Fidelity to text: 4 guns. It’s amazingly close. The main changes were shifting the time to the present day and moving to Cairo and the east coast of Africa. The film was shot in 1988 so what was then contemporary is now an 80s celebration of big hair, shoulder pads, and aerobics workout clothing. The […]
Fidelity to text: three and 1/2 guns. This adaptation wasn’t perfectly faithful to the urtext. It fleshed out the story in multiple ways (good) but omitted critical sections to make Jane Plenderleith’s decision more self-sacrificial in a completely unbelievable way (bad). That woman wanted revenge and yet Poirot appealed to her higher nature and she […]
Fidelity to text: 2 1/2 garottes. This film has a convoluted history but at heart, it’s the short story Philomel Cottage from 1924. The overall arc remains the same with plenty of name changes and additional characters, scenes, and so forth to expand on a very short story. How our heroine gets the money changes […]
Fidelity to text: 4 1/2 blunt objects. Everything in the original short story is here, along with added material that enhanced the plot. Dialog from the short story is reproduced verbatim. Quality of movie on its own: 4 1/2 blunt objects. I loved it. This was a terrific start to a terrific series. Let’s start […]
Fidelity to text: 2 guns. I think. It was hard to tell since at least two reels were missing, one near the climax plus the ending. This film was a silent movie, made in Germany, and the filmstock was so deteriorated so I couldn’t always figure out what was happening. The musical score was also […]
Fidelity to text: 4 poison bottles. It’s very close. A few name changes, minor but reasonable changes to Arthur Badcock, and similar issues. The big change for me was shortchanging Margot Bence, particularly when she was such a strong presence at the opening and in the novel. Quality of movie on its own: 3 poison […]
Teresa reviews “Endless Night” (2013) and finds that stuffing Miss Marple where she doesn’t belong creates a new nightmare. Fidelity to text: 3 poison bottles. Despite the completely unnecessary addition of Miss Marple, the story hews very closely to the text. The other major change is the Architect. He gets an unneeded name change (to […]
Fidelity to text: 3 1/2 guns. Minor characters get removed, Inspector Slack replaces Inspector Curry, a name change here or there. The big change was the ending. It was far more dramatic than the novel — necessary for a film — but badly thought out. There’s also the weird addition of modern dance, Walter’s horse, […]
Support Peschel Press at no cost to you! Buy this movie from Amazon. Fidelity to text: 2 poison bottles. The overall arc is there with wills, housekeepers, and gardeners with pasts. Add in a poisonous infusion from “The Thumbmark of St. Peter,” major character rewrites, a damsel escaping her abusive husband during a dark and […]
Support Peschel Press at no cost to you! Buy the Joan Hickson box set. This week we reviewed TWO versions of “A Caribbean Mystery.” Click here to read about the Julia McKenzie version. Fidelity to text: 3 and 1/2 poison bottles. Minor characters are removed, new ones added (mainly island citizens), scenes added or deleted, […]