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Pretty Good

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

Wealthy British heiress Linnet Ridgeway and new husband Simon Doyle are on their honeymoon in Egypt, but unable to relax as Simon's former partner Jackie De Bellefort seems to be following them everywhere to bother and berate them. Of course one could see reason for Jackie's spite since only 3 months ago she introduced her beloved Simon to her best friend Linnet, only for the two to chuck her and fall for one another. Also holidaying on the same cruise up the Nile is Hercule Poirot, who sees the danger in the spiteful path of Jackie and, in response to a plea for help from Linnet, attempts to defuse the situation.Although I am reasonably sure I have seen the 1970's film version of this same story, I cannot remember it well as it has been many years – and for sure I did not remember the details of the murder or the solution. I say this because I think this version maybe gave too many clues and winks early on about the possible victim and who would be involved; and as much as I would like to suggest I worked it out from the clues along the way – my correct assumptions about the solutions were mostly based on some rather obvious material in the first third. Particularly the setting up of the characters early on was clear what roles they would take in the mystery – however it was the specific stating of the crime to Poirot, and the "is someone listening" moment that seemed too clumsily done; in theory it should have put Jackie in the "suspect" seat in a very heavy way that then makes Poirot know it was not her, but the manner in which these moments are done here actually did the opposite for me.Related to this, although we had lots of potential suspects and clues around the Nile cruise, I never really felt too much sense of tension and urgency around the resolution. This is not really the fault of the material but more the delivery, since the tone does lack a sense of curiosity and intrigue – or at least lacks it at a level I would have hoped for. Maybe this was just me though, because I did always feel that through the other suspects, it was too apparent that we were avoiding looking closer at what seemed obvious. Aside from this aspect of the production lacking, the rest looks very good. The feeling of location is well conveyed, and it does feel quite lavishly produced. This is added to by the casting; Suchet of course is good in the lead, but the support is good and recognizable with Fox, Soul, de la Tour, Blunt, Malin, Donovan, and others all giving roundly good performances – although I thought that the mystery would have benefited from Blunt playing Linnet to be harsher and less sympathetic than she did.As a production it is a solidly enjoyable one, but for me it was one rather dented by the fact that the early clues seemed too signposted, while the others were delivered with relatively little intrigue or tension. It still plays out well, but this aspect, plus the lack of real bite in the delivery did make it feel like maybe it could have been more than it was.

A honeymooning couple, J. J. Field and Emily Blunt, take a cruise down the Nile. Among the usual variety of additional passengers is the insanely jealous ex girl friend of the groom, Emma Griffiths Malin, and the Stately, plump, mustachioed Hercule Poirot of David Suchet. Malin confides to Suchet that she has a little pistol that she dreams of putting against the head of the filthy rich and extravagantly beautiful blond who stole her fiancé, then gently pulling the trigger.One morning the ex beautiful blond is found dead in her room, a bullet hole in her head, and the initial of the jealous Malin drawn on the wall with her own blood. The blond's hair is scorched around the wound. Evidently some nameless person has put a pistol against that stunning skull and gently pulled the trigger.Things look bad for Malin. She had every reason to want the blond bimbo dead -- and a couple of other passengers might have had reasons too -- but, get this, Malin could NOT have killed the selfish slut. The night before, in the ship's saloon, Malin shot her ex boy friend in the leg and collapsed in hysteria. At Field's insistence, everyone rushes Malin to her stateroom and she is put under sedation by the doctor. (Christie's mysteries always have a doctor. They have to. He provides the time of death and other medical circumstances that the solution depends on.) A fellow passenger attends Malin all night long. When the other return to the saloon, they find Field writhing in agony, his tibia and composure both shot. Thereafter, Field is carried to the doctor's stateroom and is never left alone.It seems one of the other passengers must have killed Emily Blunt, but which one? The resentful Marxist? The personal maid that Blunt has offended? The American lawyer playing tricks with Blunt's investments and afraid of being found out? Medical discretion prevents a description of any further plot developments.I suspect that most people who see this will compare it to the much bigger, splashier, colorful, noisy 1978 production with Peter Ustinov as Poirot. At least that's what I did.I preferred the gargantuan version. Not because it's a work of art but because the production values are higher and this means it has virtues the more modest television production couldn't possibly equal.Here, the photography is a little dark. I mean, considering -- Egypt, the Nile, summertime. The score here consists of source music. A band plays contemporary tunes -- "Love's Old Sweet Story" -- but the movie has the kind of sweeping musical score by Ennio Morricone that's usually called "epic", and in this instance it's pretty good. In the movie, the honeymooners climb to the very top of a pyramid and we see them standing up there, radiantly happy, windblown, while in the TV movie they briefly visit a ground-level temple.The TV movie, being made for television rather than the wide screen, is full of stultifying close ups while the 1978 version gives us genuine vastness. And, while a supporting cast of name actors generally don't contribute much to a movie, other than the odd gasp of recognition, as in, "My God -- the piano player is FRANK SINATRA!", it really helps in the 1978 version. In the TV production I found myself confusing some of the characters' relationships to one another.More money also means more time spent on developing an entertaining and commercial script, with clearer plot threads. And, perhaps just as happenstance, the 1978 version has a superb performance by Angela Lansbury as the drunken, eccentric, erotomanic Salome Otterbourne.It takes nothing away from this above-average TV episode to say that you can simply DO more with a feature film, and you can take more time to do it. This is enjoyable on its own, though, and I prefer it to most of Agatha Christie's domestic mysteries that are part of this series. Even better than this is the episode "Murder in Mesopotamia."

I have just seen this movie and have the 1978 one on DVD. I do like Suchett as Poirot a lot but this remake can't stand up to the 1978 original. As a film the first one works much better. You just can't help but missing the likes of Bette Davis, Angela Lansbury and Maggie Smith. Not that i think a film needs an all star cast but here they provided us with a lot of good acting and humor. Francis De La Tour seems to do her best as Salome ( Lansbury in the 1978 version) but it's almost as if she does not have the freedom to let herself go. The same goes for the actress who plays the Bette Davis part. There is not as much humor in this version and the characters simply do not seem to come to life. I have only seen 3 full length Poirot TV movies with Suchett but they seem to lack something that IS there in the short Poirot stories he has made for TV. Maybe the makers should have a look at them again to see where they've gone wrong.

Its not terrible, but something's wrong with this ambitious production - probably more than one thing - but I can't put my finger on it. They seem to be trying for a number of things that never quite work. Its technically well-done, but seems peculiarly lifeless, and the perfectly competent actors come off in a rather cardboard way. I suspect that it was "filmed" using hi-def digital video, and there's something about this new process that's tricky to get right when the subject is a period-piece, or something moody, because you can get hyper-realism that works against the story. This needs a slightly dreamy, gauzy, stylized quality that isn't there. It reminds me of Marlene Dietrich's comment about the transition from black-and-white to color film, that "the mystery is gone".