there. She was to perform in three more films before
her death. A trooper till the end. Throw in John Mills and Leo Kern and you
have a cast from an old folks home. I can say this because I am not far away
myself.
Miss Marple is asked by a friend to go stay with an old friend she has not
seen in years. Carrie Louise (Davis) ,who is married to Lewis (John Mills),
is the wealthy matron of the extended family who stay with her. Too many to
get into. The friend wanted Miss Marple to be there because something suspicious
was going on. When this friend shows up the next day he is quickly done away
with before he can tell her what it is. Everyone seems to either have an
alibi or no motive. The Inspector played by Kern tells Marple - I have heard
about you. A busybody. But someone I should listen to. Good that he does.
One other name of note is Tim Roth as the possible crazy man - quite early
in his career.
Miss Marple: By
the Pricking of My Thumbs (2006) – 6.0
Some dozen years after the end of the Joan Hickson series of Miss Marple
films another TV station began their own Miss Marple films. They first cast
Geraldine McEwan as the elderly busybody and then later Julia McEwan. The
series covered all the basic Marple books as had the Hickson series, but they
also took other Christie books and shoehorned Miss Marple into them. Which
doesn't strike me as cricket. Why not just take another one of her 20 short
stories and expand it which they do in a few instances. This one is perhaps
the most peculiar because they squeeze Miss Marple into a Tommy and Tuppence
book. Not that this hadn't happened to Miss Marple before - two of the Margaret
Rutherford Marple films were actually based on Hercule Poirot novels.
Tommy and Tuppence was a separate series of books by Christie. Five of them,
with the first published in 1922 and the last one in 1973. I have not read
any of them and based on their characters from their TV series in the 1980s
I am not sure I want to. In the series they are a young married couple who
set up a detective agency because they are bored. They are a bit frivolous
but stylish and fashionable, very much in love and manage to solve the cases.
Light and fluffy. It is set in the 1920s and her hats are often the highlight
of the show. They get a bit tedious after a few shows. So their characters
in this film come as a bit of a surprise. They are middle-aged with three
children, he is off working for MI-6 much of the time leaving Tuppence at
home who takes solace in the bottle. Basically a lush. Tommy has become a
grumpy self-important personage who doesn't pay much attention to her.
Reading further it turns out that in the books they aged as in real time -
so by their final book Postern of Fate they are in their 70's. Very unusual
for characters to age much in a series of books. By the Pricking of My Thumb
was their book written in 1968 and they are middle aged in it. But what the
film does is basically jettison Tommy except for an appearance at the beginning
and end and replace him with Miss Marple. Well why not.
The plot is a bit silly but it is a decent effort watching Marple (Geraldine
McEwan) and Tuppence (Greta Scacchi) solve the case. One a little old lady;
the other who keeps drinking. Tommy's aunt Ada passes away in a retirement
home and her possessions are sent to Tommy (Anthony Andrews), who is away
as normal. One of the possessions is a painting of a small cottage and a note
is attached saying that Mrs. Lancaster who was also in the Home is in danger
and the clues are in the painting. Well, why not just tell them in the note
rather than make them figure it out. Mrs. Lancaster it turns out was taken
from the Home the same night Ada died. The two of them journey to a small
village where the painter used to live and look for the house and other clues.
It all seems to have something to do with a child that was murdered decades
before. A murder that seems to still agonize the town's people all these
years later.
90 minutes with a solid cast - Charles Dance and Claire Bloom as well -
but includes a pointless romance thrown it which added nothing. A very good
ending though. As to McEwan's portrayal of Miss Marple - maybe I am too influenced
by Hickson - but it doesn't strike me as capturing the character in the books.
Too active, too cheery and just not right. She kind of buzzes around as opposed
to Hickson who just sits, knits and listens.
Murder is Easy
(2009) – 5.0
Murder is easy. Yes I suppose it can be. I imagine hundreds go unsolved
or unknown every year. They keep finding bodies in the woods or mountains
years after they went missing. Too long to know if it was murder. You just
need to be a bit careful, not get caught doing it or carrying it away or
make it look like an accident. How many deaths do they put down to accidental
that were murder. It is hard proving someone murdered someone else. Don’t
confess is rule number 1. And be sure that there is not some little elderly
innocent looking lady about with light blue eyes asking questions and offering
tea. That would be Miss Marple of course whose hobby in old age is capturing
killers. And she is very good at it. I have been reading the Miss Marple Short
Stories and nothing gets by the old lady as she sits there and knits.
I was curious about this episode of the TV show starring Julia McKenzie
as Miss Marple. She came after Geraldine McEwan retired. Julia may be my
less favorite. Not terrible by any means but a bit too young and very obvious
in her snooping. This was based on a novel of the same name by Christie and
like the film By the Pricking of My Thumbs, Miss Marple is dropped into the
plot in which she had no business. In the book it is solved by a policeman
while here Marple works with an ex-policeman. And does most of the figuring
out. Marple is on a train minding her own business as much as she is able
to when the older woman (Sylvia Syms) across from her asks if Scotland Yard
is open because she has to report two murders and another likely coming. And
off she goes. Only to be murdered. When Marple reads about this unlike most
of us who at most report it to the police, she decides to go to this small
quiet English village where people are dropping like flies and figure it
out. Helping her is the ex-policeman played by pre-fame Benedict Cumberbatch.
Two years later he would be playing another sleuth. Sherlock Holmes. There
is a 1982 version of the book which I watched a while back and it has no Miss
Marple but also changes pretty much everything from the book with American
Bill Bixby looking for the killer.
Greenshaw’s Folly
(2013) – 6.0
This is part of the Julia McKenzie Miss Marple series. I don't really like
her portrayal as Marple - though I am not really sure why. Just not opaque
and old enough. But I just finished reading the Complete Short Stories of
Miss Marple and Greenshaw's Folly was the longest but still a short story.
I was curious enough to see how they adapted it to watch this. For anyone
who wants to read some enjoyable and not at all suspenseful easy to gulp short
stories, these are fun. Most of them are people sitting around talking about
mysteries and crimes they have come upon in their lives and see who can guess
what the outcome was. Of course, Miss Marple sitting quietly doing her knitting
figures them all out to everyone's amazement.
So what do you do if you have a short story and need to stretch it to 90-minutes?
Well of course add characters and sub-plots. The crime itself and the solution
stay just the same but they add an abusive father, a drunk priest, a young
boy, a snooping reporter, two other murders and a scandal long in the past
about experimental polio vaccines that were killing orphans. None of that
is in the book. But for the most part it works especially after the murder
of the main character which takes place at about the half way mark. It is
a gallop after that. The police have the wrong man of course till Marple puzzles
it out. In the end the not too smart cop says "A perfect murder"; to which
Marple adds "Not quite perfect" leaving off the "You idiot".
Death on the Nile
(2004) – 7.0
"It seems you had thought of everything except for one thing. Hercule Poirot".
Yes, if you plan to commit murder, perhaps you should wait till Poirot is
not around. It may be inconvenient, it may be annoying after such well-laid
plans but it is for the best. There will always be another opportunity. This
is from the TV series starring David Suchet. The series lasted from 1989 to
2013 consisting of 70 episodes. Suchet starred in all of them. I watched a
bunch of these years ago and was curious whether they covered Death on the
Nile and they did - season or series nine, episode three which I happened
to have. Interestingly, for what it is worth it is rated higher on IMDB than
either of the two films. And it is quite good though clearly a TV production.
It doesn't have the all-star cast that the two films had - the best they could
come up with were David Soul, James Fox and Emily Blunt as the wealthy man-stealer
long before she became well-known, This was only her fourth credit.
But they did have Suchet who for fans of the books is the only legitimate
Poirot. Albert Finney as Poirot (Murder on the Orient Express) is much too
belligerent and rude and his Belgian accent is all over the place; Peter Ustinov
in a series of films as Poirot is too informal, jokey and wispy; and Branagh
is Poirot on steroids. Only Suchet got him right - the mannerisms, the way
he walks in small steps, his old world charm. As he explains in the documentary
Being Poirot, he read all the books, took notes and tried to get him down
right out of the mind of Agatha Christie. He is too subdued for movies on
the screen - never a man of action but for TV he was just right.
This covers all the same territory as the two films but without all the
bloat. It comes in at 90 minutes while the 1978 version was 140 minutes and
the 2022 version is at 127 minutes. This gets to the murder much more quickly
and that is when the film and the book get interesting. You need the background
certainly but not to go on forever. Still I think I prefer the two films over
this mainly because of the casts - the 1979 version had so many they were
tripping over one another and this last version did all right as well and
really piled on the glitz. As off as Branagh's characterization is, I found
his angry avenging angel fascinating. Poirot in the books is an avenging angel
but he does it quietly, politely - though in this film after telling the
murderer the quote above leans in further and says "The executioner here is
very efficient".