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Murder on the Orient Express (1974)

 
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Tue Dec 06, 2022 6:08 pm    Post subject: Murder on the Orient Express (1974) Reply with quote



The Cadillac of murder mysteries comes standard with a gorgeous poster by famed artist Richard Amsel, a stellar cast as beautiful as rich Corinthian leather, a smooth ride on steel rails that wander through a winter wonderland, and six Oscar nominations.

The Agatha Christie novel on which it’s based presents us with a very pleasant setting for the murder — a luxurious train filled with rich and famous people, all rolling along through a snow-covered landscape, dinning on gourmet food and interacting with elegant charm.

Our hero, the famous detective Hercule Poirot (played by Albert Finney in makeup so effective that he’s delightfully unrecognizable), is right in his element. He’s knee-deep in the human drama, his brilliant mind gathering clues from his surrounds, even though he doesn’t know a crime will soon be committed!

The pleasant score by Richard Rodney Bennett is delightful, but Bernard Herrmann disliked it because (according to the DVDs commentary) he thought the music that accompanied the early scenes of the train traveling along should have been dark and ominous to reflected the fact that this was a “death train”!


_____ Murder on the Orient Express - Train departing

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We can only wonder what kind of score Mr. Herrmann would have provided for this movie, but we all know that Herrmann’s scores inject their own unique atmosphere into the films they enhance, so Murder on the Orient Express would have a significantly different flavor and feel with his music.

However, Mr. Bennett’s score does a fine job of creating the mood of this classic tale set in the elegant world of the Nouveau riche in 1935. Here’s a sample of the music, one you can play while you read this post and (hopefully) share a few comments of your own in a reply.


__ Murder On The Orient Express soundtrack suite


__________


The cast of this movie presents enough raw star power to energize a solar panel! Cool

Albert Finney’s performance is masterful — a quirky little man with a brilliant mind who never misses a single clue and who pieces together a puzzle which would confound a normal man.

Vanessa Redgrave is sultry and seductive. She was thirty-six years old when this movie was filmed.






I love the scene that includes the dialog below, during which she keeps her cool when Hercule tries to shake her up with four questions in rapid succession. She calmly answers all four questions quietly and then punctuates her answer with a lovely smile.
___________________________________

Hercule Poirot: Forgive me, Miss Debenham, I must be brief. You met Colonel Arbuthnott and fell in love with each other in Baghdad. Why must the English conceal even their most impeccable emotions?

Mary Debenham: To answer your observations in order: of course, yes, yes . . . and I don't know.

___________________________________

Sean Connery is her main squeeze, still a powerful actor despite being several decades passed his years as James Bond.






Lauren Becall could still charm her male fans, even though she was no longer the fresh-faced beauty we loved in the 1940s and 1950s.





Jacqueline Bisset and Michael York dazzle us with their youthful charm and good looks.





It’s odd that Mr. York seems to be talking in his usual English accent —





— while Miss Jacqueline Bisset (as Countess Andrenyi) alters the lovely way she normally speaks and delivers her lines with a middle-European accent which sounds a trifle unconvincing.





Or maybe I just miss her English accent so much it detracts a little from her performance. Confused

Ingrid Berman was long past her prime as the gorgeous young woman in For Whom the Bell Tolls, but her brilliant performance won the film’s only Oscar nomination. Watching her make the most of her strangely-worded dialog — which tells us so much about her character — is one of the true joys of this movie. Very Happy
___________________________________

“I vas - I international group for getting money for African mission from America rich. I speak Swedish to big audiences in Swedish American Institution in Minneapolis and other big cities. In 10 veeks ve make 14,000 dollars and 27 cents.”
___________________________________







Wendy Hiller plays Princess Dragomiroff, an elderly aristocrat clinging to life with the help of her devoted maid Hildegarde (Rachel Roberts) and the vast fortune she uses to make her as comfortable as possible.







Miss Hiller's performance is absolutely perfect . . . just as her performance was in Pygmalion (1938) as Eliza Doolittle, the original My Fair Lady with Leslie Howard. I prefer that earlier version of the story to the glamorous (and overrated, in my opinion) 1964 version.

The villain of the tale is Mr. Richard Widmark, a favorite of mine who does a masterful job portraying a very bad man with a very bad past and a very dark secret which lies at the heart of this wonderful story.






Mr. Widmark's dignified British butler is Sir John Gielgud, an actor who can display the very essences of class and distinction.





Widmark's nervous personal secretary is Anthony Hopkins, who should have gotten an Oscar nomination for his performance as well!





Hercule Poirot's initial encounter with Widmark's character, the mysterious Mr. Ratchett, is the perfect introduction to the drama yet to come. Ratchett tells Poirot that his life has been threatened, and he wants to pay Poirot to be his body guard.

Poirot turns him down!








Prior to the murder, we're treated to enjoyable scenes in which these characters interact and make the viewer feel like we're a part of this marvelous traveling community as it cruises through the wintry landscape.







During the night the train is stopped by a snowdrift blocking the track, and the following morning the cozy atmosphere is shattered by the discovery of Mr. Widmark's body, dead from a dozen stab wounds.





And so, the mystery begins. Cool

Agatha Christie's brilliant story gives us the perfect group of supporting characters to assist Hercule Poirot in his investigation. His friend, Signor Bianchi (played by Martin Balsam), is an executive with the railroad company, and he wants Poirot to solve the murder before the train is freed from the snowdrift and reaches the next station in Yugoslavia.






To provide the master detective with forensic data, Dr. Constantine (played by George Coulouris) is on hand to examine the body and determine interesting facts, like the way the twelve stab wounds vary in depth.





Poirot goes to work finding out absolutely everything about absolutely everybody, examining their passports, asking them questions, and connecting the facts as only he can.





Poirot had already noticed that there seemed to be "too many clues in this room" when he was examining the body.

And it doesn't end there, either. Mrs. Hubbard (Lauren Bacall) presents a button she claims to have found in her compartment, the one located next to the murdered man's. The button is from a train conductor's coat, and this seems to implicate the friendly conductor!






Later still, she shows up with the actual murder weapon, a dagger with the blade still covered in blood!





____________ * * * * SPOILER ALERT! * * * *

That's one of the great things about this movie, the fact that twelve of the characters are secretly conspiring to present false clues to Poirot in hopes of covering up the actual circumstances of the murder.

But the great detective begins to smell a rat pretty early on, and every time he interviews a new suspect he gathers more pieces to the puzzle.






Slowly we see the suspects starting to get nervous. Shocked





Eventually Mr. Hercule Poirot assembles all the suspects and presents his theories about the crime.

This is the big payoff for mystery fans, as we get to see flashbacks of the characters being interviewed. Many of the scenes are redone versions of the characters' earlier comments, refilmed to give them greater drama. The aren't just repeats of what we've already seen. The lighting is odd, and the camera lens causes a slight distortion. It's very effective.






We see these flashbacks as Poirot explains his observations and deductions, based on info he's gained, along with various lies he uncovered.









And then comes the dramatic scene which presents Hercule's theory about the actual events on the night of the murder. I looked for a YouTube clip of the scene, because I knew pictures wouldn't do it justice, but alas I was unsuccessful.

But as we all know, the successful conspirators end the movie by bumping champagne glasses and getting roaring drunk together (in the deleted scenes, of course Laughing), and since I didn't want to show a dozen pictures of the same champagne toast, I just picked this one because it shows the two hot chicks. Wink






And now, as the snow continues to fall outside my living room windows here in Charlotte on this chilly Sunday afternoon, it's time for me to watch my new DVD of this movie, the way I planned two weeks ago when I heard about winter storm Diego. Very Happy



_________________
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
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