Reflections in an Olden Eye: Murder with Mirrors, 1985

All month long, we're celebrating the Queen of Crime as she and her works appeared on screen, with a grand finale of five Murder on the Orient Expresses the first full week of November. Today, and all this week, we're looking at Miss Jane Marple. We've seen her on the big screen; now, a look back at one of two TV Marples of the 80s...

Murder with Mirrors
dir: Dick Lowry

Casting Coup Tuesday: The Mirror Crack'd

It's Casting Coup Tuesday, where we dream-cast an imaginary adaptation of a beloved work. All month long, we're celebrating the Queen of Crime as she and her works appeared on screen, in anticipation of the November 10th release of Murder on the Orient Express. Last week, we imagined a second Poirot. This week, may we suggest a Miss Marple?

Published in 1962, the majority of The Mirror Crack'd is an observation of the changing landscape of England, especially its countryside, 15 years after The War. Since then, St. Mary Mead has been incorporated, a new suburban row of homes - dubbed the Development - has been built behind the vicarage, Miss Marple has found need for a daily companion, Dr. Haydock is retired, and Mrs. Bantry is now a widow who has sold her home to a Hollywood star.

It's the Hollywood angle that made this an obvious choice for le cinema, as we discussed earlier today. Besides the 1980 flick, the Joan Hickson television series made this the series finale...and while the Geraldine McEwan-Julia McKenzie series kind of buried it, it did cast Lindsay Duncan.

I think the main issue - not with the Hickson version, that was perfect - but the main issue has been the pressure to do the Hollywood thing, but not taking advantage of the book's most interesting aspects. They do Hollywood catfights, but not Hollywood's prescription drug problem; they explore the pressure of older actresses to seem younger (which the book does not), but ignore the multiple adopted children of Hollywood starlets. What in the world!

Which makes it ripe for a remake.

The cast after the jump. All italicized descriptions come from the Cast of Characters on page xi of the large print edition published by G.K. Hall & Co. in 1992.

I'll Drink to That: The Mirror Crack'd, 1980

All month long, we're celebrating the Queen of Crime as she and her works appeared on screen, with a grand finale of five Murder on the Orient Expresses the first full week of November. Today, and all this week, we're looking at Miss Jane Marple. Yesterday, we took a look at the first film to bring her to the screen, Murder, She Said. Today, a Miss Marple movie about the movies...

The Mirror Crack'd (1980)

dir: Guy Hamilton

Life Begins at Seventy: Murder, She Said, 1961

All month long, we're celebrating the Queen of Crime as she and her works appeared on screen, with a grand finale of five Murder on the Orient Expresses the first full week of November. Last week, we talked all about Hercule Poirot. Today, and all this week, we're looking at the last person anyone would expect to have a mind for murder - the little old lady of St. Mary Mead, Miss Jane Marple.

The star of twelve novels and 20 short stories, Miss Marple was introduced in The Murder at the Vicarage as a nosy, gossiping busybody, cynical about people, always expecting the worse. Many's a reader or viewer who will point to the inconsistency between this Marple and the softer, kindlier little old lady we grew to love, but the difference is not so keenly felt by me. One must notice that her eyes are described as "sparkling" when she hears of murder or is in the middle of sleuthing. And there's no doubt that she manipulates people, usually maids, into doing the dirty work for her, telling them to be careful before sending them into the lion's den with her marching orders. Oh yes, Miss Marple may seem like a nice old lady - and she is! - but she has a taste for scandal and shenanigans.

Agatha is on the record as preferring Miss Marple mysteries to Poirot ones. They were easier to write because she was easier to write. Many of them do not feature Miss Marple prominently at all - instead, she drops in every now and then to hear a bit of tattle, before bringing all the threads together in a thrilling yet humbly-delivered denouement. Her books also provide more observations about a changing England, especially the post-War novels - but one is bound to notice such things in a sleepy village.

Popular on television, Miss Marple has only come to the big screen a handful of times. Today is about that very first time. Join us after the jump, won't you, for....

Murder, She Said (1961)

dir: George Pollock

True Stories and Other Tales

In which every other film reviewed here is inspired by a true story.

The LEGO Ninjago Movie
dir: Charlie Bean/Paul Fisher/Bob Logan
scr: Fisher & Logan & Tom Wheeler & William Wheeler and Jared Stern & John Whittington, story by Hilary Winston & Fisher & Logan & Wheeler & Wheeler and Dane Hageman & Kevin Hageman

Band of ninjas take on, then team up with, their ultimate nemesis, who happens to be their leader's dad. Mines the traditional father-son dynamic for comedy, but it's also bothersome, implying that a woman could never do "dad" things like play catch or drive a car. Despite legitimately funny gags, it's the first of the LEGO movies to feel forced, phoned-in.

Stronger

dir: David Gordon Green

scr: John Pollono, based on the book by Jeff Bauman and Bret Witter

True story of Jeff Bauman, who lost both his legs in the Boston Marathon bombing. Damn fine acting from Jake Gyllenhaal, not shying away from the protagonist's childishness, and Tatiana Maslany as his on-again, off-again caregiver/girlfriend. Both are mowed down by Miranda Richardson as his tough-talking, hard-drinking mother, who seems to find a purpose in being the mother of an almost-martyr; imagine if Mary brought a Bible around everywhere she went so she could tipsily tap it and go, "You know who this is about?" I was transfixed by her performance.

I'm not sure what the movie wants me to feel by the end, though. For two hours, it confronts the American obsession with making heroes out of victims, our insatiable need to throw survivors on the media hype pyre. Yet by the end, his acceptance of himself as a symbol allows him to find a sense of responsibility lacking in his life? I guess. Doesn't quite reach the Flags of Our Fathers level of discourse regarding Americana.

Thoughts on Battle of the Sexes, Good Time, Home Again, and more...after the jump

Ev'rytime We Say Goodbye: Curtain: Poirot's Last Case, 2013

All month long, we're celebrating the Queen of Crime as she and her works appeared on screen, with a grand finale of five Murder on the Orient Expresses the first full week of November. Next week is Miss Marple Week, but today, we conclude our look at the main source of her bread and butter, the little Belgian himself, Hercule Poirot.  

The history of Hercule Poirot on screen has been, as we've seen throughout this week, quite a rollercoaster. Whether they were comical, Oscar-nominated, prolific, animated, or meta, each Poirot received equal amounts praise and criticism. Maybe Christie was right in her initial assessment of bringing Poirot to the stage: maybe he was too much on the page for an actor to do proper justice.

And then came David Suchet.

I Ain't Down Yet: Murder by the Book, 1987

All month long, we're celebrating the Queen of Crime as she and her works appeared on screen, with a grand finale of five Murder on the Orient Expresses the first full week of November. Today, and all this week, we're looking at the main source of her bread and butter, the little Belgian himself, Hercule Poirot. We've discussed some of his big screen adventures, like The Alphabet Murders and Death on the Nile. Yesterday, we talked about the only series - anime, at that - to present a successful crossover of Poirot and Marple. Today, another crossover - that of fiction and reality! 

Murder by the Book (1987)

dir: Lawrence Gordon Clark

The Detective

Ian Holm as Hercule Poirot

The Victim

Ian Holm as Hercule Poirot

The Suspect

Peggy Ashcroft as Agatha Christie

With

Michael Aldredge as Edmond Cork

Dawn Archibald as Sally the Maid

John Atkinson as The Gardener

Richard Wilson as Sir Max Mallowan

With the outbreak of World War II, Christie was genuinely uncertain about her chance of survival. Besides that, after twenty years, she was equally uncertain about Poirot's longevity within popular culture. And so, in addition to a final Miss Marple mystery, she set about writing Poirot's final case, one which includes an assurance that this would undoubtedly, definitively, be the last word on Poirot: his death. Both final novels were tucked away in a vault, not to be published until after Dame Agatha's death. Christie wound up changing her mind, and Curtain: Poirot's Last Case was released in September 1975; four months later, Christie herself passed away, age 85.