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Murder on the Orient Express
1974 Crime / Drama / Mystery
 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 ’tec)
but the author was unimpressed and 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. © CinemaForever.com 2009 Write a review for this film...User Comments
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Director:
Sidney Lumet
Starring: Albert Finney, Lauren Bacall, Martin Balsam, Ingrid Bergman, Jacqueline Bisset 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...
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© CinemaForever.com 2009