Part of an unprecedented late career film blossoming for eccentric British personality actress Margaret Rutherford (capped by an Oscar® for THE V.I.P.s/’63* and a magnificent Dame Quickly to Orson Welles’ Falstaff in CHIMES AT MIDNIGHT/’65), this, the first of her four Agatha Christie/Miss Marple murder mysteries, finds Rutherford in typically fussy, noisome form as amateur sleuth, a Miss Marple quite unlike the novel’s quiet, sharp-eyed/blend-in-the-background spinster. The only one in the series taken from a Marple novel (4:50 FROM PADDINGTON), the others bring diminishing returns (MURDER AT THE GALLOP/’63; MURDER MOST FOUL/’64 both from Hercule Poirot stories) and a final mishmash in MURDER AHOY/’64. The trick in this one sees Miss Marple taking on two extra roles from the book (murder witness & house servant) which gives Rutherford more funny outfits to play around with. (She practices golf in this one.) Directed with sense & pace, if little style, by George Pollock (he never lets us see her swing a club!), Christie acolytes may find even this relatively faithful offering a challenge (forget the rest). But on its own terms, it’s pretty good fun.
DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: For real Miss Marple, there’s Joan Hickson . . . and there’s everyone else. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2015/10/agatha-christies-miss-marple-1984-92.html OR: *Rutherford in THE V.I.P.s, a true ‘guilty pleasure. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2008/06/vips-1963.html
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: John Addison’s Oscar-winning, harpsichord-happy score for TOM JONES/’63 much influenced by Ron Goodwin’s harpsichord-heavy score here.
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