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Agatha Christie: Poirot - Murder On The Orient Express (DVD)
Year: 2010
Rating: PG
Director: Philip Martin
Cast: Toby Jones, David Suchet, Samuel West
Release Date: March 03, 2011
Distributor: ABC
The Film: 4.0
FILMINK rates DVDs and Blu-rays out of 5“...brings emotional power...”
They dug out David Suchet to reprise his role as Hercule Poirot in the 2010 made for television movie Murder on the Orient Express and it appears to have been worth it. The film can't compete against the all-star cast of Sidney Lumet's 1974 version, but it more than makes up for it by effectively delivering the emotional core of the story.
Beginning the movie as an uncompromising detective, fiery and flawed, and a slave to the rule of the law, Suchet's Poirot is especially effecting as he's convinced to solve the murder of a businessman on an overnight train between Istanbul and London. Of course, the full punch of the resolution will be lost on anyone who's already read Agatha Christie's story or seen one of its previous adaptations. Nothing can really replace the genuine surprise waiting at the end of a mystery - and everything leading up to an ending you already know will seem obvious and maybe even contrived. Thankfully, this treatment is not handicapped by the lack of surprise.
The cast of reliable character actors, including Toby Jones and Barbara Hershey, combined with an up close and personal, Altman-esque editing style brings emotional power to the resulting argument about what is right and the meaning of justice.
