![murder on the orient express murder on the orient express](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/lRrgVpPuNOM/maxresdefault.jpg)
The film is a reasonably faithful adaptation of the novel, and some of its variations are improvements.
#MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS MOVIE#
And when it is not, imperfection stands out like the nose on a face.” Murder on the Orient Express is not a bad movie per se. Asked how it is he is able to deduce even the most hidden truths, he replies, “I can only see the world as it should be. In the process, we are introduced to the idea of Hercule Poirot, inveterate perfectionist: He carefully measures his two boiled eggs to ensure they are the same size having stepped in a dung patty with one foot, he carefully places the other foot in it as well to preserve “balance” (in the philosophical rather than ambulatory sense). The movie opens with an introductory scene in which Poirot is called upon to solve a mystery involving a priest, a rabbi, an imam-yes, the requisite “walk into a bar” joke is made-and the theft of a sacred relic. Who among them is the killer? Fortunately, among them is also Hercule Poirot (Branagh), and he will solve the mystery because that is what he does. One of them is murdered in his cabin with a dozen stab wounds, and the rest are trapped on the train by a snowdrift that has blocked the tracks. The plot is familiar, even to those who have neither read the novel nor seen Sidney Lumet’s famous 1974 adaptation starring Albert Finney: The year is 1935, and 13 apparent strangers are sharing a carriage on a train from Istanbul to Calais. There should be a law against casting Judi Dench in a film and then giving her virtually nothing to do.
#MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS SERIES#
Branagh’s retelling of the classic Agatha Christie tale is visually sumptuous yet otherwise inert, a series of what are essentially cameos by performers far too gifted to waste their time like this. If movies truly were math, this would be a masterpiece.īut they aren’t, and it’s not. The director Kenneth Branagh’s remake of Murder on the Orient Express labors under the same delusion that cinematic quality is arithmetical: Dench and Cruz are both here again, as are Branagh himself, Michelle Pfeiffer, Johnny Depp, Daisy Ridley, Josh Gad, Derek Jacobi, and God knows how many others who are currently skipping my mind. When a Film’s Message Doesn’t Match Its Spectacle David Sims